After we went back to her house in the woods, Miss Fran told me everything.
"It was about a month ago when I met your parents. They handed me this request, along with a large sum of money. 'Please put our daughter through extremely strict training,' it said.
"I had absolutely no idea what they were trying to say, so I tried to ask. Your parents told me they were worried about how you would do going forward. They feared that if you surged ahead as you were, never learning failure, and then lost your way later on, you might find yourself in real trouble.
"Your parents deserve some credit; I want you to understand that they did not make up this plan because they wanted me to bully you, okay?
"They had their own reasons for bringing their plan all the way to someone like me. Your hometown, if I'm not mistaken, is in the Peaceful Country of Robetta, right? The witches who live there are intimidated by your abilities. I heard they all said they couldn't teach
a girl like you. After all, that country is very, well…peaceful, so there really aren't any high-caliber witches around…
"So your parents predicted that all the witches in your country would reject you, and so they came to me. To make a long story short, they said you were too full of yourself, and so they thought up a plan to put you through a little hardship early on. Reluctantly, I agreed.
"And then you showed up. Your parents had given me the impression that you were a run-of-the-mill cheeky little brat, so my plan was to be really strict and break your strong will.
"However, when we actually started spending time together, you were nothing like I imagined. You don't balk at whatever effort it takes to achieve your goals, and you have a brilliant and insatiable mind. And the ability to match your ambition. I could have given you my approval right away.
"Since you've been here with me, I've given up on trying to teach the 'Arrogant Elaina' about failure. I'm sure that your parents wanted me to teach you the lesson that 'sometimes things don't go the way you expected,' but I realized that would be pointless.
"It didn't matter how many failures I put you through; I could already see the result. Every single time, you would get back in the fight, and never give up. You would be able to endure any failure. There was no way I could break your will.
"And what's more, there was another issue that I was only able to discover because I am your teacher.
"Elaina, you put up with too much. You're keenly aware of your own youth and your true abilities, so you let me treat you unreasonably.
"No matter how ridiculous I acted, no matter what silly requests I made, you didn't complain at all, did you? After all, you thought there was no one else you could ask to train you, right?
"When you were rejected by the witches of Robetta, what did you think? You gave up on them and set out on your own, didn't you? Did you argue against those witches, even once?
"I decided to wait until you reached the limits of your endurance.
And yesterday, when I saw your spells, I guessed it would come very soon. Today's test was the finishing touch.
"By the way, I was expecting the exam to continue until I won, and then, if you still didn't complain, I was planning to lecture you. That would be completely and obviously unfair.
"You can't just hide your true feelings and carry on, because at some point you're going to break. Now, I didn't expect you to burst into tears…but I treated you terribly, didn't I? You're unusually mature, so I completely forgot that you're still a fourteen-year-old girl. I'm truly sorry."
And then Miss Fran added one more thing.
"You mustn't just endure. If you can't stomach it, fight it. Learn to take a stand and say when bad things are bad. Let off steam when you need to. Protect yourself."
I can no longer recall how I felt, hearing my teacher's words, but she told me things in that moment that I had never heard before in my life.
Don't just endure it.
Those words are probably the reason I'm here now. I really think so.
Well, even now I have a tendency to let stress build up, though.
I trained under Miss Fran for one year. After the warning about persevering too hard in my first month, the true training finally began.
"Good morning, Elaina. I'm hungry, so please make something to eat."
"Here, have some weeds."
"…Um, is this your way of giving me a hard time?"
"I was told not to endure too much abuse, so I decided to try being honest about my feelings. Specifically, the feeling that making breakfast for my teacher is a pain."
"..."
"Just joking."
Eventually, we settled on eating the bread that we had baked the previous day.
As before, I sometimes felt a bit like Miss Fran's servant, but if I thought of it as compensation for all the magic she was finally teaching me, it wasn't painful at all.
Oh-ho, this isn't torture! It's my tuition.
"You have skill and talent," Miss Fran said. "If there's one thing that you don't have, it's experience."
And in order to rectify that, I sparred against Miss Fran over and over. Every day was very enriching.
The many days that I spent there afterward seemed far shorter than the hellish first month. Almost every day we would have intensive magic training, then return to the house in the forest for magic studies. It was so much fun.
During my training with Miss Fran, there was one incident that left an especially deep impression. I was practicing my magic in front of her house in the forest as always.
"Elaina," Miss Fran said abruptly, "there are bottles sitting over there, right? Can you see them?" Sure enough, there were two wine bottles standing where she was pointing.
"Yes, I can see them, but…what about it?"
"Strike one side with a wind spell."
"..."
The distance between the two bottles was about the width of one tree. To be clear, there was plenty of room. There was so much leeway that I thought she was making fun of me.
"Okay." I waved my wand and manipulated the wind. The mass of air made a little hyoom! as it went straight for the bottles, hitting one directly, as I had aimed it to do. The bottle flew end over end and landed in the underbrush.
"Okay, I did it."
But Miss Fran shrugged as if to say, "Good grief." "Did I tell you to knock it away?"
"…Uh, but didn't you say to strike it?"
"Let me tell you something. If you're an apprentice witch, you pass the test by knocking it away. But full witches must have more reliable and precise skill than that."
"…Huh."
"A witch doesn't knock down the bottle; she aims for the midway point between knocking it down and not. To put it simply, like this—"
Miss Fran waved her wand, and the wind headed straight for the remaining bottle and hit it directly. However, the bottle did not fall over. It just wobbled around and then stabilized.
Miss Fran smiled. "Oh, good, it worked… All right, just like that.
Witches must learn to control their magic precisely. So no more knocking them down."
"..."
I understand what you're trying to say, and it sounds reasonable, but did you have to go out of your way to make me fail first…?
After I had spent about a year as her apprentice, I got to the point where I could begin to compete with Miss Fran.
And I was able to win against her—once. That day became the final day of my apprenticeship. Wearing her usual smile, she said, "There is nothing left that I can teach you. You've grown quite strong."
To this day, I can't recall how I was able to win that last time. It was probably just chance. Miss Fran removed the bellflower corsage from my breast and in its place pinned the proof that I was a full-fledged witch.
It was a star-shaped brooch.
"Congratulations, Elaina. The Stardust Witch recognizes you as an official witch… By the way, how do you feel about 'the Ashen Witch' for your witch title?"
"…Isn't it a bit too simple?"
Did you decide just by looking at my hair?
"Huh? I thought it was really cool, though…"
"Come to think of it, how did you get the name Stardust Witch, Miss Fran?"
"I chose it because it sounds cool, of course!"
"..."
"Well, how about it? Ashen Witch."
"Sure, that's fine." I didn't particularly care.
"Then it's decided. You are now the Ashen Witch, Elaina. Do your best from now on, okay?"
She clapped a hand on my shoulder.
I inhaled deeply and responded, "I will."
Chatting about the memories we had made during my training, we returned to the house in the woods, and Miss Fran gathered up her luggage right away. She had been a drifter only in name, and in truth she was a distinguished witch from another country. That was the first I had heard of it.
It had been quite difficult to be away from home for a year, she told me with a smile.
That's not really something to smile about…, I thought, but she was probably smiling for my sake.
"In that case, why did you come to the Peaceful Country of
Robetta?" I tried to ask her.
"Because there was someone I had to see, no matter what," she replied, refusing to say more. "I would very much like to take my time, but I must be going. There are many people waiting for me back home. That's why this is good-bye."
With that, she turned to leave from the same spot where I had found her chasing butterflies a year earlier.
"Good-bye, Miss Fran." The farewell chilled my body like a glacial wind.
"Good-bye, Elaina. I'll come see you again someday. Please look forward to it and wait for me."
"…Okay!"
And then my teacher got on her broom and flew up into the sky.
I waved and waved as she slowly shrank into the distance, finally disappearing into the blue sky.
That time, I didn't try to hold back my tears.