Chapter 12: Blades in the Shadows

Wyndham, Later That Night

Guts walked up the spiral staircase, glancing through the windows where the moon shone through as he passed them, and wondered why Griffith was calling him here so late at night. The southeast tower of the palace grounds had become a spot that he'd liked to frequent. By King Adamar's request, the library at its top had been made open to Griffith and any Falcons that desired to study in it.

Daniel had talked about reading some when he was young, how it acted as something to entertain him. But simply sitting around and staring at sheets of paper with words on them couldn't be that interesting. Useful, especially for a commander like Griffith, but not exciting like swinging a sword was.

He entered the dim room, lit only by a few candles placed around the room, throwing lines of shadow across Griffith's form as he studied a book by the light of the candle that stood on his desk.

Griffith looked back at him, that slight, knowing smile of his seemingly ever-present even in the face of an attempted assassination. "Ah, good, Guts. My apologies for calling you up here so late. I wanted to make sure I could talk with you alone."

Guts' instincts gnawed at him to be alone in a room with someone unarmed. Even with it being someone he could trust such as his commander, he still hadn't shaken off the specter of that night now thankfully far in the past. "Can't help but wonder why," he said offhandedly.

"One moment. Let me finish this and I'll be with you shortly." Griffith wrote something on a piece of parchment as he looked between it and the book he was currently studying.

Guts waited by looking around the room at all the books held within. He wondered for a moment how much time and care someone, dozens or even hundreds of someones, took to write things down in these things. What had they decided was so important to remember? The kingdom's past? Great battles? Lessons to be taught to those who could read them?

His gaze returned to Griffith, to the book in front of him and the one resting on another table next to him. "With how often you've been up here, it wouldn't surprise me if you've gone and read all these," he said as he continued to look around. They seemed to go on and on, didn't they?

Griffith chuckled softly. "Many of them, yes. To be great, one has to do more than simply be skilled in battle. One has to be ready to learn in all different sorts of ways."

As Guts pondered how boring just sitting around and reading sounded, Griffith continued. "That said, most of what's here is rather light reading. Guides on cosmetics or cooking, the family histories and lineages and various nobles, illuminated manuscripts of minor events in the city stretching back decades, that sort of nonsense. There are some that are useful, though. History, tactics, chemistry, philosophy, and religion. The levers of changing a nation."

Griffith grinned slightly as he rose and searched for a book, pulling it off the shelf and opening it before he held it out in front of Guts. "And then there are things like this," he said as his grin widened into that boyish thing he so often sported.

Guts studied the pages in front of him, all seemingly composed of strangely drawn pictures of a man and a woman doing several different sorts of things together without any clothing at all. "Want to borrow it and see?" Griffith asked almost impishly.

After a moment's deliberation, Guts took the book and sat down with it, flipping through the pages. "So," he said after a moment, "I don't think you just called me up here to flip through some books with you. What do you want?"

Griffith hummed, pressing a stamp into some wax before he looked back over at Guts. "Oh, nothing terribly unfamiliar to you," he began, a somewhat intense look beginning to gleam in the man's eyes as he paused for a moment, Guts glancing over at him as he did.

"I want you to kill a man for me."

That drew Guts' full attention away from the book as he closed it and laid it on a shelf next to him. "Oh? Who?"

"Lord Julius of the White Dragons."

"That guy, then?" Guts said, recalling the angry noble that seemed to have a chip on his shoulder when it came to Griffith. "Why here? It'd be a lot easier in a battle."

"The reason is this," Griffith replied as he opened a drawer and pulled out the crossbow bolt that had come so close to killing him. "The bolt's head has been dipped in the extract of the Calabal bean, a highly efficient painkiller, and a rather rare poison if used in great amounts. Expensive enough that no ordinary cutthroat could get more than a drop or two."

Griffith set the bolt on the desk. "I've checked all of the city's doctors and alchemists, and only one carries it in any great supply. And furthermore, only one purchase of a vial was made recently. By a man formerly a member of the White Dragons."

"I paid off one of the maids in the castle to keep an eye and an ear on Lord Julius and the man in question. What she passed to me before I called for you was that Julius was in an uproar earlier today after the hunt. He was not quiet enough to escape her notice, even through the door. He intended to kill me then."

Griffith fell silent. "You are the first person to hear about this. And if all goes well, you will be the last. This is an assassination. Dirty work, and far different from the field of battle you're used to. You cannot fail, and you cannot let your face be seen."

It was silent for a moment before Guts stood. "Well, why are you asking me to do this? Judeau's far more stealthy than me, and he can throw a knife into a man's heart from 30 paces. Rickert's small and nimble. And Casca's loyal to you without question. Why not ask any of them?"

Griffith smiled slightly. "Because your blade will ensure that the job is done. And the work will send a message to those who are capable of reading it. And besides… you are willing to do whatever it takes to keep your friends, your soldiers, safe. This is the quickest way to ensure that he will have no chance to threaten them."

Griffith's brow arched, equally slightly. "Can I count on you to do this?"

Guts regarded the man before him. His commander. Sat there like a noble and asking for little more than a knife in the back of a man. It wasn't going to be the way he'd prefer to do it. It never would be, he hoped. "Come on, Griffith. Dancing around something like this isn't like what you usually do. Are you going to make that an order?" he asked, the last sentence somewhat quiet.

Griffith's smile widened ever so slightly, the expression not even touching the man's eyes. "Yes. Keep our Falcons safe, Guts. I trust you to do so."

. . .

Back in the barracks of the Falcons, Daniel strode into his, thankfully private, room, Anna following behind after he took a moment to change into something different and closed the door. Guts wasn't there, and he'd checked the roof on his way in from the armory. That worried him enough already as he made his way to his bags, and the several hidden pockets within them.

"What are you looking for?" Anna asked. "And what requires such urgency?"

"More likely than not, Griffith's called Guts away to have him kill Lord Julius." Daniel paused for a moment as he dug out a necklace that was composed of many flat connected rectangles with a single equally flat garnet in its center, and clasped it around his neck. It was an old work of his, one that would help to conceal him. "I have to at least stop him from making a terrible mistake."

"You intend to keep him from assassinating Lord Julius?" Anna asked, glancing at the door to ensure that they would not be disturbed.

"Hardly." Daniel scoffed softly. "Julius is, frankly, a pompous asshole who would rather see most of us dead before the king can laud us further. It wouldn't surprise me if he wants me dead in particular, though he doesn't know I'm the one who revealed his killer."

Daniel shook his head as he walked over to a window, opened it, and scanned around him. They were on the second floor, but next to a low wall that separated their building from the street. No one was out this late at night save for some guards in the distance.

He turned back to Anna. "No, I'm going to stop an entirely needless death and the mental wound it will create for Guts if he goes through with it. But I need to get there quickly, and I can't be identified. The swords in the armory will help with that. I'll grab one on my way over to Julius's manor."

"But the armory's a half-hour walk from here, and it's another hour to the manor in question in the other direction," Anna said after a moment of what Daniel suspected was some deliberation between Rhia and Nimira. "You might never make it."

She was right, he knew. Even with his advance knowledge, there was always the chance that some guards would stop him, or that the manor security wouldn't let him through. There was no time to concoct a plausible story as to why a Falcon would want to see the man that most visibly detested them.

But there were other ways. Ways and powers that he'd locked up, sworn to not use, to keep himself mostly sane. For the sake of Guts… for the sake of Julius' innocent child…

Daniel set his jaw, resigned to just this one strict time. Though with what was coming, he did not know if it would be the only time. "I have my ways, Anna. I'll be back quickly enough. Close the window behind me. If anyone asks, I'm on the roof and don't want to be disturbed."

He perched on the windowsill for a moment before jumping to the top of the wall, springing back and landing in the empty space between walls. He looked around to ensure that he was alone, then tapped on the garnet.

As the necklace activated and concealed his face, Daniel took a deep breath as he reached out to that part of his soul that he had thus far shied away from. The power reacted as it always had before, instantly bending to his will, and Daniel couldn't help but feel uneasy as the lines of power drew a Framework of nearly invisible starlight around him at how… natural it all felt after so long.

There was little time to think deeply about it, however, as he poured the power of his soul into the Expression of power that he'd made. And without a sound, he vanished from the spot.

. . .

Guts, a cloak draped over his form and his sword on his back, looked up at the massive, almost gaudy manor that housed his target. He remembered the map of the grounds that Griffith had given him to study, the routes that would take him past the few guards that the war with the Tudors could spare Julius.

Up over the wall on the west side of the entrance, waiting for the two guards walking atop it to pass. Down onto the chapel roof, laying low to ensure that he wouldn't be spotted, then across to an empty balcony on the west wing of the main house. Up the wall using the decorations by the balcony edge, and he was on the roof, looking around to ensure that he wouldn't be seen by any of the guards.

Then, he heard the clash of swords coming from beyond the other side of the roof, each strike breaking through the near-silence of the darkness. As he crested the peak of the roof and carefully made his way behind a wide chimney that smelled like it ran from the kitchen, he peeked out from behind it to look down on a balcony, light pouring out from the doors that led out to the balcony making the two figures dueling on it cast long shadows.

One was obviously Julius himself, striding forward and aggressively pressing down on his smaller opponent. He couldn't have been much more than a boy, and yet he still held his sword firmly, even as he stepped back from the attack. However afraid the kid was, he was obviously at least somewhat well-trained.

Even still, the kid tripped, falling to the hard floor beneath him as he panted.

"Get up!" Julius said, grabbing the kid by the shoulder of his shirt and dragging him up. "Come on! Surely you've paid attention to Captain Garlan as much as you have to your other studies. This is of the utmost importance!"

He pushed the kid away from him as he took up a ready stance. "Pick up your sword. The enemy won't give you a chance to rest."

The kid began to pick up his sword as another man, older than Julius, stepped forward. "Master Julius, perhaps it's time to retire…"

"Retire, Hassan?" Julius nearly spat the word back at the older man, who shied away. "When Adonis might well take up the fight against the Tudors? He's 15, just on the cusp of manhood. Someday, he'll lead the White Dragons when I have passed. He may even marry Princess Charlotte and be king of all of Midland. He must be ready. Or the world will trample over our house and leave it for dust."

He looked back at the boy Adonis. "That's the destiny of a son of royalty. Important in a way that normal men can never grasp."

A pause. "Come on. Get through my defenses at least once."

Guts watched as Adonis charged his father with a shout, sword raised high behind his head. 'You've got guts, kid. But when you're shorter than your opponent, that's going to be a dicey prospect.'

It ended as Guts expected it to, Julius parrying the wild chop with ease as he darted in with another attack, slicing shallowly through the boy's left arm and stepping back as he stumbled to his knees.

It was still for a moment, Hassan handing Julius a towel. The man considered it for a moment, then tossed it to Adonis, the towel landing on the boy's head. "Alright. That's enough for today. Don't cool off too much." he said, almost too quiet for Guts to hear as he strode back inside the house. "It'll make tomorrow's training harder."

Guts waited as Hassan and Adonis remained on the balcony, the older man approaching the boy. "Are you alright? I'll make sure your maid sees to that."

Adonis sighed. "It's never enough, is it?"

Hassan sighed. "Take heart, young man. He's done all he can since the countess died. With the war to fight, he's been stretched thin, especially in these past few days."

He paused for a moment, glancing at the doors before sighing quietly. "I do not say this to absolve him of his actions, but merely to explain them."

Guts couldn't help but see in the boy something of himself. All too easily now, he could see Gambino's face. His commander. The man that, after Daniel, he'd tried to impress for so long on the field of battle, but always came up short. The man he'd had no intention of killing that night.

'Damn it!' Guts shook his head slightly before knocking it against the chimney, trying almost to physically break loose the distracting thoughts from his brain. 'I can't get distracted now.'

He remembered the anger that he'd felt so often when Gambino had battered and berated him while Daniel was away. For what he'd done by sending Donovan to him. That anger focused him. Now, he was ready to kill this bastard who cared so little for his own son.

He waited a little longer as Hassan and Adonis soon went back into the mansion, then crept over to one of the high windows, peering in as he watched Hassan and Julius talking. Talking and talking and talking, Guts didn't care about what. Something stupid, probably.

Finally, Hassan left, and Guts quietly opened the window, slipping in as he heard a clay cup smash on the floor. It was silent for a moment, then he watched as Julius turned to look at the window. "Who left the…"

Then the man looked down as Guts fully stepped into the light, and his eyes went wide. "An intruder!"

He dashed towards a sword held by one of the statues, and Guts ran over to meet him, his blade coming off of his back as the cloak billowed from his speed, the hood coming off. Julius was quick. But he wasn't quick enough.

As Julius turned to face his opponent, his sword low to stab at Guts' unarmored body, the greatsword came down, cleaving through bone and muscle to bury itself into the man's chest.

The sword dropped from Julius' hands as he numbly reached out. "You…" he wheezed as he fell to his knees. "One of… Griffith's dogs…"

Then, with a last breath, the light went out from the man's eyes as he slumped forward, Guts taking a moment to pull free his blade to allow the body to hit the floor.

This… this was different. Killing a man in cold blood, so far from everything that he'd made his life on…

His heart pounded, and the sight of Julius lying in a pool of his own gore, bereft of armor or weapon, made Guts nauseous for a moment before he caught a flickering shadow from the corner of his narrowing vision.

He turned his head to see someone standing in the door, paused as they looked at the grizzly scene. "An intruder?" a voice called, muffled and distant to Guts' hearing.

'Damn it! I've been spotted!'

Instinct took over as he charged, the point of his sword forward like a lance as he saw the person stumble back out of the doorway.

As he passed the doorway, though, the figure right in front of him, he saw something flash across his vision, heard the ringing of steel meeting steel as he felt the push of his blade being diverted, slamming into the wall and just barely fitting under the arm of…

It was the kid. Adonis. Guts saw the terror, the anger in the boy's eyes. "You killed him," he whispered. "You killed my father. Damn you!"

Guts was transfixed, his head a mess of confused emotions and thoughts, before they both seemed to notice the blade that stopped Guts from running through Adonis. It wasn't like any sword he'd ever seen, the blade curving like a crescent moon as its outer edge remained pressed against the flat of his blade.

They looked at the person wielding it and found a man, or at least Guts thought it was a man, dressed in dark clothes, a cloak not unlike Guts' wrapped around him. But his head…

It was a swirling mass of lines that all passed through each other, the very act of moving through the air making a low hum.

Guts watched as the man… thing… whatever it was reached out for Adonis, the boy's eyes going wide. "What… what…"

"Sleep."

The single word the thing spoke was a harsh buzz, on the edge of unrecognizable, as its hand touched the boy's head. In an instant, the lights went out in his eyes too, dead eyes on a boy that should have been dead… on a boy that was like him, and yet innocent in all this…

'No. No, no, no! I'm not like that! I can't be like that!'

And yet, as the boy slumped over, he couldn't help but try to see if the boy was still breathing.

"He sleeps. Alive. And his memories of this night are altered. A mercy for him. And you."

Guts looked at the thing that had saved the boy, getting his cloak back over his head. "What the hell are you?" he whispered harshly.

"Right now? The least of your problems."

Guts' brow furled before he heard the clamor of guards racing up the stairs, shouting. They must have heard them. "Intruders! Intruders in the house!"

Guts readied himself as two guards raced toward them, swords drawn, but the thing stepped past him, grabbing the tip of its sword and stretching it before sweeping it out, the two guards pausing as the tip of the impossible sword scored a chestplate.

'Is this one of those things Rickert talked about during the hunt?' Guts managed to clearly think. Either way, whatever escape he could find down the stairs was gone, as more guards clogged up behind the first two.

Guts looked back at the office where Julius' body lay, and dashed back into it, keeping an eye on the creature as it continued to hold off the guards. If he could get back out the window, the buildings were all mostly lower than this one…

Then, as he began to turn toward the stairway that would get him to the still-open window, he heard the thing… well, from any other person it would have been a shout or a roar, but from the thing, it was an unnatural, monstrous sound that ripped through the air, one that made the men that were now hidden outside the door shout and scream in fright as he heard them flee for a moment.

He looked back and found the thing in the room with him. And even though he couldn't make out eyes, or anything that resembled a face, he somehow knew without a shred of uncertainty that it was looking at him.

Instinct kicked in, and Guts ran to the nearest exit, and out onto the balcony. He had to get away. Griffith wasn't going to get a favor like this ever again.

He paused as looked around him. Guards were already coming toward the stairs that flanked the balcony, and it was just far enough of a fall, 10 or 15 feet, that he might be piled onto before he could start moving.

'Well, time to pick a staircase and go.' he thought as he began to turn, readying his sword.

A stray crossbow bolt jolted him as it slammed into his arm, forcing him to start moving toward the staircase that was now on his left.

Before he could get far, however, his eyes went wide as he saw the creature rushing at him, low and fast. Before he could even react, he found himself caught in a bearhug, lifted by the somewhat smaller creature as it ran toward the corner of the balcony, toward that fall.

'Damn it!' he thought, desperately slamming the pommel of his sword into the creature's head again and again, a hollow ringing sound tolling with every strike. 'We're both going to die because of you!'

Then, the creature jumped, carrying him with it up over the rail and into the air. Guts gripped his sword tightly to try not to lose it, the world tilting wildly as they began to fall. For a moment, it almost seemed to slow down, the blur of the world resolving into the sight of soldiers' shocked faces as they witnessed the sight.

Then, a deep tearing sound, like the ripping of some massive banner, preceded Guts and the creature falling through… the night sky. It seemed to surround them, envelop them as Guts lost all sense of weight and direction for a few terrifying moments. It was utterly unreal, and all thought seemed to still as he took in the sight that seemed to expand into forever.

Then, another tear preceded them landing… somewhere dark. Somewhere outside. As the thing got up off him, he sat up and looked around. They were in a forest, the city not too far in the distance. They'd… gone so far. 'What was that? Magic?'

His eyes adjusted in the darkness and he found that the creature had not left him. It stared at him, almost appearing… indecisive.

"So what now?" Guts growled as he staggered to his feet. "You bring me all the way out here for what? So you can take a shot at me yourself?"

"No." the creature kept its weapon down. "I came to save you from making a terrible mistake. The boy was innocent. You don't need that guilt or that sort of blood on your hands."

It paused for a moment. "No one does," it said quietly.

The boy… Adonis… it was right. He was ready to kill that boy. Drive his sword through his heart just like he'd done with Gambino. 'No. No!' he swore again. 'I'm not like him! I can't be like him!'

It was silent for a moment before Guts swayed, leaning on his sword like a crutch as he pulled the crossbow bolt from his arm. "Damn…" he muttered.

"Move quickly." the creature said. "Your friends will tend to your wounds."

It turned, and as it turned, it vanished.

His heart began to pound, driving more blood from him as he clutched at his wound and stumbled forward. His head felt like it was spinning, and yet he could still walk straight for now. When had his breathing gotten so loud? When had everything gotten so loud?

He stopped for a moment, going to a knee as his vision swam. He squeezed his eyes shut. And the vision came.

He swung his sword, a child wielding something far greater than he should have had, against an adult. One moment it was Gambino, the commander he'd tried to make proud. Another, and it was Daniel, the father that he cherished. So many hours, so much sweat and blood, to make sure that he met their expectations… to prove that his life was not a waste, as he'd heard in whispers…

Then, it appeared from the shadows. Monstrous. Wielding a sword that was taller than both of them. The adult, Gambino, Daniel, Julius… Julius? They all turned, and it did not matter who it was. The horned beast sent his head flying with barely any effort, an almost bored swing.

"No!" Guts heard his voice, but he also heard the boy. Adonis. He didn't know if he was charging or if he was simply running. "Stop! Stop it!"

The massive, hooked sword came back and then speared the boy through. And finally, the monster began to breathe as it looked down at the body of the boy. It reached for its face as it breathed, almost like a slow, halting laughter. Then, the hand slowly began to drop, and where the muzzle of that beast Zodd should have been… was his own.

And behind it, wings of white stretched up and away. The wings of a Falcon.

Griffith.

Griffith.

Guts' eyes snapped open, and he pulled himself to his feet with a mighty effort. How long had he been out? It hadn't been terribly long. Right?

He shook his head slightly as he began his slow walk toward the city again. Griffith. He needed to find Griffith. He could answer this. He could answer this. He could make this make sense. He was his commander, after all. He'd given the order. He could explain why he felt like this.

Right?

. . .

Daniel flashed back into an empty room, the 'mask' that covered his head fading away as he fumbled for a moment in taking the necklace off. He felt… sick. All that power at his fingertips again, singing to him, and he still chose to leave Guts behind.

'I had to.' he rationalized as he changed his clothing, hiding it away again for later use. 'Healing him there would have tipped my hand, made me recognizable. For now, it has to remain a secret.'

But it felt so good, to save the boy's life. To save Guts' life like that. Surely he could relax a little. The road had been long and hard, and the past, that god that he'd thrown away, was so far behind him. He could…

'Slip back into what I was?' Daniel shook his head. 'Become the very thing I'm trying to keep everyone safe from? No better than the Godhand? No. That power is a curse, no matter how tempting or seemingly helpful. Even this was dangerous.'

Daniel finished dressing, then paused for a moment as he caught his breath, tried to compose himself. He hadn't left Guts too far away, he didn't think. He'd be here soon.

Finally, he stepped out the door into the hallway. It was empty, and the main hall in the distance was alive with sound. Standing at the entryway into the hall, Anna leaned against a wall, looking over at him with no small amount of worry. "Is Guts safe? Did you stop him from making the mistake?" Rhia asked quietly.

"Yes." Daniel was equally quiet. "Though I don't know if I spared him from the less obvious wounds. Or if I didn't make a mistake myself in the first place."

They went down towards the main hall, a dinner going on at the moment. Daniel wasn't exactly in the mood for eating, but he waved at a few of the other Raider commanding officers as he went to get a seat next to the commanders at their table.

"There you are." Corkus was the first to notice them and the first to say anything about it, drawing the attention of the others. "Were you on the roof, and is Guts stuck up there?"

Daniel sighed and smiled slightly as he took a seat next to Casca. "Yes, and no. Guts had something Griffith asked him to do. He didn't say when he'd be back."

"I wonder if it has something to do with that dinner party that the princess put on tonight," Judeau said, toying with his stew for a moment.

Corkus scoffed. "As if! I don't think Guts would be caught dead attending one of those. Griffith, though, if he wants to take advantage of the perks of being a knighted commander… who am I to say?"

The man sighed heavily as he rolled his eyes. "Even if Guts wasn't at that whole shindig though, at least he could have showed up to lead in joint practice with Casca's battalion."

Casca shook her head. "It's ridiculous, really. He spends so much time swinging that sword of his that it almost seems he can't be bothered by his own troops."

She looked over at Daniel. "How do you put up with this so often?"

Before Daniel could reply, he saw the front door opening from the corner of his eye, and looked up to see Guts, bloodied and tired, standing within. Casca followed his gaze, then shook her head as she stood from the table and walked over towards Guts.

"Where have you been?" she said sternly as she approached, Daniel following quietly after. "You've missed a good portion of the troop exercises today! Gaston had to lead out in your place."

She shook her head. "And what has you looking so terrible? Did you fall into the moat?"

Guts, who had simply scanned the hall with blank, almost empty eyes, turned his gaze to Casca. "Griffith," he said weakly. "Where is Griffith?"

Casca frowned. "He's at a dinner party hosted by the princess at Primrose Hall. He should be-"

"Alright." Guts turned without another word and began to walk out the door.

"Now wait a minute!" Casca began. "I wasn't finished…"

She paused as she saw the wound in Guts' arm. "Was that a-" she began as she looked over at Daniel.

She found Daniel going around her, following Guts out the door.

"What's up with Guts?" Rickert, who had followed behind Daniel and Judeau asked.

She looked back out into the night and wondered that herself.

. . .

Primrose Hall. That's where Griffith was.

Guts' mind could not focus on anything but that. The words that he heard, if they were words at all, were little more than a muted rumble. He knew, somewhat, that someone walked beside him, but it didn't matter who. All that mattered was that Griffith could make sense of this.

There, through a hallway of trees, up a long staircase, and past a massive fountain in its courtyard, sat the imposing, brilliant hall. He climbed the stairs as quickly as he could. That it felt slow, and the steps felt like they stretched into eternity, was of little consequence to him.

Then, he saw him. Griffith, dressed in robes that made him seem little different from the nobleman that he'd told Guts to kill.

Then, he paused, as the princess walked out with him. He was far enough away that neither of them noticed him, but he could not tear his gaze away as he overheard their conversation.

The princess sighed quietly. "All this dancing makes me so tired," she said wearily.

Griffith wasted no time in taking off his cloak and placing it on the wall of the fountain. "Please, take a seat," he said.

The princess, clearly somewhat surprised, took a moment before she walked over and sat on the proffered seat, nodding with a slight, but happy smile. "Thank you."

Guts shook his head, began to walk forward again. Then, he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked back and found Daniel standing beside him, Casca a little ways behind. "Wait, Guts," Daniel said quietly. "Let Griffith speak his piece to the princess."

Casca stepped forward, shaking her head. "Here, let me borrow this."

She slipped his knife from its sheath, slicing a strip from his cloak and beginning to dress the wound on his arm.

Guts clenched his jaw, then turned back to watch as Griffith began. "I must wonder at how in keeping this is, the host stealing away with a guest such as I."

"Well… I must admit I don't care much for these parties." the princess said hesitantly. "Nor really any other kind of party. They're such a bother to me."

She shook her head. "I mean, this isn't even my party at all. Simply a show put on by my father to distract the nobles from the more dreadful thoughts of the war they sometimes dare to whisper of."

"If we have to keep holding parties such as this," she continued after a moment, "it would be all the better to end the war quickly."

She bowed her head. "Why must men take such delight in shedding blood?"

"Your Highness asked that question at the hunt," Griffith said. "It may be true, that men possess such a savage side to them. It's part of what keeps us alive."

"Such savagery, however, is merely a tool, used to secure and protect what one finds precious when it is in danger." he paused for a moment. "It can be easily twisted to selfish ends, though…"

"What one finds precious." the princess repeated, smiling slightly. "Like… family, or a beloved suitor?"

"Yes, there are some like that." Griffith nodded. "But for a man, perhaps there must be one thing that is secured before all else."

"What would it be, then?" the princess asked. "Lands? Troops? You have those as well."

Griffith smiled and shook his head slightly. "No. It must be something he obtains for himself. Something no one else can take from him or fully give."

"A dream."

'A dream?' Guts was perplexed. What did he mean by something like that? Guts had always dreaded dreaming, what awaited him when he closed his eyes to sleep.

"A dream of mastering the world around him," Griffith said. "A dream of mastering himself, or the blade. Such dreams sometimes take lifetimes to achieve. And some, like storms, swallow up the dreams of those around them."

"It matters not the social status, the upbringing, the background. Whether it suits them or not, people yearn to pursue a dream. Sustained by it, hurt by it, killed by it, revived by it. Even after the dream is gone, abandoned or lost, it smolders in the heart of those it leaves behind, lasting even sometimes until death."

Griffith looked up at the night sky, glittering with stars. "I feel it is something every man should do once. Imagine themselves in the service of that god 'Dream'."

The words left Guts staring in awe at the man. It almost felt like he'd given Guts his answer without even speaking to him. 'It's all for his dream, isn't it? That's part of why he wanted me to do it. That's part of why he trusted me to do it.'

Then, Griffith continued. "To simply be born, and simply live for no better reason than that… I cannot abide such a life."

The words struck Guts to his heart, a lance of guilt feeling deeper almost than the wound in his arm. Daniel had given him direction, surely. He'd given him advice and stability. But he couldn't give him a dream, could he?

Griffith paused, then looked over at the princess bashfully. "Oh, forgive me. I've chattered on so. Such a thing must sound dreadfully boring to a lady such as yourself."

"No, no!" the princess said, then hesitated as she looked away. "It's just… this is the first time I've ever spoken so openly with a man."

She looked back at the fountain, down into the water. "Lord Griffith… you are unlike any man I've ever known. When I first laid eyes on you, I presumed you were some young aristocrat, little different from the others. Even then, you seemed so magnificent for one so young. When I heard that you were common-born, it intrigued me further. It seemed so difficult to believe. And now… I know that you are far more noble than anyone in that hall behind us."

"But even then," she continued, "at the hunt, when you plucked a leaf and taught me how to make music from it, it seemed you were simply a carefree village boy, all too used to playing in the woods…"

"And now," she said as she looked up at him, "you speak to me almost like you're quoting an ancient philosopher."

She shook her head slightly. "You truly are a wondrous person."

Guts glanced over at Casca, something that felt like a mighty effort, and found her looking away, an odd look in her eyes and her fist clenched.

"I imagine that your friends too, " the princess began again, drawing Guts' attention back, "must have been attracted by that wonder, to come as far as they have with you."

Griffith nodded slowly. "They are excellent troops, of that there is no doubt. We have survived battle time and time again, and many of them have laid down their lives for the sake of my dream. All of them are valuable to me."

"However… to me, a friend is something greater."

Guts felt that shock again, muted as if the lance from before had merely grazed him, as Griffith explained himself. "That, to me, is someone who would never simply depend on another's dream. Who would not be driven like cattle, but drive forward themselves in determining their reason for living."

"Someone who, if one threatened that dream, even if that one were myself, would oppose them, body and soul."

He looked out into the night, out at the moon that hung over them.

"What I think a friend is, Charlotte, is one who is my equal."

In that moment, Griffith seemed to stand utterly alone, the rest of the world falling away from Guts as he beheld the surety, the confidence, the utter glory that seemed to hang about his commander. It was almost like that void he'd seen tonight, utterly vast and empty, stretched between them.

Then, the princess, looking up at Griffith, broke the spell as she spoke again. "Such confidence in your convictions. That's quite a standard to hold your friends to."

"Perhaps so." Griffith stepped onto the low wall of the fountain, ambling over its top as he continued. "But that confidence is how I have achieved everything thus far."

He smiled slightly. "It carried me through days where I didn't even have a crust of bread. All the way here…"

He paused as he turned and bowed, his face drawing close to hers. "To a place where I can speak in confidence to you, the princess of a whole kingdom."

It was silent for another moment, the noise of the party a distant thing, Guts noticing it as much as he noticed Casca turning away from the sight. It did not mask the princess's next words. "What… is your dream?"

Before Griffith could reply, a servant's voice rang out from behind them. "My Lady!"

The princess stood, Griffith hopping off the fountain as they walked around it. "What is it?" the princess asked.

"Lord Julius! He's been murdered!"

A gasp from the princess was lost in the servant's words as she continued. "Some cruel assassin snuck into the manor and nearly butchered him! Young Lord Adonis is just barely waking up from his own brush with the monster that intervened."

"A monster?" the princess said incredulously.

Whatever else was said didn't matter at all to Guts as he turned and began to walk away.

. . .

Daniel watched as Guts began to walk away, Casca beginning to turn to look at Guts before pausing. "Wait a minute. Where was he?" she asked Daniel quietly.

Daniel was silent on the matter. It was for Guts to reveal. He looked back up, and imagined that wicked smile that Griffith could have, interrupted by talk of the 'monster' that several guards had seen disappear with the 'assassin'.

'A monster…' Daniel mused as he turned away, following after Guts. 'Is that how they describe me?'

'How reductive.'