3 bar menu

Stalemate – Part 06

Marquis de Blois exited the Phantom theater with his subordinates and strolled along the pavement.

The rain had stopped. A biting winter breeze brushed against his cheeks. Dead leaves drifted across the nearly deserted streets in place of pedestrians.

The illusion still lingered on the carriage’s roof. A pale face lying face down, golden hair clinging to her back. Her tattered clothes had shrunk in the rain. Wide green eyes stared at nothingness, unmoving.

Marquis de Blois sniffed audibly. “Like a dead insect. Pitiful.”

“What?”

“Is there something the matter, Your Grace?”

Morella and Carmilla inquired.

Marquis de Blois shook his head, chuckling. “Oh, it’s nothing.”

The illusion returned. Marquis de Blois’ vast empire rapidly expanded across the Old World, borne by the black wind, accompanied by the echoing praises of his supporters. Albert! Albert! The joyous voices. The lush lands gleaming as they soared through the sky.

The birth of the Occult Empire was imminent. King Rupert was practically in the palm of his hands.

Suddenly, the small illusion on the carriage stirred. Its eyes, devoid of light, stared fixedly at him, dark and filled with rage, threatening to drag him into hell. Marquis de Blois jerked to a halt.

He returned a piercing glare. The illusion quivered faintly, before dissipating like white smoke.

A chilly wind swept through. The illusion, along with a scattering of dead leaves, contorted and fluttered away, vanishing into the distance.

Marquis de Blois entered the carriage, and it bolted away once more. Soon, they reached the outskirts of Saubreme and stopped before the Soleil Noir.

There was little time left until King Rupert’s arrival. Apart from officials of the Ministry of the Occult, the Royal Knights were also assembled to welcome him. Marquis de Blois swiftly strode down the corridor.

Nothing could infiltrate the Soleil Noir, the Black Sun. Massive and sturdy, this stone-built fortress had borne witness to countless events. The Wars of the Roses, the Inquisitions, the revolutions and abolishment of monarchies that swept the Old World, to the harrowing internal conflicts of the Gilet royal family over the throne—poisonings, beheadings, royal incarcerations. Throughout history, no criminals, revolutionaries, politicians, or royals had ever escaped its grasp.

To the greatest figures of the past, tossed about by the tides of history, dying was the only way to leave this place.

And now…

It was the winter of 1925.

Victorique de Blois, the fifteen-year-old Monstre Charmant, would join them. Tonight she would draw her last breath and become a part of the Kingdom of Sauville’s dark history.

The moment of reckoning was imminent.

---

The dim stone chamber held a single flickering lamp.

An emaciated girl sat limply on a crude chair. Unlike the vision he saw earlier, she wasn’t wet or trembling. However, she was just as frail, and even her shadow seemed slightly fainter than before.

The excessive amount of drugs seemed to be in effect. Her green eyes, which were usually open, were currently closed, her long golden lashes casting fine shadows on the pale skin beneath. Her golden hair flowed in waves, spreading out onto the floor.

A closer inspection revealed her tiny frame quivering beneath a simple white garment. Her neck, as always, was twisted sideways at an unnatural angle.

The Marquis snorted. “It seems the drugs are taking effect… Grevil.” He addressed the man at the side.

There was no response.

Marquis de Blois instinctively looked over his shoulder, as though wary of something. However, outside the stone chamber was the same scene as earlier, ministry officials and armed knights in formation. They gave him a puzzled look.

The Marquis shifted his gaze back to the girl. Limp and fatigued, she remained sprawled across the chair, her stunning golden hair cascading toward the floor like a river of gold.

“Grevil?” He called his son’s name once more.

Receiving no reply, he briefly glanced at the man partly hidden in the darkness. As his eyes adjusted, he began to sense that although they might share a similar height, this might be a different man altogether.

Marquis de Blois’ eyes glinted sharply, and the shadows in the stone chamber gradually lifted.

The man’s face remained hidden, but his hair wasn’t the familiar blond of his son’s, but a fiery red, blazing like the flames of a torch.

The eye behind the Marquis’ monocle stung with both bitterness and hatred. Slowly turning his head, he stared down at the feeble girl with the golden hair.

He studied her once more. The resemblance was striking, but was this truly Victorique? Was this the same helpless child hunched here just an hour ago?

“You…!” Tension and disgust strained Marquis de Blois’ voice. “I-It can’t be!” His silver hair flared up like flames. His thin lips parted, and he screamed, “Impossible!”

The girl gently opened her eyes and fixed her gaze on Marquis Albert de Blois. Her eyes were as cold as the moon at dawn, but shone brightly.

“You… You…!” The Marquis’ horrifying voice echoed through the Soleil Noir.

Then, extending an arm wrapped in a black coat, he reached for the girl’s slender neck and squeezed it with tremendous force. His cold green eyes gleamed with a cruel light. He shook the girl, treated her like some worthless object. Her long golden hair writhed on the floor like a strange creature in its dying moments.

The girl—no, Cordelia Gallo was looking up at Marquis de Blois with a satisfied, devilish smile. Her icy eyes showed the distant past. A horrifying history between the two, a history smeared with terror and rage.

Under the cover of night, she was kidnapped from behind the theater and forced onto a carriage. Trapped in a stone tower, she cried for help, but her pleas went unanswered. Before long, she gave birth. After being rescued from that facility, she lived in fear for a long time, hidden within the darkness of the Mechanical Turk.

Her past was sinking in the jet-black abyss of loss.

“Albert, you fool.”

“What is it, you filthy animal?!” the Marquis roared. “Don’t you understand? There’s no way out of here. You and your red-haired partner are rats in a trap. Did you really come here believing you could leave alive? The real fool here is you!”

Cordelia smiled. “Of course, I understand, Albert. I only wanted to use my resemblance to my daughter to buy time. So she could escape safely. And that time has already been granted to us, by the mercy of the divine.”

“What?!”

“Once again…” Though on the verge of collapsing, Cordelia seemed to be enjoying herself. “A few years ago, out of nowhere, you appeared at a circus we were a part of. Do you still recall that long evening when you played chess against a mechanical puppet?”

“That Mechanical Turk! It was a very tough opponent.”

Marquis de Blois’ eyes widened in shock. Countless reddish-purple vessels appeared in the partially cloudy whites of his eyes.

The image of the eerie mechanical puppet came to mind, and the hair-raising displeasure. The discomfort of the scorching sun, the sweat on his brow, the long afternoon. He wanted to defeat the puppet, crush it, but…

Unable to taste the sweet wine of victory, Albert left the circus with a strange sense of frustration.

“Wait, you’re saying you were the one inside that contraption?! The puppet I challenged with my intellect, it wasn’t some supernatural machine, but you? If I had known, I would have captured you again, and…”

“Albert, my nemesis. We fought fiercely that night, but the battle ended in a draw. Such might just be the fate of our long-standing conflict.”

“You witch!”

“Tonight is no different, Albert. I was captured, but you also lost my daughter, your very important trump card.”

The corner of her lips lifted into a smile, a smile that held profound beauty and sorrow. Her green eyes, darker than her daughter’s, sparkled, yet they held a sinister emptiness not found in the girl’s. Widening fully, her eyes gleamed like gems embedded in a doll’s face, radiating an evil energy born from despair.

“Marquis Albert de Blois. Allow me to declare it to you with none other than my own voice.” Cordelia’s voice was soft and calm. “It’s a stalemate!”