The Rose Princess (15 page)

The Red Knight’s query received no reply.

“If it’s the Blue Knight, what happened was unavoidable. While the princess may be
angry, what we’ve done is absolutely correct. That’s what he died for. And I’m sure
that’s exactly how he would’ve wanted it.”

“No, that’s not it,” the black sculpture replied. Low as his voice was, it echoed
through the chamber nonetheless.

“What then?”

“It’s the princess that concerns me.”

“Oh.”

“I wonder just how our princess will take the death of the Blue Knight.”

“Really? That isn’t like you at all. Whether we live or die is of no concern to the
princess, and you of all people shouldn’t need me to remind you of that. We only live
to protect the princess and her castle, and to deliver her edicts to the worms below
and see that they are carried out, do we not?”

“But do we really live?” the Black Knight said, seeming to heave a sigh.

His words took the Red Knight’s breath away.

“Did you happen to see the look the Blue Knight wore on his face in death?” asked
the Red Knight.

Just before dawn, their comrade in blue had returned home impaled on his own lance.
As the princess was already in repose and the appearance of the White Knight would
only complicate matters, the Red Knight had summoned servants from the drifting fog
of particles and had them see to everything, while the Black Knight had taken one
look at the remains before quickly going back into the manor.

Over the centuries, he had never uttered a single compliment no matter what kind of
action had been displayed, and such seemed fitting for a battle-hardened veteran.
Therefore, the Red Knight didn’t pity the dead man, but rather admired what the Black
Knight had done. As he spoke now, it was with all due respect toward his compatriot.

“I took off his helmet. He looked so proud. It was literally the face of a man who’d
given his all and battled to the very last. Undoubtedly the battle itself was equally
grand. His opponent—”

“It was D, wasn’t it?”

“Precisely,” the Red Knight said with a nod. The swords on his back clattered together.

“A satisfying death, was it?” the Black Knight muttered, and though the Red Knight
tried to comprehend what sentiments might’ve prompted the remark, he had little luck.
“How long has it been since you became one of the four?” the Black Knight asked, his
face turned toward the ceiling as if seeking the light.

“Roughly a hundred and fifty years, sir.”

“I’ve lived three times that. And having lived that long, one grows a bit weary.”

“I see.”

“But now,” the Black Knight continued, “I truly feel full of life. I’m actually glad.”

“You mean, because we’ve lost the Blue Knight?”

“Dolt. For the very same reason as yourself, for one thing.”

Beneath his helm, the Red Knight grinned. “That could only be D, then.”

“At long last, I’ve met a man who makes me feel in the bottom of my soul that he may
well be more than I can handle. It’s been so long, Red Knight. For ages and ages I’ve
searched for just such a man.”

“Truly—this is an opponent worth gambling our lives against,” the Red Knight said,
showering their foe with heartfelt praise before holding his tongue for a moment.
When he spoke again, it was to say, “But Sir Black Knight—it almost sounds as if you
were choosing a time and place to die.”

The Black Knight laughed aloud. The same grand laugh as always, it served to ease
the apprehension that filled the bosom of the Red Knight. “We have the princess to
protect. Though the manor may be a shambles, so long as she remains, our swords and
lances must stand ready to pierce her foes. In other words, we shall see to it that
D dies for certain. No matter what.”

The Red Knight nodded an acknowledgment, but he didn’t reply. Battle was a religion
to his compatriot.

“Take out your sword,” the Black Knight commanded.

Although the order came out of the blue, every inch of the Red Knight surged with
vitality. He backed away a few steps. But even as he did so, the heavy armor he wore
didn’t make a sound.

Before drawing his sword, he asked, “What other reason do you have for being so happy,
Sir Black Knight?”

Giving no reply, the Black Knight stepped forward.

When the Red Knight heard a great
whoosh!
, his body went into action. Drawn just in the nick of time, the Red Knight’s blade
transmitted a terrific shock up his arms as he barely managed to strike out to one
side, carving an arc to his right. His hands and feet came into the ideal position.

For an instant, a true killing lust hung in the space between the two of them.

The Black Knight was in the same relaxed pose as always.

The Red Knight was poised to draw another blade from his back with his left hand.
The first sword he’d drawn lay on the floor.

The atmosphere suddenly cleared.

“As you’ve taken your favorite stance, there’s not a thing I can do to you now,” the
Black Knight said, rolling his head from side to side.

“I might well say the same. I’m not certain whether I could’ve drawn in time to meet
a second blow from you, sir,” said the Red Knight, and the words came from the very
bottom of his heart.

At just that moment, a haughty laugh echoed from nowhere in particular to surround
the pair.

“Princess!” the knights exclaimed in amazement, both taking a knee in perfect unison.
The light from the dazzling human form before them etched their shadows on the far
wall.

“As skillful as ever, I see,” the princess’s voice remarked. But was it actually the
supposedly slumbering princess that spoke, or was this the work of some Noble machinery
beyond the ken of even her knights?

“Please forgive our unseemly display,” the Black Knight said
gravely.

“You’ve taken it upon yourself to do something rather interesting, my Black Knight.”

“Begging your pardon?”

“Don’t play coy with me. Last night, you and the Blue Knight ran amok down in the
village, did you not? Why, it seems you were trying to destroy all the humans I’d
gone to the trouble of blessing with my flowers. Wasn’t that a bit presumptuous on
your part?”

The Black Knight had no reply.

“I would assume you’re prepared to accept your punishment?”

“I believe I am. But—”

“Oh, my! I don’t believe anyone has ever used that word with me before. Whatever could
it mean?”

Once more at a loss for words, the Black Knight remained silent. Even as an illusion
projected in the daylight, the lovely princess remained an absolute, godlike being
as far as he was concerned. He was no Noble. He wasn’t even a human enslaved by their
bite. If he had to be labeled as anything, then he was a bio-man—a human re-engineered
by the Nobility’s science for extreme longevity. But, that wasn’t necessarily what
made him their subordinate. The way the Nobility inspired a kind of voluntary subservience
in humans was an ideal topic for psychologists to research. Why were there people
who served the Nobility without ever being bitten by them? Though no conclusion had
been reached, the most vivid example of that behavior was currently being played out
between the princess and her Black Knight.

“The Blue Knight has been slain. Now you yourself must assume the same risk,” the
shimmering princess said with a tilt of her glowing head. “Oh, I know! I’d like to
see you do battle with the White Knight now,” she said.

At that, the Red Knight looked up at her, and then desperately lowered his gaze once
more.

The Black Knight solemnly replied, “Understood.”

“As a matter of fact, I’ve already summoned him. Come out, please,” she said, turning
matter-of-factly to where the white figure appeared like a ghost. “Here is your opponent,”
the illusion of the princess said as she indicated the Black Knight. “Have at him
until I call for you to stop. And you’re to hold nothing back. As for you, Black Knight—you
aren’t to use your weapon. You shall battle him empty-handed.”

“But that’s—,” the Red Knight began to say, his head bobbing up in amazement.

“Silence!” the princess snapped, her rebuke shaking the very light that poured through
the stained glass.

—

I

—

B
lasko the smith stared intently at the gleaming blue tip of the lance—he’d just put
it under a particle spectroscope for analysis. This was the very same weapon that
had stopped the mob in its tracks a bit earlier.

“So you say you want a sword just like this, eh?” said the blacksmith, his consternation
and diffidence quite apparent both in his voice and on his face. “What you’ve got
here is molybdenum, chromium steel, an iron polymer, plus some synthetic substance
I don’t have a clue about—and that’s the secret of its cutting strength. Come with
me,” the man said to D.

They’d arrived straightaway after saving Elena, and less than thirty minutes had elapsed
since the incident. The blacksmith was about to walk away, but he stumbled to the
ground where he was—as he was taking the lance from the spectroscope, he’d completely
forgotten about its weight. And though this oversight was caused by his desperate
urge to escape D’s exquisite countenance, the smith would’ve died before admitting
as much.

Walking over without a word, D effortlessly lifted the lance.

“That thing’s mind-boggling! It must weigh a hundred pounds or more. Something like
that could stop a fire dragon, or even a kraken.”

Rubbing his left arm all the while, the blacksmith led D around to his backyard.

Needless to say, D had requested that Blasko craft a sword that could penetrate the
knights’ armor. While the Hunter was skillful enough to deal each of them a fatal
blow even with a lesser blade, his opponents were also superhuman. It was entirely
possible they might parry his blow or make him miss a vital spot. And if his sword
were to break every time that happened, even the great D would be left powerless.

“What do you think?” the smith said with pride as they surveyed his garden.

“My, oh, my!” a voice exclaimed behind him.

Seeming satisfied with the appreciative remark, the smith took another step or two
before the hoarseness of that same voice struck him as peculiar and he turned around.
Quickly shaking his head with a quizzical expression, he then coolly strutted out
into the middle of the garden.

Blasko certainly had every reason to be proud of his yard. The grass and black soil
were crowded with rows of stone sculptures and metal castings that certainly looked
to be the work of the Nobility. A hero of antiquity with sword in hand, a giant cyclops,
a mermaid strumming a lyre, a hundred-legged spider from the stratosphere, the wildly
cavorting Pan playing his flute, and on and on—some of the statues were life-size,
but others were more than thirty feet tall. Since some of those colossal pieces were
busts, the blacksmith’s garden seemed more like an enchanted arbor that left his guests
feeling like they’d stepped into some avant-garde art museum in the Capital. And scattered
among the statues were Noble coffins that were undoubtedly the genuine article.

“I don’t suppose it matters much which we use. But how about we try this?” the smith
said as he indicated a black globe that lay on the grass. It alone seemed to have
nothing whatsoever to do with the world of art. The globe was approximately three
feet in diameter, and there wasn’t a single gleam or reflection on it, as if it were
merely sucking up all the sunlight that touched it.

“All of this is stuff I picked up from a merchant who specializes in garden ornaments
from the Nobles’ ruins. Not that I sit around admiring them or anything,” Blasko added.
“You see, they’re all here so I can test my handiwork on them.”

Now that he mentioned it, every statue was marked with deep gouges or fine cracks,
and some of them even had parts sliced clean off.

“You can’t go wrong with the stuff the Nobility made,” the blacksmith continued. “It’s
a hundred times tougher than the crummy armor and helms you run into, but even then,
there hasn’t been anything my blades haven’t been able to cut. Except for that one
sphere there, that is. Gave it holy hell with some of the Nobility’s weapons, too,
but the results were the same. What I’d like to see is what the point of that lance
can do. Would you give it here for a second?” he asked.

A true professional, Blasko was so well-braced as he took the lance from D’s hand
that only the word “splendid” could do him justice. His lower body didn’t show the
slightest danger of buckling under the load now.

“Take that!” he cried, putting more than enough resolve into a thrust at the center
of the sphere.

But without so much as a spark the lance bounced off, and as the smith took a hard
spill on his tail, the weapon came whistling down at him.

“Holy—,” Blasko groaned, but the tip of the lance stopped right before his painfully
wide eyes.

Pulling the lance away with the same left hand that’d caught it, D eyed the sphere.

“From the way that felt, it’s no use. Don’t bother,” the smith said with a dismissive
wave of his hands as he sat there on his rump. But when he saw how easily D held the
weapon in his left hand, his face went pale.

Not seeming to make any real effort, D simply swept out with his hand.

The blacksmith stared incredulously at the sphere as the lance jutted from the heart
of it. Looking at D, he asked, “Can you pull it out?”

After the Hunter easily drew it from the sphere, the smith ran his fingers almost
lovingly over the tip. With a sullen face he said, “A hell of a thing, that is. I
still doubt if I can even do this.”

“How many days to make a sword from it?” asked D.

“Three, working day and night.”

“Have it for me tomorrow night.”

“Good enough,” the blacksmith replied. “Not because I’m crazy about this weapon, but
because I can’t get over your skill. I’ll craft it for you, but it’ll be no ordinary
sword. What’s your name, anyway?”

“D,” the Hunter replied.

The blacksmith nodded. His eyes were sparkling.

“It’ll be an honor. I’ll get to go to my grave as the smith who forged D’s sword.”

—

It wasn’t long after that D returned to his camp in the ruins. Elena was leaning back
against one of the stone columns. A bike was parked close-by. Seeing D, she raised
one hand and said, “Hey there, stranger!”

Her other shoulder was wrapped in bandages.

“Go home,” D said curtly.

“No way. There’s no one there, and Stahl’s folks will just force their way in. When
I went by earlier to pay my respects, they stabbed me,” the girl said, and as she
lightly brushed her bandages, they darkened slightly with blood. “And it’s not like
anyone else is much happier with me. But relax. I’m not gonna ask you to let me stay
with you or anything stupid like that. The fact is, I came out here before I even
knew what I was doing. But I’ll be going soon.”

Tethering his horse’s reins, D took a bundle off the animal’s back.

“What’s the story with those swords?” asked the girl.

“Our friends will be coming out again tonight. I can’t fight them without weapons.”

The Hunter had borrowed the swords from the blacksmith. Although he had ten in all,
none of them would last more than a single blow.

“Hey, let me fight, too! Alongside you,” Elena said in a forceful tone.

“The only reason you’re still alive is because the Black Knight went easy on you.”

“I know that. That’s why I wanna fight with you. On my own, I couldn’t so much as
scratch the Nobles’ armor. But with you, I think we could get something done. After
all, if they don’t kill me, the folks in the village probably will. So if I’m gonna
go out, I wanna at least hurt those bastards some.”

“You’re rather tenacious, aren’t you?” D remarked.

“You got that right. See, I’ve gotta pay them back for
this
,” Elena said, grabbing her shirt with both hands and pulling it wide open.

She didn’t have anything on underneath it. Below the ample curve of her breasts, a
pair of deep red lines formed an “x” that covered her whole belly. The wounds had
clearly been left by a sword.

“When I was five, that bitch attacked my house. And that’s when she got my father
and mother, and my little brother and sister, though they didn’t really die until
the next day, when the mayor hammered stakes into the four of them. The little ones
were only two and four. The princess had the White Knight with her, and he carved
this into me when I was about to jump her. She was laughing as she said she should
leave at least one of us alive. Even now, I can’t get the sound of that voice out
of my head. And as I’ve grown, the marks have only gotten larger. She told me she
wanted me to remember what’d been done to me, and said if I joined a freak show I’d
be set for the rest of my life.”

Without malice or resentment, Elena’s tone had the stoicism of an old woman, but her
emotions burned beneath the words like a blazing fireball. That she’d been able to
cling to those feelings for a dozen years without going insane was surely a fearful
accomplishment.

Closing her top, Elena looked down at the ground. The emptiness that came after her
explosion of emotion gnawed away at her confidence.

With the bundle of weapons over one shoulder, D walked off into the ruins without
saying a word, leaving Elena there alone. But as the figure was walking away, he then
said something. “Come on,” was what it sounded like to Elena. Perhaps it’d been something
else, but that was good enough for her. Delight coursing through every inch of her,
the girl followed.

The bags D had unloaded a day earlier were still there.

“It’ll be night soon,” said Elena. “I’ll fix something to eat. You can’t very well
fight those bastards on an empty stomach. So, where would your pans—,” she began to
ask, then hastily cupped her hand over her mouth. “You don’t want any dinner, do you?”

“That’s right. If you want anything to eat, you’ll have to make your own arrangements.”

“You don’t even have any bacon or bread?”

“No,” D replied.

“I guess you never figured you’d have anyone else around. Sorry—I didn’t mean anything
personal by that. I’ll go get some food and a pan and stuff. You do at least drink
coffee, don’t you?”

“Weren’t you supposed to be going soon?” asked the Hunter.

“I can’t believe you could work as a Vampire Hunter if you’re so quick to believe
everything everyone tells you.”

Carrying the bundle of longswords, D walked off deeper into the ruins.

“This’ll be ready in no time,” Elena called out to him.

“I’ll be back soon,” the Hunter replied.

True to his word, he returned less than ten minutes later empty-handed.

“What happened to the swords?”

“I spread them around.”

“You don’t say,” Elena remarked as she handed him a cup of steaming brew. “You know,”
she continued, “I’m curious as to why you came to our village. Because I’d heard that
usually even if a Vampire Hunter found a Noble, he’d just let it go unless he’d been
hired.”

“I’ve been hired.”

Elena fairly bugged her eyes at his reply. “By who?!” she blurted out.

“Someone who asked me not to say.”

If that was actually the case, the young man’s lips would remain tight as stone. Elena
quickly threw in the towel. All she knew for certain was that he was here with her
now. That would have to be enough. Sooner or later, he was going to leave.

The girl swallowed her watery sorrows along with her warm beverage.

“You suppose they’ll come?” she asked as she wrapped both hands around her cup.

“Yes. I don’t know whether or not they’ll go after the village, but they’ll want to
take care of me.”

“But that bitch asked you to kill her knights before!”

“And do you believe everything a Noble tells you?”

“No—so stop teasing me!” Elena cried, growing bright red. Although she didn’t think
he was actually mocking her, she couldn’t really be sure—when he never smiled and
was always such a stick in the mud, it was really hard to say for certain.

“If I’m going to kill them, I have to fight them,” said D. “Given their immense motivation,
they’ll be ready to fight to the death. What’s more, they’ll have been punished for
their unauthorized attack on the villagers.”

“I don’t get that, either. How could they go against the princess? I could understand
the Nobility murdering villagers, but why would the knights? Is that supposed to be
their idea of loyalty?”

“Perhaps.”

The Hunter’s terse answer made Elena forget what she was about to say. Silence descended,
and the only thing she could feel was the wind that stroked her cheek.

“Are you scared?” asked D.

“Yeah,” she replied. She felt terribly meek. “But being here with you, I should be
feeling pretty confident. Don’t look at me. I’m shaking like a leaf. I’ve been on
my own for a dozen years, and I was never afraid of anything in all that time. I always
planned on taking out the Noble and her knights, even if it meant I got taken down
in the process. Nothing anyone in the village said ever bothered me. And yet now,
I’m scared. I feel like a baby could whip me. Why did you have to come to our village?
And why’d you make such a coward out of me . . . ?”

“There comes a time when everyone, man or woman, young or old, has to take up arms.
Even the cowards. You’re out on the Frontier,” D told her.

An incredible scene drifted to the fore in Elena’s mind. It wasn’t her parents being
attacked by a pale young woman. Nor was it herself being slashed by the White Knight.
It was the very embodiment of beauty getting back up after the Blue Knight’s lance
had pierced his abdomen.

“I was wondering—aren’t you in pain?” asked the girl.

“Pain?”

“From last night. That bastard put his lance clean through you—even for a dhampir,
that’s gotta hurt, right?”

“Does the thought of that bother you?”

“It might,” Elena replied, trying to be evasive. She suddenly felt she didn’t want
him to see her as weak. Even she couldn’t fathom the turn her emotions were taking.