|| The Knight's Ephemeris / Third ||

|| The Knight's Ephemeris / Third ||

|| Clausewitz // the Third ||

“Ply your trade, thief; dare to slip fingers into my pockets
Be you brazen enough to smile; watch my oblivious face
Clench, and be surprised; shout, for your hand gone
Rage and scream, yelp and flounder
As my knife sheaths itself in your neck
As the Stairs yawn for another fool.”

- Cithero ein Hythe, Tales of Fixed Mirth, 653 C.D(15 N.E), Sevenday of the Fifth Sceptre.


->-<-


“You’re free to go.”

He was hearing things now. Seeing things, now hearing things. He yawned, loudly enough as if hoping this illusion – what a stern looking man – would disappear. Vincent blinked when he did not.

The night had been awful. Despite whatever he had said and shown Lyrien when she had visited him, that was exactly it – a show. When the torch had winked out, he had been awake. When heavy footsteps had foretold of this man’s coming, he had been awake. Sleep did not come when one closed his eyes and saw nothing but a bloody hand and bloody words.

Why had she reacted so violently? Was it not normal?

He knew what he had seen. He knew what he had felt. But it appeared Lyrien did not; she seemed sufficiently alienated by even the thought, remembering her widened eyes of shock. But he trusted her, more than himself at this stage. That being, perhaps it was not so normal after all. Of course it was not normal. A flying hand. Not normal at all.

He blinked again. The room was bright.

There really was a man there. He was even frowning.

When had the room become bright?

At first, when he had heard footsteps he had thought it was Lyrien again – he was filled with such hope that he forgot all about his hunger and distress, leapt to his feet and waited expectantly. Of course, the thought that it was all illusion passed through his head. But even if it was, he did not care. It was Lyrien, and he had not cared one bit if it would be an illusion smiling at him.

Heavy footsteps, and a much taller, bigger shadow stopped in front of what Vincent had marked the stairs, by last night’s restless exploration. His eyes had grown used to the darkness enough to see that lighter smudge that identified the person. Then a crack, as if someone had slapped the stone wall. The light was growing – no, the darkness was receding. A black veil, being drawn in closer and closer, making circles, if he was seeing right. He did not trust his vision so much anymore.

Then he saw the guard. His armor was so bright; shining. And now, he stamped his foot to get the boy’s attention.

“I said, you’re free to go. There are people waiting for you.”

Vincent looked up at the guard, over his shoulder, since he was behind him now. A little nudge and the forceful grip told Vincent it all was quite real.

“Do you want to stay here?”

The guard crossed is arms, silver uniform mirroring the room. Vincent shook his head innocently and began his way up the stairs. As he took those steps, he realized – he was going to meet Lyrien again! Vincent’s mind suddenly raced. Did she keep her promise? Was she the one who had freed him from that. . . place, behind him? Happiness blossoming, the boy could not hide a smile. His boyish mind had already forgotten the scares from yesterday. Momentarily. Faced with the joy lighting up inside him at the thought of Lyrien, and seeing her again, Vincent let out a burst of speed-

“Good luck. . .”

Following close behind him, the guard muttered something under his breath. It was something that pricked his instincts.

Vincent’s head turned over his shoulder, an eyebrow raised. His smile was gone.

“What?” the boy asked.

“Nothing.”

Disconcertingly, the guard smiled, as if the boy’s had transferred to his.

Even more disconcertingly, Vincent was bothered by the fact that the man’s eyes were not smiling.

->-<-

“What is this?”

Vincent rubbed his eyes.

“What the Queen thinks of us.”

He tried to find some good reason why he was blindfolded.

“Do not be silly, Sahan. The Queen will have her own reasons. We are not people to dispute.”

A certain mingling of fear and bitterness followed that title. Queen. The woman who had him go through that terrible night. Vincent tried to block it out.

“Maybe. . . If this is the case, then we still have enough authority to test his usefulness. The Queen allow us so.”

It was not working. Something heavy started to weight his stomach. When was he going to see Lyrien again? Blindfolded even before seeing natural sunlight, immediately becoming free of the dungeons, Vincent did not fight solely because he had no energy to. Half dragged, half carried by the guard for an eternity he was dumped here, wherever here was. The only thing he knew was the familiar itchy sensation of carpet under his knees. And that his bruises there were stabbing at him. Add the fact that people talking over his head was becoming increasingly frustrating and irritating.

Without the prospect of seeing her anytime immediate, Vincent began to rub his eyes again. There was definitely something there. But when he touched his eyelids he felt the warmth of his skin. He opened his eyes for what would have been the twelfth hundred time. Saw nothing but darkness again. It reminded of him when he was dropped to a void of nothingness. The thought had already crossed his mind. . . Small tremors showed the rising panic.

More minutes of mumbling in the background. Then a clap.

“Zerah! Come in.”

Colors. Shapes. Faces.

He was somewhere. Orange wood. Dozens of wooden beams were garnished with equally numerous torches, brightly burning smokeless fires, all simultaneously burning that gave Vincent the impression of day. Eyes looked up – and saw an array of weapons hanging above him. On each coffer of the ceiling, a weapon had been placed at the centre. Vincent’s mouth opened and he saw there was more than one. They were pointing down, all of them, looking as if to drop. Vincent only got to saw that they were all elaborately decorated before another clap caught his attention.

“Boy! Pay attention. What is your name?”

Someone spoke. A woman. Vincent had been looking at the ceiling too long to see who.

When he looked down, he saw four people standing grouped together. Their faces were unreadable. Unsure of to whom to reply, Vincent looked at their feet.

“Vincent.”

Creaking of a closing door and footsteps told him someone had raised the room’s population to six.

“Vincent. Well, Vincent, do you know how to fight?”

It was an old woman. Well, she was not too old; just a few wrinkles, sparse. But her eyes were alive. And slightly scaring Vincent with their ferocity. Her smile added a few strands to the number of hairs raised at the back of Vincent’s neck.

“Am I supposed to?”

“Hah! No need to be defensive. I just asked you a simple question.” Her mirth evaporated. “Do you?”

The simple answer was no. He had no idea. Thinking back, he had run away from the Kynith. However his tongue had a different thought on the matter – unfortunately, as he was going to find out.

“Yes.”

Of course. Who wouldn’t- Wait. Huh?

“Good.” Another flash of a smile, and she stepped aside. “Zerah.”

She was actually quite a bit taller than him, but what was most striking thing was her hair. Fire alight on her head, the crimson embellished her face adorned with eagerness, keen dancing eyes scrutinizing Vincent, who in turn was surprised by the vivid intensity and similarity between their hair colors. He remembered the remark about the rarity of red hair. Wearing black and red only starkly emphasized her presence in the orange-tinted room. The only likeliness he and this girl shared, apart from their hair, was their barefootedness. A face that looked like a naked blade; slender limbs that swayed like a whip to crack at his face.

Which was what they did.

Something in his body had reacted instantly. A whirl of blurred surroundings, and he was skidding backwards, knees bent reflexively, feet burning from the carpet. The slap stung. It would have hurt worse had he not reacted faster. Faster than he thought he could.

“Wha- what-“ sputtered Vincent, hoisting himself back up – only to see a smug smirk on both women’s faces. The old woman cackled, even.

“You told me you can fight! Come on!”

The only warning was the flapping of fabric as the girl jabbed his ribs, twice. Her whole body seemed to be toppling forwards, overwhelming Vincent’s smaller stature. His hand thrust out and grappled for control over her arm, to stop her, this madness. But fluid and brutal were her movements, easing out of his hold, two kicks to deaden each leg so he crumbled on the floor.

“Well obviously it was a lie,” the old woman scoffed, and automatically, Vincent’s fists clenched. Something. . . was beginning to burn in his stomach. Something acidic enough to make it bottomless. “Let me put a little incentive. According to the recommendation – you were accompanied by two of our students.”

A rustle and a longer interval of reading. The scroll had popped out of somewhere, held up casually by one hand.

“A name, then? Calia. No, not Calia. . . Lyrien.”

Incentive, recommendation, student. Like he had any idea what those terms meant. All he knew was that Lyrien’s name stood out like a cloud on a spring day. Interest sparked, he kept a wary eye on the girl, catching her smiling while her eyes still fostered violent intent. His legs, were the broken? What power such a frail seeming girl had.

But his eyes were sparkling again, the mention of Lyrien snapping a faraway hope closer to home.

“Simple words for a simple mind. Show me something, Vincent. Maybe you will see her again?”

Vincent spread his feet apart. For once, he felt words were unnecessary.

“Thank you!” the woman even made a mock bow. Vincent ignored it; he felt everyone would see his teeth grind. She turned to the redheaded girl. “Zerah, the boy doesn’t seem like a complete hare-brained moron. Push him as far as he can go. . . But remember, he is personally under the aegis of the Queen, so leave him at least an inch away from flopping dead.”

The Queen? Of course. Whatever he was doing here, she had to be involved. She was the cause of everything, after all, and acid raked his throat. The cause of him fighting a girl whom he had never seen before, a girl who was practically bouncing on her feet to prove herself to people who watched them with humming murmurs. They were intrigued spectators of a skirmish that they expected him to lose miserably.

Vincent grasped that his answer did have some truth in it after all. To what extent, he could only find out. Yet his confidence was shaking around the edges every time he locked eyes with his opponent; he ended up breaking away with a sniff or a shake of the head or incessant scratching. Looking at her, seeing that crazy smile on her face, and knowing she was going to pound him to death closest – for the simple reason of being told to! - the fact that she was a girl was continuously making him imagine what would happen if that face was Lyrien. The expression of pain on such a face would jab away at his heart forever. But the following events happened too fast for his mind to catch up to his body’s orders of self-defense.

This time, his eyes could follow her movements. Barely. She was forcing him to defend, but he had no real heart to even try to land a hit on her. To the elbow about to stab his stomach he took half a step backwards, and she instantly caught on that he had trouble motivating himself to strike. She intruded his space, ghosting into his guard(not that he had much), grasping a handful of hair and yanking it to the right as she made short work of his other ribs.

This time, the pain was limited to two excruciating hits. Managing to cling onto her arm, he pulled her closer, spun her wrist to restrict her movement, and kicked the back of her knee. She did kneel – what she also did was throw him over her head with the momentum he had created himself.

There was a hoot of laughter as his face skidded along the carpet.

Vincent did not think he needed any more provocation.

Arm cocked, he charged shoulder first. She circled, sidestepping with grace, and he lashed out with the back of his fist. He could see that smug sneer as he realized his arms were just a shy short of breaking her nose, his fist flying to nowhere – and with both palms she struck, straight at his lungs. Vincent landed on his back wheezing.

The back of his head was burning. His entire body was burning. His head, though in particular, was beginning to feel heavier and heavier. . .

The room watched Vincent’s head crash to the floor.

->-<-

Under the soft light of her handheld aide, Calia watched the boy sleep. He looked for the first time perhaps, at peace. Covered in a sorry mess of a blanket – the particular saved for the newest member – and involuntarily, as if mimicking Lyrien, she spread the tangle apart to cover him better. She let out a curious sound, halfway wondering if she was absorbing the kindness Lyrien gave to people. That girl had wished so dearly to come here, but. . .

Vincent squirmed, and unconsciously respondent to the light, turned the other way. Calia remained silent. She was not sure what to feel – what was she supposed to feel, but naturally suspicious? They had found him in Kynith territory, bettering his chances of being thrown in the dungeons again. She realized she had omitted that particular detail; she would mend her drafted report later. If she ever stopped glaring at the boy. His plight seemed genuine enough, enough that Lyrien had been wholeheartedly convinced. She had her habit of trusting people out of whim, but both of them knew that if anyone’s instincts, Lyrien’s could be trusted. It was not like Calia could keep her own lips shut on the matter either. But she had. Unlike someone.

Her thoughts turned to his faring against one of the promising students, Zerah. A girl she had kept under her eye for some time. Calia prized initiative, and Zerah had it. The boy had lost, as expected, and had fainted. Fainted was a tad strong. He had more or less caved into exhaustion. No food, no sleep and the shock of imprisonment would toll a little boy too much for a fair fight in the first place. And his body had already been in a mess. Bruises and small cuts numerous enough to make another layer of skin. But his brief glimpse of physical prowess only but deepened her suspicions of the boy’s lineage. His particular movements. . . It was rare to see any child of his age to possess knowledge of hand-to-hand combat. Especially in the “outside” – the informal term for the lands not bound to the eighteen tehsil civilized Asphzein constituted of. Had his House been a troubled one? Bandits, thieves perhaps? The latter suggestion made her remember the boy’s first words: “I’m not a thief”. There was pride in there, even though it seemed he did not know it himself.

It was all quite significant, actually. It categorized him in the search of his identity. Red hair, an outlander House, combat skill. The fact that the boy could react in a fight the way he had, only reinforced his belonging to the noble class. No peasant, overworked with the realities of all-too-frugal rewards raked in by a day of hard work, had the luxury of teaching one’s child like that. The more flourishing class. . . Merchants - people of trade, business people of the general sense would have strived to maintain their prosperity onto their offspring. And if the rare exception would rise among these people, learning would be of the weapon sort, due to the fact that it was far simpler, far less costly and far more efficient. And above all this, would nobility rein their splendor of financial grandeur. Able to pay the best, teach the best and learn the best.

Calia crouched and peered into the boy’s face closer. This one was most likely of Blood than money. Despite the tradition of the word, nobility these days could be purchased as if a cheap nametag. Outside of a proper tehsil, anyone could fashion themselves a king or queen of their own land. It was ridiculous truly, as Calia had a fair share of experience dealing with these types of people, those who believed they could form an alliance with the Burning Wheel. Demanding fealty by hinting at an awesome reward. Disgusting. She answered to none but one: The Oryalis saist Kristel Lelnia, the Queen of Zeal.

She chuckled at how she had made that very clear to every ‘plutocracy’ she had encountered.

“Alexis. . . Where. . .”

Alexis?

She had not said it. She was sure no one else had breathed a word. It had definitely been slurred through the boy’s lips. Calia stood up and looked around. All the others were sound asleep, and Vincent was the only one in her vicinity near enough to have said it that loud. Her face had been an arm’s length away from his, but the question that rose by the sleep-talking still made her doubt.

He never said he didn’t know anyone. Only his parents. . . So who is Alexis?

The girl stepped back, hiding Vincent’s face into the darkness once more. She began twirling her hair around a finger, a rare sign of silent distress – Alexis. . . Family? Friend? Guardian? Man? Woman? This one name threw her into another series of questions. Had the boy been abandoned? That was most credible, considering where he had been found. She amused the scenario. Illegitimate child thrown into Kynith territory, thinking that he would be found and eaten. The flesh of children drove a Kynal into euphoria, known to be the greatest delicacy among their kind.

Not even this kid deserves to be condemned to be that fate.

Or perhaps she was entirely wrong. But alternatives proved to be progressively less plausible in her head. And the now established fact that this child knew someone, intimate enough to be in his dreams, strongly stepped up her first thoughts to highly probable status. But one fact remained, and this flicked her doubt on and off; had the boy lied? If Vincent had the capability to lie with a straight face and enough guile to deceive even her, then there was endless possibility. He could be very guilty of what her Queen had initially charged him against. The very idea made her teeth grind.

To allow this filth to be even in the same room as her mistress. . . No, that was not what would lash her into fuming hate; rather that the boy had exploited Lyrien’s kindness and manipulated her, almost drove her to strange that fragile cylinder called a neck of his. . .

Someone coughed.

Calia withdrew her hand in spite of herself. Instead, she moved closer, bending forward to examine the boy’s profile. Maybe a few drops of lantern oil would do to marr it. Or burn some of his hair. Even under the minimal light, the red was profoundly pronounced. Placing a finger on his forehead, Calia twirled her finger until a lock was wrapped around the digit. The unnatural smoothness of his hair was pleasant to the touch.

She stopped. In sudden distaste of her uncharacteristic actions, she left the boy in his peace. She looked at him, the complexities and problems he had brought, more trouble than he was worth. But as it had become now, she thought as she walked back into the corridors - the dormitory clicking shut behind her - he was going to prove very useful indeed. . .

For even if he had betrayed Lyrien’s kindness, her Queen’s benevolence, it had now come to nothing. Whatever he had planned to execute was going to be weeded out of him starting tomorrow. A smirk played on Calia’s lips; although she did not have concrete evidence of the boy being anything else other than who he said he was, a part of her mind was comforted by the idea at the thought of how the boy would suffer in the days ahead. . . Then silent mirth uttered words in between.

“Welcome to the Crusaders, Kaistia Vincent.”