Vol.6, Ch.3, P.1
Upon the blade of black I brooded. It couldn’t have been destroyed, first of all; no, not that slab of dragon-tempered steel. It’d but fallen free, I fancied, right from my grip when the tower blast had blown me away. Its scabbard, too, was missing, as I saw: the strap was now in shreds, shot by a stray splinter of timber not unlike my flank, I had to guess.
Right. Missing. The soot-steel was merely missing. Missing, but nonetheless waiting for me, whole and unharmed as when last it sat in my grip. The question then was whence. Given its unworldly weight, however, the answer seemed clear: it hadn’t… well, “exited” the steeple tower as I’d done, but rather remained somewhere therein. Perhaps it was stuck stabbing the bottom of the stairwell, or was lying a little bit out in the lectitōrium hall. Yes; any of those could be it.
“…Trouble is: it’s a dog’s dinner in there, as Sig would say,” I muttered, checking my expectations.
And that was, indeed, the rub. Doubtless did reams of wreckage now litter the lectitōrium, a sea to conceal even so stand-out a sight as the sword of soot. A needle in a haystack, if ever there was one… Now, how might I go about finding it? Was the effort even feasible? After all, the enemy must be surveilling the place like vultures circling an antelope on its last legs. In fact, if any were to find the weapon first, it’d certainly be the culprits here. They may not touch it as I could, but as the persistent would say: where there’s a will, there’s a way—especially if it comes to confiscating the sicarius of his sword. A troubling thought; whatever I was to do, I had to step to it.
But ever as I worked my wits, that “whatever” would always escape me. If only the soot-steel could whisper its whereabouts to me, I began to think. For indeed, it could whisper, or so had it felt to me a few times before. It seemed to watch and judge me when I’d first held its hilt in Hensen, as if some eye lurked within its abyss-like blade. And when Balasthea blazed, for certain was it some mysterious voice that’d guided me to Mia. Passing peculiar, I admit, that a man of no faith should fancy hearing things from some figure formless and mysterious. Well, a peculiarity, but nary a paradox, for it is very natural for a swordsman to “hear” his sword, it is said.
Nay. I shook my head. Such tales are only told of the truly gifted, and even then, merely for literary effect. What sword could really speak? Whether to guide its wielder to itself or to some damsel in distress? None, of course. Albeit I was hardly an authority on the topic, being nary a swordmaster myself. Still, common sense ought win here.
But now, if not a sword, then what? What was it that I’d heard amidst the flames? I could venture a guess or three, but…
“…No, stop it, Rolf,” I groaned inly. My mind had flown elsewhere; a fault of my panging flank, maybe. Indeed, this wasn’t the time to pine for some miraculous guidance. It’d certainly help, for sure, but nay; I must seek after the sword all on my own.
With that thought, I peered up again at the steeple from the bush. Smoke was pluming still out of its half-marred pinnacle.
“A bloody bombing, of all things…” I remarked. Bloody and sloppy. Albeit with a saboteur to seat himself so anear his mark, I suppose it’d never dawned on these dissenters that their designs could ever fail. Sloppy or no, however, that we’d failed to stop it was the bitter truth.
Right. Picking myself up was now the top priority, and rejoining Lise and the others withal.
But I sighed. “…Easier said.”
Surveying next the lectitōrium further down, I discovered the enemy men there now multiplied. On patrol they all were. Three groups… nay, four. Each comprised up to five men, all doubtless assigned to snuff out any survivors from the meeting like myself. Splendid. Enemies, already both bristling and on the hunt… Though it pained me to postpone searching where the soot-steel might well be waiting, there was no recourse but to get away and piece together some plan.
To be clear, putting behind me both weapon and company, and quitting Merkulov altogether, was certainly not an option—especially with important persons from both parties yet unaccounted for. Besides, the gate itself should prove impassable, being captured beforehand, like as not. Well, gates I should say: the Acadēmī̆a, being walled high and on all sides, had got a main gate to the south and a side gate to the west; and by the look of things, no one inside was going to get out through either of them.
What’s more, hemmed in though I was, I’d be a fool to fret and search after my friends. Nay, better to leave them to Lise. She, at least, was alive and well, I should think, being by now a warrior wise and whetted; so much so that it’d never entered my mind that the bombing had harmed her aught. After all, with just a word had she leapt aback to safety, and in the blink of an eye, no less. And Alban himself, being once infamously formidable upon the battlefield, boasted yet a boulder of a body, even in his waxing age. Indeed, a burn and a scratch was all he’d suffered, I dared not doubt.
Yes; thinking on it, things certainly could’ve gone more ill. As proof, only I had been blown out of the tower. And to add to that, Lise ought’ve decided as I had done, and put many a pace between herself and the lectitōrium as soon as she could. Why, at this very moment might she be on the move, with her father and his officials in tow.
Now that left the Londosians. Her Highness… had she been hurt? And not to mention…
“…”
…Right. Time to get busy.
Spurring myself with a crack of the shoulders, I stood and set out.
♰
The Acadēmī̆a grounds. At its east end, whence the blast had bellowed and wrought fiery misery upon Rolf and all, did four men walk. Each was armed and just as alert. But though they be sons of Man, no sentinels of the princess were they, to judge by their liveries. No; they were her foes, in fact—accomplices in the conspiracy at hand.
Very warily they went, watching every angle and keeping very quiet. Tasked to patrol they were, perhaps. And even were they not, they yet had every reason to be on edge, being abettors to designs grim and grand; designs that dared even assay at regicide. And to see them through, the four were fain to inspect any sign that seemed out of sorts.
“Oy, lo!—there,” rasped one of the men. His caution had paid off. Following with their keen eyes whither he pointed, the other three found what he had done: something black standing in the distance, past the trunks of some oak trees. The evergreen growth thronged thickly, and so almost concealed the suspicious thing in its entirety. Yet did the black shape betray itself against the low and swaying leaves—barely, albeit, that one might never have spotted it without much vigilance.
Confirming by looks and nods, the quartet drew their swords, hushed their breaths, and fanned out in formation: half left, half right. And slowly, step by silent step, they approached the dubious blackness, at whiles signing to one another with wordless glances and flicks of the head. And upon nearing the oaks, they each gave a gasp.
A sleeve! Dark and sleek, it hung slackly from behind a bole in an almost peeping sort of way. The men knitted their brows. An overcoat, they all thought. The black sleeve of a black overcoat. If the briefings held true, then this ebony fabric belonged to but one person: the rebel Rolf Buckmann.
“…”
The four felt cold at their backs. They detested the impenitent apostate, yes, thinking him wretched and revolting. Yet on the other hand, they could not take him for some limp and fangless wolf, for he was to them very fanged and very wolven, indeed. Hence why their palms sweated over their hilts, why their every nerve tingled, and why their hearts drummed. In fact, so strongly did their bosoms beat, that they feared the very sound would give them away. Thus did they each take a deep breath, steel themselves, and after a nod, spring asudden ’round the oaken bole.
“Wha…!?” uttered one of the four throats; for behind the tree was not their target… but the black overcoat as it hung upon a standing broom.
Upon this discovery, the men’s bosoms tolled terribly. They had all of them fallen for a trap, and they knew it. But just as their sweat turned frigid and their collective caution swelled to its very limits, a thump-a-thump played in their ears.
Four heads turned frantically, fretting this way and that, till all eyes settled upon one direction: further ahead and deeper into the trees, there stood a stone epitaph, large and weathered, and withal inscribed of old with the memory of some magister. The men were certain: the sound had stirred from somewhere past that landmark.
Without warning, the winds then picked up. All the woods rustled, as if in anticipation. The men tarried a while, awaiting calm that they might hear subtly again. But none came. Pressed, and perspiring all the more copiously, the quartet began creeping towards the epitaph. And they had got on halfway when a tree some strides behind them shuddered loudly and asudden.
“Hn!?”
In nigh-unison, the men turned and trained their blades to the tree. Yet no one was there. Just grass, wood, and leaf. Over some suspicious seconds, they watched it. But finding no further sign, and keen not to bite any more bait than they could help, the men returned to approaching the epitaph. More warily than ever, they scanned about as they went, pointing tense swords hither and thither. When they gained the landmark, however, they did not spring, but instead peeked behind it.
Only to find no one. No one at all.
The four then felt themselves prisoners after a fashion, or preys of warren in the sight of a hunter unseen. Still, and at least on the surface, they did not show it, nor let their alertness lax. Turning about, they went back the way they came, back to the broom and black overcoat. But even after inspecting the spot, they could discover naught else. Except…
“Hold…” one of the men then muttered. The other two recognised at once what he had noted. All eyes darted about. But tried as they might, they again found no one. In fact, they found one fewer.
One and two—the four men were now three.
Shocked and anxious, the trio twisted their faces. How long had it been since their fourth man had gone missing? The eyes in each of them scrambled again to gather what they might. Behind trees, up the branches—wheresoever a sicarius could couch, they searched to a nicety. But once again: nothing.
“…”
The men groaned and ground their teeth. However, frustrated and one man fewer though they were, at the last did they elect retreat. Swords strained and trained, they huddled as they wended their way out of the wood, never knowing when and whence the sicarius would strike again, especially with the foliage rustling deafeningly yet. But in the end, they exited the wood both unbeset and none the wiser.
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