The Rose Princess (16 page)

“The pain I felt when it stabbed into me was no different from what an ordinary person
would feel,” D replied.

Elena remained gazing intently at him, but for a few seconds she couldn’t say a word.
He bled. He felt pain, too. How many times over would this gorgeous man die in the
course of his life? Elena shuddered—she seemed to shake with every bit of energy she
had. And when the shaking subsided, her fear had gone. The intense nature of D’s answer
had changed the very face of the girl.

“We’ve got a few hours until sunset. Take a rest.”

With those words, D set his cup down and stood up.

Not speaking as she watched him leave, Elena slowly counted to ten before starting
off after him. Although she didn’t really think she could go unnoticed or even manage
to trail him very well, she simply had to satisfy her curiosity. There had to be something
to these ruins. It seemed to her as if D had been aware of that from the very start
and had come out here seeking it.

In the center of the ruins, D knelt before one of the stone columns and ran his fingers
around its base. Elena knew that ancient letters and symbols were inscribed there.
When she was just a child, the wind and rain had already worn the markings away into
illegibility, but she wondered if the young man would be able to decipher the past.

“Come over here,” D said, the abrupt command knocking the wind from Elena.

“You don’t believe in keeping much secret, I guess,” she said as she walked over to
him. “What did this used to be? I mean, I can’t believe how interested you are in
this place. Don’t tell me it holds some kind of secret about the Nobility.”

“That’s right,” the Hunter replied.

“Tell me, then. I’ll probably wind up dead tonight. I don’t wanna go out wondering
about this.”

“These are the ruins of a fortress,” D said nonchalantly.

“A fortress?! Whose?”

“I don’t know. From what I could read of the remaining inscriptions,
it belonged to humans. And it’s rather ancient—more than two
thousand years old.”

“A fortress from two millennia ago—this area must’ve been a lot wilder back then.
I wonder if colonists could’ve built it.”

“I don’t know any more than that.”

A question suddenly burst free of the girl’s brain. Elena made a desperate effort
to recapture it, but before she could pop it like a soap bubble, it floated off her
lips.

“When you came to our village, you headed straight out here. You knew about this place
beforehand, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t think a Vampire Hunter would come all the way out here to investigate some
ruins, so I have to wonder if you weren’t hired to do this, too.”

“It’ll be twilight soon,” D said as he looked up at the heavens.

The sunlight held a tinge of blue. Two shadows fell on the stone floor. One was vivid,
the other faint.

“I guess so,” Elena said, facing the manor. Soon a light sparked in one of its windows.
That was the call to arms. “I wonder if the princess and her three knights will all
come,” she mused.

In her imagination, the ecstatic Elena painted a picture of herself and D fighting
side-by-side, soaked in gore.

In no time, the moon came out.

—

II

—

“The moon is up,” said the Black Knight. He was in a room in the manor, and the royal
blue of the night sky was visible through a spot where the ceiling had collapsed.

“Are you absolutely determined to go? The princess has given us no such mandate,”
said the Red Knight, who’d been standing behind his stationary compatriot and watching
him for some time.

“I realize that. And that is why I’ve waited until night. Given the circumstances,
the princess may elect to send us out. Or perhaps she’ll give the order for us to
accompany her. However, even if she doesn’t, I’m going. You yourself saw the way the
Blue Knight died. The one who killed him must be made to pay, and those of us who
yet live must exact that payment.”

“Even if that means disregarding the will of the princess?”

“Aye,” the Black Knight replied without a second’s hesitation.

Gazing at him with adoration, the Red Knight said, “I shall go with you.”

Now it was the Black Knight’s turn to ask the same question. “Even if it means disobeying
the princess?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll meet the same fate that I have.”

“I don’t care,” said the Red Knight. Only now, his voice echoed with a certain something
that was neither purely rage nor pity. The punishment that’d been carried out in the
stained-glass chamber had been branded into his retinas. And the ghastly results of
it were before his very eyes.

The Black Knight’s right arm had been taken off at the shoulder.

“Then you’re to follow my directions,” the Black Knight insisted as he turned to the
Red Knight.

“I swear it.”

“Obey the princess’s instructions. I forbid you to disobey her. If you
ever so much as harbor such thoughts again, you’ll be marked a traitor.”

For a moment the Red Knight was stunned, but a second later he began to say, “But
I—”

“No arguments,” the Black Knight stated firmly. The steely gravity of his tone repressed
the rebellious fervor in the Red Knight. “The princess’s tack now is different from
that in the past. Perhaps the weariness I feel comes from her. However, I am no Noble.
I can’t imagine what kind of thoughts might instill such feelings in her, or how those
emotions might manifest. Most likely—”

Something hidden in the unfinished portion of that last sentence made the Red Knight
grow tense.

“—it will bode ill for all involved? How right you are!”

At the sound of that echoing voice, the two knights looked all around in astonishment,
and then turned back the way they’d been facing.

Beside a stone pillar on the point of collapse stood the princess. To her rear, the
darkness was crushed beneath a spreading mass of roses, roses, and more roses. And
their glow.

“Aren’t you the stubborn one,” the princess remarked, skewering the Black Knight with
her smile.

The two fell to one knee.

“However,” the Noblewoman continued, “you won’t be going anywhere tonight. You’re
to remain here.”

“If I might explain, Princess.”

“You needn’t bother,” the woman said with a sweep of the white rose in her hand. Leaving
a trail of light behind it, the glowing bloom was swallowed by the darkness. “I understand
how angry all of you must be. But that Hunter is a formidable opponent. Do you want
to end up like the Blue Knight?”

“That shall depend on the Hunter,” the Black Knight replied with all due respect and
fealty.

“No. I shall be the one to go see him.”

The two knights looked up at their mistress, and for the first time since entering
her service they dared to voice their opposition, shouting, “You mustn’t!”

Although the Red Knight was shaken as the Black Knight glared at him, the princess
didn’t seem at all perturbed by their outburst.

“Never fear. I shall have a different escort,” she said.

“The White Knight?”

“No. A group you’ve not seen these last two centuries.”

The Black Knight alone seemed to understand, as he looked up at her and said, “You
don’t mean—
them
?”

“None other.”

“Princess, I say this fully prepared to accept any additional
punishments. But that is one thing you simply cannot do!”

“Why is that?!” she inquired.

“As soon as you let them loose outside, it’ll be a scene of bloody carnage,” the Black
Knight replied. “I’m quite certain they could slay a dhampir. They could annihilate
the villagers as well. However, the bloodthirsty beasts will forget your commands
and leave your domain, completely indiscriminate in their unending search for blood.
That cannot be. That is not what our wise princess would do. Oh, Princess—whatever
has come over you?”

“Over
me
?”

“Once again, I ask this prepared to suffer a thousand deaths,” the Black Knight said,
sounding as if he were coughing out blood instead of words.

Listening intently, the Red Knight hung his head without saying a word.

“Princess, you have changed over the last few years. Though I can’t describe exactly
how, you seem like a different person. I cannot comprehend your thoughts or feelings,
milady.”

“My, how you pry into my affairs,” the enchanting princess spat. “Red Knight, do you
share his opinion?”

“I do, milady,” he replied, but the very second he spoke, a flash of black shot from
beside him and knocked him to the floor before he could avoid it.

“How dare you say such a thing—Please overlook his insolence, milady,” the Black Knight
apologized with a deep bow.

“Good enough,” said the princess. “But I said I would send them, and send them I shall.
As for you, Black Knight—you’re to be incarcerated. Red Knight, lock him away.”

Either the Red Knight remained conscious when knocked to the floor or he’d since regained
his senses, because he gazed at the Black Knight and responded with a troubled, “Yes,
milady.”

Still holding a rose in her mouth, the princess said, “Do you intend to interfere
with me, even if it means you must go through the Red Knight? Or will you turn your
sword against me?”

“No. Your orders will be followed,” the Black Knight replied. His answer had a bitter
taste to it.

The darkness grew denser and denser while the four-colored roses glowed stunningly.

—

Poised with his left hand resting against the pillar, D turned suddenly in the direction
of the manor. There wasn’t a sound on the night wind. Nevertheless, the hand he had
pressed against the pillar asked him, “Did you hear that?”

“They’re coming,” D replied succinctly.

“That they are. Ten of them, I’d say. On horseback. But what I sense isn’t the knights.
With those guys, you can’t tell if they’re dead or alive. But these characters are
all definitely dead.”

“Wraith knights,” D muttered.

“Bingo. And they’ve got this awfully powerful energy protecting them. That’d have
to be the woman’s doing.”

“Are they coming?”

D turned to the entrance of the ruin and replied to the girl who sat there with an
electron lantern in hand. “They’ll be here soon.”

Elena got right up, without nervousness, hesitation or even fear.

“This is what I’ve been waiting for,” said the girl. “Where did you figure we’d fight
them?”

“You’re going to be here.”

“What do you mean?!” Elena cried.

“It’s not the knights that are on the way, but a band of dead men. And those who’ve
died once can’t be killed a second time.”

“Well, what are you gonna do then?”

“I have no choice but to kill them.”

Although Elena found that to be the very epitome of contradiction, on reconsideration
she decided this young man’s skill with a blade probably would be enough to kill the
dead once more.

“At this point, I’m not about to sit back and be a good little girl. Take me with
you,” the biker told D. “Hell, if you insist on turning me down, I’ll just go off
and fight anyway.”

“Staying in the ruins is part of the battle, too.”

“That’s just double-talk,” Elena said as she searched in the bike for another weighted
chain.

“We’ll see soon enough. But when the time comes, I need you to be right in here.”

“Really?”

“Really,” D replied.

“I believe you. And I won’t have you worrying about me at a time like this.”

Not saying a word, D left her and set off across the plains that lay between them
and the castle.

There was a breeze. The green grass swayed in the moonlight. And there stood the Hunter—that
alone formed a picture. Any artist who could’ve committed to canvas the inner thoughts
of the young man as he stood there between life and death would’ve become a prisoner
of his own madness, although the resulting painting would surely endure forever as
a treasure of the art world.

“Here they come,” a hoarse voice said some five minutes after the Hunter had taken
that position on the plain. The ruins were roughly five hundred yards away.

The riders approaching across the grasslands seemed to float in a horrifying sort
of slow motion. Both mounts and riders were covered by dull gray armor. Reaching a
spot about thirty feet shy of D, they halted. Their movements were so quiet that all
but the most intent of listeners would’ve missed the sounds completely.

“The wraith knights—I’ve heard of them,” said the Hunter’s left hand.

There was no reply at all, as if it had been addressing the moon.

The ash gray figures lingered there in the moonlight like veritable ghosts.
Shreee!
squealed the leader’s blade as it slid from the scabbard on the knight’s hip. At
the same time, the other nine drew their weapons in unison. Three had swords, three
more bows, and the last three had lances. Their weapons differed little from those
of the four knights.

“Where are the princess and the others?” asked D.

One of riders raised its head and laughed. But no voice came out. Its laughter had
stopped.

D was up over its head. The Hunter’s thirty-foot leap had no doubt been faster than
the wraith knight’s eyes could follow. With a grating sound and a shower of sparks
the blade of D’s sword crumpled, but it also plowed right through the knight from
the top of its head all the way down to its abdomen.

As he came back to earth, D looked at his foe. The feeling he’d gotten from his blade
hadn’t been ordinary resistance.

Something like a white fog poured from the crack in the iron. In places, the cloud
glittered as if it were laced with silver. Once the fog had fallen from the horse
back to the ground, it took on a human form. An insect on the plain came into contact
with the fog-like being and suddenly fell over.

“Death essence?” said the Hunter’s left hand.

Some might’ve called it a supernatural aura or an eerie miasma. But as it took the
life of anything that touched it right on the spot, “death essence” seemed the most
fitting name. This was the true form of the band of ghostly riders.

The hazy mass moved toward D, seeming to be both borne on the wind and fighting it
at the same time.

The Hunter no longer had a sword. And even if he’d still possessed one, it would’ve
been impossible to cut this amorphous and unearthly cloud.

As for D—he did nothing but stand still.

—

Elena had no knowledge of D’s deadly battle. The darkness had already grown quite
heavy, and her eyes couldn’t see more than a hundred fifty feet. An unsettling mist
seemed to billow up around her, covering her skin with goose bumps. Giving a shudder,
Elena held out her electron lantern.

Something suddenly dampened the light. A single white rose had landed on the top of
the lantern. And Elena discovered that its thin stem had sunk right through the metal
roof of her light.

“But this is—,” she began to say, and then her lantern went out.

There in the darkness, with nothing save the moonlight, the rose alone glowed as if
it were ablaze.

“A gift to replace that boorish light of yours.”

Raising her gaze from the rose that’d kept her riveted, Elena found the lovely princess
standing before her. Aside from D, she had to wonder who else would’ve looked so perfect
standing out in the moonlight. Elena got the feeling she could see the scenery behind
the woman right through the surpassing paleness of her countenance.