A/N: It's official now, chapter 53 will be the last chapter but there will be an epilogue after that. It feels kind of weird to be so close to the end now after I wrote this for more than 5 months now. But we're not done yet so here we go, next chapter.
There was a thick purplish bruise under his right eye, his face was dirty and his hair hung down in a tangled mess, matted with blood. Yet his eyes remained clear and calm under all the dirt. I wondered what he could have been thinking, two of his men had been killed, another was seriously injured and he himself didn't look that well either. He must have been aware that he wouldn't be greeted with a warm welcome. Maybe he simply didn't expect a small army to show up.
But what if he only 'surrendered' because of that small army, what if this truly was all a ruse and his true intention had been harmful ones. This was about to get very complicated.
Jan stood back a bit to leave us some space but he kept his eyes on the bound up soldiers in case anyone tried something funny. Mathias leaned forward, resting his weight on the crutches to get a better look at the tied up blonde in front of him, Berwald and I stood silently at his flanks, each absorbed in his own thoughts.
I didn't really know what to say, there were many things I wanted to ask but somehow it was hard to find the correct words and so I just stayed silent, watching and waiting. It was Mathias who first spoke up. "What do you want?"
Ludwig moved his gaze from Mathias to Berwald, ignoring the former's question completely. "I'm glad that you're better now." His voice was rasp and a little strained but still a tiny glimpse of sincerity was noticeable. Berwald grunted something incorrigible in reply and Ludwig turned back to Mathias.
"I know this is hard to believe but I have come here to offer you my assistance." Again the look in Ludwig's eyes was as sincere as the tone of his voice, I could not detect the hint of a lie, which either meant he was honest or just a terrible good liar. "That really is hard to believe." I said slowly as I drifted my gaze over Ludwig's companions. The two men that were bound next to him seemed uncomfortable, not only from the position but also from the situation. One had his eyes cast down; the other looked at some point on the wall behind us. I wondered if they even wanted to be here.
"Why?" Mathias asked and shifted his weight. I could tell that standing on one leg was getting strenuous; his arms weren't used to supporting so much weight constantly. Ludwig noticed it too and threw a curious glance at Mathias' leg. "Maybe we should change locations for that." He suggested, "This is not the most pleasant place to be."
I could hear Jan fidget behind us; he didn't like the prospect of Ludwig and his men roaming about free, not at all. And I was sure that he was about to say something but Mathias beat him to it. "Fine, but we will keep you in chains." His voice was calm and laced with an authority I had never before heard on him. He almost sounded like the Lord he one day would become. Completely out of nowhere I remembered the thoughts I had on our horse trip, and for a moment I had to fight a blush. I wanted Mathias to use this voice on me while I was kneeling before him, gagged and bound and do everything he ordered me-
Okay stop now.
This was going too far.
I mentally slapped myself, how could I think of something like that in a situation like this? What was wrong with me? I had never been the sexual type; I had never spent so much time simply thinking about sex and imagining weird scenarios, and as much pleasant pastime that could provide, this was simply not the right time for it. There was seriously something wrong with me.
I shook the odd feeling and focused again on the things at hand. Jan had of course protested but Mathias' words were final and so he begrudgingly followed. It was in a way amazing how an experienced military officer was forced to obey orders from someone like Mathias, based solely on social differences. What a strange world.
Jan ordered a few of his men to bring the injured soldier into an unoccupied room, where James would later look after him and treat him as best as possible. The other three were brought up into another empty room where they were allowed to sit down comfortably on a chair before they were tied up again. The room was also big enough to house our entire group this time so that everyone could listen to the explanation Ludwig was about to give.
"So?" Mathias asked, once everyone had settled down again. It was a bit weird to be honest, a bunch of people stuffed into a room to question one soldier about his motives. The whole situation was surreal. Why did those weird things always happen to me?
Ludwig sighed; a look of exhaustion suddenly took hold of his features. One of his men, the one who had stared at the wall, shuffled his feet and for a moment he seemed like he was going to say something, but then he slumped down again, resuming his mindless staring. I couldn't get a good look at Ludwig's men in the dark cellar; it was only now that I took notice how different they were from their leader.
The one that had attempted to speak could have easily switched his soldier's clothing with fine silk garments and passed for the noble, without all the dirt on his face of course. He had a somewhat sophisticated look but otherwise was rather plain aside from his unusual violet colored eyes. He was almost the exact opposite of Ludwig whose every muscle screamed soldier at my, he seemed far too fragile to be on a battlefield, but I knew of course that appearances could be very misleading. And he had a similar hair curl sticking out of his tousled hair, just like me.
The other one was the smallest, even though that was kind of hard to tell from their sitting position. But despite his height he seemed the fiercest of the three, there was something almost feral in his eyes and the effect was enhanced by the bloody splotches on his clothes. But there was something else that put me off, I just couldn't name it, something seemed very strange about this person.
However before I could determine what it was, my thoughts were interrupted by Ludwig's voice. "The short answer would be because of my brother, the long answer however is much more complicated and intricate." He stopped for a moment to gather his thoughts; the silence was filled though with the snort of the smallest of the three soldiers. "How come that every time we are tied up it is because of Gilbert?" He almost sounded contemptuous but I was more intrigued by the name he had said. Gilbert? That Gilbert? So Ludwig had dreamed of his brother while he had cuddled with me. Somehow that was even more disturbing.
And just like with his appearance the voice of the man also seemed a bit off. But now the third, the one with the curl spoke up and his voice sounded exactly like the dignified noble he could have easily passed for. "Because Gilbert is trouble on two feet." He complained, albeit I sensed a hint of affection in his words.
"Don't listen to Ludwig." The one with the pony tail said, our language sounded foreign and harsh from his lips, but I understood him well enough. "It is really a pretty easy story. Gilbert got captured, Gilbert is too awesome for ransom and now Gilbert is best buddies with our enemies, or maybe we should say friends now? God this is far more complicated than the actual story." I could literally see a vein twitch on Ludwig's forehead and it didn't take much to see Ludwig on a drill ground yelling at poor recruits with that exact vein almost popping out of his head.
"Eli…" Ludwig said with a warning undertone, which seemed to shut up Eli, at least temporarily. "You have to admit though that Eli definitely has a point." The second soldier interjected before Ludwig could resume his story, his accent was almost nonexistent and he spoke with some sort of noble refinement. "Roderich, please, not you too." The vein had stopped throbbing, now Ludwig appeared to be more tired than angry, it almost seemed as if this was a regular occurrence within their group.
Poor Ludwig, wasn't he supposed to be the one in charge?
"Okay so let me get this straight." Arthur tried to cut the whole bickering short, "Your brother," he indicated his head towards Ludwig, "got captured… by who exactly if I might ask? As far as I know we were not at war until recently." Now that he said it I realized that he had indeed a point. But hadn't Ludwig said something of the likes to Berwald, about how he had been in a similar situation than we were? So maybe he was referring to his captured brother, but who had captured him?
Eli made an attempt to answer but Ludwig cut him to it. "We're not exactly sure. We were in your lands already when it happened, one day he went off into the woods to relieve himself and when he didn't return we searched for him but all we found were traces of a fight and his necklace that must have torn during the confrontation."
I didn't miss the look of pain on Ludwig's features; he didn't take the disappearance of his brother well at all. I cast a glance sideways to my brother. The thought of him disappearing one day, carried off by who knows who was outright terrifying. I felt the sudden urge to pull Emil into a tight embrace but I fought it off, now was not the right moment. But I decided to give Emil that hug later. I should hug him far more often.
"We didn't hear anything from him for a long time; I was close to thinking he was dead…" Ludwig's voice trailed off and for a moment I was sure that there was a moist glimmer in his eyes but he pulled himself together and continued: "Then we got a message from him, he has this bird that keeps following him and he used it to send us a message. That was we could be sure that it was really from him."
"Yeah," Eli said dryly, "I still wonder how it found us. It even waited dutifully for us to formulate an answer. I swear one day I will get behind Gilbert's attraction to birds it is too uncanny to be anything natural." Roderich only nodded in agreement, even though he didn't seem so much interested in Gilbert's bird secrets.
"The message said that he was well and that he decided to fight for your side from now on." Ludwig continued, ignoring his companions' comments. I didn't miss a certain tenseness though, his eyes stared straight ahead as if the subject was still difficult for him. Ludwig had always given off the feeling of being a soldier down to his very core, he would never think of betraying orders and still, here he was, forfeiting his country for his brother.
While the other two kept some sort of lighthearted façade to cope with the gravity of their situation, Ludwig silently suffered, trying hard not to show how upset he truly was. Yet there was no doubt in his eyes, no wavering, no matter how hard it was for him he wouldn't abandon his brother and I couldn't help but to respect him for that.
It was at this point that I was finally convinced that this all was not some kind of elaborate plan to infiltrate us. Especially not after Ludwig let Berwald go, why would he go to such great lengths to get us after he had let us purposely slip through his hands.
"I wasn't sure at first what to do but after I had let you go." He looked at Berwald pointedly, "My status inside the army was rocky at best and I had some doubts about the way they were handling things even before that. I am a soldier and it should never, under any circumstances ever, be the duty of a soldier to kill civilians." Ludwig's face twisted into a mask of disgust and a shadow appeared in his eyes.
Suddenly I remembered the smoke and the smell of burning flesh, the fear that laced the air and the terror that guided every step. The streets illuminated by the inferno that consumed everything in its path and over all the endless patter of the rain that did nothing to ease the burning. Sometimes in my dreams in the darkest hour of the night I could still heart the screaming, but thankfully I was spared the sight.
Eli was pale and looked slightly sick but his wave was firm as he spoke. "You were just following orders." He tried to move closer to Ludwig to provide some sort of comfort but the ropes that bound him to the chair prevented any contact. Ludwig frowned and opened his mouth to say something but he closed it again without uttering a single word.
"It is like this." Roderich picked up the story where Ludwig had left off, "Don't get me wrong, we are no traitors at heart, we are and will always be Orushians, but for the time being we can no longer commit to a cause that we all feel is wrong. And as stupid as he may be at times, Gilbert is a soldier and knows what he's doing, He wouldn't abandon his homeland on a whim, no I'm sure he had his reasons."
For a moment no one said word, everyone just let sink in what they just had heard. More than Ludwig's longwinded explanation, it were Roderich's words that conveyed their intentions. It was Mathias who once again broke the silence. "Jan, untie them." He said softly but his tone nonetheless demanded obedience. And with a deep sigh Jan stepped forward and cut through the ropes that bound his prisoners.
There were many questions left but for now everyone felt that these three people were trustworthy, each and every one could relate to their story. I would go to the end of the world for my brother and maybe even farther for Mathias. And I knew for sure that the others felt similar in some way. We were born in different countries, our cultures were different and we even spoke a different language but in one thing we were all the same, we would do everything for the one we loved.
"What about the other one?" Tino asked as the three rubbed their wrists to get the feeling back in their hands. "The wounded one?" Ludwig slumped back in his chair and rubbed his eyes; Eli and Roderich exchanged uneasy glances but stayed quiet for their leader to explain. "That is quite… unfortunate." Ludwig finally said after he had realized that rubbing his eyes wouldn't make the harsh reality go away.
"You see we couldn't just leave like that, that would have been rather suspicious." Ludwig started to explain. "We claimed we had evidence that a group of merchants would pass by the area in a few days and we volunteered to stay behind so that we could attack them. Our plan was then to manipulate the scene, making it look as if a battle had taken place and that we had been either killed or captured. But unfortunately they sent three other soldiers with us and so we had to adapt our plans." He looked over to Eli who had begun to excessively stretch his tired joints and let out a contented sigh once he was done.
"We had to fool the other to think that we had missed the caravan. We actually wanted to send them back while we followed them but they insisted on coming and so we had to continue with our little story." Eli continued while he rotated his shoulders until a popping sound satisfied him. The action caused Roderich to wrinkle his nose.
"To make a long story short, believe me it is boring, we had a plan of getting rid of them but before we could do that your soldiers surprised us. They fought back, that's why they got killed, while we surrendered immediately." Ludwig looked unhappy at Eli's words but he didn't object to them. "I wish there had been another way." Eli mused, "But now there is no helping it. Would you mind getting us a change of clothes and maybe a bit of water?" He looked with disdain at all the dirt marks on his clothes and tried to rub of a dark spot on his hand.
"Of course." Mathias said and with another deep sigh Jan got up to inform James of the newly needed accommodations, without even waiting for Mathias to give him the order to. "Are you injured?" Arthur asked kindly, offering his help in case anyone needed some treatment. Eli smiled brightly, giving his face an almost beautiful look that was so unfitting for a ruthless soldier. "No I'm fine, but I figure a few introductions would be nice?"
"That's right." Ludwig grumbled, "I know only few of you." For some reason that made me laugh and as the others looked at me in puzzlement I only had to laugh harder. The situation was just too absurd. "Well, knowing is a bit exaggerated." I was still snickering and had to take a few deep breaths to calm myself. "Sorry, I guess I'm not used to these kinds of situations." My explanation did nothing to erase the confused expressions around me but I just shrugged, there was no way in hell I would ever tell anyone about the far to intimate way I got to know Ludwig, involuntarily of course.
The matter was dropped when Jan returned with Hannah in tow who resolutely took control over the situation as she led the three away towards a bit more to eat, new clothes and a bath. I bet James never had this much interesting guests in his house before. The others followed, explaining on the way who was who and I couldn't shake the feeling that afterwards they would have a very twisted idea of some of our personalities.
Only Mathias and I stayed behind and we watched as the others left, only Ludwig stopped before he left the room and turned around one more time. "He survived." He said with a glance towards Mathias, before he closed the door behind him. I didn't know for a moment what he was talking about but then I saw the look of immense relief on Mathias' face, followed by a few tears that formed in his eyes.
And then with a smile that threatened to split his face Mathias pulled me in a bone crushing embrace and twirled me around, balancing on only one foot. "He's alive." He whispered, his voice over spilling with joy. "I'm not a murderer."
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