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Argeus the Paladin -> RE: =NaNoWriMo= Flight of the Black Eagle (11/29/2011 9:59:43)
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Chapter 10
Clan Business
“Now, I guess you still owe me those answers.”
Wladislaw’s return to the original topic was as sudden as his tone was tactless, as the girl’s twitching eyes could testify. She quickly gathered herself, however. After all, it went without saying that he did not come there for some free medical treatment and some exchange of pleasantries.
“You’re an exacting kind of guy, don’t you know that?” she broke out a tiny giggle, before returning to a more serious turn of phrase. “What do you want to know?”
“What were those demons doing in the hold?” Wladislaw said, his face completely serious as he uttered each word. “If there is a traitor among the garrisons, I want his name.”
Yukiko stared at the Polish soldier without blinking, as though trying to find out whether he was joking or just plain ignorant. Wladislaw’s persisting serious, no-nonsense look, unfortunately, implied very much the latter.
“If I told you there had been no funny business threatening any of us that night,” Yukiko answered calmly, “would you believe me?”
Wladislaw was taken slightly aback. There was no reason for him to say yes, both from a logical and from a cautious point of view. Yet Yukiko’s tone and expression hinted nothing of treachery or deceit. That seemingly obvious contradiction caused the Polish soldier’s face to twitch confusedly.
“I want some further explanation before I can say anything about that,” he finally said, picking the most neutral answer he could muster. “The fact remained that some enemies were within the castle walls and…”
“Not exactly,” Yukiko retorted, interrupting his sentence. “Those Oni… weren’t our enemies.”
Whatever confusion Wladislaw had had a moment ago erupted into full-blown disbelief. He stared at her with the most inquisitive look available to him, his blood-red pupils locking onto hers, his forehead wrinkling as his senses strained to detect the smallest sign of lies from her.
“Nice try, young lady,” he said, his voice raised threateningly, just barely shy from being openly hostile, “but I am no fool, I’m afraid. Try a little harder next time if you want to conjure a convincing lie.”
“But… but I wasn’t lying! That’s just how it is!”
“Prove it,” Wladislaw said, as though commanding. “Or it’s off to the Colonel with you and your lies.”
The girl’s reaction to his order was a curious one. Her gaze remained innocent and truthful, but at the same time she was clearly hesitating. The room was slightly cold at that time, yet her forehead was dripping with sweat. She muttered something inaudible under her breath as she fidgeted with one of the figurines on the table nervously, like a pupil standing before the whole class with all eyes on her, having just been confronted with a question she had not prepared for. Whatever she would need to reveal to make him believe her, it would seem, would also reveal something completely unrelated that she did not want him to know.
Finally, she wiped the sweat off her forehead with her sleeve, slowly lifting her head at the Sergeant, having chosen the lesser of the two evils. the look in her eyes that of a gossipy girl about to divulge to a best friend another best friend’s secret, hoping ever so vainly that said secret would be kept safe while it almost invariably never would be. The analogy went on so far as to the actual words she uttered.
“If I told you what I know,” she said pleadingly, “would you promise to keep it a secret?”
“Depends,” Wladislaw said coldly. “You can’t make me promise to keep a secret of some details that could very well save lives – my comrades’ lives.”
Again the girl hesitated, keeping her neck bent as the fidgeting continued. It became obvious that Wladislaw was proving to be far less reasonable than she had thought he was. Once again she weighted her stake, momentarily not knowing what is better.
“I don’t have all day, you know,” Wladislaw reminded. “You could tell me what you know right now, or I’d have to do my sworn soldierly duty…”
Then he placed his right hand on the table, as though preparing to stand up and leave. Such bluff – if it was intentional, that is – finally broke the stranglehold. Almost at once Yukiko reached out and grabbed his hand. Or rather, what she thought she was doing. Wladislaw’s gloved hand was much, much larger than her tiny palms, creating a moderately humorous sight for his perusal.
“Wait, hold on!” she cried out. “Don’t go!”
“Then go ahead and tell me what I need to know,” Wladislaw said, his voice raised mercilessly, proving that he was indeed running out of patience.
The girl was about to take another pause when she realized that Wladislaw was not going to put up with that fiasco much longer.
“Alright,” she finally said, her voice suddenly shrunken into a quiet mutter barely audible, as though she did not really intend him to hear the last part in the first place. “But… please don’t tell anyone. If you can help it, of course.”
Taking a deep breath followed by a large swallow to calm herself down, she began to speak.
“Those demons… they were nothing more than – if you will – mercenaries,” she said, “for lack of better words.”
Wladislaw rolled his eyes. The disbelief in his general expression was still there, though enough of it had disappeared for him to gain a nominal amount of trust in her words. Barely enough to maintain the negotiation, that was.
“How so?” he asked, his voice now a fine mix of both said disbelief and a particular, conductive degree of professional intrigue. “Last time I checked, you don’t go around negotiating with demons, much less trying to recruit them. Not if you are sane, at the very least.”
“It’s… sort of hard to explain to an outlander like you,” Yukiko said. “Among the circle of priests and shrine maidens here, demons and spirits are just part of the many denizens of the world who can be tamed and coaxed into doing their biddings as well as being destroyed or exorcized. The Oni are just the easiest to be so manipulated as such.”
Wladislaw remained silent as he withdrew into a pondering posture when he realized exactly how hypocritical his last question was. Using being from other races – sometimes other planes of existence or some other metaphysical drivels along those lines – to do their bidding had been the norm in the Holy Komnenian Empire since the humble beginning of King Pergamonios I two millennia prior. The backbone of their entire economy had lay in the hands of the humble Hemoheilotai, for instance. Those human serfs, having sworn their blood and labor to said nobles in exchange for protection against pretty much everything from other supernatural factions’ encroachment to global financial downturns, were more indispensable to the Empire’s existence than half of the nobility.
That resonance did not mean Wladislaw had run out of questions, however.
“The fact remains,” he said, “that on our very first day here we were attacked by the same demons. How would you explain that?”
“Like I said,” Yukiko answered, “the Oni are quite easy to muster and rile up to do one’s bidding. They are the first choice for our – mostly my father’s – enemies because of that.”
She took a deep breath to ease her tension before continuing.
“But that doesn’t mean we can’t hire a few when we want to,” she said. “The three Oni you saw the other day were rented wholesale… by my father.”
Wladislaw’s eyelids stretched as far as it humanly could as he stared at the girl, making no attempt to conceal his astonishment.
“Say that again?” he said. “So let me get this straight – Lord Mitsumaru, in all his infinite wisdom, hired some mercenary demons to beat his daughter up?”
His mouth twisted and twitched as he looked at her for a few before speaking up a few.
“I hope you do realize how ridiculous this sounds, don’t you?”
His doubting words and expression was quickly doused when he took another glance at Yukiko, who, by then, was adopting a serious set of gestures herself.
“My sister… she’s special,” Yukiko finally said. “I don’t know the exact details, but she was born with the kind of power none other in the clan had, or our entire people for that matter.”
“What kind of power are we talking about here?”
Wladislaw asked, his curiosity beginning to be whetted. He leaned slightly forward towards her, showing, if nothing else, his eagerness to know more about that matter.
“If that’s the power to stick metal blades through enchanted Hemothorakes with impunity, we’d be in big trouble to make an enemy out of her,” he thought, shuddering slightly at the thought.
“We don’t really know,” Yukiko shook her head “That’s the whole point – all the priests and priestesses both legitimate and otherwise my father had consulted throughout the years never exactly reached an agreement on that matter. Some said she had a demon’s soul intertwined with her own, others that she had a particular connection with the spiritual world and can freely tap into it, still others resorted to… nonsense I can’t comprehend very well. The only thing they agree with one another is that my sister is going to be an… enormous asset against my father’s enemies once she knew what her power is and how to harness it. But…”
Yukiko’s voice then trailed off as she stopped, hesitating as to what she should best say. By then Wladislaw was listening especially attentively. He had known about something along those lines going on in the Empire, but it was the first time he had observed it in person.
“But what?” he asked impatiently.
“But until then…” Yukiko continued, her tone shivering and her voice growing softer with every word, “they say she is a continuous danger to both herself and everyone around her.”
“And have you any inkling of what said powers might be?” Wladislaw asked. “If I were you, I’d be sure to take… precautions to avoid any regrettable accidents.”
“My father could keep Fuyuko in an ivory tower forever if he wanted to,” Yukiko said, glaring at Wladislaw rather harshly for even thinking about such a suggestion. “But I doubt I need to tell you why that won’t work and why my father will never do that, do I?”
“Well, I suppose,” Wladislaw answered sheepishly, before returning fire with another question. “But what does it have to do with the demons the other day?”
“It is generally agreed upon by my father’s advisors that the best way to glean out my sister’s powers,” Yukiko said, pausing a little in mid-sentence for emphasis, “is to place her into a battle situation. The more powerful the opponent, the more likely she would, they say, be forced to use her powers as a bid for self-preservation. And that is where the Oni came into the story.”
As Wladislaw listened on, his previous intrigue slowly grew into a distinct disgust.
“So let’s see if I got the gist of it here,” Wladislaw said. “So your father’s best bet to help your sister is somehow to hire some demons that have proven to be extremely deadly to the uninitiated to beat her up in the hope she’d freak out and do something about it?”
He took a brief pause to gather his wit before continuing.
“Sergei’s old man is better at parenting than that,” he commented, “and he’s been dead for sixty years.”
Yukiko’s expression turned sour. She looked at the Cataphract, her arms propping her head, her hands cupped around her cheek as she let out a quiet sigh.
“I know,” she said. “At first everyone was against that idea. Then a few… unfortunate events happened, and it became clear that our clan has more enemies than we could handle otherwise. My sister was aware of that too – she more or less chose to go this way out of her own free will.”
“I see,” Wladislaw said, nodding. “And your place in the grand scheme of things is?”
“I take care of Fuyuko,” Yukiko said. “A sort of morale officer, conductor and medic for her ‘training’ sessions, if you will. I make sure nothing ill happens to her during the whole session, treat her bruises and cuts and keep her motivated and happy in between. It’s… the least I can do, you see.”
There was a dash of shame in Yukiko’s voice. The reason behind it was largely obscured by her ambiguous tone, however. Whether said shame was because she was powerless to help her sister more, because she was not the chosen one or both, Wladislaw could not tell.
“And then the other day’s incident happened,” Wladislaw chimed in. “Now it might be just me and my lack of acquaintance with your obscure magic and powers, but if that performance she put up was not a splendid display of power, I don’t know what is.”
“That is exactly what my father have been bothered by since then,” Yukiko said, nodding quickly. “She did display some terrific power, but the outburst was anything but controlled.”
She looked at Wladislaw, smiling with a particular degree of gratefulness in it.
“I’d have to thank you for that, Mr. Sergeant,” she said. “Had you not knocked her out back then, nobody knows what kind of damage Fuyuko might have caused under that trance.”
”Self-defense, is all,” Wladislaw answered, shaking his head rather humbly, before his face took a turn for a more concerned look. “How did your sister fare since then? I hope I didn’t injure her or something…”
“No, you didn’t,” Yukiko said, her face glowing. “Whatever caused her to erupt the way she did had also granted her some kind of odd resilience. She has been quite alright since then, if only with a bit of a headache.”
Wladislaw, however, was not convinced.
“I didn’t see her in the past few days,” he said. “And I’ve been all over the castle looking for you then.”
Yukiko paused, the smile on her face promptly extinguished.
“That… that’s because my father decided to keep her… locked up until he’s looked into the matter,” she said, her voice now filled with anxiety. “I… I honestly don’t know whether that is good or bad any more.”
She took a brief pause to inhale deeply before continuing.
“That’s why I was away all the while,” she said. “Between school, looking after Fuyuko so she doesn’t feel lonely or sad and my… other duties, I was quite hard-pressed for time. Until today, that is.”
Wladislaw nodded in acknowledgement. That explanation made perfect sense, now that he looked at it.
“And has your father reached any conclusion about why that happened?” Wladislaw asked. “If he figures out why, this whole business would be done, I presume?”
“Unfortunately, no,” Yukiko shook her head. “And the way things go, it would be a good while before they could reach any conclusion at all.”
“What’s exactly the problem then?”
“We didn’t know what exactly happened that triggered that,” she answered. “It’s a long story, but that day’s training was a little… abnormal. In short, Fuyuko decided to begin on her own before my father or I have arrived. And then when I made it there… everything’s already done.”
A flash of realization coursed through Wladislaw’s head as he ehard Yukiko’s assessment.
“Well, you do have a witness as to what happened back then,” he said, his lips curving into a rather arrogant smile. “Me. I’d be pleased to offer what help I can on that matter if you need.”
Yukiko’s eyes opened wide at Wladislaw. The look on her face indicated she was punching herself mentally for not having thought of that earlier.
“I… forgot about that,” she said, her expression filled with joy. Such expression, unfortunately, quickly died down as she realized something else.
“But… no, not really,” she mumbled, shaking her head ever so mildly. “Our clan’s business had always been particularly... complex. Even if you are to show up, it could very well not solve anything.”
“If a witness doesn’t work, how about a simple piece of evidence?” he said, his voice raising a little as he drew his silver dagger from its scabbard and placed it on the table.
Yukiko’s eyes opened wide as she stared at the new object and examining its exquisite handiwork, her face filled with intrigue.
“And this is…?”
“Everything your sister did that night, she did it with this blade,” Wladislaw said, smiling. “In hindsight, it might have been a mistake throwing it out there for her, but hey – what’s done is done. But if anything could help you with that investigation, it’s this weapon.”
There was a brief moment of silence as Yukiko weighed her options. Said silence took much longer than Wladislaw would like, but just before he was able to raise his voice to protest, Yukiko finally spoke up.
“I’ll see what I can do with this,” she said, breaking out a brief smile with a distinct optimistic undertone. “If it works well… I don’t know how I can thank you.”
“Well, if I could do a service in the name of the teachings of the House of Chevalier, the deed itself is a reward,” Wladislaw said, beaming brightly. “And also as my thanks for the free treatment.”
He raised his injured arm for emphasis, raising a quick blush on the girl’s cheeks as a result.
“I’d just ask you this again, Mr. Sergeant,” she said, her voice now calm and solemn. “Everything I’ve told you today is… clan business, and I’ve already done a disservice to my family by telling you that. It would not do anyone any good if words get out to anyone else of what we discussed today, would it?”
“I’d keep that in mind,” Wladislaw said. “Though, if at any points your clan business runs against our best interest, I’d have to do it. Am I clear?”
“I guess so,” Yukiko said, letting out a long sigh. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that, shall we?”
“Likewise,” Wladislaw said, before standing up and heading for the doorway…
********
The local Shinto shrine of Sakurasaki was located in a natural recess overlooking the plateau on which the town rested. Its only connection to the outside world was a rocky, winding stairway carved into the mountain itself, branching off from one of the smaller lanes. The naturally quaint air of the place, coupled with the difficult terrain it occupied ensured rather few visitors and pilgrims all year round aside from the major holidays. And even then never would more than a couple dozens would populate its interior at any given time. Currently, in the dead of winter, with its main entrance more or less coated in snow, very few people, if at all, would think of venturing to it unless a family ritual called for it.
That was where Yukiko was now headed, not as a pilgrim but as someone going back home, if the clothes she wore was of any indication. A wooden pair of slippers, a loose white tunic and an even looser, red baggy skirt-pant hybrid were rather impractical in that freezing weather. Yet she wore it anyway, since there was no garment that would give her a better sense of self-identity and association to the place as that traditional shrine maiden outfit.
Then again, the weight of that garment had lately become rather hard to bear on her part. She had been frequenting the shrine less as a ritual maiden as her religion called for and more like a pilgrim looking for solace and advice, only to, like a dog being thrown a bone, be assigned with more even tasks to carry out after the immediate weight in her heart had been lifted. The duties of a shaman in the unique backdrop of the town and all its complex relations that were not always obvious had been tiring her out each day more than the last.
Busy in her thought, it was only when Yukiko was near the top of the stairway did she realize that there was one set of footsteps in the snow-covered steps more than there usually was. One probably caused by a heavy, metallic pair of boots, since they pressed deeply into the snow and left a pronounced, sharp mark in it. Such footsteps, until the Cataphracts’ arrival two weeks prior, had been totally unseen of in town. A sudden, gripping bout of anxiety descended upon Yukiko when she thought about it for a second. With due haste, she picked up her pace and hurried into the shrine’s main hall.
The sound of people talking within the main hall could be heard as soon as Yukiko crossed the donation box halfway through the front yard. Or rather, a single voice of one man speaking loudly and menacingly, a voice that belonged to a battlefield or a public forum rather than a holy site as this. Fearing the worst, Yukiko’s brisk pace transformed into a sprint, dashing into the shrine’s main hall, heedless of her bulky clothing.
A she stopped outside the hall’s doorway and shot a quick glance inside, a scene completely foreign to her was playing out. The senior priestess, flanked by two of Yukiko’s fellow shrine maidens, was in the middle of conversing with a figure Yukiko had never seen before. Her racing heart slowed down slightly, knowing that at least her fellow shrine maidens were not in danger. Taking a deep breath, she briskly stepped aside and watched.
The strange figure, at first sight, looked quite like a Cataphract to Yukiko’s eyes. Then again, not being used to foreign supernatural peoples and their styles of arms and armors, she had every reason to lump them all together under the category of ‘weird armored outlanders’. His torso was fully clad in a thick, hardened leather cuirass over mail knee-length hauberk, covering half of his splinted greaves and boots that protected his shins and feet. Behind his back he strapped an imposing, double-bladed great long war axe that made the Cataphracts’ standard-issue longswords look like harmless penknives in comparison. Naturally the figure himself was huge, towering at least a whole feet over the priestess and one and a half over Yukiko herself.
In contrast to his heavily clad body, he left his head bare, perhaps to better stimulate conversation. To Yukiko, that was a counterproductive choice, since his face laid bare was more frightening and savage than anything a faceless helmet could impose. Wild ginger hair and formidable beard and mustache, grotesque-looking black-blue face paint, a pair of bulging eyes always staring arrogantly at the opposition… he was everything her father was, only much, much more savage. Add in his large, eagle nose and a mouth ever ready to open wide enough to swallow whole a trout and Yukiko had every right to shiver at his mere countenance.
Her senior priestess appeared to be able to maintain a far greater degree of composure compared to Yukiko, since she still looked as calm as ever, like a completely undisturbed pond, answering everything he had to offer.
“I doubt I understood your request, Emissary,” she said, her voice as resolute as it was polite. “Our shrine here is independent of the Daimyo’s influence and jurisdiction, not too unlike the men of the cloth from the West. Anything you want to know, you would be far more successful to ask Lord Mitsumaru – or any noble slated to take his place – himself rather than us.”
The armored man merely smirked with the air of arrogance of someone who thought he knew everything, regardless of whether his perception was right or not. He paced to and fro in front of the priestess for a few, before stepping up in front of her, staring down on her as he spoke.
“Really now, priestess?” he asked, as though interrogating. “My Jarl has plenty of evidence from reliable sources that the shrine here does participate in a few… unofficial pet projects of curious interest, the kind that the Daimyo normally would not admit to exist but are there to his benefits anyway…”
His voice was deep and far more wolfish than even the most wolf-blooded of Yukiko’s ken. For all she knew, his normal voice was already about as frightening as her father’s when he was furious, something both she and Fuyuko never wanted to risk.
“Those projects, even if they exist at all, have nothing to do with us, as I have been telling you since the start,” the priestess answered, still largely maintaining her countenance, though her slightly raised voice suggested that her patience was wearing thin. “I sincerely suggest that you double-check your sources or otherwise find a better means of validating your intelligence.”
“If that is everything I wanted, we would have far better and more efficient methods to do it,” the armored ‘emissary’ answered with a chuckle. “What I want from you, priestess, is a proof of your cooperation and goodwill. That you are willing to support our just cause should the time come. That you are a friend of the High Monarchy and a worthy ally of both High Jarl Aedric Alesiadr and my Jarl.”
His voice lowered slightly as he scanned his eyes across the room, making the priestess’ attendants flinch in fright.
“Would you seriously give up on that chance?” he said emphatically. “Such is the prize everyone, up to and including men of the cloth in our Northern homeland would desire.”
“We honestly have little interest in what you are proposing, Emissary,” the priestess answered. “With all due respect to the High Jarl and his willingness to associate himself with our humble establishment, we are but a small monastic congregation. The politics of the realms does not interest or concern us as much as you think.”
The armored figure was about to continue his reasoning when suddenly his face tensed up, his thick, sharp brows knitted while his eyes caught fire. His right hand reached for his axe, not yet brandishing it, though making absolutely clear that he was not hesitating to do so if bad comes to worse.
“Who goes there?”
His voice bellowed out, echoing around the hall like the howling of a wild dire wolf. Yukiko’s heart skipped a beat – she had, just a second prior, leaned too hard on the doorway and caused an admittedly small creak.
For the moment Yukiko was at a loss for what to do. She had seen plenty of menacing figures throughout her life, many of whom bore arms more vicious and countenances more inhuman than their guest. And yet the moment her sight set upon the flaring pits of seemingly primal rage that were the axeman’s eyes, she couldn’t help but feel overwhelmed. It was nothing like the demons she and her fellow shrine maidens were used to confronting. Frightening as they were to laymen, they essentially were no more frightening than a prey’s desperate glare to a crew of hunters armed to the teeth and well-trained enough to put them down with gusto. Both Yukiko and those monsters knew without saying that the demons posed zero threat to her comrades and normally would be treated with contempt accordingly.
The axeman, however, was a huge unknown to her. Knowing that the head priestess would stand by her no matter what, she was not exactly afraid of that axe of his. His looks, however, were another entirely different story. The look in his eyes, a near-perfect reflection of what he was as a person according to her philosophical beliefs, was so saturated with a kind of grudge and hatred so intense that just a quick glimpse at it made her break out in cold sweat.
Yukiko finally reached a decision just seconds before the axeman would step past the doorway and spot her after quite a bit of mulling oer that understandably felt like a long winter. She took a deep breath, stressed her shoulders and clenched her fists – presumably to stop herself shivering. And then, as calmly as she could artificially forge her expression and features to be, she stepped into the open to face the axeman, bent on depriving him of the pleasure of finding her out.
It was quite an unpredictable move, at least from the axeman’s perspective, as his rapidly morphing expression testified. The warrior’s face, as soon as his eyes had swept across Yukiko’s face, changed dramatically. He lowered his great axe as he stared at the girl, the fury in his countenance just now having lessened by no small amount. In its place, however, there now was a particular dose of disbelief and astonishment, which, in his case, translated into a tone that was no less frightening than his roaring voice in the first place.
“Who in Toutatis’ name are you?” he demanded, his voice booming even louder as he stared at her.
At this performance Yukiko’s brave and dignified façade began to crack. Whatever sliver of self-control she had at that point was barely sufficient to keep herself from collapsing prone on the ground huddled in a fetal position with her hands over her ears. All the while, she was shivering like a malaria patient, only stopping when the head priestess intervened on her behalf.
“Pardon me, Emissary,” she said, bowing ever so slightly with her hands clasped as she shuffled between Yukiko and the warrior. “May I have the pleasure of introducing to you,” she briefly glanced at Yukiko before returning to him, “Mitsumaru Yukiko, one of my fellow sisters…”
She nodded meaningfully at the warrior before continuing.
“… who also, conveniently, happens to be Lord Mitsumaru’s elder daughter.”
The priestess’ formal introduction, part of her style as far as Yukiko knew, still painted a light blush on her cheeks. After all, of all the things she differed from her twin sister, not liking to be talked about was a trait they both shared.
“Really now?”
The warrior’s response to this revelation, on the contrary, was interesting enough. He squinted his eyes making no attempt to conceal his intrigue as he scanned Yukiko from top to toe with all due curiosity. It was as though he was taking note of her face, her features, her garments, her bodice… right down to her very essence as a person. His sudden interest in her did not help Yukiko’s confusion and fright much, and for the next moment she was starting to shiver. Not a good performance in and of itself, but she doubted anyone could do better in her shoes.
It took the Emissary a while before he lifted his inquisitive eyes from her form, his hand rubbing his chin.
“Hmm… yes,” he finally nodded, acknowledging what he had seen. “Toutatis’ gift is understandably not so strong with you, but what you have is still… far more noticeable than that of your kind I have seen lately.”
He took another complete look all over Yukiko before stowing his great ax behind his back again. He then bowed her, a gesture presumably mimicking the Japanese tradition, and yet was so insultingly clumsy in its execution that she was unsure whether he was being at all offensive on purpose or was just that ignorant of proper Japanese gestures. Or maybe it was that axe of his that made the whole gesture seemed off. Yukiko probably wasn’t the most qualified person to make that judgement.
“In any case,” he said, having made some effort to rein down his booming voice into a more restraint and civil tone and volume, “well met, daughter of Mitsumaru.”
“Y… yeah, nice to… to meet you, mister,” Yukiko stammered, not knowing what better to say. “And… and you are?”
The head priestess shot a quick glance at the warrior, as though telling him outright to keep his mouth shut before speaking on his behalf.
“Thegn Hestrulfr Sverdborg, a retainer of Jarl Ingvar Seaxnar of the High Wolf Monarchy,” she introduced with all due formality, less because Yukiko might be interested in it and more to stroke the emissary’s sense of self-importance. “Or, in terms you are more familiar with, Yukiko, he’s a… foreign dignitary here to discuss particular matters with the Daimyo and your father.”
“I… I see. My pleasure, sir” Yukiko answered, nodding in acknowledgement as she broke out a customary, diplomatic at the figure just like the good Japanese girl she was brought up as. “By the way… you were discussing something with Sister Natsumi, aren’t you? Then… then I guess I have no business here…”
That last part was not entirely diplomatic. Suffice to say, after multiple incidents earlier in her life – or her sister’s, for that matter – she had learnt that the best way to live with her father in peace was to not bother about his businesses and dealings. After all, given enough tough lessons, even the most curious kid would learn to rein in her bad habits. That attitude carried on well until her young adulthood.
“That’s smart,” the emissary said, his massive beard quacking in a chuckle as he nodded at her. “This does not concern you in the slightest. We shall keep it that way, yes?”
He turned around, turning his back towards her.
“I give you ten seconds to make yourself scarce,” he said. “We wouldn’t want anyone not concerned to get tangled up.”
At that point, the head priestess’ eyes flared up, as thought having caught a gap in her opponent’s defense. Which she did, figuratively.
“You said it yourself, emissary,” she said slyly. “Your dealings does not concern Yukiko, and neither does it concern us by extension.”
The emissary was, understandably, bewildered at her sudden declaration.
“Hold on,” he rolled his eyes at her with both bewilderment and a pronounced look of anger. “What does this girl have to do with the business we are discussing?”
“Emissary, it is only reasonable,” she answered, accentuating her statement much more than previously, “that we can’t be expected to know more of what goes on within the walls of Sakura-jo than the daughter of the castle lord himself.”
Her eyes darted back to Yukiko for a brief moment, before turning back to the emissary.
”If Yukiko here can’t help you with whatever you are seeking,” she continued, “we naturally can’t, now can we?”
The emissary was stunned for a moment as le looked back and forth at the two offending women. Even the most dim-witted of warriors would know that there was a point where no amount of threats and coercion would work, and that seemed to be the point for him. Finally, he exhaled loudly before turning back to the priestess.
“Fine,” he growled, “Have it your way.”
“Our pleasure,” the priestess bowed. “Now, if you would excuse us… we need to return to our prayers and other humble monastic duties. We would bother you no longer.”
The emissary glared dagger at the priestess, before striding towards the doorway, defeated and empty-handed. Before he left for good, however, he did turn back for a final threat of sort, complete with a direct pointing at her.
“But by Odin and Toutatis, I shall get to the bottom of this,” he said loudly. “And if I find out you were hiding something from me, anything at all, priestess, then you shall have to answer to High Jarl Aedric Alesiadr himself. And his fury, make no mistake, is a thousand times more fearsome and a million times more brutal than that of a humble Thegn.”
Having said that, he began to stride down the steps, leaving behind not even a farewell. The echoes from his steel sole still lingered about the main hall for a while before the cold winter wind drowned it down. It was only when those menacing footsteps had finally been out of the picture that Yukiko emptied out her lungs in relief.
“Sister Natsumi,” she asked the head priestess. “What was that all about?”
“Trouble,” the head priestess answered, sighing deeply in mid-sentence. “All you have to know is that the High Wolves’ agents are here in Japan. In Sakurasaki, actually.”
“But… but aren’t they like half the globe away?” Yukiko asked back with all due bewilderment. “What exactly are they doing here?”
“Well, they are,” Natsumi answered. “And as for why, your guess is as good as mine. Apparently something in Japan, in this very city, seems to have piqued their interest.”
Yukiko cupped her chin, racking her brain before exclaiming.
“Could that be…” she raised her voice, her face still taken over by a certain sense of dreadful revelation. “Could they be after our Cataphract friends?”
“Not quite, I reckon,” Natsumi answered. “For one, Hestrulfr came here just very shortly after the Cataphracts arrived. It’s not likely he could go from the Scandinavia to Japan within half a day’s notice.”
And then her expression changed for a more serious look as she paused, apparently hesitating for some reason.
“And for the other,” she finally said, “well, there are things that do not concern you, Yukiko.”
Needless to say, Yukiko was not amused.
“But… I’m worried. About Fuyuko, about you, about all of our sisters and everyone we know!” Yukiko said. “There must be something I can help, right? Right?”
Natsumi, predictably, was unfazed.
“As I said,” Natsumi answered. “These things do not involve any of us, including both you and Fuyuko.”
She then smiled warmly at her subordinate, as though coaxing her back into calmness.
“I appreciate your concern either ay,” she said, before promptly changing the topic with so much as a quiet clearing of her throat. “Anyway, I guess you have something you wish to tell me, don’t you?”
She glanced at her two attendants, signaling them to leave them to themselves for the moment. The unspoken order was carried out quickly enough – a moment later, it was only Yukiko and Natsumi standing opposite to each other in the shrine’s main hall.
“Well, I’m all ears,” she said. “What do you have to say?”
It was now Yukiko’s turn to hesitate. For a brief moment, she just stood there, not knowing where to begin.
“I… I met him again,” Yukiko finally said.
Natsumi’s eyes flared up with great interest.
“Oh?” she asked, her voice raised a little. “And how did that go?”
“Well, I guess,” Yukiko answered after measuring her words. “He’s… a strange individual in my books. He seems to be a reliable sort, though not a saint by a long shot.”
“Nobody is,” Natsumi said. “You should have known that by now, shouldn’t you, Yukiko?”
“Yes, but… but that’s beside the point,” Yukiko answered, feeling confused at her own words. “He’s just… strange. I mean, he is a foreign soldier who just got entangled in a rather… intriguing local business that could swing in many ways to his benefit, and yet… and yet his only concern is whether it would affect his Empire’s interests in any way.”
Contrary to Yukiko’s attitude, Natsumi seemed to be strangely indifferent.
“That’s hardly surprising,” she said. “They say that the typical Imperial noble are either religiously loyal retainers to the Komnenid bloodline or figuratively and literally bloodthirsty zealots who knew no friend and family but the Empire itself, depending on who you ask.”
“Their priorities are… messed up,” she winked at the junior shrine maiden, “if you’d like to look at it that way.”
Natsumi then clasped her hands together as she turned to Yukiko.
“But the more important thing is,” she said. “Did he reveal any more about what happened that night?”
Yukiko immediately produced from her person the offending object – the silver dagger her sister was using in that night’s mess, wrapped in several layers of cloth and paper.
“Here, Sister,” she said, unraveling the pommel and drew out the blade. She bit her lips as she did so, taking care so that the silvery edge would not touch her skin at the slightest. She still grimaced slightly in discomfort, but noticeably so, as her hand wrapped around the handle made of fine silver.
The head priestess’ eyes opened wide as her playful and carefree expression earlier turned into fascination. Said fascination, however, seemed to have stemmed not from the blade’s design and make, but rather from the very material of the weapon itself.
“Silver?” she asked, glaring at the blade inquisitively. “I should have guessed.”
“What’s wrong, Sister?” Yukiko asked, her voice understandably tinted with anxiety. “Will… will Fuyuko be alright?”
It took a few seconds for the priestess to register her subordinate’s question. She dashed her eyes quickly from the blade back to the presenter, making every effort to conceal her apparently abnormal interest in the blade.
“Huh?” she said as she snapped out of her trance. “No, nothing. Nothing wrong so far as I know.”
She then lifted her lips in a reassuring smile at her subordinate. Unlike her previous attempts, however, this smile of hers was not the least convincing or reassuring for that matter.
“Just relax, Yukiko,” she said. “She’s going to be just fine. Trust me on this.”
Before said hesitation could be further questioned, her voice once again resumed its natural assertiveness.
“Well, you know what you should do,” she said. “Securing an… ally among the Cataphracts is of vital importance for us, Yukiko.”
Yukiko’s eyes were firmly planted on the ground as she listened to her elder, maintaining that posture for a while after Natsumi had finished her instruction.
“Sister Natsumi,” she finally said. “Would you reckon… he would bother to even lend us a hand?”
“I’d say so,” she nodded. “I can’t make any guarantee, but you can, you know, try. Our interests, after all, aren’t that far off from the Empire’s, at least for the moment.”
“I’ll do my best,” Yukiko answered, nodding firmly. “If it would help Fuyuko and my father, I’d do anything.”
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