There was a kind of hush that had fallen over the outside of the Royal Palace. The ramparts were vacant and while there were some guards on the ground near the gates where the road led in. From high up, it was rather easy to see that the castle was vulnerable to an attack from the air, but that probably wasn't exactly the kind of thing that most people were capable do doing.
Luckily for Bucky, Sam was able to lift him high enough to avoid any eyes from the ground who might have spied them if there were any there. The pair of them circled around the inner keep, passing over the circular arena in its shadow. Without the aid of radios it was hard to talk while moving this fast, but they had agreed to drop down as close to the keep as possible and see if there was anyone they could warn about what was about to happen.
As why dropped in altitude and the ground came up to meet them, Bucky let go, tucking into a roll to hit the ground and with his Vibranium fist down to disperse the force. Sam landed right beside him, the wings folding up and going into his pack.
"You posing for a full page spread," Sam said. "Come on, stop goofing around."
Bucky set his jaw as he glared at Sam. "You just want me to blow out my knees."
Sam pointed over at him, wagging his finger next to Bucky's face. "Are you about to go on another old man rant?"
The pair of them were approaching the garage-like tunnel that lead under the castle for Ground Dragons drawn carriages to drop people off. There should have seemingly been some kind of guard here or attendant, but there was none to be found. As they stepped into the covered garage the air cooled slightly.
"Doesn't this all seem kind of—modern?" Asked Bucky.
"Pshh, I've been saying that about this place since we first showed up here. This whole place seems like a mix of a bunch of things that in some cases have no business being anywhere near each other," Sam said. "Like a big old piece of pineapple on pizza."
Bucky drew a dagger from his belt. "Did you hear that?"
Sam turned his eyes toward the side of the garage where the Ground Dragon stables. He looked back toward the door of the palace where there was still no guard to be found.
"I don't hear anything," said Sam. "Wait, someone's coming."
Sure enough there was a loud noise like a group of people stomping through the inside of the castle. Guards, more than likely.
"You gonna lower the knife so they don't come out here and kick our asses?" Sam said to Bucky.
"Not just yet," Bucky said. "Listen to that, where the Hell have you heard guards marching that sloppy?"
When Sam listened closer it sounded like panicked running, like people pushing their way down the hallway in a frantic forced movement. Before either of them could further voice these thoughts a group of people lurched out of the opening of the door, moving with jerky motions like they were being haphazardly posed and moved.
"What the Hell?" Sam asked.
They moved their heads in a slow, circular motion as if trying to sniff out something nearby. Their eyes were open, but devoid of any kind of expression. Then, with a jerk, all of their heads turned toward Sam and Bucky.
"I don't think that those are the guards," Bucky said.
"You think?" Sam asked.
The people rushed them, moving like a horde of puppets dragged along by their strings. Though they moved like they were being controlled, they seemed to be real actual people. Castle servants, guards in their lighter armor, maybe even some low level noble—the differences in the clothes told the story. These were the people from inside of the palace.
Bucky and Sam backed off some as the crowd flooded in around them, there was maybe twenty of them to their two.
"Can that cyborg brain of yours tell if they're still alive?"
Bucky glanced around before he pushed a maid away and back into three of the people who were trying to surround them. He studied anything that he could, trying to find any sign that they still actually alive.
"They're not breathing, at least not that I can see," Bucky said.
One of the guards raised his fist and lunged forward to swing at Bucky. The motion wasn't quick enough and Bucky arched his back and pulled his face away to avoid the attack and counter with an uppercut that sent the guard sprawling.
It seemed to Sam that they had made the choice to try and keep this non-lethal. Using his Divine Protection, Sam boosts himself into the air just enough to split-kick two of the attackers.
As quickly as they can attack, they're laying them out. When one of them is knocked to the ground they go still, laying there without moving. But as more of them start to go down a strange thing happens: with only three of the original group left their movements are much more fluid. Whereas they could only move in a general sense at first and make haphazard attacks, they were suddenly adept enough to pull back and dodge and move out of the way of Sam's attacks.
The one of them who was focused on Sam, a woman with blonde hair in a cook's uniform, tried to box him away from Bucky and keep the two of them separated. She moved with lightning speed, even lifting off of the ground into the air to perform combinations of kicks that lasted long enough that she had to be hovering. Sam pulled his hands up to cover his face as she unleashed the combination on him.
When she dropped back to the ground and moved to punch, he caught her by the arm and used his flight to flip over and toss her to the ground behind him.
During all that time Bucky fended fended off the other two men, a guard and a butler with deft strikes and finished them off after the attacked his Vibranium arm and he retaliated with a should shove that knocked them both flat on the ground.
Sam was already checking the pulse of the maid he had just down when Bucky looked over to him. Their eyes met and Sam shook his head. "Doesn't look like any of them are alive."
"Well they sure looked pretty alive there at the end," Bucky said. "What the hell is this?"
"It's like some sick Japanese horror movie shit—turning people into puppets," Sam said.
Bucky nodded. "It did really seem like they could have been on strings or something," he said. "You think that's what all this is?"
"Nothing else that it could be from what I am seeing, like you said they even got better as they went along like whoever is doing this was able to focus when there were less people being controlled," Sam said.
"Don't really see anyone around who could be doing the controlling," Bucky glanced up toward the door again, but found no one there. "And if they're dead and they can be controlled, why release them when we knock them down?"
Sam shook his head as he moved to join Bucky in heading for the door. "You're asking me, the guy who doesn't control dead people puppets a lot of really specific questions about dead people corpse puppets."
"I thought you could impart some more of your Japanese horror movie knowledge on us," Bucky said.
The two of them stepped through the front doors as Sam turned to glare at Bucky. "I hate you."
Bucky chuckled. "I know."
The inside of the building was unguarded, just as the outside had been. More than likely a lot of the people who were meant to be doing the various jobs in this place were the corpses that they had laid out entering here. As they walked there was a bend in the hallway that turned to lead into the center of the Keep, the decor was more elaborate that way too.
Sam pointed. "Throne room should be toward the center, that's where they would be right?"
Bucky nodded. "We're just assuming it's the center because of what, the decor?"
As if on cue five more of the pupated corpses stepped into view, their blank expressions watching Sam and Bucky.
"I'm going to go ahead and say because of that," Sam said.
"At least there's less than last time," Bucky said.
Behind them there was a rush of noise, feet and hands slapping at the floor, the wood and plaster of the walls rattling from motion. The two of them glanced back to see the previous group of puppets slinking along the halls and walls as if dragged by invisible strings.
"You just had to open your big mouth," Sam said.
The fireball moved fast, unfurling like a net as it closed in on Peter, Roswaal hadn't actually seen him at full speed—maybe it was a miscalculation on the margraves part. Peter prepared for whatever it was going to do though, perhaps this was more than a simple straight line attack. Maybe it was tracking his movement.
He couldn't just let the Margrave Pokémon fire blast him to bits here and now and his tingle had only given him a split second to relax.
With both hands straight up Peter fired webs into the ceiling and hoisted himself into the air as quickly as he could and much to his dismay the ball of fire spread wider and curved upward to follow him. The sounds from the crowd filling the room were shock, terror, there were some shouts to do something now.
Then Peter heard the resounding telltale sound of a metallic disc slamming into something and ringing out. Steve had thrown the shield, right at Roswaal and the Margrave had caught it in one hand out to his side.
For a moment Peter thought he might be able to get behind Roswaal, cause him to stop his own attack, but even if he made it there fast enough Emilia was too close to risk it. He dropped back to the floor, in a crouch as the ball of flame churned downward following him again.
Steve had moved out into the aisle and Reinhard too, but it was neither of them who came to Peter's aid. A bluish-white light engulfed the fireball and canceled it out, leaving only a faint mist in the air as a familiar voice echoed through the room.
"If you wanted me to make an appearance, then all you had to do was ask." It was Puck, the small, cat-like spirit appeared in front of Peter as if to guard him from any future attacks.
"That was your gambit, right Roswaal?" Puck asked, as if this were no big deal he topped this question off by licking his little gray paws and using them to rub over his forehead.
"A spirit," cried out one of the people from the side of the room that houses the civil servants.
"Great Spirit forgive us!" Someone else yelled.
Puck ignored their cries and pleas. "I'll have you all know that you've got my daughter here in front of you," he said pointing down the aisle toward Emilia. It was then that in looking, past Steve, Reinhard, and everything else that Peter caught a glimpse of Roswaal's face. There was a grin that he had which seemed like the grin of someone who had known exactly what was going to happen, like he had planned this.
Had he and Puck planned this, they had made a gray deal about not allowing Puck to appear here today and somehow the whole idea behind that had made sense and yet it was Roswaal who did something that was sure to draw Puck out or eliminate him.
"What's you game, Roswaal?" Steve asked snatching his shield away from the Margrave's hands.
"I think it is pretty clear what my game is, Captain Rogers, I am merely demonstrating my candidates abilities," Roswaal said with a shrug.
"By nearly killing Peter?" Steve threw a punch at Roswaal, in a flash his fist was in the air flying toward the Margrave's face and then the unthinkable happened, Roswaal slapped his fist away and floated backward to avoid further attack. For a moment Steve stood stunned.
"I'll ignore that since things were getting a little heated in here," said Roswaal. "The truth of the matter is that I knew Miss Emilia wouldn't let anything happen to the boy."
The bushy-eye-browed member of the wisemen's council rose and walked away from his seat, descending from the dais as the room chorus of murmurs grew. The other candidates had moved from standing back to staring at Emilia now. Peter wondered if it was from amazement or fear though.
"Little Miss," said the wiseman who had come down. "Do you mean to tell me that you mustered that level of spirit control without chanting or motion?"
Emilia glanced up, her fist pressed to her chest. "I apologize Councilman Bordeaux, it wasn't a conscious effort I just…"
Bordeaux Zellgef held a hand up, his robed sleeve swishing as he motioned. "What is your spirit's name?" He asked.
"He's the Great Spirit Puck, Master Zellgef," Emilia said.
Bordeaux sighed. "You also seem to be, at least, the most mannerable of the candidates," he said. "Roswaal, where did you meet the girl?" He asked.
Steve walked back to stand by Peter. "You okay?" Steve asked.
Peter nodded, but said nothing.
As Roswaal started to speak, Puck cut him off. "I don't think that we're done here, Roswaal L. Mathers," Puck said. "The only reason I let you live before was because my daughter wished it. But if you want to continue our previous bout from where we left off I would be happy to leave you and the rest of this damned country on a fresh layer of permafrost," Puck said.
When the small spirt cat was done speaking a frigid wind burst from him and pushed out in a wave to fill the room and cause a layer of frosty mist to form in the air. People ducked for cover and screamed out. It was clear why they had been so afraid at Puck's appearance, now. These people probably rarely saw the smaller spirits, to see one as large and intelligent as Puck must have been astonishing and awe inspiring.
"Oh Great Spirit, please have mercy on us," came a shrill voice from up in the Wisemen Council's section of the seating behind the throne. It came from Miklotov.
"With the skill and the amount of mana control you've shown us here today, it is no doubt that you are a Spirit of great renown," he continued.
Puck put a little fuzzy paw to his chest which he had puffed out with pride now. "Ah, now I see that some of you youngsters do have some manners after all."
Miklotov smiled. "It is a great pleasure to be treated as if I'm a young man at my age," he said.
"Baaaaack to the matter at hand," Roswaal said. "I found the two of them living at the heart of Elior Forrest when I dared to venture into the place on a survey. That territory is dangerously close to my own and as the permafrost has been spreading, albeit slowly, I felt it necessary to conduct an inspection of it beeeefore things grew quite dire."
It occurred to Peter that when earlier people had droned on too long they were shut down by one of the other candidates, but after Puck and Roswaal's display it seemed that there might have been a little fear over interrupting either of them.
"My expeditions were not without folly," Roswaal continued. "The first two attempts to enter the forest found me attacked relentlessly by a Great Spirit of such magical prowess that I wondered if it were worth it to enter. On my third attempt, when the attack happened again I found that a lone girl called the Spirit off on my behalf. That girl was none other than Miss Emilia."
"And just remember that," Puck said, "it is because of Lia and her warmth that any of you is standing today and not buried in the frost!"
Bordeaux Zellgef burst into boisterous laughter, where the rest of the room was still in a state of panicked confusion he could do nothing to help himself it seemed. He grabbed his sides, not bothering to hold anything back as the laughing continued to pour out. When he managed to speak finally, he said. "This is quite the little performance you wrote here Roswaal—I guess your little skit was all a ruse to prove to us that your half demon girl here was to be respected?"
At that half-demon crack, the room darkened, growing colder than it had before. Puck ballooned up to fill the large space at the front of the throne room and forced the candidates to back away from where they were standing until he was towering over the room and had to hunch down to avoid his head pressing into the ceiling. Puck's eyes glowed a yellowish white.
"Did you think this was all a ruse?" Puck's voice was deep now, it seemed to echo not just inside of the walls of the room, but deep down in the center of your chest. Peter had no idea Puck could do this, in theory he had seen that Puck could get bigger. He had always assumed there was a limit to this.
At this size, Puck's appearance took on a more fierce, tiger-like look. His long, bushy tail swished side to side behind him as he spoke again. "Is anything about this funny to you?"
Peter noticed Reinhard move to pull his sword, the room was growing cold too fast. It was like the mana release period, but far worse. Several of the spectators dropped to their knees from the cold.
"Puck, that's enough!" Emilia cried out.
In an instant, Puck shrunk down to his normal size and the room slowly regained its warmth.
"Just remember this," Puck said, "if any of you gets any bright ideas about treating my daughter unfairly or making sport of her."
With that, Puck became a faint outline and vanished from sight in a blue flash of light.
Roswaal looked to Peter and Steve, his smile deepening.
"If I could, I know I have taken up more than my fair share of the council's time," Emilia said. "I am sure that Miss Felt would also like to speak, but I would like to tell you about who I am from my own lips," she said.
Bordeaux was returning to his seat, red with angry at being made a fool of from the look of things. It was Miklotov who gave her permission to speak and so she did.
"Honorable Wisemen of the Council, I present myself to you. My name is Emilia," she said putting her hand to her chest. "I am a silver-haired half-elf who from Elior Forest who is accompanied by the Great Fire Spirit Puck," Emilia said in a dignified tone that even Peter wasn't sure he had ever heard from her.
"The witch of the forest!" Someone shouted and the moment the word witch left that person's mouth the whole mood of the room changed.
"Go on then, out with your demands Frozen Witch!" Another person yelled.
Peter thought that he should say something, but the person who came to Emilia's defense before him was even less expected.
"You old bastards claim that you want to hear us answer, to hear us speak, but then you drag us in here and give more time to these men," Priscilla said waving her fan toward Roswaal, Bordeaux, and Reinhard, "than you do to the actual women who that damned gem chose. Let the little half-breed speak."
Emilia shot Priscilla a glance, though she owed the woman a quarter of a thanks. "And that was a name people have used for me, the Witch of Winter or the Witch of Glaciation," Emilia explained. "My only demand is that the Council be impartial and that everyone consider all of us without prejudice based on race or class," Emilia said.
"You just ask that we are impartial?" Asked Miklotov.
Emilia nodded. "I can't help that I was born a half-elf, or that I happen to look like Satella, the Witch of Envy. The hardships that life has dealt me have taught me one thing above all else, all people deserve to be treated equally or at the very least with the level of respect that they treat others."
Peter smiled. "The Golden Rule," he muttered.
"Hmm, that is an interesting point that you propose we work from, impartiality. Would you have us forget the accomplishments of Miss Crusch or Anastasia? Or not consider where Miss Felt originates?" Asked Miklotov.
"I would just ask that you see me, Emilia. I have no family name, no vast riches. Not the girl who everyone associates with the Witch and not the girl who lived in Elior Forest. Just me," she said. Then she turned to address the other candidates. "We can all start from the same point, today and do our best to show the citizenry what we are and what we stand for from equal footing."
"That is wishful thinking, but an impossibility, I am afraid," Bordeaux said. "I apologize for my rudeness, but it is human nature to see things and associate them. The same way that I cannot see Reinhard's red hair and that sword at his hip and not think of his beautiful grandmother practicing in the training ground, the average person can not see what you are and not think of the woman who destroyed most of our world."
Emilia's shoulders sank, her confidence expelled.
"That having been said, you have shown us that when you could have killed everyone in here you did not, and when you could have threatened or tried to freeze us, you asked us for fairness. Those are noble endeavors. And not just for fairness for yourself, but for all of the other candidates who stand beside you," he said bowing down to her in a show of respect.
Emilia glanced up, her lips curling into a smile.
"Just one more thing, the boy that Roswaal tried to burn alive," Bordeaux said. "He fired strings from his fingers? What is his whole part in this? A lover? A husb—"
"No-no-no, nothing like that, like, heh, I'm Peter Parker," Peter said raising his hands up to fire a quick burst of web into the air. "I shoot webs and crawl around like a spider." That was probably the least graceful explanation he had given of what he was.
"And your association with Miss Emilia?"
To that Peter didn't know what to say. Did he call himself her knight as he had heard Al do when it came to Priscilla or was that not allowed? He had only heard himself and Steve referred to in kind of vague terms. They were protecting her, they were her guardians—other vague things like that.
"He is my knight, along with Captain Rogers. Though it might be odd this time with how I protected him, he's more than capable," Emilia answered, her face reddening as she played with her fingers. "He is also—my best friend. Probably one of my first and only friend really."
The small smile that lit up Emilia's face was enough to make Peter forget that someone had just fired a tiny moving sun at him.
There was a silence in the room, some of the knights turned to look at Peter and he recognized right then that some of these gentlemen were the same ones he had fought the previous day on the parade grounds. He couldn't tell if they were looking at him in anger or admiration, though.
Then Julius stepped out of line, his hands were clasped behind his back which caused his coat to be pulled tight against his slender form. He stepped out onto the red carpeted center of the room.
He raised a gloved hand. "When you say that you are her knight, what is meant by that?"
"Um, I didn't say that, she did, but what it means to me is—she was the first person I got to know here and I want to help her accomplish her goals because I believe that she's right," Peter said. He turned to look at the four other candidates. "No offense to you all, like I'm sure you're great, but Emilia's idea about equality is something I believe too."
"Hmm," Julius groaned, rubbing at his clean shaven chin.
"So if I can't be called a knight because there's a special requirement, either way I plan to stand beside Emilia."
"Well, that was quiet the detour, Miss Felt, are you ready to speak?" Miklotov cleared his throat and then asked.
Julius looked to the old man, but didn't bother to press the issue.
"Yeah, I have something I would like to say," Felt said, her little round face taking on a smirk. She walked away from the other women so that she was standing even with Emilia, the skirt of her dress clutched in her hands to keep her from trampling over it.
"Thanks for the nice clothes and the little layer of paint and powder for my face, but if you think I'm going to play in your hoity-toity popularity contest you've got a big surprise coming!" Felt yelled the last bit, her arm stretched out dramatically at her side.
Reinhard didn't seem stunned by this revelation all, instead he dropped to one knee with his eyes closed. It was as if he were ready to accept whatever the path forward was for supporting Felt.
"Wait a minute," Marcos said. It seemed that he had completely lost control of the proceedings that he claimed to be overseeing just minutes ago. "Are you saying that it is your desire to relinquish your title as potential Priestess of the Dragon and next Ruler of Lugnica?"
Felt touched her hand to her chest, eyes closed as she raised her nose up at the crowds assembled in the throne room. "That is exactly what I am saying to you!"
Marcos glanced to Reinhard who in turn lifted his head, though he stayed kneeling. "Very well then," Reinhard said with a smile. "My Lady's will be done."
At the very mention of one of the candidates giving up the room erupted into a cacophony of protest and jeers hurled at Felt. Many of the things yelled were accompanied by insults like 'sewer' or 'gutter'. The civil servants side of the room had mostly turned to tossing their hands up and shouting over one another while on the knights side there was a more orderly confusion.
Just as Miklotov raised his hand, intent on quieting the processions, Peter's tingle flared to life stronger and harder than it had in a long while. He whirled around, checking the door behind them and then looking up toward the windows that lined the top of the room, just below the crown molding.
In the corner window, above the civl servants side of the room a dark shape appeared headed straight for the glass. Peter spun and leaped into the air, without thinking and web zipped himself toward that side of the room as people turned and glanced up to see where he was headed.
When the glass broke Peter was there just in time to catch the huge slab of rock that had been hurled through the window. Without anything to push off of in the middle of the air he couldn't force it back, but he managed to quickly attach a series of webs to it and dangle it from the ceiling of the throne room while people ran for safety.
The knights were at the ready when he glanced back, with Reinhard standing the closest to him, but still down in the center of the aisle.
Peter crawled over the surface of the boulder, making his way to a spot near the top of the thing where he could look at the window. As he reached the point where most of his web had connected into a single strand to hold this thing, he spotted a woman at the center of a wriggling mass of people carried through the air by them.
She was blonde with pale blueish skin and a white dress. Peter couldn't see her face, even from this close up. Not because of a mask or veil or any of the normal reasons that a person's face might be covered, but because the hands of the cluster of people that carried her would move synced in time with her to keep her identity obscured. The alarm bells of his heightened sense were going off in his head, Peter could hardly manage to see straight with it at this point .
He felt something land on the surface of the rock next to him and glanced to his side to see Reinhard standing there, his white cloak flapping against the wind blowing in through the newly blown out window.
"What's the meaning of this?" Reinhard demanded.
"The meaning of this?" The woman's voice was eloquent and calm. Somehow, even though he could barely see the bottom of the woman's jaw, Peter got the idea that her lips weren't moving. The voice was too level and coming from too nearby and seemingly everywhere at once.
"A test," came the woman's voice, "Yes, that would be the closest approximation, but I suppose that I'm getting ahead of myself. Silly me, of course, of course introductions are in order," she said as she curled her body into a bow with the help of the horde of people that surrounded her in the window. Some of their hands even tucked in against her stomach as if to accentuate the gesture.
Peter didn't know what Reinhard was thinking, but he knew that neither of them could tell the status of these people that she had carrying her. Were they mind controlled? Alive? Dead? If they were to attack her not knowing they could be killing innocent people who had done nothing worse than being made pawns.
Still, much of the room was in a panic as many of the people below them rushed for the door only to find that they couldn't get it open. Julius, Roswaal, and Steve fought their way to the front, trying to get the people to safety. Emilia was shuttling the Wisemen out too, with Puck having reappeared alongside her again. Whatever this was, they had to buy time to get these people out of here.
"I am Cassiopeia, an Inquisitor for the Witch's Cult," the woman said, using the hands of some of the bodies clustered around her to do her pointing. "I've graced you with my presence in a bid to stamp out heresy!"