Chapter IX

“Sire, if I may, you may wish to consider being more...ambitious?” Grand Duke Eyal said, trying to phrase his advice as tactfully as possible.

“What do you mean?” King Hadar asked. He and the Grand Duke were met in his office in the castle. The Grand Duke requested this audience to speak to him about the situation with Nihilus.

“Well, your Majesty, the thing about the land of Nihilus is that it is very flat, hard to defend against invading armies, whereas our lands are more...mountainous, and easier to defend. I say we take advantage of this. We are fairly certain now that Nihilus is responsible for the attacks in your castle; Blackstar Talismans don't exactly make themselves. I say we expose this as a way of getting the people on board with an invasion of Nihilus. A preemptive strike, to put a stop to their sinister plots before they can launch an attack against us.”

“I appreciate your...patriotism,” Hadar said, “But at the time it seems that Nihilus is doing little more than trying to sabotage us from within. This tells me that the King of Nihilus lacks the military might to engage us directly. I don't think an all-out war is truly necessary, my friend. We just need to worry about protecting our people from threats already within our borders. If Nihilus does decide to invade we will work out a defensive strategy, but I will not bring war to my people.”

“If you do not Nihilus will. The price of not fighting our enemies on our doorstep is fighting them on theirs.”

“And what if they're just waiting for us to send our armies away from the capital? What if they've infiltrated the capital so well that all they need is slightly more lax security? They might just be waiting for us to make that mistake so they can capture Aius.” Hadar shook his head, “Send a platoon of men to Muri to help defend the people there in the event of an invasion. Take only DEFENSIVE measures! No one is to set one foot into Nihilus territory.”

“You hope that presenting a large enough force may intimidate our enemy?” the Grand Duke asked. “Very well, I shall do as you ask.”

The past few days had been hectic for Hadar. He'd had to sign off on new taxes levied, and on documents canceling old taxes. In response to several moving letters he'd pardoned six convicts whom he believed to be innocent of the crimes of which they stood accused, and had to deny pardons to several others whom he believed were likely guilty, though nagging doubts kept him awake at night. In his own capital city he had authorized the building of new homeless shelters, which made some of the richer commoners unhappy, considering that it was their taxes that went to house the “idle” poor.

All the while nobles and advisers had been asking him how his “relationship” with Queen Sarahi was. In truth, they were trying to get some kind of appraisal of their sex life, in hopes that they might see hints of a long-lasting dynasty. On the one hand, this reminded Hadar that the best hope of keeping a clear line of succession in Arx was to encourage the budding, secret relationship between Milo and Sarahi, one they were nurturing on their own quite well. On the other hand, it reminded him of the cruel fact that he was unlikely to find true happiness for himself.

Yes, Hadar felt that he was doomed to a strange form of eternal misery. Many men would envy his situation, being King. Many would even kill one another for a throne, but he never had any such aspirations. He'd always wanted to be a paladin, a defender of the people, never their ruler. He'd also hoped to find a man to love. Perhaps a comrade at arms whom he could always be with, even on the battlefield, or perhaps a peacetime lover to come back to after battle was done. Insteead he found himself forced into a role he never wanted. He had to pretend he was what the people truly wanted him to be for the sake of holding the kingdom together.

Hadar wasn't raised with the expectation that he'd one day be King, so while he was trained as a paladin he was never trained as a strategist. For this reason he was terrified of the idea of going to war with Nihilus, more than the usual reasons to be terrified of war. He feared that if he attempted to invade Nihilus as a preemptive strike he would lose, and bring much more death to his people than he would if they simply prepared themselves for Nihilus' invasion and defended their homeland.

As Hadar put away the documents in his office there was a knock on the door. “Come in,” he said.

Malachi, the royal messenger, entered the room, looking distressed. “Your Majesty, the castle of Countess Ezra has fallen!”

Counts and countesses ruled regions referred to as “counties,” which were far from the borders of the kingdom. It was a terrible sign indeed for a countess' castle to fall, for it was a sign of how far in the enemy had already gotten. Countess Ezra's castle was in the county of Xane, not far from the capital city of Aius, and was one of the more impregnable fortresses in Arx. Only the King's castle and the castle of Marquise Zoe were stronger. “How has it fallen? Was it an invading army that had gotten so far in unnoticed? That's impossible!”

“It wasn't an army, the castle was taken from the inside. Demons appeared inside the castle, many turning the soldiers and servants within into their thralls. About a quarter of those living in the castle managed to flee, but the Countess and many others are still unaccounted for.”

Hadar shook his head. “Madness! Why must the people of Nihilus seek chaos like this? Thank you for the news, friend. I have work to do.”

Hadar spent the next few hours getting together a force to retake Countess Ezra's castle. Since paladins from Caelum had already arrived at the castle the force included ten of them, just under half of what had arrived. After some negotiation with the Arch-Bishop he agreed to also supply the King with three golems and one geomancer. The force was small, and the Grand Duke, who was still in Aius at the time, offered to send a regiment of knights with the King, but Hadar reminded him that the enemies inside the castle were likely almost all demons, and the Grand Duke's knights would be unable to wield diamond weapons or cast holy spells. Milo and Sarahi offered to come with him, of course, but he reminded them that under the circumstances he needed people he could trust watching his castle, lest the same thing happen there. Furthermore he wanted them to keep Grigori in check, and instructed Grigori to report to them and treat their orders as if they were his own. Grigori seemed indifferent, as usual.

The paladins and geomancer each got horses to ride. Since the golems themselves could neither run fast enough to keep up with the horses, nor ride horses themselves due to their immense weight, they each got carriages, pulled by four horses, and driven by volunteers from Aius.

Hadar looked over his small force of fifteen, including himself, as they gathered outside Aius, “Are you all ready, men?”

“Aye,” the paladins all said, in unison.

It was customary for the leader of any unit going off to battle like this, whether over a small group or a full legion, to give a stirring speech to motivate the troops. Hadar, however, had never been good at speeches, so he ignored this tradition. “Let us be off, then!”

Each of the paladins in the group had been students at Caelum Academy before Hadar, men he looked up to as older schoolmates in his early days there.

The golems, of course, were just puppets, with no free will of their own. They each were masses of stone and clay gathered together in the shape of large human beings, with two symbols carved into their foreheads. One symbol was the Ancient Script symbol for life, and the other symbol was the unpronounceable name of God. It wasn't that speaking the name was forbidden, it was just that human tongues were literally incapable of pronouncing his true name. This was why they only ever referred to him as “God,” which was more of a title than a name. Unlike the golems at the academy, which were meant to mimic demons, these golems were made specifically to fight alongside paladins, and as such were specifically enchanted to follow orders, and even had certain special powers of their own, aside from their brute strength and near invincibility. These golems could, for short periods of time, turn themselves invisible, for one, a huge tactical advantage. They could also consume stone or dirt, and if they had previously been damaged the stone or dirt they consumed would fill the cracks, chips, or cuts.

As this group, this force of righteousness, rode off to face the demons in Countess Ezra's castle the people of Aius cheered for them, showing their support and encouragement. They bowed as the group passed by them, and girls threw flowers and handkerchiefs to them. Though this force was small, they felt they had more than enough to rescue the people of the castle, if any still survived, and enough to slay the demons responsible.

Grigori continued his investigation in the castle as if nothing had changed. He entered the guard barracks in the middle of the day, when only those who worked the overnight shifts were present, and asked where the guard known as Huram slept. He inspected Huram's bed, and found, hidden underneath, small scraps of wood and a broken horse-shoe.

Now, Ocran, the servant whom Grigori had interrogated earlier, had told him that he suspected Huram of being the one who made the Blackstar Talisman, but finding these scraps incriminated Ocran more than they incriminated Huram. Grigori doubted that a real warlock would be so sloppy as to leave pieces of a Blackstar Talisman in a place that so easily implemented him in its creation, and that so many people had such easy access to. Real warlocks would have hidden materials in some dark corner in a cellar, or buried them in the ground, but even then they'd only do so BEFORE the talisman was complete. Once the talisman was complete they'd want to dispose of the evidence as quickly as possible. They certainly wouldn't have pieces lying under their beds. Yes, this evidence was most definitely planted in order to shift blame, and Grigori was certain that Ocran was the warlock now.

He couldn't afford to trust the castle guards to apprehend Ocran, though. If Ocran knew that Grigori was onto him before Grigori could ensure that he could neither escape nor strike back this could end in disaster. Grigori would need to apprehend Ocran on his own, using his best cunning.

As he walked down the castle's halls, his hand on the hilt of his short-sword, he heard the sound of something heavy being knocked over in one of the rooms nearby and stopped dead in his tracks. He'd been passing one of the guest rooms and the door was closed, which was unusual for a room no one was staying in. Grigori pressed his ear up against the door to listen in and heard the sound of fabric ripping and the muffled sound of a young lady attempting to scream. Grigori pushed on the door in an attempt to open it, but found that it was locked. He stepped back and kicked the door as hard as he could three times, until finally it broke inward and he was able to enter the room.

In there he saw Iddo, the guard whom he had caught staring lustfully at one of the servant girls, without his pants, on top of the same servant girl, whose dress was torn nearly to pieces. He had one hand covering her mouth and another hand holding onto both of her wrists. Grigori drew his sword and shouted, “HEY!”

Iddo jumped to his feet and spun around with his fists raised. This gave the servant girl just enough time to slip out and run away, screaming.

“Son of a whore!” Iddo shouted and reached for his own sword. Grigori sprung into action and stabbed Iddo's hand. His blade went right through, causing Iddo to cry out in agony.

“As far as I'm concerned there's only one fitting punishment for a rapist,” Grigori muttered before he swung his short sword low. Under the law of the Inquisition rapists were castrated, which was both a punishment and a means of preventing them from ever committing such atrocities again. Normally this was done in a way that would prevent them from bleeding out, but Grigori had neither the time nor tools for such a method, and he felt that Iddo needed to be punished immediately, lest he either get away with it or attempt it again. Iddo fell on the ground, bleeding, screaming, and curled up in a fetal position, holding the place where his genitals had once been. Grigori turned to walk away, only to see two other guards standing in the doorway, no doubt drawn in by the sounds. Their weapons were drawn and their expressions told Grigori that they were angry at him, which told him that they either hadn't heard from the servant girl that Iddo was attempting to rape her or that they didn't care. Either way Grigori knew he'd have to act quickly.

He had no intention of killing these guards because he didn't know if they were merely acting on what they saw without all of the information or if they were actually corrupt and on Iddo's side. At the same time, though, he knew that they would likely move in to attack him soon, and he'd need some means of defending himself. Real swordplay was nothing like what peasant children mimicked with wooden swords or tree branches, or like what actors portrayed on the stage. Real swordsmen generally did not block sword-blows with their own swords, because that was a quick way to blunt or even break said swords, and swords were only effective so long as they were at least a bit sharp. Grigori didn't have a shield to block the attacks from the guards and neither did he want to blunt his own short-sword fighting them, so he picked up Iddo's sword just as they moved in and used it to deflect their swords as they swung at him. He took that extra moment to dash through the opening between the two of them and dropped Iddo's sword behind him.

The two guards soon gave chase, and Grigori knew he was unlikely to be able to defeat both of them. Yes, he had some warrior training, but he had been trained more as an investigator than as a warrior, these men had spent their whole lives training as warriors. He'd gotten lucky so far, or perhaps Sandalphon was truly watching over him, but he dared not put that luck or blessing to the test. So he fled. Of course, this became an increasingly complicated matter soon, because as he dashed down the narrow halls of the castle other guards saw him running and saw guards chasing after him, as well as the blood on his cassock and his blade. Any guard worth his salt who saw something like that would pursue Grigori, or otherwise attempt to stop him from getting away. The more guards pursued Grigori the less likely escape seemed. The only advantage he had over them was that since he was in a light-weight cloth cassock and they were in metal armor he could move faster, though he had to worry about the ends of the cassock getting caught on nails or furniture.

With the sound of metal boots against the stone floors thundering behind him Grigori began to throw obstacles into the path. He tossed chairs behind him, or cut the strings holding up tapestries so they would fall on the pursuing guards, but this only seemed to slightly slow them down. He knew he couldn't run forever. He could hear them shouting profanity and insults, some directed not at him but at his mother. He thought it was ironic how much they could hate him considering none of them even knew why they chased him aside from the fact that he was running away. He'd venture a guess that if many of them knew the real reason this whole chase had started they'd almost call him a hero.

Grigori found his way to the kitchen, where the slammed the door shut and immediately dragged a table over to barricade the door. The servants in the kitchen all stared in shock as Grigori scrambled to get the door blocked off, and as soon as it was he turned to them, “It's a misunderstanding, I assure you!” he told them, the bloody blade still in his hand.

Obviously they couldn't just take his word for this, especially as the guards began to break the door down. To them all of this looked like he had done something heinous and the guards were after him. They weren't members of the castle guard, but their courage was stronger than one might expect for mere servants.

The servants all picked up various objects they could use as weapons; rolling pins, meat cleavers, butcher knives, pans, ladles, whatever seemed like it might make a useful weapon. Grigori held up his blade, pointing it at them to keep them at bay. “Back, all of you!” The servants had no warrior training, individually they were no threat, but if they all attacked him he wouldn't have a chance of survival. He'd never be able to fight them all, but he also knew that each of them were afraid they'd be among the few who'd fall in trying to take him down. All of them were too afraid of death to be the first to attack him.

The door began to crack and break as the guards slammed into it over and over, and Grigori braced himself against the tables he'd placed in the way. He silently prayed that some kind of miracle would save him from their rage. Now, even more than before, surrender was certainly not an option. He'd stabbed and castrated a guard, fought two others, and undoubtedly hurt many more as he tried to get away. Now they'd be so angry they'd kill him on sight.

“Halt! Halt! HALT I SAY!” he heard a woman's voice shout from the other side of the door. He could hear the guards all step away from the door and the pounding stopped. “Brother Grigori, it's Queen Sarahi, Alma told me why you did it. Iddo had it coming. I apologize for the misunderstanding.” Alma must have been the servant girl Iddo attempted to rape. Apparently she'd told the Queen what really happened.

“I won't be killed for this?” Grigori asked. It seemed fairly obvious, but he wanted to hear the Queen at least say that much after all he'd gone through just now.

“No, Grigori, you were in the right,” Queen Sarahi said.

Grigori cleaned his sword and sheathed it, and the servants helped him move the tables away from the door, or what was left of the door. Grigori walked out into the hall to greet Sarahi, Milo, and all the murmuring guards. Standing by Sarahi was Alma, the servant girl he saved from Iddo.

“Thank you so much!” Alma said as she threw her arms around him.

Grigori felt his face flush and gently pushed her away. Such physical contact between two people not married or engaged to be married was forbidden by the Inquisition because it encouraged lust and the sin of desire. “I did what anyone should do. But honestly I wish he'd been stopped sooner. Did he manage to steal your virginity?”

“No,” Alma said. “Thank God!”

“The angel Sandalphon was watching out for both of us,” Grigori said and then turned to Queen Sarahi. “I'm grateful you arrived when you did. I was likely only moments away from losing my life. Is anyone...other than Iddo, of course, seriously injured?”

“A few sprained ankles and twisted knees,” Sarahi said. “At least so far as I know.”

“Has a physician treated Iddo's wound yet?” Grigori asked.

“What?” Sarahi was confused as to why he would even ask such a question.

“I performed the castration rather sloppily, he may very well die from bleeding out or infection if not treated.”

“he was caught forcing himself on a woman, the penalty for that is death. Why bother?”

“Death? No! he still has a chance for redemption! What about his soul? Would you really damn him for all eternity for this?”

“I would,” said Alma.

“That's not our decision to make!” Grigori said, for the first time since they'd met him appearing passionate about something. “Listen, it's our purpose in this life to save as many souls as we can, even the worst sinners can be turned righteous! It's not like he can attempt his crime again!”

“In your own lands you have your own laws,” Queen Sarahi said. “Here in Arx we punish rapists and attempted rapists with death. Frankly, they've shown they no longer deserve to live when they do something so terrible.”

“It's not our place to decide who does or doesn't deserve to live!” Grigori said. Even back in his homeland it was rare for him to get worked up at all, but a man's immortal soul was on the line here, and Grigori considered that reason enough.

“Maybe it's not our place to decide that, but we have very specific laws here in Arx, and we keep them,” Sarahi said, her tone getting harsher and harsher by the second. “You are not in charge, with Hadar gone I am, and I will rule in this matter as the law says I should. Iddo will be stoned to death for his crime, if he survives long enough to reach the city square.”

Grigori fell to his knees. “No! No! No! his soul...forever in demon hands...no!”

Alma felt utterly disgusted that Grigori could feel so much sympathy for a monster who just a few minutes ago tried to force himself on her. She was grateful for what Grigori did, certainly, but it was beyond bizarre to see him so concerned for the soul of a man who didn't seem to have one. The man she called her hero was now begging for the life of the man he'd saved her from. She couldn't imagine anything more confusing.