The Labyrinth of Whispers
*Pat. Pat.*
Ines slammed the fake's head against the floor once more. Blood sprayed from his nose.
"Stay away from the fake. Tell me where the real Vicente is."
His expression shifted. A distant, almost nostalgic look filled his eyes, and a voice unlike his usual one emerged from his lips.
"I'm Theo."
Ines's pupils trembled violently.
"Ines, do you remember? How much I—"
"Stop lying."
The low, sunken voice was chilling. The boiling anger in Ines's eyes was hot enough to burn anyone who met her gaze.
*Tap.*
Jeanne caught Ines's wrist. The stiletto halted just before piercing the throat. Had she been a second slower, the fake would have died.
Ines gestured toward Fabian. Fabian pressed down on Ines's heaving shoulders to calm her, his own chest rising with excitement.
Jeanne knelt in front of the fake Vicente.
"Don't try anything. The one you can talk to is me."
The fake let out an irritated *tsk*. Jeanne ignored it and asked her question.
"What's your name?"
"Theo."
"That's not right. If you don't want to answer, it's fine. What do you think is the reason your leader sent you to us?"
"To capture the royal, Lady Jeanne, and deliver you to Lord Vicente."
"Do you really believe that?"
"Of course. I am Lord Vicente's loyal subordinate. That is why he entrusted me with such an important mission."
The fake spoke proudly. Jeanne shrugged.
"But your leader doesn't seem to think so."
At Jeanne's words, his face twisted.
"If Vicente truly cherished you, why would he throw you before us?"
"That was because I trusted him..."
"No. Because you were someone he could discard, someone he didn't care about."
Before Jeanne could finish, the fake Vicente shouted.
"Don't insult my father so carelessly!"
Confusion clouded his expression. While he urged caution, traces of doubt lingered. The reactions were all too clear. Seeing this, Jeanne rejoiced inwardly.
*She had struck the right spot.*
Reactions like these would never appear in daily life. Doubt created cracks. Jeanne widened those cracks, intent on splitting them further.
"No. When it comes to your leader, I know more about him than you do."
"...What do you know about my father..."
"Something he never told you exists. Do you know what 'Sun' means?"
Sun. The word Jeanne had used earlier to confirm the true Vicente's identity.
"Do you know Vicente's secrets?"
Jeanne whispered softly.
"Aren't you curious? What Vicente hides, and why he never told even his most loyal subordinate."
The silky voice delicately probed his loyalty.
Her ability to see through human psychology and strike at weaknesses mirrored her father, King Philippe VII, whom she had hated most. Ines wielded it skillfully, repeatedly lifting and dropping the heart of an assassin who had given her entire loyalty to one person.
"If I bring you before him, you'll learn everything. I've come to negotiate with Vicente, and you'll only need to watch the conversation."
Betraying the one you serve isn't what you're doing. Jeanne spoke the words of persuasion. The tight pulls, the loosening releases, every push and pull felt so natural that Fabian, watching from behind, was stunned.
"We'll find him somehow even without your guidance. You'll regret missing the chance to know his secret your whole life."
A wavering gaze revealed inner turmoil. Jeanne concluded slowly, like a demon offering a bargain.
"Guide me to him."
The Black Wing's base was a labyrinthine maze of assassin quarters.
Chastan stood on guard, hand on his hilt, ready to draw his sword at any moment.
Gazes from all directions. Suppressed breathing. Movements clearly surrounding them.
For Chastan, who fought with pure instinct like a wild beast, the assassins' presences were deeply irritating. His already heightened senses made him appear ready to transform into a beast even before battle began.
Following the fake Vicente's lead, Ines never relaxed her guard. She worried he might walk straight into a trap.
Of course, all were skilled fighters, and facing multiple assassins in combat was winnable. But physical traps like narrowing walls had no way to avoid.
Ines recalled her memories and compared them to the known paths.
The Black Wing's structure remained largely unchanged since her time. The only difference was that she had fled the organization the moment she became a formal assassin. Most memories before that were training grounds. And that training ground...
"Is something wrong here?"
Jeanne murmured as Ines halted.
Why did it feel so familiar? This was the training ground. Ines scanned the people training, wondering if something was amiss.
They were different from the assassins she had known. Among them, the tallest barely reached Jeanne's chest.
Children.
While they should have been running and playing, these children repeatedly stabbed wooden dolls with their short swords.
*Even little kids...*
Sorrow filled Samuel's voice.
If the boy he had rescued had not been taken to the temple, he might have ended up here even if he had lived.
"This is where they belong."
To kill Ines and capture Jeanne, the Black Wing had deployed dozens of assassins.
How had they found so many?
The answer was simple. They had raised them themselves.
To do so, the Black Wing had abducted children and committed human trafficking.
"With the war creating so many orphans, many will come here."
Ines's voice began to tremble slightly.
"Every day they train... they drink poison... they kill the living... they cut their bodies with each other to get used to pain..."
Each day had been terrifying.
After enduring those horrific days, what remained was only one being: a puppet with all emotions stripped away.
"For those raised to be weapons for slaughter, there are two tests. The first is..."
Ines explained while suppressing her rage.
Training for child assassins ended around ages twelve to fifteen.
Children could exploit their target's complacency, making them necessary in some operations where even one experienced assassin wasn't enough.
That's why they were deliberately put into real combat before adulthood.
The assassins raised this way had to pass two tests to become formal Black Wing members.
The first was random target assassination. The training instructor designated one person to kill without hesitation.
"The instructor picks you, or gives you the situation. I waited on a tree, and the first person who passed underneath... I killed."
It didn't matter if it was a man, woman, or child. They must not feel compassion for others and must not hesitate.
Could one kill someone with no relation to them on command? This was essential for an assassin's aptitude.
The person Ines had killed was a woman who was pregnant.
After completing her work, the training instructor laughed, revealing it. He praised her highly, calling her talent unparalleled.
Listening to this, Ines only flicked her nails. The strange feeling she had felt while watching a person die in agony was all a young girl like her could do.
Assassins who passed the first test were paired up. Those who failed became practice targets for the next trainees and died.
"And the second is..."
Ines couldn't continue. She caught her breath.
A memory she didn't want to recall.
Yet she had decided to face it head-on. Avoidance was impossible.
"...One-on-one duel against a comrade they trained with."
Fight without restraint. Kill your opponent and survive.
This training aimed to sever all connections while erasing even the smallest emotions from the heart.
Killing one trained assassin was wasteful, but the one who survived became a far superior assassin.
There were plenty of children without ties anyway. If they died, new ones could be brought and raised.
"He didn't stab me... but I... I..."
Ines's eyes filled with tears.
Theo. Abandoned from birth, he had grown up among beggars before coming here around age seven. The name had hardened when someone first called him by it.
Even in a place for raising assassins, friends formed. They comforted each other while enduring the grueling training.
When Ines was injured, he fetched medicine and applied it. When danger arose, he protected her.
It wasn't coincidence that he was chosen as her opponent in the final test.
In the one-on-one battle where only one could survive, Ines swung her sword. Theo only defended, looking for an opening.
And then the decisive moment.
He simply accepted Ines's strike.
"I would rather you live in this world than me."
He left those words as his last words.
If she hadn't killed him, Ines would have died. Ines didn't cry. Watching another assassin's corpse being carried away, she only tightly pressed her lips.
It took a long time to realize that those feelings were sadness.
At thirteen, Ines became a formal assassin of the Black Wing.
Her talent was remarkable, and the leader, Vicente, had kept her close enough to watch. If she had stayed, she might have become the next leader.
But after becoming a formal assassin, the very first mission she received ended with her fleeing.
They didn't assign solo missions from the start, so there was a senior partner, but Ines's blade turned toward him instead of the target.
The Black Wing's rule against betrayers left countless assassins chasing her, intent on killing only her.
No matter how talented Ines was, hiding from assassins her whole life was impossible.
Thus, after wandering many places, she entered a knight order.
If it was the royal knight order, even the Black Wing couldn't touch them freely.
It wasn't easy to live comfortably there either.
Training within the capital was somewhat better, but the moment external training began, assassins struck without warning.
Thanks to Dein, who trained with her, she had survived multiple times.
Ines never told Dein, but she always felt grateful.
For helping her.
And for never asking about her past.
"The Black Wing is like that."
*---*