Vol.6, Ch.4, P.7
“Your Highness, have you any hurts?”
“Nay, none to worry for. My thanks, Lady Emilie.”
So did my princess answer, and yet very tense still did she appear. I could fault her little for feeling distraught. All of a sudden had the day turned evil, and we teetered now on the brink of utter ruin. But we mustn’t falter now. I must keep Her Highness steady and defend her at all costs.
At any rate, our plight needed much sorting out. ’Twas all fine and well to have extracted the princess from the lectitōrium, but what precisely had fallen out back there was yet too much to puzzle out. As far as I could guess, despite destroying sections of wall and toppling the spire, that blast had gone little to plan for its instigators: they’d failed ultimately to take us out, let alone the steeple itself. Thanks to that, we at the council had been able to flee the disturbance, tower and all, without too many hurts to pay for it. I myself came away with but light burns here and there, and could act unhindered yet.
Regardless, so blind and confused had the lectitōrium become that during our flight, I could not rally together the knights and Praetorians therein. Battle had erupted in that choking mire of dust. Friend was indiscernible from foe. And so daring it not, I had to exit thence at the very soonest with the princess, taking with me also the lord chancellor, and Raakel besides, who’d spotted us just in time whilst fending off some enemy men anear. And now were we but a scant party of four, all stooped in the shade of some trees just north of the lectitōrium.
“Well, what now, then?” asked Raakel.
I had to choose carefully. The fog of war hung much too thick. I would put Her Highness in great peril were I to misstep, if even in the slightest. “We cannot linger here. The lectitōrium, its premises… ’tis all compromised,” my answer began. “First things first: we quit this place in concealment.”
“The gates,” said the princess, “they are held against us?”
“Alas… I fear ’tis so, Highness,” I confirmed.
Given the speed of our “disturbers”, ’twas certain that they’d captured the gates before ever their assault began. And if I must guess, ’twas both of the gates that they now held: the main portal to the south, and the one lying west, through which we’d entered first on this day. Yes… frightful to say, we were trapped in Merkulov. I’d fancied to break through one such gate, but with Her Highness to consider, and withal knowing nothing of the enemy’s strength and positions, I deemed the risk much too great. For the time being, I must needs keep the princess safe within this vast and sudden lair, at least till some change came to our fortunes.
Presently, we set off, keeping low and cautious as we went. I headed the file, whilst Raakel took the rearguard. Although, counting a mere four as we did—with two scarce able to defend themselves, no less—we might’ve seemed more a string of fugitives than a file of soldiers.
Raakel seemed to agree. “Feels naked not havin’ numbers, doesn’t it?” she whispered.
To be sure, both she and I were capable, standing amongst even the utter mightiest of the Order. But with persons of the highest import in our care, and not least surrounded and shut inside hostile territory as we were, the both of us dearly pined for succour of any kind.
“Too much so,” I whispered back. “I only pray our fellow 5th be somewhere near at hand.”
A good number of men had been tasked to Merkulov’s watch, beyond those fighting in the lectitōrium to this moment: men like the Orderly knights, as well as the wards local and regular to this establishment. ’Twas my hope to join with even one of them. The worry was that if the invaders had taken the gates, then many such foes ought now be prowling about the place, dragging their nets and attacking whomsoever they didn’t count as their own—meaning the better part of those able to help us likely had got their hands tied already… or worse.
“Might ye be the only leaders come from the 5th?” the princess then asked us.
“Nay, Highness,” I answered. “Another came with the vaward entourage: Sir Edgar Bailon, our chief adjutant, if you remember him.”
Her Highness fell quiet. “…Is that so.”
“Pray have heart,” I tried to solace her. “Your Praetorians, too, ought be alive and lithe. Indeed, we shall be in allied hands soon enough.”
Certainly were Merkulov’s grounds most sprawling, and moving about it in stealth as we were, we ought not be discovered so easily. Yes, even by our friends, sadly. Nevertheless, the hope for succour was not perished, not when we have got in our party some of the realm’s finest to hold the line.
♰
The air thrummed asudden. Our princess startled. We all halted. “…That noise,” she murmured after a nervous pause. “Another explosion?”
“Yes, likely so,” I answered.
In looking to assess our chances at the nearer southern gate, we’d since wended on slowly and cautiously, and had found ourselves at the south-eastern parts of Merkulov, when it echoed into our ears: a sharp hammerstrike of a sound, followed by a rumour slow to fade. Leading the company to the nearest shade, I then very carefully raised my head over a line of shrubbery. And peering about, I soon discovered the source: the studitōrium at the centre yonder. To attest that, there rose a column of smoke from one of its inner buildings.
“Weren’t summat the en’my expected, I’ll bet,” guessed Raakel, as she peered out alongside me. And she was likely right: that tumult was not to their plans. Or at the very least, it ought be safe to assume so henceforth.
“Indeed, they’ll swarm thither at once to investigate, I’m sure,” I added, before turning back to our uneased princess. “Your Highness, let us skirt large the centre sprawl and ultimately make for the side yonder opposite. The west gate may soon be less manned, if the main one nearer us proves stoic to that noise.”
To this, our sovereign gulped and nodded. “Very well,” she said. “I shall trust to thy counsel.”
For a long while thereafter, we wandered deeper into the southern parts, this time even more slowly and with redoubled caution. Due to that disturbance, the enemy men were now frightfully alert, with not few in great haste towards the studitōrium. Many of their companies would we overhear along the way, and one did we sight asudden, but having entered the gardens, which abounded with hedges and shade, they passed us by none the wiser. Had battle been forced upon us, however, ’twas certain that my blade and Raakel’s maul would’ve more than sufficed against any unlucky chancers-upon. But only at the uttermost end of need did I dare resort to combat. For were aught to befall Her Highness…
“Lady Emilie,” she whispered asudden. “There is a matter I must ascertain.”
From her tone alone could I guess this “matter” to be very important, indeed —not that whatsoever she asked could be unimportant, I suppose.
After ensuring that no enemy was within earshot, I bent back down. “Yes, Your Highness?”
“‘We shall be in allied hands soon enough,’ thou hast said,” the princess began. “May I hope that doth include Rolf Buckmann’s, as well?”
Slightly but surely, my shoulders shuddered at the name. Is Rolf a friend? A man to be trusted? Though I meant no discourtesy at all to Her Highness, I thought the question rather silly.
For of course was Rolf a friend. Were I in the shadow of his soaring shoulders, then what solace, what surety would I know now. Why, I would harbour not a worry in the world, even as hunters and hound-men hem and harry us from every direction. This I doubted not in the least. Not in the very, very least.
“…”
Even still, I could give Her Highness no answer. Were he here… I thought, …Oh, would he were only here.
Here to be my light in the dark, my shelter from the storm, my great and steady tree—ever and always there to grant me warmth and hope.
Oh, had that future come and not gone.
But as if to pull me out of the waters of wandering thought, the princess called again to me:
“Lady Emilie?”
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