Brief introduction:
Hello everyone, and welcome to the new chapter! I haven't been able to write since roughly five months ago, simply because I didn't have a vacation up until now.
In order to try and keep a bit of actual progress, and because there were so many reactions following the last update (the story gained 7000 hits and 25 reviews between the last update and now, bringing it to 25 k/146 total, which feels like a huge accomplishment for a small community. Thanks everyone!), I tried to write two chapters in one go again. Unfortunately chapter 14 is still a long way from being done and while I'll try to complete it this week, chances are good that my vacation runs out before I do, which would cut my writing time back to 0. Posting the chapter solo seemed like the best idea for now, as everyone would at least get something. Again, I will try to get it out soon.
Special thanks go to everyone that reviewed the last chapters. I try to take everyone's advice to heart as I go along, and reactions in general are the main reason that I'm still so motivated to put so much effort into this.
Well, let's get going, shall we?
*Important note: remember that Estelle is still disguised and currently has her hair painted brown.*
Disclaimer: I do not own Tales of Vesperia nor anything else that may be referenced in some way.
Nobility, chapter 13: shades of evil.
*Roaaarrrr*
Karol screamed in terror, after which he span around with his sword drawn, ready to fight or run away (preferably the latter) from whatever monster had apparently still made it across the re-established barrier…
…Only to find Tiny staring at him with his oversized eyes.
He sighed in relief. "Oh man, I thought you were-"
"Really Karol, what are you doing?" Nan demanded from behind him.
Again he spun around in fright, this time racing to think of an excuse for openly admitting his fear.
"Don't get distracted!" she chided. "Gald doesn't spontaneously make itself when we kill monsters, you know," she continued, after which she pointed at the paper-covered pile of monster parts they had been working on the last two days. It was significantly smaller than it had been two nights ago, but there was still a lot of work to be done. The way things were looking, they'd even have to leave some of their spoils behind.
"Y-Y-Y-Yes, Nan!" he sputtered, instantly refocusing on further preserving the eyeballs of the carcass. Truthfully, Karol didn't really understand what people really used all the (in his opinion) utterly disgusting and creepy monster parts for, but he was glad that the things sold so well. It was the major source of income for the hunting blades, next to contracts that were put out on particularly dangerous or annoying types of monsters.
The work wasn't easy for him however, as every time a particularly vicious claw or scythe-like appendage came under his attention, he had to repress the image of being violently torn apart by the type of monster they had belonged to. Whenever that happened, he regretted his choice of joining the hunting blades. Deep down inside he just knew that he'd never be brave enough to really be one. In fact, joining up at all had been a desperation move since he had failed in just about any guild he'd ever been in.
He dared a quick glance at his seemingly fearless colleague, who had been working alongside him ever since the barrier had been repaired by Rita. Before then they had taken turns working and watching the town's surroundings for any signs of impending monster attacks, such as the absence of birds, ever so slight shifts in colour that could occur when certain wolf-type monsters were prowling, downwind sounds of buzzing for insecticides… they knew them all, and they knew them far better than the Knights would. As a hunting blade, it was expected of them. After all, their purpose was to hunt down and kill monsters while the knights were only there to keep people safe (or so they claimed).
He sighed. Well, to be honest, he had a lot to learn. Sure, he knew more than the average civilian or knight, but he wasn't even near the level of the absolutely brilliant hunter that was accompanying him. Among their guild, Nan was known as a child prodigy, which had earned her the right to be trained extensively by their leader, Clint, himself. No such luck for him, of course. In fact, the only reason he'd been allowed to come with them on this mission was because he was to be tested on his value.
Tested on his value by having him hunt eggbears; the thought still made him gulp.
*…growl?*
To his side, Tiny was staring at the covered pile of monster parts. For a moment, Karol wondered if the creature had any sort of idea of how much death it was looking at.
"Um, Nan? Can I ask you something?" Karol asked, trying to get his mind off of the subject.
"What is it?" she replied without looking.
"Well… you know… why did you let me take Tiny with us? I… kind of expected you to … um… kill him along with his parents in the cave," he said. "No-not that I'm telling you that was the wrong thing to do, of course!" he quickly added upon receiving one of her glares. Aside from really not wanting to get on her bad side, he also didn't want to get the eggbear hatchling sliced in half over some poorly chosen words.
"You really don't know?"
"Um… N-no… and It feels even stranger since you usually keep going on about how it's the duty of us hunting blades to kill all monsters and I- well…" he was unsure how to continue.
Nan was silent for a while, staring back across the grassy fields. Finally she sighed. "Karol, do you really think you're cut out to be one of us?"
Karol, caught off guard by the question, narrowly avoided slicing deep into his finger with his carving knife. "Wh-what? Off course I am! Yeah, definitely. Why'd you-"
"I think you're too afraid," she stated.
"W-well… maybe… maybe I'm not as brave as you are, but-"
"Karol, you tried to run from every monster you met along the way unless one of us was right next to you," the far more experienced hunting blade cut in, all the while still not looking at him. Apart from it being true, what made the statement worse was the hint of disappointment with which she had said it.
Karol opened his mouth to reply, but couldn't find the words; what was he supposed to say? Confessing that he was a coward who had joined up only out of sheer necessity didn't seem like something that what was left of his pride would ever recover from. Could he lie about it? Claim that he really was brave for some reason? No, that wouldn't work, maybe if he changed the topic…
… but he didn't manage to find a topic. What made the ensuing silence even worse was that Nan had finally decided to look straight at him.
'No! There HAS to be a way out! I can't get thrown out of this guild, too!' he kept telling himself.
*BUUUUUURRRRRP*
Both teenagers blinked and whirled around to find the eggbear hatchling merrily chewing away at a centipede's leg.
"T-Tiny! You already ate just a few hours ago! We can sell that for gald, you know!" Karol cried out in an unnecessarily loud way, causing Tiny to immediately scuttle off in fright. Of course the hunting blade immediately gave chase, lecturing the monster as he went.
It was as good of an excuse to get away from here as any.
The times Nan hated the most were when there was no action, with no monsters to be hunted and no bartering with merchants to be done. As a monster hunter she enjoyed the anticipation during the tracking, the thrill of the fight, the satisfaction of the kill, and finally collecting her just rewards for helping making the world just a little bit safer. Whenever she wasn't training or out on a mission, she felt as if she was wasting her time.
Now was such a moment.
No matter how much she told herself that watching the surroundings was a task she had to take seriously, she knew that there really wasn't much of a point. Incidents of monsters openly attacking active barriers were highly rare, with the last of those incidents having occurred years ago. Thus, if she hadn't been tired from preserving so many useable monster-parts during Karol's shift, she would have given up scouting to help him go through everything a bit faster.
However, fatigue combined with boredom made her quite a bit more irritable than she normally was, and after watching Karol exit from the scene, she felt slightly guilty for being so blunt and accusing towards him. While it sometimes annoyed her that he got scared so easily on the job, there were also times that she felt genuinely concerned over him. What could have happened that had made him like that…?
She shook her head. No, subtly probing him about it had only made him stutter and run off, just like just now.
'I don't understand my own guild members... sigh, why did the boss order me to stay here again? I should be out hunting, not protecting someone who's supposed to be an arch-enemy of the guilds!"
"Well what do these ol' eyes of mine see? It has to be the loveliest image of premature beauty that Raven's been granted in… eh, forever!" a voice sounded from nearby.
Nan gasped and whirled around; whoever that was had somehow managed to get practically right next to her without her even noticing! Sure, she had been bored and distracted, but that was no excuse for a trained huntress! Her hands grasped her massive weapon instantly in case it turned out to be someone who wished her harm, like some imperial citizen that harboured ill will towards a Guild member...
"Hey, easy there darlin'!" the voice responded, and she was surprised to see an old, haggard looking man standing casually in the shades. Still, that meant little, as she knew even harmless-looking monsters could be highly dangerous if you acted carelessly. In her mind, the same went for humans. Well, that, and there was something about this man that made her feel highly uneasy.
"I gave you a compliment on your looks and you draw a weapon on me? Aw heck, youngsters these days; there's just no pleasing 'em" the old man trailed on.
"…What do you wa- no, first, who are you?" Nan asked carefully, not letting her guard down for an instant.
The man shrugged. "Who am I? Oh I do lots of things, but before everythin' else I'm a pleaser of ladies all around the world! You're a little young for my tastes though, so why don't we just settle on that I'm a fellow Guildsman. Let me guess, you're a hunting blade, am I right or am I right!"
"Hmpf. Knowing that doesn't make you one of us. It's not like anyone couldn't have guessed what Guild I was from by the preserved monster remains over there," she countered. "If you're one of us, why did you sneak up on me like that?"
"Ouch, good one," the man admitted, still not having moved from his position. "Well, let's keep it at this. Between the two of you and your friend, I'd reckon you're the more dependable one and the fewer people who know about this, the better! So I'm going to let you in on a little secret. See, I know ya can't be all that happy about old man Clint forcing you to guard some prince who also happens ta be part of the reason so many Guild children lost their parents in the last war."
"What? How-!"
The man only smiled. "Yeah, now about that little secret…"
"Commander, I've gathered everyone outside as you requested."
Flynn didn't respond; his attention was focussed on his reflection in the mirror. It felt strange, really. Outwardly he looked the same as always: calm, collected and (as he hoped) radiating confidence.
Inwardly he was in turmoil.
In just a few moments, he would reveal to everyone that he was about to leave the unit, no, that he was even about to leave the knights in general. How would everyone react? Would they think he was dishonourable, giving up after so long? Maybe they'd even consider him a deserter, as he was technically directly disobeying orders to return…
…Which was dangerously close along the lines of what his father had done, leaving him and his mother alone for the rest of their lives.
The thought made him grimace and increased his uncertainty of his decision even further. For the umpteenth time he replayed the conversation with Yuri in his mind and tried to determine if he hadn't been falsely tricked or manipulated into this; it wasn't that he didn't trust Yuri to not lie about matters this grave, but bringing someone like Estelle along to mentally unbalance him a bit was right up his alley. Though how could that be, as he was sure he'd never told him about her?
No, in the end he was again forced to conclude that what Yuri had said was the only thing that made sense: that the two of them had met by chance and that everything his friend had said about the severity of the situation was the truth.
"Commander?"
"Oh, right, thanks Sodia," Flynn finally replied, pulling himself out of his musings. He glanced outside and he felt a twinge of pride that everyone had been assembled in full gear so readily despite the very early hour.
Somewhat to his surprise, the female knight didn't leave right away. "Sir… I don't really want to intrude, but what's troubling you?"
"What do you mean 'what's troubling me'?" he inquired, turning towards her. He guessed that more of his mood had to be visible than he'd have thought, since he rarely saw Sodia look so worried either.
"Look Commander… Flynn…" The higher-ranking knight blinked; hearing her use his name directly was highly rare. "Why are you so tense today? The last time I saw you like this was back in the war," his second-in-command pressed on.
Seeing her look at him directly in the way that she did made him feel… strange. For some reason he felt a bit guilty for not informing her earlier, even if technically it was supposed to make no difference. Well, it was too late now, anyway.
"I'll tell you when we get outside. Come on."
"Yesterday, Prince Yuri brought me news that I'd been dreading for quite a while. I can't tell you here openly what it is, but suffice to say that the corruption among the knights is even worse than I'd imagined. The fact that we were sent here without any backup when Deidon hold and Aspio were both far more capable to help is, by itself, all the proof I needed to settle my remaining doubts on things."
Flynn closed his eyes. "So, that said, I've decided to l-"
"Flynn!"
He blinked. 'Was that… Yuri?'
The commander immediately whirled around to find his friend and the two Guild children running towards them. "Yuri, what's-"
"Get everyone ready to move out. We're leaving the town right now," the prince commanded upon his arrival. Flynn immediately ignored the feeling of awkwardness that came with being directly ordered to do something by his best friend; anything that got Yuri as tense as he currently was had to be very bad news.
"What? Why? What are you talking about?" Flynn asked, steeling himself for whatever was to come.
"There's a huge group of knights coming here from Deidon hold!" the girl next to his friend responded. What was her name again? He was sure Yuri had mentioned it yesterday…
"And we know what that means," Yuri took over. "Now that we've survived their death trap, chances are they're coming here to finish the job themselves."
Flynn's initial reaction was one of shock; even with all the corruption going on, Yuri claiming that the knights would go as far as to outright murder a group of their own seemed a bit of a stretch. Of course, these were the imperial knights they were talking about and with everything that had happened recently…
As for his men, they were surprisingly stoic upon receiving this news, showing no other outward reaction than muttering a few unpleasantries under their breaths. With all that had happened, he couldn't blame them for feeling very bitter towards the knights of the surrounding towns and their superiors, since they had basically been left to die here. Even now their discipline was still highly adept, Flynn concluded with a pride.
Rather than the commander, the first one to break the semi-silence following this proclamation was the boy. "Wait a moment, Pri-Yuri, is that why you were so worried? You're kidding, right? I mean, there's no way we'd get attacked by your own subjects... right? I-I mean, you're their leader, their 'Don'! You can just command them to stop, right? Right…? Um…" he trailed off, seeing everyone was watching him with grim expressions.
"Yeah, about that, most of the knights and I are kind of on bad terms with each other. I'm pretty sure they want me dead since me being alive is in the way of their commander taking over the empire in the long run, "Yuri stated dryly, patting Karol on the shoulder as he did. This proclamation also caused quite a bit of hushed conversation around them. "So no, no such luck. Good idea though, guardsman Karol."
"But that's hor-!" the boy began.
" It's not important right now," the prince continued before turning back to Flynn. "What is important is making sure we get ourselves out of here as quickly as possible."
"…Before we get into that, are you sure that's true? How do you know they're coming, and how do you know it's them?" the now ex-knight replied, going over the standard queue of questions for emergency situations.
The girl crossed her arms and looked up at him with an air of indignation. "Of course I'm sure! The clouds of dust on the horizon are a dead giveaway; the group is too big for a pack of monsters at day, and it's coming directly to the south, where Deidon hold is located. Everyone knows monsters tend to avoid roads and roam more along the forests or mountains. And lastly, why would a group of monsters be coming straight at a city protected by a barrier from that far away? It doesn't make sense."
'I guess that seems reasonable, but something's bothering me…'
Flynn glanced over his soldiers, who were looking at him expectantly. They were waiting for orders even though he officially wasn't their commander anymore. Technically he didn't even have the right to make any decision at this point, meaning they should have been looking at Sodia instead. No, it was probably better to put it aside for until this issue was resolved. "Didn't we have scouts of our own posted outside of the barrier?"
"Sir! We couldn't see anything unusual right up until you summoned us here," Chastel answered swiftly, leaving the unspoken accusation hanging in the air.
"Hmpf, I'm the one of the best trackers in the Hunting Blades. I don't miss things you knights would miss," the girl stated. She said it with such conviction that she was either indeed highly skilled, or…
'An extremely good liar,' Flynn inwardly finished. "You know, Yuri, I don't want to imply anything, but my scouts are pretty good as well and I'd take their word over the one of someone I don't know at all. Rushing out of here in broad daylight without having scouted the path first, and for no other reason than the word of a stranger, just feels as if we're walking into a trap."
"W-What? Nan's the best tracker there is in our Guild! There's no way she'd be wrong about this! If she says so, then the knights are coming!" the boy next and slightly behind her suddenly chipped in.
"You're the one who wanted us to come!" the girl took over, addressing Yuri. "And now that I see something dangerous, you're just going to ignore it? Well, I didn't want to be here in the first place, so if you're not leaving, we'll go by ourselves, right Karol? I'm not going to stick around for the knights."
"Wha-! Oh, Y-yes, of course we aren't!"
*growl!* came a sound from nearby, and it was then that Flynn became aware of a very small creature that had apparently been hiding behind the boy. Was that the eggbear hatchling? It looked far too… harmless and cute for something that was bound to one day become a vicious man-eating beast that could easily rip fully armoured knights to shreds. Had that been there the entire time?
'Well, it's not like it's dangerous now, and I need to resolve this first,' he thought to himself.
Flynn locked eyes with Yuri. There was only one question to ask, being 'are you willing to risk it?', and Yuri nodded before he even asked. "I have this feeling that we can trust them. And to be honest I'd rather pick leaving early over staying regardless. It's a lot easier to shake off whoever is out to get us if we're already moving."
The soldier nodded grimly. "I don't like this, Yuri, but you have a point. If this turns out to go bad and we have to fight either here in the city or on the field, at least we won't have to worry about civilians out there."
'But I still need to tell everyone that I can't be in command anymore… right?'
"Um, everyone, before you go, I'd like to finish what I came here to say," Flynn managed. "With everything that happened recently I found myself unable to continue serving the knights with a clear conscience, so I wanted to-"
"Don't worry, commander!" Hisca suddenly cut in. "We're with you to the end!"
Flynn blinked, and then blinked again. 'Sorry?'
"We're also tired of being sent all over the place, and the knights clearly don't care about us," Chastel took over from her twin sister. "There's no way we're going back, so if you're going with the prince, so are we! Right, everyone?"
"Right!"
"Of course!"
"No one will separate us from you, commander!"
"Obviously we're coming with you," Sodia joined in with the chorus of agreements. Since she was in the front, she was easier to hear than most of the others. "Wait, you were going to ask us, weren't you?" she continued, and Flynn found himself taking an involuntary step backwards under her questioning glare.
"Er, well, everyone, you see… I am basically switching sides from the knights to the Royal guard and I wouldn't expect everyone-" Flynn tried.
"Ok, that settles it. All of you are now formally enlisted! Welcome to the Royal Guard. Oh, and you guys can skip the oath part until later," Yuri proclaimed from right next to him, cutting him off. Much to Flynn's chagrin, this was followed by more cheers.
"What! Yuri, they have no idea how much trouble we're in, or how dangerous this is!" Flynn whispered angrily from the corner of his mouth. "You're taking away their chance of walking away from all this!"
"I think I made it pretty clear by bluntly telling them that the knights are probably out to kill everyone here, including me," Yuri whispered back. "And didn't they all say that they would be with you until the end? You're not going to ruin this happy moment of unity for them, are you?" he added smugly.
"I- but- this is-"
"Commander, if we're going to leave the town, we shouldn't waste much more time," Sodia interrupted.
Flynn took a few seconds to gather his wits. "Ok… Ok, assign a number of soldiers to gather whatever gear we have that's still in the inn. I want a few lookouts to look for signs of the approaching knights. Also, we need a few men to ready the horses for a long trip to the northeast. Everyone else… probably knows what to do."
A few moments later, Flynn and Yuri were alone again.
"Are you really that surprised that they decided to come with you?" Yuri then asked.
"I can't say it doesn't feel strange to see that all of them would instantly give up their chances at reaching a higher rank in the army," Flynn answered. "That's not what's really bothering me though..."
"Hmm?"
"It's just that I've never lost someone under my command since the end of the war. This whole mess... I don't think I'll be able to get everyone through it alive. It seems too much to hope for, no matter how well commander Niren instructed me before he retired."
"They made the same choice we made," Yuri said, turning away to glance at the sunrise. "And given how well they held out here, I'm sure they can take care of themselves well enough. Next to that, what do you think would happen to the ones that went back? It's obvious the higher ups don't exactly value their lives. It should be safer for both us and them by having them travel along with us."
Flynn was silent for a moment. "I hope you're right."
On a nearby rooftop, Garrote carefully weighed his options. Now that Lowell and Scifo were alone, the chances of a direct assault working had gone up drastically. They were still oblivious to his presence, as were all of Scifo's subordinates. Getting to his vantage point on this highly-overgrown building had been easy considering that the sergeant had summoned ALL of his underlings to address them directly.
He reckoned that Scifo would never have been so careless if he didn't think himself free from imminent danger. It was a reasonable assumption, but a flawed one. It would even have been a fatal one if it hadn't been for the fact that Scifo was a supposedly highly accomplished fighter; rushing up to the two of them headfirst in an attempt to quickly kill Lowell would be risky.
Additionally, if the healer accompanying the prince was somewhere nearby, it could even be practically impossible to accomplish. He had heard numerous rumours from his allies concerning her skill in both combat and restorative magic, and until proven otherwise he had to take her presence as another serious liability. It was likely that she was resting in the Inn behind the prince and his friend, which could put the time until her interference anywhere between a minute and just a few seconds; probably the same amount of time it would take the other soldiers in the inn to act.
No, the direct assault was too much of a gamble. For now.
Another option was to attempt a long range throw to kill the prince with a poisoned dagger. However, from this distance of roughly 40 yards, there was a very realistic chance he would miss, which in turn would put the prince on very high alert for at least the foreseeable future. On the other hand, if he did managed to hit Lowell at range, even if the initial injury would not kill him instantly, it would leave him with only a short amount of time before the poison would. That amount of time did depend on where he would hit the prince, which made planning around the possibility a bit difficult.
Would Scifo or Lowell be quick enough to counteract the poison, if either of them even had the ability? What if he did rush them after such a hit? Wouldn't that reduce the risk of them dealing with the poison to an acceptable level and would he manage to escape afterwards?
Maybe, and maybe not. However, the presence of both that healer and other enemy soldiers nearby made it less of a gamble he wanted to take. Perhaps if he had been more talented with a bow...
He shook his head. The old pervert could have taken the shot if he had been with him, but he wasn't. No sense spending time on wishful thinking.
Since they were leaving shortly, there was no time to set up a more proper assassination in the village, which left the options of striking on the road or trying to reach their obvious destination of Aspio beforehand and setting up a trap. The latter was far safer than the former and provided him with... interesting opportunities.
First, he wanted to learn why the hell the knights had decided to show up now after sending him on this mission, because it was the second time their actions would directly cause his efforts to fail, as far as he was concerned. What was all this about, and what did they hope to gain? Was it really a direct assault? Maybe a ploy to drive the prince into a trap on the open fields?
'Based on what I've seen so far, I'll assume this is just another move of stupidity. Couldn't they have given me at least one damned extra day? Concerning the knights as a whole though, there has to be a way to use them to my advantage. What if I told the garrison at Aspio what happened here before Lowell got to his destination? I'm sure they wouldn't react very well to the news that all of Scifo's unit deserted to the royal guard in the middle of an ongoing mission. What would they do? ' He wondered as he quietly climbed down the back of the house, after which he disappeared into an alley. Knowing how corrupt and false the knights tended to be, he was sure that would somehow make life difficult for the prince, regardless of their course of action.
Not striking now also gave him the opportunity to gather some more information in the village concerning the soldiers travelling with the prince, especially of that healer, Heurassein. Even if the only thing he learned was what she looked like, that would be worth the effort. All he knew right now of her appearance was that she had pink hair and was attractive, which was as good as nothing; he highly doubted a woman in her position wouldn't try to conceal something as eye-catching as bright pink hair, and 'attractive' was a very broad term. He needed to see her figure, or better yet, her face, and imprint it in his mind.
While he considered Heurassein a secondary target, removing her would remove a large obstacle in killing Yuri, again if the rumours were true. He could foresee it being necessary to kill Scifo beforehand as well, preferably on the same night he would kill Lowell and Heurassein, to prevent any warnings beforehand. It would require some very strict planning but he had done similarly complicated set-ups in the past.
'Although, if I happen to find either Heurassein or Scifo in a moment of weakness, it might be worth the risk. Everyone has a weakness. Didn't they say that Heurassein is the 'incurable do-gooder' type? And I find it hard to believe that Scifo doesn't have any personal feelings towards any of his female subordinates; that would be very unnatural after years of dangerous service together. Someone is probably sleeping with him regularly. I'm sure the locals are more than willing to tell me everything they know about 'their heroes'," he mused as he emerged on the street in his civilian clothing.
None who saw him knew just how dangerous of a man was walking amongst them.
It was dark in Ioder's cell.
Without any sort of window or visible connection to the outside, there was no way to tell exactly how long he had been here. The only measure of it he had to go by was how many times he had fallen asleep already, which was eight. Of course, each of those times had been from exhaustion, since he half expected anyone to enter the room to kill him regardless of his political value.
For the umpteenth time he tried to reassure himself that there was no way they were going to finish him even after keeping him alive for so long after the mutiny, but the harder his logic tried to convince him, the more stubborn that feeling of terror resisted. That feeling had held him ever since the day each of his guards had died or betrayed him.
He wished that he had had something to do down here but there was no light and no company. No distractions coupled with the fear made him relive those horrible images over and over; images of a ship approaching theirs, upon which a number of royal guards had brutally turned on others, leaving blood and gore everywhere. While he had seen one or two battlefields in the past, the sight of soldiers being dismembered right in front of him had made him throw up on the spot. The fight had been resolved quickly when the ship had been boarded by those strangely cloaked and masked men, who had slain all the remaining opposition with a certain grace and effortlessness which had made the situation even more horrible.
One of them had approached him, and just as he thought he was going to get stabbed to death, he had been drugged instead. The only things that stood out afterwards were sounds of laughter coming from some of the traitors, nauseating and nightmarish disfigured images of corpses, the ship, a port, a large building, and finally the strange masks through which red eyes had been watching him, bearing barely concealed anger.
When he had truly regained his senses, he was in this room, alone. As far as he knew, he was the only non-traitor from his ship that had survived. No one had talked to him since; in fact, the only sounds that sometimes reached him were screams of terror and pain coming from somewhere in the vicinity. It didn't take much of his imagination to know that people died here regularly and probably in sick and painful ways.
The door to his cell was opened only rarely, each time to push a tray of food into the room. It was always carried by one of those red-eyed men, and though they were always silent, something in their manner towards him always gave him the idea that what they wanted nothing more than to cut his throat to be done with him.
Who were these men and who were they working for? Had this been a set-up? If so, what did they hope to gain by keeping him here? Something about the way these people dressed seemed vaguely familiar, but he just couldn't remember properly; were they terrorists? Some secret order of Guildsmen looking for Don Whitehorse himself? And how did they get help even from INSIDE the royal guard?
...If this was to be his current position, was his cousin Yuri safe?
There were so many questions, and every explanation he came up with had at least one major flaw he could not explain. Was the goal war? A ransom from his house? Or just to capture a trophy for the Don as a revenge for the last great war?
The door suddenly opened, and he barely had enough time to reflexively stand up. His vision was obscured, as even the relatively dim light in the hallway behind seemed blinding to him. After it had adjusted, he saw a red-coated man with a strange ball of metal for a left hand leering at him.
Every muscle in his body tensed.
"So you're the catch that all the boys have been talking about," the man said. "I was pretty excited when they told me how they got one of the two remaining princes under our control: stories about the tougher imperial nobles like old Lowell are still told among the Guilds, after all."
He took a few steps closer. "But when I look at you, some little boy cowering before me in this shithole of a cell, it feels pretty disappointing. Heh, just from looking at you I can see you wouldn't even last a day among my crew."
'So at least the Guilds are involved somehow...' Ioder realized, though he didn't know what to say. This was the first man who had spoken to him in days; was he here only to insult him?
The man sighed. "Not going to talk, are you? I guess I shouldn't have expected better from a spineless pipsqueak. I-"
"I-If you're here only to gloat, I'd appreciate it if you left now," Ioder blurted out before realizing what a dumb mistake this was.
To his surprise, this evoked a laugh from the man. "Oh really? Then just maybe there's a bit of fight left in you, which is a good thing; you'll need that to survive where you're going," he said, after which he glanced around to the door. Ioder tried see what he was looking at, but the man's imposing figure and the lighting made it difficult to determine.
"Let me introduce myself properly; my name is Barbos," he stated.
The next moment, Ioder felt an intense pain on the side of his head, and it wasn't until he had landed on his side on the floor that he realized how hard he had just been hit in the side of his head.
"Barbos-," another voice sounded from the hallway.
"Heh, don't worry; I was holding back and this brat needs to learn some respect," the man replied, after which he knelt down next to Ioder. "You see kid, I'm the leader of the Blood Alliance and I don't like being interrupted in the way you just did."
Ioder, in turn, struggled get back up despite the dazed sensation working against him. "Just this once though, I'll forgive you and consider this our proper introductions. As a blood alliance custom, I managed to draw blood from you in one motion upon our first meeting. Think you can do the same to me? I'm completely open right now."
'What in the name of...'
"Y-You can't be serious! Are you insane?" Ioder managed to say through the pain.
"Insane? No kid, I'm as sane as they come. I'll tell you what's really insane though; here in the Guilds, you become a leader because you're strong. Back in your place, you become a prince because someone in your family, hundreds of years ago, was declared to be a noble for whatever reason. Do you think you have the right to be who you are because of what that guy managed to do?"
Barbos pulled Ioder up close with his remaining hand. "Do you?" he repeated.
The prince's mind raced. This man was clearly not sane in the normal sense and obviously had some problem with the empire's nobility. However, he wasn't convinced that just giving him what he likely wanted to hear was the right thing to do. "I... don't know. I've never... thought about my position in that way," he replied truthfully.
Rather than commenting on his answer, Barbos threw him roughly into the wall headfirst. This time, the pain caused him to drop to the floor and for some reason he couldn't get himself to stand up anymore. Everything seemed... dull to him, and he felt nauseous.
"Spineless like I thought," the large man commented.
"Barbos! That's enough!" Ioder heard from far away. Was it... a woman?
"Pfah! You really are too soft, Mutilate. I can see why you and Garrote failed to kill Lowell. They should have just sent-"
'No... 'Failed to kill Yuri'? That means he's also in danger...''
"Don't push your luck with me," the woman replied threateningly. "I already regret the decision of introducing you to him prior to the transport. Don't assume we can't get someone else to do it!"
There was a long period of silence in Ioder kept trying to prevent himself from vomiting. Strangely, as the seconds grew by, he felt parts of his body grow increasingly numb and his hearing and vision were gradually growing worse.
"...kid, waiting on something... delivered to me. Then... come along..." the man's voice told finally him, though the words didn't make sense.
He tried to respond, but couldn't bring himself to talk properly.
"Idiot...at him! Bleeding...!"
The last things Ioder was aware of were two red eyes watching him from up close, followed by something cold being put on his head.
"Boys will be boys," Hisca said to her twin.
"Right, that's the... sixth time Yuri has lost in a row?" Chastel remarked, seeing the prince slowly pick himself up again. "But is it just me, or is he actually putting up a bit of a fight this time? What do you think, Sodia?"
"Hmmm," The second-in-command replied while drinking some water from her field bottle.
"I said-"
"Yes I heard, and you're right. He's fighting better than he did last week. He fought pretty well when we went to rescue Flynn too, even going into overlimit while I never knew he was able to do that," the higher ranking soldier clarified. "Despite that though, I'd still say he has a very long way to go before being able to match the commander."
After riding without any lengthy breaks for an entire day and night, they had finally stopped at the base of a hill. There had been no visible signs of any knights pursuing them, and even the small Girl had said that they should be safe for now, not to mention that she looked far more relaxed. While Sodia was somewhat relieved that they apparently had shaken off the coming knights, Nan's overall behaviour seemed to get more suspicious the more she thought about it. Had there really been knights coming at them? Well, she wouldn't press the girl for an answer as long as the commander decided to trust her.
In their makeshift camp, some had gone for a quick sleep while some others took care of the horses. There was a small group of people studying a map while those who wanted to were practising swordplay, archery and artes in a grassy area which was partly shielded from view by the hill. To the surprise of few, one of the couples duelling consisted of Yuri and Flynn.
Sodia refocused her attention towards the latter of the two, who was making an exaggeratedly friendly inviting gesture towards the prince. Yuri, in turn, was grinning broadly as he re-assumed his fighting stance. The sight made her smile; there was something so cute and heart-warming about their mock rivalry...
"Hello? Terca Lumines to Sodia?" Hisca said, waving her hand in front of Sodia to draw her attention.
She blinked. "Huh? What?"
The red haired twin tilted her head slightly to the side, watching her thoughtfully. "We were just talking about how Yuri could have gotten stronger so quickly when you just zoned out. If you're tired, maybe you should get some sleep while you can. Or..."
"...maybe you're not tired at all, but just daydreaming about the commander?" Chastel took over, smiling at her in a knowing way. Sodia hated that kind of look; first it nearly always made her blush and nervous even if she hadn't been doing anything of the sort, and whenever she did manage to keep a straight and innocent face she was never able to convince either of them with it. Maybe she would have had better luck if the three of them hadn't been friends and comrades-in-arms for so long.
She tried anyway. "I wasn't-"
"Your face is telling us a different story," Hisca pointed out as expected. "It's really too easy to read you at times."
Sodia sighed irritably. "It's not like the commander is the only thing on my mind! I was just thinking about how... well... cute it can be; the way those two treat each other."
"'Cute?' You don't think they're into each other, right?" Hisca replied, obviously sceptical.
"N-No, I just mean, well, they've been through a lot of things together since they became friends, and even though they're from completely different environments they can still get along so well. Don't you find it... I don't know... cute so see them playing around like this?"
The red-haired healer laughed. "I can't really deny that, but I can't help feeling as if you sound a bit envious towards Yuri? Wouldn't you want to be the one who was closest to Flynn? To have most of him for yourself to fulfil your deepest, darkest-"
"Hisca, don't tease her like that. You know she doesn't like it when you go into that area," Chastel cut in. Sodia silently thanked her for the chance to at least slightly recompose herself.
"Oh, sorry about that, Sodia," Hisca replied, though she didn't sound sorry at all. "It's just that I've always kind of found it strange why you never tell him how you feel, even when it's pretty obvious to us. What if someone else beats you to it and he doesn't turn her down for once?"
"But I did! I keep on giving such obvious hints and he never ever seems to pick any of them up, or at the very least he never acts on them! If he had an interest in someone else I'd understand, but..." Sodia trailed off, glancing around to see if anyone else had heard that. Luckily, that didn't seem to be the case.
"I- I obviously love him and yet he never ever seems to notice me in that way. He never even told me he wasn't interested or that he didn't like my attempts to get closer to him. It's like I'm not even there at all and it... hurts a lot, Hisca," she continued solemnly, turning away from them.
"...Well, I know what would at least get a reaction from him," Chastel remarked after a short period of silence.
"Really? Like what?" her sister replied while Sodia kept a lot of negative feelings in check.
"Remember that time when we were still In Commander Niren's unit? When we were still struggling how to use blastia properly and were training to become healers?"
"Wow, that's quite some time ago... let's see, three or maybe four years now?"
"Almost, yes. It was before you joined us, Sodia," Chastel continued. "Back then, Flynn got into a bar fight with some Guild members in one of the outer cities where we were stationed."
"Really? That doesn't seem like something he would do," Sodia replied, trusting her voice enough to rejoin the conversation.
"I never said it was the commander's fault; I think those Guild members somehow knew that his father had been a famous knight and that they tried to provoke Flynn into fighting by insulting him," Chastel explained. "Anyway, he managed to beat them all up almost by himself, and he got off with only a minor head injury. It still needed to be treated though, so I was called in to handle it afterwards."
"Haha, I see where you're going with this," Hisca cut in, obviously amused by something.
"Yes, well, back then I was still a beginner, so I wasn't really thinking about... some practical things yet," Chastel continued, this time blushing slightly. "When I came into the room, he was sitting on a couch adjacent to a wall. What I should have obviously done was to ask him to sit down somewhere else, so that I could have had easier access to the wound on the back of his head, but I was so focussed on making sure I would do the healing arte well that I went right to it."
She paused briefly. "So I sat down in right in front of him, and then I tried to pull his head down enough for me to reach that wound. The commander was a lot taller than me back then too, so it was... um.. pretty hard, and he also kept struggling for some reason I couldn't understand then. Afterwards, he kept on avoiding me during trainings for reasons I couldn't understand. I always thought he thought I had healed the wound poorly, but during the war he finally told me that he found his head shoved into my... chest and was just too shy and embarrassed to tell me then. He's always been a bit awkward around me ever since."
Sodia couldn't help laughing at the image. She had to admit that she felt slightly better after Chastel's obvious attempt to cheer her up a bit. "Haha, thanks for the advice, but I somehow doubt even doing something like that would work at this stage."
"Hey sis, I just remembered something..." Hisca said, frowning. "Do you remember? Back then, I'm pretty sure Flynn actually had a girlfriend."
"Hisca, that's NOT what Sodia wants to hear right now," Chastel hissed under her breath.
"What? No, please tell me! What was she like?" the higher ranking soldier found herself asking, intrigued. This was the first time she'd ever heard of him actually being in some kind of serious relationship.
"Well, I think I only saw her twice, and I only talked to her once. She was this beautiful pink-haired girl, and she had come to see him during her leave. She was also enlisted in the military and she and Flynn were childhood friends If I recall correctly. They were so happy to see each other back then; if only I could remember her name..." Hisca finished, digging deeply into her memory.
"She was also in the military? But I've never seen anyone like that ever since I joined this unit," Sodia commented.
"Neither have I," Hisca clarified. "I've never seen her once during or after the war."
"I never heard Flynn talking about such a person either, but he was always reserved about his private life," Chastel mused. "Oh... do you think she might have died in the war then? That would have been devastating for Flynn," she added solemnly, not really wanting to think about that possibility.
"That would explain why he would be very hesitant to get personally involved with someone from his unit," said Sodia. "Other than the military rules forbidding such endeavours outside of spare time, of course," she added. Then again, she felt like she was entitled to ignore that as long as it didn't affect her performance, simply because she practically never had any free time and was always on-duty. "Maybe I'll try asking him about her once."
'If she died, I'd feel sorry for the both of them. Why hadn't Flynn ever mentioned her if she had been someone important to him? Or maybe we have it wrong and there was nothing between them in the first place?'
The three of them watched another duel between Yuri and Flynn before Sodia stood up. "I should be going; why are we spending so much time gossiping as if we're a bunch of schoolgirls, anway? I'm not tired and I'm sure there's something useful I can do around the camp."
Before she could move away though, Chastel put her hand on her shoulder. "We're talking about this because we're just as normal as everyone else, and just as allowed to have feelings. Sometimes I have the feeling that you're too serious to really come to terms with that. This is something that's obviously been bothering you for a long time and ignoring it would just negatively affect you."
Sodia had no asnwer to that.
"So are you going to see Flynn then?" Hisca asked her, not at all unkindly.
"No... No, I want something useful to do. Maybe I'll try talking Estelle. There's something I've been wanting to ask her for the last few days, but I Just never had the opportunity ever since we fought that horde of monsters together to save Flynn."
"Really? Like wha-" Hisca began, before her eyes widened in excitement. "Oh, you're going to ask her to stay with us longer, right? Good idea! She's a really nice person and she knows LOTS of things about healing in general!"
"It always felt like a bit of a waste that she was going to leave us so quickly," Chastel went on. "She's proven to be surprisingly useful to the unit, for a civilian, that is. Now that we're all Royal guards, maybe she'll consider it."
"Yes, maybe," Sodia agreed. "I'd like to get to know her a bit better before I formally make the offer, though. Here goes nothing," she said as she left.
As it turned out, Estelle wasn't very hard to find. As the only one of the group dressed in a black and gold royal guard uniform, she did kind of stick out of the crowd. She had situated herself in the shadow of a large oak and was reading from a reasonably large book. However, as Sodia drew closer, she could see that the other woman was frequently casting a worried look over to the 'training area'.
"Um, Estelle? Do you mind if I sit down here for a moment?" Sodia began.
"Huh?" the brown-haired guard replied, after which she shifted her attention away from the fight she had been watching. "Oh, it's you, Sodia. No, please do. Can I help you with anything?"
"No, I just wanted to talk to you for a moment. I didn't really get much of a chance when the four of you arrived in Halure at night, and when we were racing to get to Flynn afterwards. And then you were constantly working with the healers to tend to the wounded civilians from the monster attacks..." she explained. "So first and foremost, thanks for all the help you've given to us and the civilians."
"Thanks, but you don't really need to thank me. I helped because I wanted to, and we made it through not only because of me. Nan helped a lot in the fight, and so did you. Yuri... well, at least drew a lot of attention, and even Repede and Karol were useful in their own way. I'm sure Hisca, Chastel and the others could have handled all the wounded almost as well, too; it would just have taken them a bit more time," Estelle replied.
"Well, I was glad to have you with us regardless," Sodia countered, determined to give her at least some credit. "You really showed us how royal guards are supposed to handle things," she continued, after which Estelle for some reason looked a bit sad. "Nan might be skilled, but she's just a child and I can't say I really trust her yet. And Yuri also still isn't up to our level, even though he's somehow become a lot better over the span of the last week."
"...They didn't train him very well," the healer stated absently, looking out towards the training field again.
Sodia blinked, following her gaze. "Huh? What do you mean?"
"Yuri," Estelle clarified, watching him as he barely managed to parry a powerful trust from Flynn. "He told me he'd been trained to fight ever since he was old enough to understand, but they never taught him anything more than the basic techniques of actual combat. He also knows next to nothing about the actual use of Aer, and, as far as I can tell, no one has ever instructed him on some more advanced but vital sword forms either; it's like they deliberately messed it up."
"... You're right," Sodia agreed, watching as Yuri gradually lost his balance from an incoming barrage of trusts and swings. "They didn't ever teach him; most of what he knows comes from their sparring sessions, or that's what he told me. The commander never had enough time to train him up to actual level of someone in the unit, though; we were always being sent out to fight. What I never understood is why the Royal guard never took the time to do it properly; their captain... our captain is supposed to be a legend when it comes to swordplay."
It was still a bit hard to get used to the idea that they were now all royal guards; maybe they hadn't been inaugurated in most official way, but they still were a part of it.
"I think it's because Lisa didn't want to develop a teacher-student bond with him, as it might have gotten in the way of her judgment on other things relating to his safety," Estelle mused. "At least, that was the only explanation that made sense to me. That still doesn't explain why someone else from the guard never did, however. Hmmm..."
"So, if Yuri's been with you for the last week or so and he suddenly got better, does that mean you tried to train him yourself?" Sodia asked, trying to keep the conversation going.
"Well, I did try to teach him what I could on short notice," the healer said. "He has a lot of potential, but he's also very reckless. There were times where I thought he was deliberately not doing his best to copy what I was showing him. It was frustrating, but also a bit... fun at times; to see him actually trying to use it against monsters, I mean," she finished, smiling softly. "I just hope he doesn't break his arm so often when I'm gone, as healing that becomes harder each time it does without a proper period of rest."
'Wait...'
"So it's true then? You're really going to leave soon?" Sodia asked. Even though they hadn't known each other for very long, she also felt that Estelle was a very pleasant person and a valuable soldier. Seeing her leave so quickly felt like a waste.
"I... have to. My situation is complicated," Estelle explained. "The reason I'm really here is to get the stolen aqua blastia back from Aspio, and then deliver it back home. I'm from the lower quarter and many of the people there depend on it for clean water. After I do that, It would probably be best for me to disappear as I've been officially sentenced to death."
"You what! What did you do to deserve that?"
"I tried to stand up against a group of obviously corrupt knights, and I... managed to do it. They simply wanted me out of the way after that and I was only a common lower quarter inhabitant, which made it a lot easier to do, according to Yuri," she added in obvious sadness.
"I'm not actually a proper royal guard either," she continued. "Up until last week I was just a healer in the lower quarter. The only combat training I've ever had was from the time I was enlisted in the knights, and that was for less than a year. While it's good to know that you think differently, the truth is that I feel as If I'm far too out of shape and unqualified to handle something as important as keeping one of the two princes safe. He's... probably better off in your care."
"You don't sound very happy about-" Sodia began to point out, but was cut off as a rather powerful wave of aer energy suddenly washed over them. She was surprised to find Flynn glowing with aer energy, still facing Yuri. The two of them had relocated themselves up to the point where they were reasonably close by, only 20 or so paces from where she and Estelle were sitting.
'The commander... in overlimit? Against Yuri? Hmmm... '
"Flyynnnn!" Estelle shouted out, the tone of warning in her voice obvious. The unspoken message of 'You'd better hold back,' was clear.
Flynn waved nervously, somewhat to Sodia's surprise, after which he sheathed his sword and threw his shield aside. Yuri put his own weapon away shortly after making a wave of his own; apparently the fighting had come to an end.
Estelle let out a small sigh of relief. "At least he decided not to try."
At that moment, a second, distinctly less powerful aer wave rushed over them. It seemed Yuri had joined his friend in going more or less 'all out' and was taking an unarmed combat stance.
The healer facepalmed. "Never mind. This is what I mean about him being too reckless..." she muttered to herself. "Yuurriii!" she then called out in roughly the same manner she had addressed Flynn.
The prince briefly turned in her direction and gave her a thumbs up.
"Somehow that doesn't really make me feel any better about this," she commented to Sodia.
"All right then 'Your Highness', so you think tenth time's the charm?" Flynn said playfully.
"Heh, just so you know, if you beat me this time it's only because Estelle told me to hold back," Yuri retorted.
"Haha, right... *you*, beat *me*, in hand-to-hand combat? Yuri, you've never seen me in a bar fight," Flynn replied confidently.
"That's ok; you've never seen me in one either," Yuri countered.
Flynn frowned. "Huh? But Yuri, you've never been in a bar fight," he pointed out, after which the prince grinned.
"Are you sure about that?" he asked while moving forward confidently. "Oh, and remind me for a second; between the two of us, who actually uses hand-to-hand combat in serious fights?"
The blond-haired soldier pretended to think. "Well, you, obviously, but let me ask you this," he quickly added, "between the two of us, who is wearing plate armour in a hand-to-hand fight?" he finished smugly.
The grin never left Yuri's face. "You, obviously," he admitted, drawing closer still. "But between the two of us, who was it again that knocked out that GIANT monster charging you with nothing but his fist?"
Flynn involuntarily took a step back.
"So Estelle, what do you intend to do when you've returned the aqua blastia? Where will you go?" Sodia asked the woman next to her, shifting her attention away from the ongoing fight in front of them.
"I'm thinking of moving to the continent to the northwest, somewhere closer to the Guilds. Maybe even going to Dahngrest itself; if the empire doesn't want me, I think that's the safest place to live," Estelle replied, looking back to her book. "This is an atlas of the continent; it was given to me by one of the villagers in Halure as a gift for healing her husband. The area around Dahngrest is suspiciously empty; I'm sure there are lots of towns somewhere around the capital that aren't on it."
The conversation was interrupted by a suspiciously loud metallic clang coming from Yuri and Flynn, even though they weren't using weapons. Both women looked up but found nothing unusual about the fight, other than the fact that Flynn looked like he was in a lot of pain.
"Then, if Yuri's friends can somehow undo that death sentence, maybe I can come back to Zaphias one day," the healer continued after a brief pause, casting a suspicious glance towards the prince.
"...Why don't you try joining our unit instead?" Sodia asked after a moment of contemplation, finally deciding to ask what had been on her mind for a while.
"E-Excuse me?" Estelle replied, clearly caught off-guard.
"Well, think about it. We're a unit of highly trained and well-disciplined soldiers, used to doing dangerous missions," Sodia began, trying hard not to think about her not even remotely professional conversation with Hisca and Chastel just now. "We're also no longer a part of the standard military, so their business doesn't really concern us, and we're going to be constantly on the move with the prince until he's done what he needs to do, which makes us difficult to track. Secondly, everyone I've spoken to so far seems to think highly of you, so there's no way we'd hand you over to them even if they found us. You're obviously a valuable soldier that we want to have along for the ride, and after we're done, you're free to go wherever you want."
Sodia paused to colelct her thoughts; what else could she say? "Lastly, under commander Flynn's leadership, we haven't actually lost someone ever since the war."
'I think that's the best I could have done,' she thought to herself.
Estelle was silent for a very long time, staring into the direction of the fight though obviously not paying attention.
"I... I've thought about staying longer..." she then hesitantly said, "but how would I get the aqua blastia back to the lower quarter safely? And what if a large force of corrupt knights somehow finds and corners us? I think I'd stand a better chance to remain undetected by myself," she explained.
"Hmmm... all right, I understand," Sodia replied. She wasn't happy with the answer, but there wasn't much she could say to counter that. She could see why Estelle would be hesitant to just give the aqua blastia to a random trader from Aspio heading in the direction of the capital, and going deeply into Guild territory probably was the safest option for her.
"That's not the only reason I can't stay, though," Estelle suddenly continued. "You're all nice persons from what I can gather, but I... don't want to stay close to Flynn."
"*pant* *pant* What... do you think they're talking about over there? They're in deep conversation over something and it obviously isn't some idle chatter,"" Flynn managed to ask while barely sidestepping a punch from the still aer-enchanced Yuri. It had been pretty much clear from the start that, in this form of combat, he had to take his friend as a serious threat. Even though the overlimit he himself had activated allowed him to take punches without flinching, the incoming hits still hurt like hell. Somehow Yuri had even managed to hurt him through his armour by using some strange arte he'd never seen before.
Well, that, and there was the fact that his heavy armour was in fact weighing him down, adding to his already present feeling of feeling of exhaustion from having healed both Yuri and, to a lesser degree, himself, after their previous nine duels. Keeping up his guard properly was proving to be a problem.
"Oh no you don't; you're not going to use some cheap trick to distract me when I'm obviously kicking your ass," Yuri countered, keeping up the assault with another flurry of blows.
The reaction sparked up a feeling of annoyance that gave Flynn new strength. He caught a forward jab with his left hand, then pulled Yuri closer to him and in the same motion elbowed him in the side of his head with his right arm, which caused the prince to stagger.
"Kicking my ass, huh? Then what do you call that?" Flynn taunted.
Yuri then expectedly turned around his axis, delivering a backward elbow of his own to the side of Flynn's face. It added another dulled yet distracting bruise to the soldier's collection.
"I call it 'the great Scifo dropping his guard'," the prince retorted playfully. "So when are you going to stop holding back?"
"Ha ha. You know I can't... do THAT," Flynn replied, swinging his left arm in an inward wide arc in an attempt to hit back, upon which Yuri jumped backwards nimbly. "I *pant* don't want to kill you."
"Kill me? What; you think I can't take a hit? It looks to me as though you're having a bit of difficulty keeping up at all," Yuri pointed out. "If you're still going to try, maybe it's time you at least brought out your artes again."
Flynn paused, both to catch his breath and to mull over the idea. Going along with it would quickly drain the reserves he had left, and it wasn't as easy to properly control or the direct his artes without using a sword. Constantly training artes while armed had made him start aiming them partly by using his sword up to the point where not using it felt unnatural; he could seriously injure Yuri if it went bad.
The smart thing to do was to just let Yuri have his glory for once and call it a day...
...but that stupid, infuriating grin made him reconsider. He was asking for it, and truth be told, Flynn felt like he had something to prove ever since he had been saved from near-certain death by someone who wasn't even a proper soldier, even if that person happened to be Yuri himself. He'd show him he wasn't harmless even if he were tired.
"All... All right then, you're on," Flynn replied, grinning. "Let's see how well 'Your Highness' fares when the kid-gloves are off."
"Good, now COME ON! Azure edge!"
"Demon fang!"
Sodia had no idea how to respond. "Really? But... Why? I mean, he's the most honourable and capable soldier I've ever met."
"He's... not a bad person," Estelle began, obviously thinking hard on what she was saying. "But... his heart is in the wrong place. If he ever gets into a position where he has to choose between what's right and his career, don't count on him to make the right choice," the healer continued, after which she looked her right in the eyes. "It can cost you a lot; things you can't ever get back."
"But didn't he just prove that he did make the right choice by leaving the knights?" Sodia countered, feeling a bit unsure.
"Maybe... but maybe it's just because there was a convenient way out," Estelle pondered. "It could be that he's changed, but I can't ever forgive him."
"...There's so much I want to ask about this that I don't even know where to begin," Sodia admitted, feeling lost. Estelle seemed trustworthy and if what had happened was really that horrible, it went completely against her image of Flynn so far.
"I... think it's better if you don't know," the healer answered. "It's obvious that nothing like this has happened recently and I don't really want to cause an internal problem in your unit. Just, as a... friend," she added tentatively, "let me advise you to please remember what I said if you think something like that could ever happen again."
'She's so selfless and nice; I just can't believe that the commander somehow caused her harm,' Sodia thought to herself.
"Ok; I'll take that to heart and I'd like to consider you as a friend too," she replied, smiling softly. "But-"
It was at that moment that a strange wave of aer flowed past them, which caused Estelle to immediately focus on the nearby fight again "Wait. What are they doing?" she asked.
When Sodia turned to Yuri and Flynn, she was just in time to see a couple of rather unfocussed aer waves crashing into each other, causing a chaotic dissipation of energy. Behind that came three more waves from Flynn, each of which Yuri managed to counter with a wave of his own, albeit barely. Still, it was a moderately impressive display of artes used without weapons.
"Honestly? It looks to me as if they're just trying to show off," the second-in-command commented dryly. "At least Yuri is, since he could just have avoided those without wasting energy. I think the commander's putting a bit too much force in the artes as well."
Estelle sighed. "Can't they just try something safer, like arm-wrestling, instead of using artes that could smash holes in boulders? Maybe I wouldn't have to worry so much about Yuri if they did."
"Oh, you don't have to worry," Sodia said, grinning; she had seen them fight far more often. "They know how far they can push-"
*Boom*
Unlike the previous waves of aer, this time the dissipation came with a blinding flash of light. When it cleared, Yuri was almost right in front of Flynn, obviously having ran right through the explosion. Flynn, obviously caught off-guard, barely managed to start an arte before Yuri was upon him with his own. From their vantage point, they saw two glowing white fists quickly closing in on either combatant.
Sodia was vaguely aware of Estelle standing up next to her. "Wait! Don't-!" the other woman cried.
It was too late though, as both aer-enchanced punches hit the opposing combatant squarely in the chest.
For a moment everything seemed silent. Everyone who had been watching the fight had stopped talking, and everyone else that had been fighting had been distracted by the light long enough to see the end.
Seconds went by as the two combatants just stood there, followed by their overlimits deactivating, and finally, without either of them speaking, they both fell down; first Flynn and then Yuri. Neither of them stood up afterwards. Reactions amongst the crowd were divided; some clapped their hands, others laughed, and some others still doubted whether or not to go and offer aid. They wouldn't be getting there in time though, as Estelle and Sodia were already moving.
"...here we go again..." Estelle mumbled on the way there.
"Well, Yuri's vitals are normal as far as I can tell," the healer commented later, following a brief check-up of the unconscious prince.
"So are the commanders'," Sodia answered a moment later, feeling somewhat relieved despite her previous sentiment; Yuri and Flynn had never fought like this, and a fight had never ended in such a way either. Still... "I never really expected anything else, anyway; like I said, they know how far they can push each other, and no matter what we used to tell them, they'd fight anyway. Boys will be boys."
This caused Estelle to chuckle weakly. "Maybe you're right. Honestly though, what am I going to do with him if he keeps doing things like this?" she added, summoning up the aer for a healing arte.
'...?'
"Well then, maybe you should stay so you can teach him some discipline," Sodia replied in an amused tone. "We all know Yuri desperately needs someone wiser than him to keep him in check," she continued, interested to see how the other woman would react.
"Haha, yes, he does," Estelle agreed, also amused. "Um, I-I... don't mean me, of course! I'm sure there are lots of... people that are better suited," she added after a few seconds, clearly having lost her concentration. "And I'm going to be gone, so I can't anyway. Ugh, sorry, I need to focus on this arte."
"Right," Sodia answered neutrally, deciding not to press the issue; she wasn't like Hisca or Chastel. She liked that there was at least a chance Estelle would consider staying, even if it was just because of Yuri. That was enough for now.
Author's comments
This is the longest chapter I've ever written, mostly because I couldn't find a good cut-off point near the end but at the same time kind of liked the overall flow of the latter parts. While I do have a beta now, I have to admit that I lost contact with her since I've been away for a while (my apologies), which is why I went over the grammar myself once more, removing what mistakes I could identify. If you find any, feel free to point them out so I can edit them :)
In the first version of this I uploaded, I used the name 'Ignis' as Chastel's twin sister instead of Hisca, and Nylen instead of Niren. I have no Idea why I thought Ignis was the correct name, but thanks for reminding me otherwise, Deidaro. Nylen seems to be used by some translations instead of Niren, but I'll just go with Niren as it's the official translation.
Karol and Nan finally get their share of the proverbial glory in this chapter. I tried not to focus overly much on Karol, since while he's far easier to write, we also know a lot more about him than of Nan, which makes it less of a challenge and, I believe, less interesting. Opinions on either characterisation?
About the royal guard being separated from the military: I keep trying to find some convenient way to mention it in a conversation somewhere, but it never seems to come up. The reason they are separate units is because Yuri's father pushed the remaining houses to force the council into splitting them up. The colour changed to black to reflect mourning, as his decision was sparked by an usual amount of nobles dying or disappearing in a short amount of time. In short, he was very distrustful of certain military figures and ultimately didn't want to entrust everyone's safety to just one man.
After having included both Garrote's part and Ioder's 'torture session', I decided to make the rest of the chapter a little less dark. I wonder if you as a reader felt that the chapter was boring afterwards, or that you liked the character interactions/references to the movie/the Yuri and Flynn fight?
Also on the later parts, yes, there is a lot of bonding between Sodia and Estelle. While they didn't get to talk too much beforehand throughout the events, I figured that between the facing of a horde of monsters together and taking care of the citizens of Halure, they had enough short conversations to at least be reasonably comfortable with each other before the above conversations. Plot wise, I also needed that to happen and to establish Hisca and Chastel as 'present' individual group members.
As a refresher for those who are a bit confused, while it's never directly stated somewhere, Sodia and Yuri in this timeline have been friends for a couple of years.
Well, on to chapter 14, I guess. This time, we will jump right into the ruins and attempt to get everyone out of Aspio afterwards. Let's hope I manage to finish it in time! Oh, and reviews are always highly appreciated :)
-kind regards,
Dieuwtjin