Time for Revenge
With their plans laid, the four of them were working out how to find Catherine — wherever she might be — when Pierre hesitated, then spoke first.
"Uh… Joan… I know this really isn't the time to ask, but… is Lord Ligny… your lover, by any chance?"
"Huh? What are you talking about, Brother?"
"Ahahahaha— right, of course. Silly question. Sorry for asking something so weird."
"Honestly, Pierre. Why would you put her on the spot with something so pointless?"
"He's my slave."
Jean, Pierre, and even Ligny all started coughing at once.
"Th-that… M-my lady Joan, didn't we agree you wouldn't say things like that when other people are around…? Cough, cough…"
"You don't like it? And these two aren't 'other people.' Besides, they're going to find out eventually anyway. Last night, too—"
"AAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!!"
"AAUUUAAAAAAHHHH!!!!"
The two brothers clapped their hands over their ears and started screaming in unison. They clearly did not want to hear another word.
But during last night's tryst, wailing had carried through the wall from the other side — so Joan's assessment was not far off the mark.
"If you really don't believe me, I could demonstrate right now. How about it, Ligny?"
"*Gulp.*"
"*Hssss—*"
"Even so, I am still a noble, my lady…"
"…Have you already gone off me?"
"Th-that's not it at all…"
When Joan pouted, looking mildly sulky, Ligny dropped to one knee before her with a soft sigh, slipped off her shoe, and pressed his lips to her foot.
"I didn't ask you to go that far to prove it— mmnh…"
"If I didn't, I was fairly certain you'd keep needling me about my loyalty for ages…"
"Heh. Well, you could keep going — no need to worry about the audience."
"I'm not quite that much of an animal. Please, only when the two of us are alone, Master."
Joan traded a look with Ligny's pleading eyes, briefly weighing whether to slide her foot between his legs the way she had the night before.
The two brothers watched with pitiful faces, but they might as well have been invisible. A private world was forming around Joan and Ligny alone.
"There. That enough of an explanation?"
"…"
Caught in the charged atmosphere between the two of them — and remembering far too clearly what had happened the night before — the brothers coughed awkwardly, covered their eyes, and tried to retreat to their rooms. But right in the middle of that chaos, a clamor rose from outside the house.
"My lord Count!!! Where are you!!"
"We know it's all just rumors!! My lord!! If they've taken you, at least shout!!!"
"Your wife and your aunt are waiting at home!! My lord!!!"
At the voices carrying from a distance, a vein stood out on Joan's forehead and her expression twisted.
"These… goddamn bastards…"
"…My apologies…"
It was almost certainly a Burgundian scouting party looking for Ligny.
It would hardly be strange if one or two survivors from yesterday's rout had escaped, and there had likely been a rear detachment watching the main force from afar as well.
Joan scooped up the warhammer she had brought and the bastard sword lying beside it, then stepped outside.
The bastard sword was long enough to drag along the ground, but she was in no condition to care about that.
"…?"
"Lord… Count Ligny?"
Seeing Ligny looking unexpectedly intact — a few blows to the face notwithstanding — the enemy soldiers began to mutter among themselves.
"H-he didn't actually turn traitor, did he…?"
"Come on, no way. He's got family in Burgundy. Even a bastard wouldn't go that far. His aunt and his wife would be executed for treason on the spot."
"Hey, look at that son of a bitch!!"
As if he had made up his mind about something, Ligny took up his halberd and stepped forward, and the murmuring among the Burgundian soldiers grew louder.
Then a soldier whose gear marked him as someone of at least moderate rank strode out from the rear.
"Which one of you is the bitch called Joan?"
At the sound of her name, the two brothers and Joan all looked at Ligny.
Their eyes said, You told us no one knew — but Ligny only looked flustered. He had no idea either.
"You insane witch!! You screamed that you were Joan of Domrémy, beat every last one of our boys to death, and now you're going to play dumb!!"
Ah.
So that was it. She had gotten a little carried away with the theatrics.
"Ah… ahahaha, I did get a bit worked up back then— nothing personal. You people just pissed me off, hahahaha."
As Joan fluttered a hand and tried to laugh it off, something round came rolling toward her feet.
"…?"
A face she somehow remembered.
It was Catherine. Ever since Joan had fallen into this world, the memories that kept bleeding in had always held her — the gentle older sister who looked after Joan and soothed her.
That dear, familiar face, which must have been on its way home to the village after taking refuge somewhere, came rolling to a stop at her feet.
"Ah…"
"Ca… Catherine?"
"Catherine…? N-no… it can't be… Catherine!! Please…"
The moment Joan and the two brothers recognized what had rolled to their feet, all three froze side by side and tried desperately to look away, to pretend they did not know that shape. But it had already burned itself into their minds with merciless clarity.
"You… you… goddamn…"
"We ran into her on the way. She didn't even know we were Burgundians — kept asking if anyone had seen her little sister~"
"…No…"
"Ah. Even while one man after another was on top of her, she just kept asking the same thing. Really, had we truly not seen her sister? Heh heh heh… She tasted pretty good, actually."
"Nnngh…"
The grip of the warhammer in Joan's left hand and the bastard sword clenched in her right slowly grew wet. Blood was seeping from beneath her fingernails where she held on too hard. Already half-claimed by madness, Joan began to walk forward, dragging the bastard sword along the ground.
"U…UAAAAAAAHH!!!"
She swung the bastard sword in a great arc and cut the jeering soldier clean in two — blade and all — then brought the warhammer down on the torso still twitching on the ground and turned it to minced meat in a single blow.
"GRAAAAAHHH!!!"
What followed was nothing but Joan's slaughter. The enemy soldiers split between those who fled and those who froze where they stood and died like dogs.
"Why did you do it!! Why!! You didn't have to!!!"
She tore through them, endlessly demanding answers from men who were already dead and could never reply.
Only about twenty soldiers remained when Joan finally clawed back a shred of reason — and Catherine's head swam into her vision once more.
"Hh… hhik… S… Sister…"
"Master…"
In the moment Joan's attention fixed on Catherine's head, the remaining troops who had been eyeing her flinched back at the sight of Ligny's halberd.
But Ligny, staring at the mountain of corpses that had been Burgundian soldiers — men who only days ago might have been his own subordinates — could not bring himself to strike first.
"Ligny…"
"…"
"Ligny… Ligny…"
"…Yes… Master."
"Say it."
"…"
"Who is the master you serve right now."
"My lady Joan…"
"Say it! Jean de Luxembourg-Ligny!! Who is your master!"
"My lady Joan alone is my one and only Master."
Something seemed to settle into place in his heart. The look in Ligny's eyes grew calm, and he adjusted his grip on the halberd.
"Please wait just a moment. I will be right back."
Ligny slowly twirled the halberd and began to walk toward the Burgundian soldiers.
"T-treason!! He's a turncoat!!"
"Enough noise. You lot were nothing but conscripts dragged onto this battlefield — farmers until a few days ago."
One of the soldiers who rushed him with a clumsily drawn sword was split clean down the middle and tumbled to the ground.
They were all terrified, but they knew that the moment they ran, the longbows of the rear detachment behind them would turn on their own backs. So they could not flee.
"…K-kill them!! Kill the traitor and the witch!!"
No one answered the shouted order from the man who still refused to step forward himself. Every last one of them was only fretting over whether someone else would charge in and die first so the rest might seize a chance to run — when a voice cut through.
"…From here…"
"…?"
"Not one of you… is leaving alive."
"Kill her!! She's a witch!! Even if you make it back, you'll be cursed!!"
An arrow streaked in from the rear, but Joan casually flicked the bastard sword and knocked it aside as if it were nothing.
The deflected shaft buried itself in the shoulder of a soldier who had been hesitating with his blade raised.
"AAAAAGH!! Witchcraft!!"
"Somebody help me!! I don't want to die!!"
"Anyone who runs dies first!! Killing that witch and the traitor is the only way you live!! Attack!!"
A few men charged Ligny — and crumpled on the spot like marionettes with their strings cut, dropping in a wet scatter across the ground.
"I apologize for the unsightly display, my Master."
"…"
"I swear this one last time. Until the moment this life ends, I, Jean II de Luxembourg-Ligny, shall have no master but one — my lady Joan of Arc."
Joan, who had at some point drawn Catherine's head against her chest, looked at Ligny and cried out.
"As your sole master, I order you. Ligny. Not a single one of them is to leave here alive."
"As you command, my Master."
Ligny gave the halberd a light snap through the air, shaking free the blood that clung to it.
Then he settled into a slight forward lean, kicked off the earth, and launched himself ahead.
"Forgive me. I won't give you time to feel the pain."
One sweep took two men, then three, then five. In an instant, the remaining soldiers were rolling across the ground.
Joan's two brothers had already dealt with the longbowmen who had loosed those arrows, and were dragging them out from the direction of the woods.
"Sister… Catherine…"
"Joan…"
"Jo…"
In the crossroads before the house — so quiet now it was hard to believe a battle had just ended — Joan finally let the sobs she had been holding back tear free.
"Sister… hwaaah… Sister… Catherine… uuu… hhik…"
"Catherine… hh-hhik… Why…"
"Hhik… Catherine… why did you…"
They were still pouring out their grief against that desolate backdrop when, in the distance, their parents came racing home on a horse loaded high with baggage.
The moment their mother, Isabelle, saw Catherine's head, she collapsed where she stood in a dead faint.
Their father, Jacques, looked at Catherine in grim silence for a long moment, then disappeared behind the house.
Ligny carried Isabelle inside and laid her on the bed, while Jacques reappeared at some point with a shovel and quietly began to dig.
Blood ran down the back of his hand where he had clearly driven his fist into something hard enough to split the skin.
After a modest funeral and prayers for Catherine, Jacques took Joan's hand and spoke.
"If all of this is a trial He has prepared… then it is a trial far too hard for me. I pray you find the right answer."
"I will… I swear I'll make everything right again. For Catherine's sake, if nothing else."
"I will pray for you always."