Noble V: Greylancer (5 page)

“Why is that?”

“We have no time for tears if we want to live,” answered Michia, looking away for
a moment. “Half of the children die within two months of their birth. The land in
these parts can barely grow a tenth of the crops that we need to survive.”

“You receive necessary rations from the Administration Bureau in the Capital.” Greylancer’s
tone turned serious. Overseeing the Northern Frontier sector was his responsibility.

For the first time, an incredulous expression came into Michia’s eyes. “Do you not
know?”

“About what?”

“The rations we receive from the Bureau do not last any of the villages more than
a week.”

“That’s absurd. I’ve seen to it that you will never go hungry. Your welfare has always
been a priority.”

“But you do not deliver the supplies yourself.”

“You’re not suggesting—my vassals? Profiteering?” He shook his head. A ferocious gleam
began to burn in his eyes. “Why do you weep now, amid this reality too hard for tears?
And…”

Greylancer swallowed his words, as a faint smile crept across Michia’s face.

“There is another reason why I weep,” she said, hopeful and bashful at the same time.

“Speak it now,” said Greylancer gravely.

Her pale arms twined around his neck.

It was a moment best described as a miracle.

No other time in history has a human, neither spellbound by a Noble’s gaze nor seeking
servitude, ever willingly desired a Noble.

“I weep because—” Michia stopped. Greylancer looked up at the entrance. “What’s wrong?”

“An unfortunate intruder.” Greylancer clenched Michia’s hand.

Four silhouettes rushed inside and scattered about the stable.

“Michia—what are you
doing
?” The earth-scorching cry belonged to Chief Lanzi.

Though she let go of his hand, rather than pulling away, Michia collapsed over Greylancer’s
lap.

“What are…my lord, just what have I done to earn your disfavor?” The chief trembled
violently.

Two of the men appeared to be the chief’s hired hands, and the other, Greylancer recognized.
The man had been the one glaring at Greylancer with murderous intent at the tavern.

“My lord…what is…this?” An emotion unlike despair and shock swelled in the chief’s
voice.

Greylancer rose to his feet
and offered no explanation in his defense. Resuming the bearing of an overlord ruling
over his lowly human subjects, the Noble glared.

A shock wave of contempt and anger ripped through the four intruders. They were sent
reeling on their heels, and two of the men fell onto their backsides.

“The door was open, so you are forgiven for not knocking or announcing your presence.
I shall take my leave.” Greylancer moved toward his cybernetic horse without so much
as acknowledging Michia.

“My lord,” said the voice of a younger man. When Greylancer did not slow his pace,
the voice called out, “There’s something you should see.”

Sensing an odd confidence in the frightened voice, Greylancer turned his head.

A horrible chill stabbed like a stake at his immortal heart.

A youth of about twenty with his head wrapped in bandages stood clutching a rusty
cross in his outstretched hand.

The others let out a cry. Though there were only four men including the chief, their
voices rang across the stable with the force of an entire division of men.

“So it works,” said the youth. “I was wandering around some old religious ruins and
came across an ancient tome. I guess what was written in it was true—the Nobility
fear the crucifix.” He nodded at the others behind him, but two of the men were paralyzed
with fear, as the stakes and hammers trembled in their hands. “Don’t just sit there!
Do it!” yelled the youth at the top of his lungs.

“Chief, Chief…” Greylancer gnashed his teeth.

The chief was struck motionless by the fury in Greylancer’s voice. The cross was supposed
to render the Noble unconscious, or so the youth had said. But though the Noble had
averted his eyes, he hardly appeared shaken, much less about to fall into a swoon.

Greylancer hulked over the chief like a mountain. “Have you any idea what you’re doing?”

“I-I know it,” stammered the chief. His teeth chattered as if to rebuke the temerity
of his actions. “Th-this is an act for…for all humanity! A day that will live in history.
This night will sound the starting shot of humanity’s revolt against the Nobility!”
The last words tripped off his tongue, not from growing calm but from desperate abandon.

Meanwhile the youth with the cross ran up to one of the feckless men on the ground
and seized a stake and hammer. “Father!”

Chief Lanzi winced.

“Ah, so he is your son, is he? You also spoke of a daughter.” Greylancer’s voice took
on a scornful tone that seemed to threaten not only Chief Lanzi but also his progeny
in the present and extending into all eternity.

Lanzi’s son shoved the two weapons to his father’s chest. “Father, stab him in the
heart with this.”

The stake and hammer rattled in the chief’s arms, as his entire body trembled.

“Father!” cried his son. But when Lanzi continued to shake, he yelled, “Then hold
this. I’ll end him!” The youth shoved the cross in his father’s hands and took the
stake and hammer in his own.

As he stood ready to lunge at Greylancer, Michia intervened for the first time. “Stop
it, Lanok. You must stop. Lord Greylancer is—”

“I don’t want to hear it!” cried Lanok. “You’ve been a good mother to us. You never
hit us or threw us out in the dead of winter for disobeying you, like our real mother.
You were fair, but firm, an ideal mother. Leticia and I have always thought of you
as our real mother. But now, look at you! Throwing yourself into the arms of this
Noble. You’re a traitor! A traitor to Leticia, my father, and me, your friends, the
village, the Frontier, and all of humanity! Leticia is lucky she isn’t here to witness
this. As soon as I finish the Noble, you’re next!” These baleful words were enough
to paint over the night with sorrow.

Lanok rushed forward with the stake pointed at Greylancer’s chest and lifted the hammer
over his head.

Tackling his side to intercept his advance was Michia.

The two tangled and spun around several times in the other’s clutches before tumbling
to the ground.

The cybernetic horses let out a loud whinny.

“Chief Lanzi,” boomed Greylancer. “Put down the cross!”

The old chief dropped the crucifix as if he’d been struck by a thunderbolt.

Greylancer’s right arm traced a wicked arc.

It was easy enough to call it a sudden flash of steel. But the tip of the lance exceeded
three meters and its grip easily five meters in length.

The blade stopped not on Lanok, who’d scrambled to his feet, but at the throat of
his companion, who was left twitching helplessly on the ground.

The Noble cast a smile that might rightly be called benevolent. With his eyes trained
on the boy before him, Greylancer addressed the rebel leader. “Lanok, was it? As overseer,
I have governed over this land by example. My regard for you humans is no different
than that of other Nobles. But I will not promise your safety and leave you to fend
for yourselves in a wasteland not even beasts or monsters dare inhabit. Nor will you
be laid to slaughter for my gain. And in return my demand is this—absolute loyalty.
It is easily given. Do not cross me, do not talk back in anger, and do not lie. And
never raise a sword against me. They are the commandments I have passed down to you
at my appointment and have repeated time and again. You have been allowed to live
in peace ever since. A peaceful life. Is that not what you humans desire?”

“Ruled by the Nobility, surviving on what rations you toss our way—
peaceful
? Even if that were true, it’s no way to live. We live and breathe! As long as we
are subjugated by your rule, we might as well be dead. What good is living in death?
There are enough living dead already! Cursed vampires, cold-blooded bastards! This
planet was born for us warm-blooded humans!” Lanok shouted, “You will die proudly,
Hendry!”

“Hmph, did you hear him,” Greylancer said to the youth named Hendry. “A mere boy who
must be defended by his mother. Will you listen to
him
?” The lance dug into the boy’s throat. Blood snaked down his neck. “Tell me that
you want to be saved. Cry and scream that you do not want to die. Grovel before me
and beg for your life. Then you will be allowed to live. Then you shall have the honor
of serving me.”

When Hendry heard this, a certain look floated across his face. Lanok let out a groan.

A servant of the Nobility—a human who is bitten and dies by the hand of a Noble returns
to life with the same abilities of the Nobility. As one of the living dead. A vampire.
When he submits to his station as a well-heeled dog of his master, he ceases to be
human. Most such servants would think of themselves as better than human.

A most sweet proposition. A delectable existence indeed. Those humans who joined the
lowest ranks of the bloodstained world became informants and traitors against their
brethren.

At that moment, a certain look came across the faces of these humans—one of terror,
panic, guilt, and an avarice that exceeded all of the former. It was the very look
that had crept across Hendry’s face.

“Die, Hendry!” Lanok shouted again.

“No!” cried his friend. “I didn’t want to pick a fight with the Nobles in the first
place. You dragged me into this. I don’t want to die. God knows I don’t want my head
torn off and tossed in the streets for crows and monsters to pick at.” Hendry turned
to Greylancer and continued, “Yes, make me your servant.” Hendry turned over onto
his knees and touched his forehead against the dirt.

“Very well.” The giant came forward. Throwing back his cape, Greylancer grabbed Hendry
by the hair, pointed his face upward, and buried his face in the boy’s neck.

“Hendry!” Lanok let out a heartrending cry.

Soon anguish and an indelible look of rapture spread over Hendry’s face. Lanok imagined
the blood of another world pouring into his friend’s veins.

Hendry’s body convulsed violently.

Aside from the two crimson lines trickling down his throat, a bloody flower began
to spread its petals over his chest. The tip of a deadly stake tore through the wool
shirt and emerged from his chest.

“Vachss?”

As the others remembered the presence of another youth, the boy named Vachss drew
back the stake he’d driven into his treacherous friend’s heart from behind and swung
for Greylancer’s chest.

The spike had pierced through Greylancer’s green and gold embroidered shirt and clear
through his chest.

“Well done. So you are a lad with some courage.” Greylancer glanced up at Vachss as
he passed a free hand across Lanok’s face, which was set in an indescribable expression.
“Alas, too late. Your friend has already fallen prey to my kiss, and you will have
to die. A most brutal death.”

“Why…why…do you not fall?” Vachss’s mouth opened and closed like that of a fish found
in a market.

“Pray,” said Greylancer. “Pray to the god you believe in. Or you will never destroy
me.”

Vachss had a god he believed in. He would not be able to endure this world otherwise.
Though he tried to intone a prayer, memory failed him.

“I heard that if you pray from your soul, God will be by your side. And I am unable
to lay a hand on him. I want to see this god. Pray.”

The Noble’s inexplicably solemn voice seemed to summon Vachss’s memory.

Amid the stench of blood beginning to fill the stable.

“Lord…I will fear no evil…for thou art with me…” The others listened to the horribly
arid voice that came haltingly at first and then turned into a desperate echo. “…the
Lord is my shepherd…He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside
the still waters.”

Perhaps someone among them was aware that Vachss’s god had been born in a manger.
Were that the case, perhaps bearing witness to another birth in this stable did not
seem strange.

Soon the prayer ended.

A pious calm pervaded the barn, like moonlight on the Holy Night.

“Do you see Him?” Vachss asked—of whom, it was not clear. Perhaps Greylancer, or Chief
Lanzi.

“Y-yes…” The chief nodded. “He—”

“—is not here.”

The instant Vachss recognized the voice belonging to Greylancer, his head twisted
360 degrees. The sound of his neck bones being crushed reverberated across the barn.

“What’s the matter, Chief? Lanok?” After dropping the dead body atop the corpse of
the other boy, Greylancer shot a look at Lanok standing dumbstruck. “So your god does
not come, even when you give prayer. I must say I am disappointed.”

The Noble’s long lance howled once more, cutting a path for Chief Lanzi’s neck.

His head sailed through the air in a gush of blood as the lance took aim at a new
target.

Greylancer let slip a gasp.

Before the sidelong sweep of the lance could slice Lanok’s chest in two, Michia had
jumped out in front of her son. The blade was wedged halfway into her torso.

Greylancer stared down at the young mother as she fell to her knees in a spray of
blood. This mortal wound was evidence of either a lack of skill or the Noble’s singular
ability to halt his lance mid-swing.

“Run,” said Michia in a blood-gurgling voice, prompting the Noble to turn toward the
young insurgent.

After being pushed to the ground again, Lanok recovered his feet and tried to go to
where his mother lay.

“Don’t—” Michia rasped. “Hurry, you must run.”

Lanok whirled around and eyed the door behind him. “Mother.”

“…quickly.” Then Michia collapsed.

Lanok chose to do his mother’s bidding.

As he let out a mournful wail and ran for the door, Greylancer pointed the lance at
the boy’s back.

“Don’t.”

The woman’s thread-thin voice halted the bloodshed. When the Noble craned his neck
downward, Michia was clinging to his right leg. Fresh blood trailed behind from where
she had fallen and crawled. Blood that he had spilled.

Greylancer’s face betrayed a look of confusion, perhaps for the first time in his
life.

“You defended me and defended your son, and for that, you will die by my lance. Why?
Why do you protect two enemies?”

“…neither is…an enemy…of…mine…”

The thread began to break.

“My lance will kill you. You protected your son, knowing this. You could have lived
another day. Do you not value your life?”

“A life…which you once saved. I am…content…to be able…to do the same. It will take
time for…my son…to understand… so do not forget…that I saved you…and Lanok.”

“I will remember. You have my word,” said Greylancer, surprised by his own heartfelt
reply.

Michia collapsed and did not stir again.

“Now you are dead.” Amid the stillness and stench of blood pervading the room, only
the low murmur of Greylancer’s voice drifted about. “You humans all die so quickly.
Flesh decays, and bones are left to bleach and crumble away in the wind. Why do you
die so quickly? Why do you give your life for others, knowing so? For your son, I
understand. But why did you not hesitate to save mine?” Greylancer hoisted the lance
high in the air and stared at the blade. “I have taken the life of one who protected
mine.”

If one’s voice told the secrets of the soul, no doubt the Noble named Greylancer was
harboring a certain emotion.

An emotion called grief.

†

Bistoria, the capital city of the Northern Frontier sector, was eternally dampened
by fog and rain. The cities heavily populated by Nobility were deliberately designed
to maximize shadows, where Nobles could amble down the stone-paved streets or otherwise
rush past the gaslights in coaches.

What Greylancer found waiting for him upon his return from the Frontier was an order
to report to the Capital at once.

This is sudden. What do they want?
he mused to himself.

Quietly, Greylancer boarded the emergency aircraft. The flight to the Capital was
three hours.