Jasi
Hastily made rib-cage
The young Issir woman, Katelyn, who served as the queen’s personal maid, held the blue robes wide for him, but Jasi motioned for her to wait a moment longer.
“I need to adjust all this extra flesh around my chest,” the Eunuch said, struggling with his snug corset and the blackened –already scarred- skin at the nape of his neck. “I swear on your dreary crayon, Katelyn, I could feel that bastard’s fingers digging into my larynx!”
“Dalai-Tue mentioned that Voges had a fractured skull,” Katelyn remarked stiffly, her flat chest –for a girl- matching her sharp demeanor, as Jasi wiped down the exposed areas of his body with a damp cloth. Voges skull was crashed, sliced and mangled among other things, so yeah. “Do you groom down there, Master Jasi?” The maid added in a barely-concealed sarcastic tone.
Darling, I’ve faced insults every single day for nearly forty years. I’ve grown twice as unashamed as that divine temptress, Naossis.
“Do you? Perhaps you ought to begin with that upper lip love. It’s not quite a full mustache yet, but you’re not too far from making it work,” Jasi shot back with a grimace of frustration and worked himself inside the clean robes. He then used a fresh towel to wipe his shaven skull and powder his neck to hide the bruises. Scars may look great on a beefy warrior, but on a fat eunuch past his best years, they look like syphilis blemishes, or the start of cancerous growths.
Men tend to value you less after some point, and it gets worse, if you appear sickly, or damaged on top of overweight.
It wasn’t that Jasi could regulate his physique better, unless he stopped eating altogether and at some point you just say fuck it, pass me the lamb chops.
The thought almost made him long for the earlier years and his youth, when he’d the body and face to have men willing to listen to him. Then he remembered what came with all that interest and since Jasi never favored getting mounted like a stable mare, when better prospects weren’t available, he just tossed all these thoughts to the dumpster.
Hmm, well… balls in mouth.
“Ah,” Jurian De Braal said surprised, just as Jasi closed the front of his robes with a black sash and turned to face him. “I was looking for Master Jasi,” the young Issir said with a manly blush. His older brother Sir Mandel had lost a finger, but refused the Dottore’s assistance, not to appear soft like a cunt, or that fat eunuch. Jasi, who was comfortable in his skin, not that he had a choice either way, always looked to get all the assistance he could find. So he was eager for the busy Dottore’s help, but unfortunately nobody gave Jasi a second thought.
The court’s foremost interest was the queen.
Then the Duke and his brother.
Then the Barons and the foreign officers, or dignitaries.
Jasi suspected he wasn’t really on the list’s first page.
Or any page.
“Look at the face and forget about the man-tits,” Jasi explained with a touch of razz. “I’m him in the flesh.”
“The Shield wants to speak to the Queen,” Jurian croaked and he’d a nervousness about him born out of curiosity and bottled sexual confusion that made Jasi a little excited truth be told. You swallow a good number of phalluses and you’re bound to acquire the salty taste, the flattered eunuch thought, but his reply was curt.
“The Queen is indisposed.”
Borderline vindictive.
“The Shield wanted to query what to do with Lady Lissane and Sir Reuten,” Jurian expounded.
“What does the Duke say?” Jasi probed switching to a more diplomatic verbiage and waved for Katelyn to return near Elsanne. The queen was with the injured Gust, Dalai-Tue and Sebastian Leigh. The latter a mortician and not a dottore of course, but that’s how close it was.
If you can’t stop the bleeding with skin and stitches, use cadaver wax.
“The Duke wants the knight released, but the Shield refuses given that Sir Jan wants his sister removed from the dungeon first.”
“Who put her in the dungeon?” Jasi queried signaling for Jurian to follow after him.
“My father,” Jurian replied.
“So De Braal asked for me?” Jasi asked while heading back towards the main hall.
“You’re the queen’s creature… ehm, helping hand.”
“Goodness me, you’ve a dirty mind. Arm, leg, or foot, would have been equally controversial, but less filthy Jurian. Why not her voice? This is closer than anything else. Unless you said ‘tongue’, then it would have been worse, I suppose.”
“Apologies,” Jurian croaked and Jasi puffed out relatively satisfied.
“Don’t worry about it.”
To hear Elsanne’s screams at the sight of the gore-covered Gust was a shock for Jasi. He had seen the young Kaltha princess grow up. Overcome the indignity of getting sold to a husband who wanted her for the wrong reasons, hadn’t picked herself, or even innocently coveted, as young maidens’ frequently do. Much like a slave, she was born without real freedom. A privileged slave undoubtedly, but a slave none-the-less.
Jasi knew since the start, Elsanne’s na?ve psyche would be tested. It was tested indeed, but the young princess survived. She grew up. Elsanne moved with a sense of duty, stronger than her pride. The princess knew right from wrong. She also knew politics instinctively.
All Elsanne needed was a loyal partner, loving her for the right reasons and support her through thick and thin, even when it would be detrimental for them personally. When the time came to make the choice, despite Jasi’s discomfort, or distrust, she had yet again picked the right person to stand next to her. The hale knight brought her everything she lacked, both romantically given that Elsanne was a big enough romantic for both of them and politically. Any other partner, whatever talents they might have had, wouldn’t have helped her cause.
The pirates did to a point, but Gust delivered her Scaldingport and the Ikete connection. Castalor, Colle and perhaps, if they played their cards right, Riverdor. Without him, Lord Anker would have crashed her.
So seeing Gust collapse, the queen felt her whole world collapse with him. In every sense of the way. Friends and those like Jasi, who had fallen for the young queen’s charms and supported her dreams, now had to step up in her hour of need. While Elsanne mourned, paralyzed by grief and worry, her followers needed to keep the ship steady.
Find a solution, in the event Gust failed to come back.
Everyone thought he wouldn’t, Jasi wasn’t as certain, but whatever the case might eventually be, we should all do whatever is necessary.
Sir Stefan De Braal stood upright clad in chainmail shirt worn under a chest-plate, with Duke Rik sitting at the top of the long conference table and stare in thoughtful silence at one of the bronze weights used to secure a nicely-painted map of Kaltha on the table’s edge right in front of him.
The Duke had his cuirass on as well. Jasi arrived just as Hubert Boss, the other person inside the main hall flinched and came about from his slumber.
“The boy my lord… he’s still breathing,” Hubert mumbled in dreamy confusion and De Braal barked to snap him out of it.
“God damn it Hubert!”
“Aye,” Hubert blinked and then stared at the eunuch curious. “Hmm.”
“Father, this is Master Jasi,” Jurian reported and the Shield waved him away impatiently.
“We are aware Jurian. Stay at the door.”
“I’m here, but I’ll need a briefing,” Jasi said taking a chair on the Duke’s left side. “I was injured.”
“How?” Rik asked turning to look at him.
“Helping your brother,” Jasi replied. “Well-known Duke Rik.”
“I can never tell whether he mocks us, or not,” Rik told the scowled De Braal, who shifted on his feet with another grimace. The Shield was in pain.
“I can and he is,” De Braal growled, clenching his teeth tightly. “The Queen needs to make a decision.”
“Lord Gust is in a coma,” Jasi retorted and then smiled in an approachable manner. “She won’t leave his side.”
“He’ll pull through,” Rik said crooking his mouth. The Duke’s sole eye piercing Jasi’s skull. “Tell her that. Gust is very tough.”
“Well, the doctors are not as optimistic my Lord,” Jasi replied carefully.
“We can’t wait for Gust to get off the bed,” De Braal grunted and glared at Jasi. “You know the queen’s will. On the matter of Sir Jan Reuten and Lissane Reuten, Sir Stans kids can’t be left voicing grievances right and left. We should clear the duke’s slate.”
“Your proposal is to have Sir Jan killed?” Jasi asked evenly.
“Out of the question,” Rik barked and a wayward crow came to land on the other end of the long table.
“It was a suggestion,” De Braal hissed, changing course seeing that he had no backing on the matter. “But Lissane is a problem. A known lady tossed in the dungeon. People might consider it an act of revenge from the Duke, against his father’s mistress.”
“So we kill her off quietly?” Jasi asked the Shield.
“Sir Jan won’t have it,” De Braal grunted, not against the idea.
“Who would? His own sister, so soon after losing a nephew,” Jasi commented mockingly, before clearing his throat to ask curious. “Who took Ron Bach’s head?”
“Eh, I don’t… was it the birds?” De Braal asked and the lone crow watching them from three meters away let out a curt caw, quirking its head to look away. “Aye, they did.”
“Where’s is Baron Sigurd?” Jasi changed the subject after a small awkward pause.
“He’s not doing well,” Rik informed him puffing out.
“I can see how this horrible event might have affected… well, she’s his brother’s widow after all.”
“Sigurd was stabbed,” Rik elucidated gruffly. “He doesn’t care about Lissane.”
“Uhm,” Jasi nodded thoughtfully. “So we release brave Sir Jan Reuten and we keep his older sister locked up, until she calms down?” He proposed, knowing this wasn’t an option.
“Jan won’t have it,” De Braal grunted. “The boy thinks he won whilst we were distracted with a hundred things, but he has no standing. The queen—”
“The queen likes Sir Jan,” Jasi cut him off politely. “He’s Gust’s friend.”
“Gust has few friends. Most of them are dead,” Rik retorted. “And he didn’t like Jan back in the day.”
“Yes,” Jasi agreed. “But years later, the Lord Prince came to favor those who fought alongside him in Eplas and made new friends, our queen happens to share.”
The new Duke returned his stare on the map again, without answering.
“What’s the real problem?” Jasi asked the two men.
“Ard De Moss refuses to move from Even Fork without the Desert Crows and Giel Kugel probably has learned about the wedding already,” Rik replied. “As we speak he probably marches back here. Gust’s men want to see whether he’s alright, or not. The news travel fast Eunuch.”
“Is it monetary? This loyalty to their field commanders?” Jasi asked. “I’ve seen it on Jelin a lot.”
“That’s one side of the coin. How is it on Eplas?” Rik asked and reached for a piece of coal stick to draw something on the map.
“The Khan rules over all,” Jasi replied.
“Does he?” Rik murmured and Jasi noticed his sole eye was fixed outside of the allied duchies. Up and to the northeast of Colle even. Beyond Issir’s Eagle. “Robert might have gotten lucky,” he told the old Shield.
“It won’t look good,” De Braal grunted. “Staying put until all matters are resolved.”
“There’s good reason for it. Ruud is gone and my brother is wounded,” Rik grimaced and then stood from his chair. He used his left hand to work his right shoulder under the cuirass pad. “But if we harm Lissane and I don’t care for her at all, then Jan could turn on us. Kugel might even get ideas in his head. What does the queen think Eunuch?”
Ah, of course. Let’s toss the blame in her arms.
“Send Lissane away,” Jasi replied. “Jan shall follow after her. He’ll take Solt with him. Turn into a Knight-Errant, I believe is the term.”
“Um. How far is away for her highness?” Rik probed deep in thought.
Elsanne has no idea, nor does she care at this point young Crow.
“Which are the farthest Issir lands?” Jasi asked.
“Eh,” De Braal rustled and walked to Hubert, the chamberlain had fallen asleep again and had his head hanged back, whilst releasing loud snores with his mouth gaping open. “Eaglesnest, Pascor, if you’re asking currently,” the old Shield said and gave Hubert a soft tap on his cheek to wake him up.
“The cellar is empty. Those troglodytes took everything!” Hubert declared with a gasp, sounding startled and then glared at De Braal. “Stefan, you look like a constipated dog son,” he told him all serious. “Eat some vegies with your meat.”
“What other domains are there?” Jasi asked with an inadvertent smile.
“Not many neutral. Eh, I reckon the Duchess, up in Krakenhall,” Rik replied with a shrug. “Inform Jan, he can take his sister and leave Blackcrow’s Pillar with his life. Nobody shall harm him whilst my brother draws breath, but he can’t stay within my domain. Attacking the Duke’s guests in the Duke’s hall isn’t tolerated.”
“You think Ron Bach had Voges attack your brother wise Duke?” Jasi asked and Rik took a deep breath, right hand brushing a long white hair back –the Duke had his thick hair caught at the nape with a leather string-, afore offering a reply.
“The 2nd served Lord Anker,” Rik said and De Braal nodded in agreement.
“Voges blamed the loss of the Foot on Gust? Or did the High Regent sent him?” Jasi asked looking for a goblet to serve himself, but none was near his side of the table. The hall lacking in servants and old Hubert, who could have played that role, appeared as much unwilling, as incapable of moving from his chair. Hubert’s wrinkled mouth split in a nasty smirk, his old eyes twinkling in a taunting manner.
Old arsehole.
“What else…? The queen has a different opinion?” Rik queried perceptively.
The queen has no opinion yet, but I was present, Jasi thought wetting his crayoned lips nervously. Gust looks strong and is… very strong, but Voges…
Bald ugly girl, Voges had said to Jasi surprised and much confused, one eye missing and the other empty of life. Jasi had talked to him during the funeral. Voges knew who and what he was. Was it an insult? Jasi didn’t think so. He didn’t feel it in the man’s words, or his undertone. Voges acted as if he had seen the Eunuch for the first time during the scrap.
“Others are skeptical as well,” Jasi risked a guess and the Duke nodded.
“You talked to the Lorians,” Rik said with a sigh. “They have an agenda Jasi. But they have seen Voges, same as we have.”
“Who do they blame?” Jasi asked and Rik glanced at De Braal, who grimaced uncomfortable.
“Magic. Only one place has magic eunuch. If you believe in such things.”
“Do you?” Jasi asked, since learning where everyone stood on such matters was worth its weight in gold and twice that in negotiating power.
You needed both to climb up the ladder and stay there.
“I grew up talking to birds and listening to the Others words,” Rik replied simply.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
“Just burn it,” the old Shield grunted. “Heed to the Raven’s warning.”
“He attacked my brother. I want the truth for me and not for the duchy,” Rik replied and turned his solemn eye to Jasi again. “Do you want to see Voges?” He asked.
No.
Once was enough.
Jasi sighed deeply troubled and much discomforted.
But I’ll do it for the queen.
His voice eventually came out steady and businesslike.
“Absolutely, my Lord Duke.”
-
An hour later
17th of Sextus of 195NC
Lord Prince’s and the Queen’s quarters
A sickly-looking Jasi, despite a fresh coat of makeup, stood at the entrance of the candle-lit bedroom to behold the Queen sitting on the bed, next to the sleeping Gust. The knight’s torso and face heavily bandaged.
Elsanne’s haunting whispers echoed inside the large room. Katelyn stood with a wet cloth in hand and used it to bring the injured Gust’s temperature down. Dottore Dalai-Tue sleeping in an armchair at the other side of the bed, while the mortician Sebastian Leigh had just left according to Sir Klaas who stood guard outside the door.
“Fabled Mistress,” Jasi said softly after he approached the stooped Elsanne respectfully.
“He talked in his sleep,” Elsanne said in a hoarse voice, holding the knight’s large callused hand with hers.
Jasi glanced at the sober Katelyn and the maid shook her head that Gust hadn’t.
“Perhaps he needs some rest,” Jasi offered letting a breath out nervously.
“They dried up his lung, but more fluid gathered,” Elsanne said in a whisper. “If they stitch the wound he’ll drown in his blood. If they don’t, the fever shall rise, or an infection might kill him Jasi.”
The eunuch grimaced feeling the queen’s sorrow coming in waves. Her disheveled head left a mess of white hair cascade down her exposed dark-skinned shoulders. She still had her wedding dress on.
“What do you want me to do?” Jasi asked her in a soothing manner.
“There is a ship in port,” Elsanne replied and turned her head to look at the standing eunuch. Her famed jade-colored eyes swollen, inside dark circles. “It has its sails gathered, but stands under a black, red and gold flag. There are Imperials on board.”
“You’ll bring a Zilan into Scaldingport. During the day?”
“I’ll bring it in Blackcrow’s Pillar,” Elsanne replied, her voice hardening. “To save my husband.”
“They might not listen to me,” Jasi argued softly.
“We have Garth’s ear,” Elsanne insisted.
“You might pay a huge cost, for no profit.”
“Garth owes me one for letting him use Ruud’s port.”
Rik’s.
“You might need his favor later,” Jasi reminded her, although it was a lost battle this.
“I’ll use it now just the same,” Elsanne retorted stubbornly, a sniffle ruining it some for her and then added with a raspy croak. “And pray I won’t need the Wyvern Lord’s assistance again.”
“What if you do?” Jasi asked.
“Then I’ll beg,” Elsanne replied hoarsely.
-
Early noon
Scaldingport’s Docks
The Imperial Galleass was a narrow and slick warship. Deceptively so, as it stood over twice the size of a Brig and sported two towers aft and fore. It was a touch smaller in tonnage than the Khanate galleon, but three meters longer. Jasi spotted human crew onboard, but as he ascended the drawbridge near the back of the ship, different figures appeared on the top of the aftcastle. Some of them armoured and armed, others sporting braided long blue hair, or variations of it. Usually standing taller than the average human, with large strange eyes and even more peculiar ever-moving, long alien ears. A couple of them superbly muscular. All of them extremely handsome both in their feminine, or masculine variations.
Jasi puffed out, gathered his robes and watching his step, started heading for the tower’s stairs. A human sailor –of Cofol origins- went to talk with him wearing a pervert’s smirk, but a Zilan stepped forward before he reached the bottom of the staircase and barred Jasi’s way.
The long-faced creature with the shimmering blue eyes raised a hand, thumb, index and mid-finger extended and pressed together.
“Greetings,” the handsome male Zilan said in Imperial, or something close to it.
“Greetings,” Jasi replied politely and bowed his bald head. “I only speak common Imperial.”
The Zilan nodded and then grinned showing two rows of large teeth, at least two pairs of beastly canines in them. It sent a shiver down Jasi’s spine.
“I spoke in common,” the Zilan explained. “I bid my greetings to the queen’s neutered slave and the eternal heavens above. A great gift you are. You look terribly delicious.”
Jasi gulped down nervously.
“I’m Sontar, of Mirthral. I attempted a jest. For the most part. I help captain the ship, my father serves on,” the Zilan explained slowly as if he was talking to a dumb slave, either marketing himself for a new bedmate, or fighting for a larger portion of fresh dinner in the ship’s galley. The dinner to be served was Jasi.
Honeyed cunts!
“Actually, I’m not on offer,” Jasi said quickly. “But I came to speak—”
“How rude,” Sontar interrupted him with a bored sigh and another hopeful stare. “This is Arassil, the Admiral’s old ship, freshly painted. If you go up there, you might meet him. He’s in a bad mood.”
Jasi licked his lips.
“The Admiral—”
“SETC’s Admiral,” Sontar clarified rudely cutting him off. “But he’s the 1st Marine also. Uhm. Mirthral is standing at the Monarch’s meetings, so Flardryn plays the Marine leader again with the 13th.”
“What is the reason for the admiral’s bad mood?” Jasi asked hopefully, since learning more was part of his visit and Sontar beamed once more toothily, more disturbing this grin than the previous one and then took a step back, freeing the way up the staircase.
Jasi put a foot on the first step and was just about ready to move the other, when Sontar whispered in a conspiratorial manner.
“Tragedy.”
The South Eplas Trading Company’s Admiral, was a wiry male with short-cut washed-out purple hair and lime-colored eyes. He had a smart leather armour on, very tight, and reinforced with an engraved chestplate that depicted a gold wyvern.
Next to him stood an obviously younger female Zilan in an Imperial Marine medium armour. Smart-eyed and with a mess of shortish blue hair framing her face that left her long ears poking out the sides.
The female looked extra cute and fit, in an exotic way.
Jasi found himself interested. The female Zilan blinked those large gleaming, golden-brown eyes and stared at the approaching Jasi amused.
She communicated something to Flardryn and the Admiral reached to grab a harpoon from a cut-off barrel.
“The Queen’s eunuch,” Flardryn said in Common, with a heavy exotic accent and then used the weapon as a staff to rest on.
“I’m honored the good Lord Admiral has heard of me,” Jasi started with another bow and a smile.
“Your reputation didn't precede you, but I do possess good ears,” Flardryn replied indifferently. “Still, you’re a mildly curious encounter in this gloomy port.”
“Lord Admiral,” Jasi tried again nervously. “Someone attacked the Queen at her wedding and injured her husband seriously. He’s the brother of the current Duke of Scaldingport and a known Knight on top of everything else. The Queen asks for your assistance.”
“Where is the injury?” Flardryn asked dispassionately.
“It’s a sword stab through the lung,” Jasi explained. “Broke a rib and did some internal damage. We can’t stop the bleeding.”
“When was this?”
“Ah, two days ago almost?” Jasi replied and the Admiral raised a washed-out purple eyebrow.
“Is Sir Gust a full-blooded human?”
“To the bone marrow. But you have to work to get to it.”
“The human means this Gust is tough,” Lusha explained at the frowned Admiral.
“Very tough.” Jasi agreed.
“Lusha, you are a combat medic,” Flardryn said and Lusha nodded. Flardryn turned to Jasi next. “I assume you’ve used a healing potion and it didn’t work. Right?”
“We haven’t… I’m not sure,” Jasi replied with a grimace of discomfort.
“We shouldn’t,” Lusha told Flardryn, the latter had sulked heavily at Jasi’s earlier admission.
“The queen shall consider the favor paid.”
“Well, the Monarch might not see it thus,” Flardryn argued with a deep sigh.
“What do you mean? My Lord Admiral,” Jasi tried again. “It is a straight up trade.”
“For you perhaps,” Flardryn retorted crustily. “From where I’m standing, it is not. And it does involve me using up the company’s resources without authorization. What if it doesn’t work?”
“There is no risk for you, or the Monarch,” Jasi said starting to feel really worried the Zilan wouldn’t cooperate.
“The Queen is desperate,” Flardryn noted dispassionately.
“Her husband,” Lusha told the thoughtful admiral.
“It would help avoid a tragedy,” Jasi added, his mouth dry and Flardryn stood up straighter, his hands still grasping at the harpoon.
“Lusha will go and see whether something can be done to assist your Queen,” the admiral decided and Jasi puffed out overcome by the stressful moment. “However, the Monarch would like something in return. Hardir is particular on these matters.”
“We assist SETC anyway we can,” Jasi reminded him.
“Can Sabretooth Castle be taken?” Flardryn quizzed.
Jasi blinked not expecting the query.
“Isn’t that in Regia?”
“Why dodge? It’s a simply query,” the Zilan retorted gruffly.
“You know it isn’t,” Jasi fired back and then forced himself to bow. “Apologies. Ask for something else.”
“Ityliel was killed by a beast,” Flardryn said, his tone changing. “There was no reason for it, I’m told,” the Zilan admiral flipped the harpoon using both hands and then stabbed it on the boards. “It’s not easy to accept such a thing. It feels wrong and somehow fake. I can sense something is off beam, but I can’t prove what. Why?”
Jasi licked his lips trying to find the right answer.
“Is the story true in its details? How Ityliel died?” The eunuch asked in a discreet manner.
“Would a Monarch lie?” The admiral asked gloomily and stared for a moment at Scaldingport’s dock buildings visible through the rising vapors.
A Duke would, Jasi thought. And so would a Monarch, if it suited his purpose.
Jasi realized the Zilan SETC Officer had turned to look at him intently.
“The true culprit is disputed in both stories. The events unclear even to those who were present,” he finally said and Flardryn pursed his mouth mildly, afore nodding.
“Let’s trade in stories then. Ityliel was devoured by a beast, but that night the beast came close with two Zilan. A military scout and a former musician with no field experience.” Flardryn said. “The beast approached and killed the first, my Tyl… but failed to surprise, less so harm, the darn bard.”
“Mayhap the bard is more skilled than he lets out?” Jasi offered.
“His mere presence is the reason I was skeptical in the first place,” Flardryn replied in agreement. “Once and it’s a coincidence, but more than that and one wonders why people keep perish in a horrific manner in his vicinity.”
“Officially the killer worked for the Queen’s opponents,” Jasi revealed in his turn, “but magic is involved, which none of them possess and those who do, she considers friends and allies.”
“What kind of magic?” Flardryn asked curious.
“I can’t describe it differently. A part of Voges still lives. His heart was beating well after his head was destroyed,” Jasi explained with a shiver at the grotesque memory of the bloody human remains the new Duke had shown him earlier.
“Ah,” Flardryn gasped, his eyes looking distant, mayhap lost in thought for a brief moment. “But are you sure of this?” He asked at the end of it.
“Is my arse too big?” Jasi retorted voicing his inner thoughts out loud unwittingly, caught in the Zilan Admiral’s scrutinizing stare.
“Not to an obscene size,” Flardryn assured him diplomatically and then added in a sober manner. “We need eyes on this. Sontar!” He barked, startling Jasi out of his stupor.
“Admiral!” Came the Zilan’s reply from behind the eunuch. The ship’s captain had approached without Jasi realizing it.
“We need to put Taranir on this jumble. Straighten it out posthaste,” Flardryn ordered. “Send a bird.”
“The Lassel and the fleet is beyond Abrakas Gullet sir. Unreachable, until they moor at Turtle Isles and send us a bird first,” Sontar replied and Jasi felt intimidated being suddenly sandwiched between the two much taller than him Zilan.
“Who’s Taranir?” Jasi queried and Flardryn grimaced, mulling it through.
“A SETC Director of sorts,” the Admiral replied.
“Knows magic?”
“Knows crime and how to solve it.”
“The Cryptae leader stayed as a guest in the Admiral’s quarters,” Sontar suggested and Flardryn pursed his mouth even more troubled.
“We can’t send Aquilan inside Scaldingport. He belongs in the field. Not to mention he’s on loan from the Phalanx,” Flardryn scolded his subordinate, but raised his right hand to scratch at the side of his cheek in contemplating silence. “When I first deployed with the 6th Marine back in 1801,” the Zilan high-ranking officer reminisced, “The first supposedly friendly persons that came out of the mist were this maniac and his buddies. It was all downhill after that.”
“Who is Aquilan?” Jasi probed, trying to gather as much information as possible.
-
Hubert stood small and looking extra-frail next to the imposing, clad in Hoplite armour and strange helm, very muscular Zilan. His arms sprouting out of the sculpted cuirass, veiny and swollen. If Gust had been a Zilan, he would have looked like Aquilan, Elsanne thought impressed at the alien creature.
Then the Hoplite removed his helm and the queen decided the Zilan’s face didn’t look like Gust’s at all. Especially the long ears and the bleached-blue short hair.
“Tetrarch of 4th File, Aquilan, of Cyran. Hoplite Leader in the Phalanx, Main Othrim,” the cute Zilan-medic Lusha announced saluting the mean-looking alien warrior standing inside Blackcrow’s Hall by touching a closed fist on her chest. “10th in rank in the Phalanx and commander of the Cryptae special operations unit.”
“We wish to know who attacked my husband, honored Aquilan,” Elsanne said courteously. “The identity of the culprit is disputed, but the disagreement is kept a secret, we hope you’ll adhere to.”
The Hoplite remained silent, still standing rigidly upright.
Elsanne glanced at Jasi curious. “Does he speak our language?” She whispered with a polite smile at the aloof medic to offer them a helping hand in the matter.
“Master Aquilan?” Lusha probed and the wiry Zilan crooked his mouth.
“Where is the corpse?” He asked in a hoarse rasp, just as Elsanne started to believe their alien visitor was a mute.
-
Jasi followed Aquilan inside the crypt, where Voges’ mangled body was held. They reached the wooden coffin-sized crate deposited before the entrance to the much larger underground catacomb, where all the dead De Weers were kept and the Zilan stopped a meter away from it. With a curt hand signal he sent the guards away, including the queen.
Jasi went to retreat, but the Zilan grabbed him by the shoulder, elongated strong fingers digging inside his flesh to the bone. The eunuch cried out in pain, felt his arm paralyze and then the Zilan’s hand left his shoulder and closed Jasi’s mouth to keep him silent.
For a long moment, nothing was heard inside the small dark vault, but the sizzling noises of the burning torches. Jasi realized he couldn’t breathe and ogled his eyes desperately, fighting against the Zilan’s palm, until Aquilan’s index finger moved higher up his cheekbone to reach just below his eye. He pressed the soft flesh there in warning and the tearing up Jasi stopped whimpering.
Some moments passed and then a scratching sound was heard from the coffin. Then creaking, boards pressed against nails.
Aquilan let go of Jasi’s face and walked sure-footed inside the seeped in darkness larger catacomb hall, leaving the shaking eunuch behind him with the noisy large crate. The sounds coming out of it so freakish and disturbing, Jasi felt a small amount of piss spraying out of his wrinkled small cock.
Then the Zilan returned carrying an ancient spear. He approached the coffin, stooped to grab the heavy lid’s edge and then ripped it out of its nails with a heave. The wooden cover banged on a nearby wall and came apart, just as the Hoplite raised the spear vertically and aimed it at the open casket.
When Voges tried to come out, his skull and head still split in two, horrifically mangled and gory, flapping pieces of gory flesh and bone, Aquilan skewered the living corpse through the chest and nailed it on the floor of the coffin alike a macabre spit roast.
“Always kill the body, the heart,” Aquilan explained in passable Common, his voice coming out haunting inside the crypt’s walls. “After destroying the brain. The first kills the body, the latter severs its connection with the body’s builder. Of course without the brain it’s mostly harmless, a mindless Zombie.”
Jasi nodded and then flinched, when Aquilan ripped the corpse’s arms out starting with the stub, afore moving to the other. He then produced a sharp exotic dagger from somewhere and started cutting off the head with it. Both its split pieces, starting low at the bloody neck and making good progress.
“Make a pile and burn them after I finish,” Aquilan cautioned. Then using the dagger and his naked fingers, cut first near the spear wound –widening it- afore prying open the corpse’s chest completely to look inside the bloody cavity.
Jasi stomach rebelled, vomit rushed up his throat and flooded his mouth. He faltered, desperately trying not to puke all over himself and when he came about breathing heavy, Aquilan stood over him. The Zilan brandished half a bloody ribcage before the whimpering eunuch’s scared eyes.
“Nine pairs of bones, instead of twelve,” the Hoplite rustled a sober explanation. He didn’t have to be so dramatic, as Jasi was already fully intimidated by the gruesome spectacle. The eunuch had seen morticians work on corpses, but the sight of a body torn apart with one’s bare hands was nigh uncomfortable to start with and was about to fuel his nightmares for many years henceforth. “A hasty job, done to gain a quick local advantage,” Aquilan expounded and stood up, still holding the torn out ribcage in his bloodied hand.
“What does it mean?” Jasi croaked on the verge of fainting. Only holding on out of sheer will and the fear of fouling his new robes in gore and his own pool of vomit.
“You have a battle-tested Aken in the field,” Aquilan replied raspingly and pursed his mouth in a scowl.
“Is that a magic practitioner?” The terrified Jasi queried with a small voice and Aquilan blinked as if startled at the legitimate query. He stared in Jasi’s face unsure for a moment and then let out a grunt.
“Aken is a race of peoples, like humans, or Zilan,” the Hoplite explained sounding more miffed than a moment before. “Magic comes in many variations neutered court servant. This could be an accident, or an attempt to chance a favorable outcome birthed out of opportunity, which is strange for an Aken Elder. They are very meticulous and patient in their approach and planning. Not impulsive. Hmm. A better soldier Construct, fully trained and briefed on the task, would have done a much better job. This thing… was just passable enough to fool a chance inspection. Maybe make contact. Very young and not yet grown into its new body. Probably remotely guided by its master.”
Bald ugly girl, Voges hissed in Jasi’s face. The memory haunting.
Jasi still had trouble following the Zilan’s words. “In all that’s sacred, what is a Construct?”
“A fake person. An echo of what he was afore.”
Perfumed balls in mouth.
Are you serious?
He must be with that face.
“I’m sorry, but this sounds crazy,” Jasi croaked and realized his legs were shaking uncontrollably. “I can’t tell our queen any of this.”
“Find a way,” Aquilan suggested and glanced at the blood-spattered floor around the gory casket. “Or don’t. Where was the Construct before coming here?”
“Voges was… an officer of the 2nd Foot.”
“An army unit,” Aquilan guessed correctly.
“Destroyed. He survived.”
“No, he didn’t. When was this?” Aquilan kept the questions coming rapidly and Jasi answered caught in his intense stare and commanding voice.
“A year ago.”
“Where?”
“At Three Roads. It’s a vital road junction very close to the port of Colle,” Jasi rasped, gripping his trembling right hand with his left. Aquilan nodded once, in a silent acknowledgment. He then flung the ribcage onto the heap of torn and mangled body parts that lay before the coffin. The Zilan turned around, casually lifted the eunuch’s long robes to wipe the worst of the blood from his hands, his gaze icy as it met Jasi’s wide, horrified eyes.
Once Aquilan had cleaned himself as thoroughly as possible, the stoic Hoplite strode out of the crypt, leaving the shaken and nearly frantic Jasi behind. It wasn’t long before the concerned Queen discovered the eunuch in this state.