A voice that sounded like a cold breeze laughed: "What good does recognizing me do? You'll all die here in the end. I'd planned to kill you long ago to cut off every thread of evidence, but you took that job heading out to the vast ice plains, and your location couldn't be pin down, so things dragged on until now."
Without waiting for Yakov's reply, he burst into hearty laughter. "If you want to resent someone, resent your boss Yakov! If he hadn't gotten tangled up in this affair, you'd all be enjoying life right now. As for now—even though you know nothing, I'm not letting any of you leave. Go ahead and cry, tremble, despair! Enjoy the last little bit of your lives!"
After that gleeful, arrogant laugh, silence fell again beyond the cell door. There was not a sound from outside, no matter how Yakov and the others cursed, mocked, or pleaded. None of it drew the slightest response.
"…I'll escape from here, and one day I'll twist off every last one of your heads and feed them to the ice bears!" Yakov's voice carried no trace of his usual shy stutter at that moment—he'd deployed the warrior's "taunt" to devastating effect. But gradually, his voice became the only one echoing through the cell. The mercenaries who had been backing him up fell silent and still.
After catching several peculiar looks directed his way, Yakov stopped his taunting and swept his gaze over the mercenaries slumped helplessly around the cell. He saw several pairs of cold eyes, tinged with barely concealed hatred.
A chill settled in his chest, and his booming voice dropped low. "You resent me? You resent me for dragging you into Sir Duda's affair?"
"None of us did a thing, yet here we are—arrested, facing death at any moment. Boss Yakov, do you think we're not going to feel bitter? Do you think we won't seethe with anger?" His second-in-command, Hake, questioned him with a bitter edge. He still called Yakov "boss," but the respect was gone from his tone. "Why didn't you tell us back then that you'd crossed Sir Duda? I would never have agreed to stay!"
"Scum! You made your own bed—lie in it!"
"Enough! All of you, enough!" Anna suddenly screamed, her voice shaking with fury. "When boss Yakov became a knight, what did you say then? When he offered to take us on as his knight retainers and steward, what did you say then? Boss Yakov never intended to drag us into anything—it's that bastard Duda who's to blame!"
Tears of rage glistened in her eyes. She simply couldn't accept that the mercenary band—normally so harmonious and cheerful—could turn on each other like this.
"Is it really like Sister Katrina said—that only in the most desperate, most dangerous moments do you truly see what a person is made of?" The words echoed in her mind, a rather philosophical line Katrina had once shared—which Lucian had actually crafted by adapting the classical phrase about virtue revealed in dire times into one of his operas.
Anna's scream and accusations plunged the cell into silence. Then Yakov's heavy voice rang out: "You can resent me all you want, but infighting at a time like this—are you trying to throw away our only hope of escape?"
"But there's a Great Knight out there…"
"Sir Duda hasn't even lifted a finger yet—he must be even more terrifying!"
"There's no hope!"
Yakov's voice was calm yet resolute. "You won't know if there's a chance until you try. Sir Duda's little speech was obviously meant to turn us against each other. He wants to watch us fracture under despair—to feast on the ugly depths of human nature. From what I know, he delights in other people's suffering and hopelessness. So even if I die, I won't give him the satisfaction. What about the rest of you? Do you want to die to the sound of his laughter?"
"Well said!" Applause crackled from beyond the cell door, and Sir Duda spoke with a jovial tone. "Yakov, I recall there's a very lovely young woman in your group—prettier than most noble ladies. You seem quite fond of her?"
"What are you going to do?" Yakov's hands tightened around the iron bars.
Anna's voice was equal parts fury and fear. "Sister Katrina has nothing to do with this! She only joined us along the way—she knows nothing!"
"I enjoy slowly destroying the things people hold dear right in front of them—savoring their expressions and reactions. That reason should suffice." Duda's laughter grew even more wild at the sight of Yakov and Anna's desperate reactions. "Two adult werewolves have already been sent to fetch her. They're both quite strong—she may not be able to handle them. Ha ha ha!"
"Bastard!" Yakov shook the iron cage until it rattled and clanged, the whites of his eyes threaded with red.
Anna shook her head in terror. "You're a demon—you're a real demon!"
Legend held that demons reveed above all in slaughter and destruction.
"The highest compliment I've ever received." Duda showed not a flicker of annoyance at the insult—in fact, he looked thoroughly pleased. Then he chuckled, "Oh, and since I'm in such a fine mood, I've decided to move your execution up to right now. That way you won't have any chance to escape."
At those words, the color drained from every mercenary's face. The morale Yakov had just stoked was utterly consumed by despair.
…………
The Shachlan Empire was vast and sparsely populated, and the estates here dwarfed anything near Lintar. The one before them—merging seamlessly into the darkness in utter stillness—was no exception.
"Sir Duda's estate," Viscount Karlandia announced from atop an evergreen tree. Dressed in a black shirt beneath a red coat, he stood at the very tip of a branch as though he weighed nothing at all, his black cloak swaying gently with each motion of the bough.
Katrina hovered beside him in silence. With a pulse of spiritual energy, a vertically oriented eye materialized before her—its iris composed entirely of black arcane patterns, both mysterious and unsettling.
She adhered to the mage's cardinal rule: avoid unprepared engagements whenever possible.
"An Arcane Eye?" Viscount Karlandia tilted his head to glance at it. Several spectral bats fluttered off from his person and, together with the Arcane Eye, slipped silently into the estate.
A short while later, the bulk of the estate's layout was laid bare before their "eyes"—visible patrols and hidden sentries, traps and ambushes, enemy numbers, disposition, and approximate strength.
"A few areas are shrouded in some kind of mysterious power; we'll need to get closer to discern what's inside." Katrina was never one for unnecessary words in battle, and she gave Karlandia a terse summary before her body gradually turned translucent and vanished into the night sky.
"The patrol grunts and sentries on the perimeter couldn't spot us even if they tried," Viscount Karlandia remarked with a languid air, his body slowly dissolving into the darkness. "Oh, and do watch out for the werewolves' sense of smell."
The defenders and their arrangements were at most knight- or priest-level—utterly paper-thin in the presence of two near-high-tier powerhouses. What did command their caution were several adult werewolves prowling the grounds.
The two slipped into the estate as easily as walking among wooden puppets, making their way to one of the areas enveloped in mysterious power—the main hall of the manor.
A faint ripple flickered and vanished. Katrina employed the metamagic technique "Spell Mute" and recast the Arcane Eye, threading it through a crack into the interior.
…………
An altar of unknown material came into Yakov, Anna, and the others' view, with longswords, daggers, and other weapons scattered haphazardly across the floor.
The altar was pitch-black through and through. All four sides were carved with grotesque, snarling faces—each bearing twin horns, twisted features, and protruding teeth that dripped an endless stream of crimson blood.
When the blood fell upon a ring of intricate runes circling the altar's base, a thin crimson mist rose from them, carrying a scent that was at once bloody and sickeningly sweet.