Chapter Seven: An Unexpected Helping Hand
Lord Fernando was not having a good day. As Praetor of the Centralian Forum, he had had his fair share of bad days...but this one had to take the cake.
The Praetor had been unceremoniously tossed into the dungeon below the palace like a load of old garbage. He had been left with his leather armor, but his gladius and pistol had been confiscated. A lone Ainu warrior stood guard outside the cell. Fernando had tried making conversation with him, but it was useless; the man could have made a statue feel stonewalled.
Fernando gazed out the tiny window. He wasn't able to see the Silver Arrow from this vantage point, but he knew it was still out there, floating in the harbor. He clenched a fist, and then released it. He had no idea what had happened to the Sun Emperor; he did not know why the Ainu leader had ordered him imprisoned and executed, but he did know that his men down in the harbor posed a significant threat to the city. The Sun Emperor would have them killed, too, and there was nothing Fernando could do about it.
At one point during his long wait, the Praetor could have sworn he had heard cannonfire from the direction of the harbor, but he couldn't be sure. Not that it mattered, anyway; he was never getting out of here anytime soon.
The Praetor rose from his blanket and started to pace up and down the cell. He had no idea how long he had been incarcerated. Four hours, maybe five? It had been sunset when he and the Ainu Marshal had been granted audience with the Sun Emperor, and the sky was now pitch black. The eastern horizon had the faintest tinge of blue, though...so morning couldn't be far off.
The dungeon entrance swung open and another samurai walked in, the flickering torchlight behind him making him a dark silhouette. He was presumably the current guard's replacement; they rotated in shifts.
Lord Fernando returned to his blanket, not bothering to engage this newcomer in conversation. The discipline of the samurai was uncanny; they could probably stand still as mountains like they usually did until they simply died from thirst.
How had everything gone so bloody wrong?
Things had been so simple: travel to the Empire Where the Sun Rises, meet with the Sun Emperor, convince the damned Ainu samurai to join the war against Zamorak. Of course, things were never simple when the Ainu were involved, but Lord Fernando had not been expecting complications such as the Sun Emperor ordering him to be executed without giving a reason.
Something was definitely amiss. The man Fernando had spoken with had been the Sun Emperor...and yet, at the same time, he hadn't been. Almost as if he were-
Lord Fernando was jerked out of his reverie by the dull thud of a body hitting the ground. The Praetor gaped in shock as the samurai who had just walked in wiped his katana clean on the now-deceased cell guard's armor. The dead guard still had a look of mild surprise imprinted on his face. No doubt he had been wearing that same expression as the samurai drew his katana in a thin, sharp line across his throat.
The samurai then cleaved the lock off of the wooden cell door and kicked it open. Lord Fernando squinted as the torchlight from the hall outside spilled into his cell. The samurai, based on his posture and movements, appeared to be a younger man; perhaps in his early thirties. He was dressed in samurai armor that was a deep maroon color, a similarly-colored kabuto helmet with the an elegant crest displayed in the front, and an ebony facemask that mimicked a face twisted with pain. The samurai's eyes could be seen through the eyeholes, but the rest of his face was obscured.
"What do you want?" the Praetor rasped.
"Come with me," the samurai ordered in heavily-accented Commonspeak. As Lord Fernando stood back up, the samurai tossed him a cloth bundle.
Fernando unwrapped the bundle. Inside was a runite gladius in the place of his old mithril saber, and his double-shot pistol, as well as his small pouch of lead ammunition. The Praetor swiftly secured his weapons to his belt as his samurai liberator led him out of the dungeon and up into the hall.
Six samurai were waiting outside of the dungeons. When they saw Lord Fernando out of his cell and armed, they quickly drew their katanas and attacked. However, only two of them lunged at the Centralian Praetor; the other four struck at their two comrades, surprising them from behind. The two samurai thudded to the ground and breathed no more, blood seeping from their wounds.
The four samurai gave a sharp bow to Fernando's liberator, who returned the gesture and barked a command in Kurigana. The four samurai sheathed their blades and fell in step behind Fernando and his liberator-who clearly seemed to be their leader. The small party swiftly made their way down the hall and up a flight of stairs, where two more samurai joined them. The unmoving bodies of the spearmen who had been guarding the stairs had been dragged into a nearby alcove.
"Why are you men doing this?" Fernando hissed to the samurai leader.
The leader held a fist in the air. "You talk much, gaijin. No talk now," he growled. "We get out of city, you talk then."
"Fair enough," Lord Fernando acquiesced, resting a hand on the grip of his gladius.
Suddenly, the samurai leader struck Fernando over the back of the head, causing the Praetor to stumble forward, and seized his hands, holding them behind the Praetor's back. Before Fernando could protest, he looked up and realized that the leader had just saved his life. A tall samurai warrior stood at the junction of the next corridor, flanked by nearly a dozen common Ainu spearmen. The tall samurai shouted something in Kurigana, and, in unison, the group of rogue samurai quickly gave a quick, respectful bow.
Lord Fernando's liberator and the tall samurai engaged in a conversation in rapid-fire Kurigana. They were speaking too fast for Fernando to get a good hold on what exactly was being said, but he could still get the gist of it. The tall samurai seemed to be some sort of garrison commander, and he wanted to know why the hell Fernando was out of his cell. Fernando's liberator seemed to be explaining that he had just captured the Praetor in the middle of an escape attempt.
The tall samurai was silent for a moment, then reached down to his waist and snapped out his katana, the curved blade glinting in the torchlight. He said something about executing all prisoners attempting to escape and struck, his blade whistling towards Fernando's neck.
Even before Fernando had the chance to react, there was a loud clang. The tall samurai gave a start of surprise. His blade had been blocked by the samurai leader's own blade. The tall samurai screamed something that more or less meant treachery in Commonspeak, and recovered his blade, this time striking at the leader of the rogue samurai. The spearmen all gave raw-throated cries and joined in the fray.
Fernando staggered back as the other six samurai on his side engaged the spearmen. The commoners were no match for the samurai; katanas could slice through their spears like lava through ice. Even so, they were not inept warriors; no Ainu soldier-samurai or commoner-was a bad fighter. One of the spearmen dodged a strike from one of the rogue samurai and managed to drive the shaft of his weapon into a gap in the samurai's armor. The samurai stumbled back, grunting in pain.
That spearman picked up the weapon of a fallen comrade and, as his compatriots occupied the other samurai, lunged at Lord Fernando.
Fernando quickly fumbled with his scabbard, drawing his gladius and sidestepping the thrust. The Praetor pivoted around on his heel, all the while ignoring the throbbing pain in his head from where he had been struck. The runite gladius was not the same as his old mithril saber. For one thing, it didn't have the reach of a saber, but the gladius was a much stronger sword, and its shorter length also allowed for more dexterity.
Fernando hacked the spear in half and the spearman stumbled forward, thrown off by the sudden loss of his weapon. The Praetor smashed the man in the head with the hilt of his gladius, rendering him either unconscious or dead.
The tall samurai was fending off three rogue samurai at once. As his spearmen fell one by one, the tall samurai fought harder and harder. He managed to gut one of the rogue samurai and slash another across the shoulder. The leader of the rogue samurai, finishing off the final spearman, stepped into the fight and matched the tall samurai blow for blow, their blades whirling around each other in an endless dance.
Finally, Fernando's liberator managed to disarm the tall samurai. He kicked the garrison commander in the chest, propelling the other man back several meters, driving him to his knees. The samurai leader brought his blade whistling around in a swift arc, but brought it to an abrupt stop just as it grazed the skin of the tall samurai's neck. The samurai leader murmured something in Kurigana and stepped back, offering the man a respectful bow. He then knocked the tall samurai unconscious with a swift blow to the back of the head.
One of the seven rogue samurai who had assisted in Fernando's escape had been killed and another seriously wounded. One of the more burly warriors carried the wounded man on his back.
The lead samurai proceeded down the junction, turning down the hallway that led towards the palace entrance. Instead of heading to the actual entrance, however, the rogue samurai led Fernando down a smaller corridor that ran perpendicular to the entrance, lined with barred windows.
One of the windows had no grille; it had been removed ahead of time. The only problem was that it was over thirty feet off the ground…slightly higher than your average jumping height.
One of the rogue samurai cupped a hand to his mouth and gave what sounded like some sort of birdcall. When he got no response, he repeated himself, thought a little louder than last time. This time, there was an answering call from outside the window, and a rope was tossed through the opening.
The lead samurai gave a single command in Kurigana. Up.
Immediately, the smallest of the samurai pulled himself up the rope, followed by the burly samurai who was carrying his wounded comrade. The smaller samurai reached down once he got onto the edge of the window and helped the burly samurai up.
There was a shout from the end of the hall. Lord Fernando looked down and saw a lone spearman. The common soldier had spotted them and was calling for reinforcements.
The lead samurai repeated his command, up, and gave Lord Fernando a light shove forward. The Praetor took the hint and grabbed the rope. He was still more or less in his prime, so shimmying his way up the palace wall wasn't too difficult a task. The smaller samurai helped him up the final stretch as well.
Once he got situated on the window's edge, he prepared to climb down the other side, but the smaller samurai stopped him. "No. Wait you here for next man," the man ordered in heavily accented, broken Commonspeak. He then grasped the rope and slid down the length of the outside palace wall, joining the burly samurai and his wounded comrade on the ground.
Lord Fernando turned his attention back to the inside just as a fourth samurai was making his way up to the window. The Praetor reached down and grasped the Ainu's wrist, hauling him up the rest of the way.
"Arigato," the warrior thanked him and gestured for him to continue.
Arrows started to clack off of the walls as the palace garrison began to stream into the hall, drawn by that one spearman's calls for help. The Praetor saw a group of archers firing away at the rogue samurai, flanked by a steadily-growing troupe of footsoldiers. That was when Lord Fernando noticed the Marshal of Ainuido, Akai-Hanako. A host of samurai streamed forward after the footsoldiers, but the Marshal barked a command in Kurigana. The samurai all stopped suddenly, ordered to stand down by the Marshal.
Without having any time to wonder why, the Praetor proceeded to lower himself off the edge of the window niche, steadily sliding down towards the ground.
The samurai above me helped another warrior up to the lip of the window and started sliding down as well. The two men reached the bottom more or less at the same time. Within thirty seconds, the rogue samurai leader had climbed out as well, taking the rope with him.
The Anuīn Palace was set atop a manmade pyramid of sorts, so there were no external perimeter walls that needed to be scaled, as was the case in most other royal domiciles.
As alarm bells started to clang furiously in response to the breakout, the lead samurai hustled everyone around the back of the palace. At the back of the palace was the garbage chute—a smoothed, polished half-pipe cut into the slope of the pyramid that ran all the way to a small, open building at the bottom, where commoners would pick up the palace's garbage and transport it away.
The samurai had come prepared. An Ainu youth around fourteen or fifteen years old was waiting for the rogue samurai at the top of the garbage chute. He saw the samurai coming, and leaped into action. "I have the rugs," he was saying in Kurigana, gesturing at a stack of a dozen rugs piled next to the chute's mouth.
The lead samurai clapped the boy on the shoulder and gave another nod to his men. As the samurai broke formation and sheathed their weapons, the leader said to Fernando, "You take rug."
Fernando watched the other samurai each pick up a rug. One by one, they lay their rug flat on the mouth of the chute, then laid down on them and pushed off. The polished surface of the chute did not snag at the rugs, allowing the men to slide all the way down to the city, several hundred feet below.
Fernando picked up one of the rugs and placed it at the chute mouth, hesitantly lying down on his back. The samurai leader gave him a slight push, sending him over the edge. The Praetor's stomach fluttered and the wind tore at his hair as he shot down the pyramid which the palace was built upon. The world was a color-filled blur as he descended several hundred feet in just a few seconds.
It was over even quicker than it had begun. The Praetor came to a stop amidst a pile of rubbish. Fernando quickly got to his feet and hurried out of the garbage hut, where the others were waiting.
The lead samurai came down last. Once he staggered out of the garbage hut, he pointed at the rubbish wagon which was normally used to transport the garbage away from here. As one, the samurai got the wagon ready—pulling two horses from the stable and hitching them to the wagon. The wounded samurai was laid down in the back of the wagon.
The lead samurai got everyone loaded into the wagon, including Fernando, before climbing into the driver's seat and taking up the reins. The warrior snapped the reins and got the wagon moving.
It was slow going at first, but at the lead samurai's constant urging, the horses picked up speed. Within a few minutes, the samurai were speeding through the streets of Kātayō. There weren't many townspeople out and about this time of night, but those who were scrambled to get out of the wagon's way.
Before too long, the imperial soldiers had organized enough to try and stop the speeding wagon. Men on horseback wielding bows and spears pursued the fleeing samurai. Several times, arrows had pierced the wood right next to Lord Fernando.
The lead samurai took the wagon around a street corner and onto a road that ran at a downward tilt. Visible at the far end of the street were the sparkling waters of the harbor, where the dim light of dawn started to reflect off of the tips of the waves.
A spear thunked into one of the wagon's wheels, but luckily it didn't hold. If it had, the wheel would have been splintered, which would have send the wagon flipping into the air and crashing.
Another man on horseback drew up level with the speeding wagon, brandishing a spear which he aimed at one of the large, clunky wheels.
Lord Fernando acted fast, reaching down to his waist and drawing his double-shot flintlock pistol. The Praetor leveled the firearm and pulled the trigger. Fire and smoke gouted from the upper barrel of the weapon as the black powder ignited, propelling the lead ball through the air and into the chest of the Ainu with the spear. The man was knocked off his horse and onto the street, where he lay clutching his wound.
The Praetor cocked the weapon, which rotated the double barrels so that the one that had fired was now on the bottom, while the one with the bullet was brought to the top. Fernando fired at another pursuing soldier, but this time he missed.
More soldiers fell into the pursuit until the rogue samurai had a sizable mob on their tail. Lord Fernando struggled to reload and rearm his pistol, but the constant bumping made it difficult.
Finally, the wagon reached the bottom of the street's incline and raced towards the docks. A dozen or so soldiers clad in yellow and orange-patterned armor were waiting to receive them, armed with bows. However, the arrows they fired went well over the rogue samurai's heads, instead flitting into the pursuing mob of soldiers. Several men on horseback cried out as the arrows struck them from their saddles.
The soldiers lowered their bows and broke ranks, streaming into a small boat that was moored at the dock. The samurai leader did not wait for the wagon to come to a complete stop before leaping out. The other samurai hurried out of the back of the wagon, along with the youth and the Praetor.
"In boat! In boat now!" the leader shouted at Lord Fernando as he climbed into the skiff, which Fernando recognized as one of the Silver Arrow's boats. The Praetor jumped from the dock and into the boat as the samurai cast off and started rowing like crazy.
The boat slid further and further away from the docks, leaving the mob of soldiers milling about on the shore with no way to pursue. The Praetor took a deep breath and slid his pistol into his belt, finally able to rest easy.
The Ainu rowed the skiff all the way across the harbor to where the Silver Arrow was anchored. A lantern was unveiled from the deck and directed onto the boat of Ainu samurai. "Identify yourselves, or you will be fired upon!" a deep voice commanded from somewhere up on the deck.
"I am Lord Julius Fernando, Praetor of the Forum of Centralia, and I hold grudges for a very long time, so how about you don't blast me to hell!" the Praetor bellowed, relieved to hear someone talking in Commonspeak.
There was some muffled discussion on deck between Centralian sailors who were clearly surprised to hear the voice of one of their countrymen.
Ropes were lowered from the heights of the man-of-war, which the samurai quickly secured to the skiff. The sailors of the Solver Arrow worked fast, hauling the skiff up the length of the ship's hull and over onto the deck.
Captain Harcourt stood on deck, ready to receive Lord Fernando. "Praetor," the Captain clasped a fist to his heart in a salute. "Praetor, accept my humblest apologies for not being able to prevent your ordeal," the naval officer said. "Upon return to the homeland, I will tender my resignation to the-"
"That will not be necessary," Lord Fernando quelled the Captain, climbing out of the boat with the rest of the samurai and the Ainu archers. "Even if a detachment of marines had accompanied me, they would have been slaughtered. You are a good captain; one which we cannot afford to lose, right now."
Captain Harcourt gave another salute. "I will do my utmost to prove myself worthy of this judgment, Praetor."
"Though you do not have to, I'm sure you will."
Captain Harcourt nodded. "I'll call it even if I can get us out of this harbor alive."
Lord Fernando arched an eyebrow. "Trouble?"
Harcourt gave another nod. Before explaining, he turned to his first officer, saying, "Mister Naevius, get us underway, if you please."
"Aye, Captain, sir," Commander Naevius, the first officer, saluted his superior before turning and bawling out orders to the rest of the crew. As the sailors scattered to their respective posts, Harcourt led Fernando back towards the stern of the Arrow. He also beckoned for the leader of the rogue samurai to join him. The other rogue samurai and the Ainu archers quietly slipped belowdecks.
"Not long after you went to see the Sun Emperor, I was visited by an Ainu samurai by the name of Amōyo," Captain Harcourt explained to the Praetor as they stepped up onto the poop deck above the captain's cabin, back at the stern of the man-of-war. "He is belowdecks with the others right now. He told us of what had happened to you and warned us that the Imperial Army would attempt to put us to the sword. Sure enough, we were attacked by three of their junks, but—thanks to Amōyo's warning—we were ready for them. We sank all three of their ships with our twelve-pounders."
Lord Fernando nodded, remembering the faint cannonfire that he had heard back in his cell during the night.
"There is a full-scale rebellion occurring in Ainuido right now," Harcourt continued. "I'm sure you knew as much from your time spent in Kātayō…but what you probably did not know is that this is no mere breakaway faction seeking to overthrow the Emperor. Rather, they fight against him…and yet for him at the same time… This man is Niten, one of the commanders of the rebellion."
The samurai who had freed Lord Fernando bowed as he was introduced. The Praetor returned the gesture. "It would seem that I am in your debt, samurai," Fernando said.
"It matters not," the samurai replied. "By the end of this ordeal, we will be deep in each other's debt. Such a bond cannot be measured."
"Our problem right now is that the Imperial Army heard our cannon-shot, and the Ainu loyalists will have ships waiting to intercept us outside of the harbor. We will have to maneuver past them and not get bogged down in a prolonged fight."
"You can take us to your base of operations?" Lord Fernando asked Niten.
The rogue samurai nodded. "That was my intention."
"Praetor?" it was Captain Harcourt's turn to raise an eyebrow. "We will provide safe transport for these Ainu rebels, but after that we are returning to Centralia to report on what has transpired here. We do not involve ourselves in foreign rebellions. We have failed."
"Failed?" Lord Fernando chuckled. "Oh, no, Captain. We haven't even begun."
"Praetor, I am under orders from Admiral Straume to escort you back to Centralia in the event of a failure of diplomacy-"
"Damn those orders, Mister Harcourt. Our mission is to secure the aid of the Ainu, and we are not leaving until we do exactly that. Centralia is in danger, Captain. Grave danger. It will not matter if he succeeds or fails in the Hallowlands; Zamorak will march on our home, and he is going to do it soon. We need the Ainu. Failure is simply not an option. We must at least speak with the rebels."
Captain Harcourt remained silent, gripping the rail with both hands. Lord Fernando said nothing, either, knowing that the Captain was thinking.
Finally, Harcourt spoke. "I will have to think on this," the Captain declared. "I do not like the prospect of disobeying Admiral Straume, but… Well, either way, we must first get out of this harbor. We get past the Ainu loyalists waiting for us out there, then I will consider your proposal."
Lord Fernando knew that he wouldn't get a better deal at the moment, so he decided to let things be, for now. The Praetor gave a quiet sigh and turned his gaze up towards the sea up ahead. The twin peaks of Iro and Oyo—the two mountains that formed the entrance to the harbor—grew larger and larger as the Silver Arrow sailed ever closer towards the pass in between them.
The next leg of his journey lay ahead. Considering the fact that he had been locked up in a cell less than two hours previously, Lord Fernando took a deep breath and felt a profound sense of freedom.
The sun poked its nose up in the east, shining down from behind the Silver Arrow, its light reflected back at the Praetor from the waves.
A wry grin tugged at the Praetor's mouth. He hadn't always been a politician. Once upon a time, he had served in the III Legion as a quartermaster. Though his had not been a combat role, he had still fought with a gladius to slay monsters as often as he fought with a pen to secure supplies for the men he was assigned to. He had spent too much time in the Forum, and the feeling of being back in the grit of things was…
The Praetor's grin grew into a full smile.
It was liberating.