The Prophet's Dream
"Getting through the outer walls is easy enough, but no one just walks into the inner keep — we'd need the captain of the guard... No. Wait a moment, my lord."
The second son stopped himself yet again.
Try as he might, something about all this struck him as deeply strange. If the Count of Yeitz truly wished to enter, he could simply stand before the outer walls beneath his family's banner and summon the garrison openly. So why in the world was he trying to sneak in?
"Would you care to explain, my lord?"
"Hmm."
Johan found himself in an awkward spot. Watching the second and third sons tremble with fear yet resist all the same stirred a faint twinge of guilt in him.
But the truth was difficult to explain, because it rested entirely on his own instincts and experience.
—As it happens, I'm a knight of imperial origin. A few years ago, the Emperor sent his finest knight, Sir Karamap, along with mercenaries, to attack my family's lands. I barely managed to cut Karamap down and escape — and looking at that army out there now, it brings back memories.
—My lord. However little you may think of us, to insult us with such an obvious lie is going too far!
...Yes, that was exactly how it would go. Johan wracked his brain, then simply said whatever came to mind.
"The truth is, I had a dream last night. And in that dream, a prophet spoke to me, accompanied by a holy sign."
"!"
—Huh? They actually believe that?
Even as the words left his mouth, he half-regretted them. That might have been laying it on a bit thick. But the second and third sons traced holy signs across their chests and listened with an expression of utter reverence.
It was enough to make Johan, the one telling the tale, feel embarrassed. They really believed it this easily...
"Ohh..."
—Don't you two start too...
Even the guards standing nearby wore faces that had been wholly swept away, and Johan could only stare in disbelief. Wasn't this past the point of mere innocence?
Still, there was nothing to be done about it. The religious authority Johan carried was far more potent than he had imagined.
The Church proclaimed it, his own words and deeds reinforced it — but above all, the road Johan had walked had proven that faith true.
If a knight who won victory upon victory like this was not beloved of God, then who in the world was?
Naturally, from the Church's standpoint, one could almost hear them sighing, 'Knights... sirs, winning battles is not how the Lord shows His love. Cast aside such barbarous notions, attend a few of the priests' lectures, and perhaps you'll come to understand what faith actually... ' But among ordinary nobles and knights, there was no helping it.
It was a world where honor and custom could not help shaping belief.
"And... and what did the prophet say?"
"He said that those who had come to the Viscount's castle intended him harm. As an honorable knight, I was asked to put a stop to it."
"Of course...! My lord, forgive me! To have dared doubt you, even for a moment!"
"......"
The persuasion had worked, yet Johan felt an odd, nameless frustration.
As befitted a castle raised in the days of the Ancient Empire, the castle of Carquilano County was vast and formidable, and the ground between the outer wall and the inner keep alone covered a considerable distance.
Naturally, the Viscount and his retainers resided within the inner keep. The gates of the outer wall might be passed with ease, but the inner keep was another matter entirely. They would need the cooperation of someone who knew the castle well.
"There's a captain of the guard I know. I'll send word to him and have the inner gate opened."
"Excellent. Some of you will disguise yourselves as laborers, the rest as merchants."
"...Er, does that include us as well?"
"Hmm. And were the two of you planning to march proudly up to the gate and announce that the Viscount's own kin have arrived?"
"...W-we'll do it."
The second and third sons changed their clothes with dazed expressions and rubbed grime onto their faces. The mercenaries, for their part, went about it with the practiced ease of men who had done this more than once or twice.
"We'll hide the weapons in the carts."
"Don't draw so much as a blade until I give the signal. If someone jumps the gun, things can get needlessly complicated."
The worst possible outcome would be for these men to have genuinely come as envoys on honest business — and for Johan to arrive and start swinging his sword. In the Viscount's eyes, Johan would look like a madman. Returning out of nowhere, cutting down an envoy, and running amok...
To avoid that, they had to wait, confirm what manner of men these were, and only move once the strangers showed their true colors.
—Hm. Although, after going to all this trouble, it would be rather embarrassing if they really did turn out to be envoys.
Had he gone on about a prophetic dream for nothing?
"My lord."
"What? Why don't you just carry a banner while you're at it?"
"...F-forgive me, Captain. Those men over there — aren't they mercenaries?"
No one opened the gates and rolled out the welcome simply because armed men arrived claiming to be envoys. Least of all an envoy arriving in secret amid such chaos as this.
First they would present their credentials and letters of passage, produce the token proving their office as messengers, and only after the castle had verified everything would they be summoned inside.
"Why do you suppose they're wandering about on their own?"
"Isn't it obvious? They've been on the road for ages, their blood's up, and do you think they can just sit still? Look at them. Don't those faces scream beer and dice?"
"Good. Bring them over."
"Yes, sir."
A few of the guards with the least menacing faces approached the men alongside Goidun, playing at merchants. They rolled the dice, lost a little silver, and their marks lit up like children.
"Ah, is that the time already? I'd best be off."
"Off where? Stay a little longer, come on!"
"Ah, but the master will be furious with me... Then how about this? All I have to do is deliver a report anyway, so why don't you wait a moment outside while I see to it."
"Really? Then sure, why not?"
The men trailed after them like trusting ducklings. Once they rounded a corner, Johan and his men emerged from both sides. The swaying, drunken loitering had made them look for all the world like city street toughs.
The mercenaries snorted with contempt. Any man who could be frightened by toughs lounging around a city had no business surviving a battlefield.
"You dirty dog — you lost a few coins at dice and now you're pulling this trick?"
"You seem to have taken us lightly. We are mercenaries who've fought more than ten battles on the field. So don't go reaching for that little paring knife of a dagger, and hand it over nicely like a good—urk."
Johan answered by swinging his cudgel into their midsections. The men collapsed with a strangled hurk.
"Drag them aside. I'll have to thank the captain of the guard later."
The man's generosity in lending them an out-of-the-way warehouse made the job several times easier. Johan bound the mercenaries and began the interrogation. Karamap wedged his blade between each man's legs. Their trousers went damp, and their mouths opened at once.
"A-anything! Anything at all! We'll tell you anything!"
"Good — such quick understanding. Truly befitting men who've fought more than ten battles on the field."
While Johan smiled with satisfaction, the Viscount's third son produced paper and pen, evidently intending to record the mercenaries' testimony.
"Oh. Sharp lad. You're of the Ginolene family, then..."
"Andolata. Andolata, my lord."
"Right. I'll remember the name."
Johan had actually been hoping the mercenaries would invent things that hadn't happened. With the right material to work from, he could have inflated it many times over.
"It was Baron Gartner! It was Baron Gartner's scheme! I had nothing to do with it!"
"Tell me in more detail which baron was attempting what."
But the work proved easier than Johan had expected. Baron Gartner was a warrior even more savage and quick-tempered than Sir Karamap, and he had apparently kept blabbering to his men about what he wanted done.
Andolata's hands trembled. He could not help his fury — that a lowborn wretch from outside would trample the contributions of his house underfoot as though they meant nothing.
"I see. Has Baron Gartner been plundering the area as well?"
"What? No, he hasn't?"
"Karamap. He's getting comfortable. Apply pressure with your teeth."
"N-no! No! He has! Now that I think of it, he has!"
"There are burned-out villages nearby. Did the baron do that too?"
"Yes! Yes!"
"......"
The guards standing at Johan's side wore expressions of profound embarrassment. Wasn't that the work of Johan's own men running rampant while he lay unconscious?
"You're writing all of it down, I trust? That should be enough. Let us go see the Viscount."
"Um — Count. There is something I should tell you."
"?"
"The Viscount has not yet recovered, so Lady Aol-la is serving as his regent — and Lady Aol-la..."
"You mean she won't be quick to trust me?"
"......"
Andolata hesitated, then nodded. For all his youth, he was remarkably shrewd, and Johan found it refreshing.
"And what do you think?"
"I... I honestly don't know."
He was, if anything, more trustworthy than his elder brother. Johan decided to hear out this young nobleman's counsel.
"Ah, for fuck's sake..."
Jyanina muttered curses as she compounded her remedy. The eyes of the servants watching her were anything but casual.
With them guarded like that, even seduction-based persuasion would be an uphill struggle.
—You lent the Count the power of your magic?
—I went to slay a monster. Isn't lending my strength only natural?
—And you healed his wounds as well, did you not?
—What nonsense is this? The Count must be mad to entrust his wound-treatment to me...
—Silence. I've no wish to hear it. If you are truly a mage, then cure the Count's illness. Do so, and this latest act of insolence and betrayal will be overlooked entirely. But if you cannot...
Living as a mage, one inevitably ran into moments like this — being coerced into a domain one had never touched.
A mage had to be able to slip out of such moments with skill. Jyanina had escaped them deftly any number of times before, but of all occasions, this one had gone messingly, damnably wrong.
With her hands bound like this, there was nothing she could do. And this place was completely foreign territory besides.
—Judging by his complexion, his liver and stomach have weakened? Then use bull's liver and stomach to target his strength? Ah... fuck... this is a potent tonic that kills if misused...
She knew how to harness monsters and put their power to use, but raising a stricken old man from his sickbed was not one of the mysteries she pursued.
For now she was stalling with a medicine that had no effect whatsoever, but if she didn't show them something soon...
"I had my suspicions, but you really are a mage. What are you up to?"
"...Kyaaaah—urk!"
Jyanina shrieked. Or rather, she tried to — right up until Johan struck her across the throat.
She gasped and choked, unable to breathe.
"Ah. My apologies. But then why go shrieking in the first place?"
"Hkk, hkk, y-you son of a—hck..."
Johan waited for her to calm down. By the time her voice returned, her fury seemed to have been throttled along with it.
"How did you get in here?!"
"I came to pay my respects to the Viscount, and I caught sight of a familiar face in the next room. So I dropped in for a moment."
"...My lord! Please, help me!"
Jyanina seized Johan's hand.
When she had left Johan's camp, she had been raising her middle finger and screaming 'A curse upon you! May we never meet again!' — but now that she was in the Viscount's camp, Johan's camp seemed positively pleasant by comparison.
"And how exactly am I supposed to help you?"
"These bastards are trying to kill me!"
"You? A loyal servant of the Emperor?"
"That's exactly the problem with these dense fools! They don't even know who I am, and they have the gall to be insolent with me!"
Jyanina clung to him and poured out her whole sorry situation. Listening, Johan had to fight back laughter. Wasn't this precisely the misunderstandings mages endured — the thing Suetleug had complained about at such length?
"The mages I know can raise a fallen man back to his feet. Why can't you?"
"......"
Jyanina made to curse him back, then froze at the sight of his fist. It looked as though it could snap her neck without the slightest difficulty.
"Well, this works out nicely. As it happens, my purpose here and yours are nearly the same."
"?"
"Follow me. We're going to meet the Viscount."
"Where are the servants?"
"Ah... don't worry, they're not dead."
"I wasn't worried at all."
"Truly a mage, through and through."
—You little shit—
Andolata had counseled that it would be better to speak directly with the Viscount himself rather than with Lady Aol-la. However inexperienced the Viscount might be, he was certain to render a far cooler judgment than his daughter.
Johan had accepted that advice.
He hadn't known precisely what condition the Viscount was in, but he was evidently capable of conversation. That much was enough.
"...?"
At the arrival of such an unexpected guest, the Viscount, lying in his bed, simply blinked in bewilderment.
—Can't move his body, but can just barely speak, then?
Johan picked up the silver cup beside the bed and, with an assassin's deftness, quietly poured in some blessed water. It wasn't something that absolutely had to be hidden — but there was no need to announce it openly, either.
He offered a brief prayer, traced a holy sign, and tipped the cup to the Viscount's lips. Jyanina went slack with disbelief.
"...No. My lord. You're not a bishop — surely a prayer and a cup of water can't possibly—"
Jyanina stopped mid-sentence. The Viscount's fingers had twitched.