Bel Niente nella Guerra

"Beautiful Nothing in the War"

A/N: Here's hoping the time changes don't throw people in between these chapter breaks, but it was really the only way to keep the "chapters" from spanning way too much read time. Enjoy!

AC 190, August 17
Sachsen State, Germany
Kushrenada Estate

The second time she woke there was someone seated nearby, and the hunting jacket was absent. A subtle reminder of her failed escape. The white dressed nurse was not wearing a firearm that Lucrezia could find visible. However, the youngish looking woman was sound asleep. The room itself was expensively furnished, dark, and rather on the large side. If she'd been kidnapped, she reasoned, at least it was by someone rich.

It really did not offer the consolation that not being kidnapped might have.

The bandages on her head were gone, replaced by tabs to hold the broken skin together and encourage proper healing. It was her forehead that had been struck, over her right eye. She slid a hand across the wound, and knew there would be scarring. Her long cable of dark hair had been undone, but no one had bothered to change her clothes.

That fact reassured her. If she had been kidnapped… had she been kidnapped? It didn't really matter. Wherever they, whoever they were, were keeping her, she was not staying.

If they hadn't changed her clothes, it meant no one knew about the knife she always kept on her when she went out hunting. Tears threatened her eyes, and again she rose from the bed where she had been laid to recover. Her head spun and threatened her warningly, but she took a moment to orient herself, and let her head stop pounding. Then she started walking. This time she had no boots on her feet, and moved silently in her socks as she made her way to the door. She found when she pressed her ear to the door that there were voices outside.

Her heart hammered in her chest, and she could hear it in her head. Obviously, whatever had hit her had done so hard enough to give her a concussion… but she didn't take the time to worry about that. She waited for the voices to fade, and then, carefully, she turned the ornate handle on the door and checked the hallway.

The room she had been slumbering in was dim, but the hallway was bright. Her eyes hurt as they caught the glare of the lights that lined the hallway, and she had to shield them as she made her way quietly into the corridor.

There was thick carpet, and, as she made her way down towards the direction the voices had been going, she could see that the building, wherever she was, had rich furnishings. The end of the hallway widened and there was a broad staircase that swept downwards. The walls were lined with windows. Outside it was still raining.

She could hear voices again, but her ears were still ringing… she couldn't tell which way they were coming from. The decorations were similar to the palazzo where her father had lived, she decided in an instant as she hurried down the stairs. Just before the curve would reveal her to anyone downstairs, the curtains fell thickly just on the side of the windows. She ducked behind them, knowing that whoever was talking would see the motion in the thick drapery if they were looking at it. But she also knew how little inhabitants of this sort of a place paid attention to such things.

"Your youngest sister survived," Treize related in a sober voice. The nineteen-year-old, ginger-haired military captain was keeping pace with a taller, dark haired man with pale skin. "Regrettably, the Alliance extraction unit did not arrive in time to save your whole family."

"It is more regrettable to me than it will ever be to them," was the dark haired man's reply. Antonino Euseibo Noin was as tall as the Romefellor captain, but had a different bearing to him entirely. His head was bowed, and he watched the carpet passing before his feet as it passed away out of sight.

"I am only sorry I was unable to be a better help to you. The intelligence we received was late getting to me, and even then it took time to organize the order…"

"You are a better friend than someone such as myself has right to look for in an organization like Romefellor," Antonino said, cutting across Treize's apology.

"Antonino, you mustn't blame yourself for the short-sightedness of others. The protection of your family was a regrettable oversight on the part of my superiors when they recognized the talents that you possess."

The dark haired man's lips spread into a melancholy smile. "Then when you are in power, see to it that you do not make a similar mistake in dealing with your subordinates."

"You have my assurances. Not everyone in Romefellor takes death so lightly." The two men walked down the hallway towards the staircase that lead to the second floor, past portraits of ancestors, their polished boots making little noise on the thick carpeted floors.

"Thank you for taking such personal care of her," Antonino said as they began to ascend the first of the stairs. "I undoubtedly would have lost track of her if you had not made sure that she was brought to your residence instead of taken to an Alliance hospital facility."

"I had no intention of relinquishing the family of a personal friend to incompetence of that caliber. If they could not properly defend them, or see to their rescue, I doubt very much that they would be able to heal them. And after encountering your sister's cunning, I doubt they could have held her safely."

"Cunning?" came the other man's reply.

"Your younger sister had disarmed one of the guards and taken possession of his firearm."

"Luc," Antonino said in an annoyed tone.

"Is that her name? You rarely spoke of your sisters."

"My youngest sister," Antonino said, "Lucrezia Catarina. Father indulged her taste for sportsmanship… she is proficient with such weapons."

"Interesting indeed," Treize replied, pausing as they reached the top of the stairs and turned down the hallway towards the room in which the girl had been left to recover. He frowned for a moment as he saw the nurse that had been assigned to the room stumble into the hallway.

"Master Treize!" the woman called out, moving down the hallway towards the two men. "Thank goodness you're here. The young lady… she's missing from her bed!"

"My father's indulgence was tempered by extreme patience," Antonino replied. "It was a part of his downfall."

"Your younger sister continues to intrigue me, Antonino." Treize regarded the nurse as he spoke. "Order the servants to search the mansion from top to bottom. She was suffering from shell shock and a concussion, according to the Alliance field medic that treated her. He also had little to say about the black eye that she gave him. Tell them to be cautious."

A frown creased Antonino's handsome face, spreading upwards from his lips to encompass the entirety of his countenance.

"There is no loss of face, Barone," Treize said. "The rest of my family is away at the moment, and the only other inhabitant of the house is my foster brother."

"I was unaware you had a foster brother."

"You did not speak of your siblings to me, and so I did not speak of mine to you," Treize replied. "Do not be alarmed, he is also a member of the Romefeller, your sister is in little danger from the likes of Zechs Merquise."

Again the dull voices faded, and Lucrezia felt it safe enough to venture out of her hiding place. She continued down the stairs, glad to find the halls almost a ghostly empty, and headed for the nearest set of doors that did not appear to lead into an interior room.

If her hearing had been better, perhaps she would have heard when someone followed her, and if her senses were more collected, perhaps she would have thought to find shoes and a jacket against the rain. But her scrambled head simply demanded freedom, which required flight, and given an opportunity, she took it.

Lucrezia slipped down the front steps and took off at a run across the front lawn. The rainwater fell cold, and wet the late fall of wherever she was. The rain must have been falling for a while, the grass under her feet was cold and slick. It wasn't until she reached the edge of the lawn that she heard the fall of boots over the rainfall.

Someone was following her.

Whirling, she reached into the cinched waist of her riding skirt and drew the short knife she kept there. Her eyes struggled to focus in the overcast light. Dimly, she was aware that she should not be having such a difficult time focusing her eyes… but then she found the source of the noise that had been following her.

The person following her did not appear to be a soldier, despite his crisp attire. Her throbbing mind raced. The nurse had worn no real uniform… other than that of a house staff person.

Her grip on the knife became unsteady as her eyes focused on the young man who had pursued her.

He did not look bad. His clothes were formal, well-pressed, but they appeared to be that of a school uniform rather than a military one. His expression was gentle… concerned. His hands were lifted in a gesture that was calming. He was unarmed. He had blue eyes and the palest blond hair she had ever seen. He did not look bad at all.

A light off to the side caught her eye, and Lucrezia turned her head to see that the front door was opened again, and there were more people coming out of the house. The grip she had on her knife tightened, and she lunged forward with it. Whoever had her was not going to get to keep her!

Anger fogged her eyesight worse than the blur from pain and the weather. She closed her eyes and waited for the stunned young man to grasp in pain, for the blade to sink into flesh… she closed squeezed her eyes shut tightly against it. She had never struck a human being before.

After a moment, she realized that she hadn't hit anything, and she opened her eyes. Her arm had passed under the other young man'. He had caught it against his side. Letting out a frustrated grunt, she jerked her arm to try and get it free. Noise was assaulting her… the haze of the rain and…

He was talking. She looked up at him, and as her eyes focused on his lips, she could make out his voice. "…not going to hurt you," he was saying.

"Do you know what they did!" she screamed at him. It still hurt, her throat… but there was no coughing that threatened.

He was shocked to hear her voice, and let go of her arm in the process of lifting his hands peacefully again. But he gave her too much of an opening. She pulled her arm free and slashed at him with the knife, retreating towards the trees when he dodged her attacks.

Past him, she could see that the people from the house were closer. She could make out their uniforms. Servants… And beyond them… two tall figures dressed in stately jackets…

Her footing gave way. Whatever she stepped on wasn't secure in the moist earth, and she fell backwards. Her eyes were trained on the tall figures… one of them was familiar. Tears came to her eyes as she hit the ground heavily. Her brother…

His voice was distant, cold. Disapproving.

Just as always, only she couldn't hear it well.

The same young man… the blond youth with bright blue eyes, knelt at her side in the muddy dirt of the unmanicured part of the estate's grounds. "Let me help you," he said in a kind voice.

The voice reached her ears. It was the first words she could truly hear since waking up in strange places. His voice was low, and as calming as his gestures had attempted to be. Antoni was close, this man… boy, she corrected her fuzzy mind, couldn't hurt her now. The knife fell from her fingers, and she took the hand he offered. Her head was still pounding, her chest heaving from the exertion of running the length she had from the estate. It was farther, now that she looked back at it.

The young man pulled her up to her feet, but too quickly. Her spinning head felt overwhelmed, and the ringing quieted down to let in sound in a rush… too much sound.

"Easy with her," the strange tall man said. "She's got a concussion."

The commanding voice of the strange man was a sharp counterpoint to the soft assistance of the boy that had a grip on her. It was the last thing she heard clearly. The stern eyes of her brother swam into view as he stepped towards the two of them, and the murmurs from the servants caught up to her. She shut her eyes, and felt herself go slack again.

"She has spirit," Treize said as the servants moved quickly back up to the main building of the estate. The four of them followed more slowly. Treize and Antonino lead the way.

"I take it, then, that this is your foster brother?"

"Zechs Merquise," the young man said. He followed behind the two older men, carrying the damp young woman he had just caught from fainting.

"Zechs, may I introduce Barone Antonino Eusebio Noin and his sister, Lucrezia Catarina."

"And may I apologize for my sister's hasty attack upon you," Antonino said without turning to regard the young man.

Zechs watched their backs as they moved. Treize appeared, as usual, to be tense, but only as much as he ever was to maintain his guardedness, but the older man… Antonino, his back was stiff, and his shoulders pinched upwards as though he had recently pulled a nerve. "Apology accepted, Barone," he said.

The older men seemed preoccupied, and both walked in silence ahead of him. The rain did not seem to hurry either of them. It was as though they did not care about the dampness of their clothes or the disarray of their state as they moved up the front steps. One of the servants was waiting and opened the doors for them.

"This time I think she will be sooner in waking," Treize said. "Let's retire to the sitting room. She can lay down in there, and we can hope she decides not to run again."

"She is probably frightened. Our father did not allow a military presence in the house around us as we grew up. Guards were kept outside and at the stables, but were not allowed in with the family and the servants. To find herself in the power of one after an attack of that magnitude undoubtedly scared her. And then to wake a second time, days later, in yet another unfamiliar locale… we may not get along as well as you and your foster brother, but I do not think she will run if she sees that I am nearby."