Here to Make a Deal (1)
"Two days, huh..."
The frown came before I even realized I was making it.
Time is short.
Execution in a mere forty-eight hours.
Even with the right to interrogate, there's no telling how much I can actually get out of her.
As an Immigration Officer, I knew the basics of questioning — enough to draw out a traveler's origin and whether or not they were lying through casual conversation. But professionally extracting information was outside my jurisdiction. That work belonged to the Intelligence Department. Interrogating a dangerous criminal like a Changeling was more than the Immigration Bureau could shoulder alone, and with a clock ticking down, all the more so. The best course would be a joint operation with another agency.
But even if I file a cooperation request with the Intelligence Department right now, it'll take a full day just for an agent to arrive...
Charitably assuming they took an express coach, a substantial chunk of time would still vanish into the road.
Having finished that thought, I turned to the soldier.
"Understood. I'll discuss the details with the Count directly."
"Yes, sir. Then I shall take my leave."
The moment he stepped out of the Immigration Bureau, I had my attendant activate the crystal orb.
"Yeees. This is the estate of Margrave Reyes. Please state your businesss."
It was the same languid-voiced personal secretary as always. I cleared my throat and spoke quietly.
"This is Central Officer Nathan Kell."
"Yes, y-yes?"
The instant she heard my name, the secretary went rigid. Whether she remembered the blood-soaked state of my face from the Pig Hunt Operation, she practically convulsed and shrieked.
"Th-the C-C-Central Officer!?"
So a picture really was worth a thousand words — and the effect lasted quite a while.
"Is the Count in her office? If so—"
"I'll, I'll connect you right away!"
And so a meeting with Margrave Reyes was arranged at record-breaking speed. In less than a minute, the familiar face of a sturdy, middle-aged man appeared in the orb.
"Margrave Reyes. I apologize for requesting a meeting on such short notice."
"— Central Officer. First time seeing you since that day. Your face has healed up nicely, I see."
"Yes, thanks to your assistance, it mended remarkably well."
After a brief bow, I came straight to the point.
"I'll be blunt. Would you consider postponing the execution of the Changeling currently in your custody?"
"— So you finally received my message, I take it."
"I'm sincerely grateful for the right to interrogate you granted me. But she holds information of the utmost importance, and two days is far too tight to complete a proper interrogation."
It must not be forgotten: the Changeling hadn't been caught at the border, but within the Margrave's own territory. Interrogating criminals on one's lands was, by right, entirely the lord's privilege.
Yielding that to me was a genuine courtesy.
But was there truly any need to rush the life-or-death decision of a prisoner already in chains? At the very least, a day or two of delay should have been feasible.
"I earnestly request that you postpone the execution."
The Margrave's answer was resolute.
"— That, I cannot do."
"Pardon?"
"— Her crimes are simply too grave."
Reyes furrowed his brow, visibly uncomfortable.
"— Smuggling of strategic bio-weapons. Assault of an Immigration Officer and flight from custody. Terrorism at the border. Unrest within my territory. Destruction of property. Impersonation of a government official."
The charges came one after another without pause. Every single one warranted a heavy felony on its own. A vicious criminal whose summary execution would have raised no objection whatsoever. She would die without question.
And if she was going to be executed anyway, then milking her for every drop of information beforehand was simply the optimal move.
So why had Reyes refused?
"— Certainly, as you say, postponing the schedule is possible. But keeping a felon like her alive for an extended period risks sending a very particular message to my people and to visitors alike."
The moment I heard those words, I understood exactly why he was refusing the delay.
"...You mean to make an example of her."
"— Precisely."
The Count nodded.
"— The example must show law-abiding spirit and stern punishment alike. Crime at the border and within my lands is a crime against the kingdom itself — and a challenge to the Margrave."
To a lord, the territory is not merely land. It is the people who have lived there for generations, the laws and discipline that govern them, and finally, the lord's own standing resting upon it all. Territory is the sum of everything.
For an upheaval of this magnitude to erupt in such a domain, and then for the lord to let the felon linger unpunished — that would amount to a declaration that he simply didn't care.
"— It's already been five days since her arrest, and some of my people witnessed the chaos firsthand. If I merely keep her locked away with no punishment at all, what do you suppose they'll conclude?"
That the Margrave's name — and the law of the territory — could be taken lightly. In this world, reputation and deeds performed in plain sight defined everything.
That was exactly what the Count feared.
And five whole days had already passed. I squeezed my eyes shut.
I burned three of those days at the Royal Castle. That's time stripped away from me here.
Which meant the interrogation right had effectively been mine for days — I simply hadn't been able to use it, stuck in the capital as I was. However unavoidable it may have been, the fact remained that I'd squandered my window to question her.
Clutching at straws, I asked anyway.
"Th-there's really no other way?"
"— There is one. If she reveals everything about the power behind her, I will grant a stay of execution."
In other words: make her confess. If the Changeling spilled every piece of information she held, that alone would salvage a measure of the Margrave's dignity.
Then he added one final condition.
"— In exchange, the execution will not be carried out in the morning. She will be put to death after sundown."
That was likely the utmost concession the Count could offer.
"Thank you for your understanding. I will call on you shortly."
With those words, the light in the crystal orb went dark.
I rose from my seat at once. There was no room for hesitation.
I have to go now.
Every minute, every second, was precious. Let me think. Before setting out — what does interrogating a vicious criminal actually require?
As far as I knew, interrogation demanded intense psychological pressure, an atmosphere of menace pressing down on the subject.
In which case, going alone is a poor idea.
I'd already been physically assaulted by her once. To her, I posed no threat whatsoever.
I glanced around the office. What might frighten a Changeling?
That was when two people, hard at work, caught my eye.
"Olfactory Officer."
The wolfkin lifted his head. "Yes?"
Yes, exactly. Someone who had clashed with her directly and handed her a crushing defeat was guaranteed to exert real pressure. Add his massive frame and intimidating features, and he fit the bill perfectly. Though considerably mellowed these days, the wolfkin race had once been called a grotesque marriage of savage instinct and cold reason.
Next, my gaze turned to the woman processing eight documents and eight入境 entries simultaneously, all by herself.
"Tactile Officer."
"Ye-e-s?"
A tentacle raised its hand in tandem with her soft voice.
It might sound like species prejudice, but sea-born races — those not rooted in land-dwelling biology — were fundamentally uncanny to the rest of us. And she was a Quarter Kraken, carrying the blood of a colossal marine creature in rich measure. A body built from tentacles, an unfamiliar form of flesh entirely — more than sufficient to inspire a deep, primal dread.
And if things go sideways, she can simply release her human form.
That form — the one that had nearly knocked me unconscious the one time I'd witnessed it — was guaranteed to work. Excellent.
"Business trip," I told the two of them. "Follow me."
— Drip. Drip.
In the silent underground dungeon, the sound of falling water rang out in steady rhythm.
"Khh... haah..."
Beyond rusted iron bars, a woman with violet eyes exhaled a pain-ragged sigh. Both her arms hung bound in shackles, hoisted high toward the ceiling, and her whole body was a ruin of lash marks and bruises.
"How many times do I have to say it..."
Shahal spat a blood-flecked glob at the floor as she addressed the man before her.
"Go shove it up your ass, you crippled piece of shit."
At the thick vitriol, the guard standing before her panted for breath.
"Stubborn bitch..."
Five days now. Five days of relentless torture, and this utterly depraved criminal had given back nothing but curses and mockery. She had driven herself so deep into spite that she hadn't screamed even once — if anything, it was the guard with the whip who had burned out first and stumbled away.
The guard strained to keep his nerve.
"You die in two days anyway. You know that, right?"
"..."
"Before then, just tell us who's behind you. Then I'll put in a word with the Count so you can die easy."
Death, wielded as a threat. But Shahal only cocked her head to one side and answered.
"Ha. Well now. Are you certain it's actually me who'll be executed?"
Then, slowly, something began to squirm inside her mouth.
"What are you—"
— Crrrick. Crunch.
Her face twisted with a grotesque sound in the same instant. Before long, Shahal — transformed into a man wearing the guard's own face — grinned.
"Imagine getting your throat cut while wearing your face. The lads would love that, wouldn't they?"
"You — you insane bitch, how—!"
"You'd be shocked how much hair a person sheds. Your head's littering this whole floor as we speak."
A wheezing cackle echoed through the cell.
"You're no threat to me at all. Worry less about me, more about guarding your hair."
The body bound in chains was, admittedly, Shahal's. The one injured, the one fated to die soon — also Shahal's.
And yet it was the guard who felt the pressure bearing down on him.
"Come to think of it, maybe the one executed that day won't be me at all. Maybe it'll be you."
The direction of the threat inverted. Shahal rattled the chains binding her arms in deliberate menace — iron clashing against iron, shattering the silence with a growl like a cornered beast.
"The day I get free of this place, you'll be the very first one I kill."
"Y-you're... you're a monster..."
Utterly spooked, the guard fled his post in a hurry, curses trailing behind him.
— Stomp. Stomp.
She called out after the retreating footsteps.
"Mind your hair. Never know who might eat it and wear your face next."
No answer came back.
The underground dungeon sank back into silence. And then—
— Squeak, squeak.
A small mouse slid cautiously out of a hole in the wall.
"Hello. Back again, are you?"
Shahal beckoned to it in a gentle voice. It was a little mouse she had tamed over the past five days, using scraps of her own leftover food as bait. Now entirely free of its wariness, the creature crept close to her feet and nuzzled against them.
Shahal slowly raised her foot.
And brought it down.
— Crack.
With a chilling crunch, her heel crushed the mouse's body into a hideous pulp. She plucked the fur from the remains and tucked it between her toes. Swallow that, and she could transform into the very mouse she'd just stomped to death.
They still had no idea what a Changeling truly was. Not merely people — she could become any creature that bore fur. Exploit that blind spot, take the shape of a mouse, and shackles and iron bars alike would hold her no longer.
"Two days left, they said..."
Shahal gazed quietly at the rusted bars.
Then tonight, before dawn, it happens.
Escape this place. Then run the operation one more time. The abduction of the Saintess was not yet over.
I have to learn what Hatenzilla promised me. No matter what.
Weeks ago, she had struck a bargain of sorts with a woman of a certain religious order — the ones called the Evil God Cult. A deal so large it shattered Black Hand's unwritten law: never entangle yourself with those who stand above kings.
Its terms: the abduction of the Holy Church's Saintess. And in payment, Shahal was to receive a single piece of information.
— Your people. The Changelings spend their lives aching for others of their kind, don't they? I know where another Changeling is.
Information about her own kin.
Changelings were a vanishingly rare species. Always disguised as someone else, they could scarcely ever recognize one another — and even revealing one's true nature meant, more often than not, being branded a monster and slaughtered for it. Perhaps because of this, Changelings had always been tormented by a loneliness of the species. A yearning to find kin who shared their fate.
From childhood, Shahal had been drawn by that yearning, forever starved for any word of her kind. Joining Black Hand, too, had been an act born of hope — the hope that somewhere within it, she might obtain that information.
If I escape from here, I simply start over from the beginning.
The mission wasn't finished. Transform into a mouse, slip away, then burrow back into the pilgrimage crowd once more.
Of course, before any of that, she intended to slaughter every last guard and soldier who had left her body in this battered ruin.
"I'll pay back threefold what I received."
The Black Hand way. Vengeance is repaid threefold. That much, she fully intended to see done.
"Especially that man."
And there was one man she wanted to repay above all. The one man who had wrecked her mission from top to bottom.
"That cursed bastard..."
Her brow furrowed as she pictured the dark-eyed young officer. And in the very moment she sank into plotting exactly how she would deal with him—
"Greetings. I've come bearing the right of interrogation transferred to me. Where is the prisoner?"
"Sh-she's this way. Be careful. Her hands are bound, but she's extraordinarily violent."
"Yes. I'm well aware."
A familiar voice drifted from far down the corridor. A calm, businesslike man's voice.
— Stomp. Stomp.
The footsteps drew closer. And then—
— Screeeech.
The rusted iron bars swung open with an ominous groan.
"You..."
"Greetings, Changeling."
The face she least wanted to see — and most wanted to shatter — appeared before her all at once.
She bit the words out as if chewing them.
"...Central Officer."
Black eyes and violet eyes met, two people carrying entirely different goals behind them.
Forty-two hours remained.
The interrogation had begun.