The Unlucky Envoy
Jannina was flustered. She had been about to insist that he really had been properly blessed when the mystery radiating from Johan's silver sword made her flinch.
There was no mistaking it — the mystery pulsed, seething out of the blade itself.
"Then the Lord didn't notice! There must be something different about you!"
"Do you take me for an idiot?"
"No, that's not what I meant..."
Jannina scrambled to think. At this point, she had to prove her claim. A Cyclops — a Cyclops, maybe? The odds were good that the sword held that particular kind of power.
"You truly feel nothing? No surge of strength? This dagger here— hyah!"
The moment Jannina drew the dagger, Izelia slammed a fist into her belly and seized her by the throat.
Pure knightly reflex.
Dropping the dagger, the pinned Jannina desperately opened and closed her empty palm, as if to prove there was nothing in it.
"Misunderstanding! Eep — it's a misunderstanding! A misunderstanding, I swear...!"
"Izelia. You may let her go. One dagger in hand hardly makes her dangerous. But from now on, announce yourself before you draw a blade."
'Damn elves...'
Jannina cursed the elves under her breath while clutching her throat and hacking out coughs. When she'd first met Izelia back at the fief, she had actually warmed to her a little — such a gentle, gracious noblewoman.
But an elf was an elf in the end. That race's peculiar belligerence and boldness simply did not agree with her.
"I'm... I'm sorry, my lord."
"Mm. Apologizing for a fault is a good thing. You simply need to correct it going forward."
Coming from Izelia with utter sincerity, those words only stoked Jannina's fury.
'Damn elf bastards!'
"So what exactly am I supposed to do with this dagger?"
"I thought the power of a Cyclops might be enough to snap even a dagger in two."
Johan nodded, took the dagger, and squeezed. It was forged of decently hard steel, yet it broke with a clean snap in an instant.
Jannina's face lit up.
"See! I told you, my lord!"
"Jannina. I am not holding a sword right now."
"...???"
Only then did Jannina realize that Johan had a sword at his hip. He had sheathed it while she was busy being throttled by Izelia.
"Th-then draw it again and try—"
"Mm. No change."
Johan still felt nothing different. The mystery seeping from the sword did nothing to strengthen him. As Jannina floundered, something brilliant flashed through her mind.
"Oh — of course, my lord! You already carry such tremendous power that the might of a Cyclops wouldn't register as any difference to you—"
"My friend. That mage of ours... seems rather hard to trust."
Izelia murmured under her breath. As a noble herself, she knew all too well the charlatans who passed themselves off as mages.
Suaetlug was undeniably a brilliant mage, but Jannina was a good deal less convincing.
"Either way, I understand. Do try to be believable."
"My lord, this is real, I'm telling you! There's no other explanation — ask Lady Suaetlug yourself!"
"How exactly am I supposed to ask her, when she's lying on top of my stomach?"
"Good country for pirates to come out of."
"Indeed, my lord. From here you can see the whole wretched lot of them — heathen pirates, heretic pirates, escaped slaves turned corsairs, noble-born ones..."
The archipelago around them was a tangled mass of small islands, and the currents ran strong and fierce. It was plainly an ideal hunting ground — plenty of cover for fast-moving raiders to dart in and out.
"The Republic keeps pushing to expand toward the Ulcana Peninsula. Doesn't it covet islands like these?"
"How could it not?"
The Venedo Republic was hardly alone; the other city-republics and petty kingdoms alike had long cast hungry eyes on the fat, fertile lands of the Vinashitim Empire. An island like this, used well, could serve as an outpost and a trade port all at once.
"But taking a suitable island is no simple matter, so it remains merely an ambition for now."
The islands Hormaric had been granted as his fief were on the small side — enough for a fort or an outpost, but nothing more. What the Republic wanted was something bigger. An island with a city on it.
"Where would that be?"
"Corhe Island, further south than where we're headed. It's quite a large one — several powers are already drooling over it. Ah—"
As he spoke, Giada flinched at a flag snapping up on another ship. A signal had been raised.
"Pirates have appeared, my lord! Time to show them what we can do."
"I look forward to it."
The seamanship of the Republic's sailors was famous. They lived for naval battle, and they read the Edene Sea as easily as the palm of a hand.
At the first glimpse of the Republic's distinctive galleys, the pirates didn't even offer a fight — they wheeled their ships around in a panic and fled.
Naval warfare in this world was still a primitive thing. Ships rammed each other and settled it hand to hand, or rained bolts from ballistae and arrows from bows; at worst they dragged along siege engines like catapults.
In such fights, the decisive factor was a ship's sheer size. The bigger and taller the vessel, the more absolute the advantage.
Long decades on the open sea had made the Republic a master of galley construction, and its great, powerful galleys had become a byword for terror among the pirates.
"They're running."
"...Do not worry, my lord. They'll come at us soon enough. Pirates are savage and brutal, but they aren't stupid enough to simply run in a situation like this."
Withdraw when the odds turn against you, and live to fight another day. It sounded obvious enough, but it was not something just anyone could manage. Breaking off pursuit while scattering in retreat was beyond the abilities of a ragtag mob.
And pirates, of all people, would never show that kind of tight cohesion and loyalty. They all knew perfectly well that if it came to a rout, every ship would simply flee on its own.
"They're not coming?"
"......"
Yet even as the fleet drew near the island, no counterattack came. Giada looked around with a sour expression.
"Hey. Why aren't they here? Check the ambush positions properly."
"We've checked twice. It appears they abandoned their ships and went up onto the island..."
"You're certain there's nothing here? This is a perfect spot for an ambush."
"Well, it's hardly my fault the cowards lost their nerve and ran, is it—"
Against the sailor's protest, Giada had no reply.
"Fine. If the pirates have run, then we land immediately. Signal the ships to come alongside."
"Yes, my lord."
Giada added, half in excuse, "They're likely waiting on the island to strike once we land. Please wait a moment, my lord. I'll show you how the Republic's sailors make a landing."
"I never said a word."
Giada was right that the pirates had been waiting for the landing — though not quite the way anyone expected.
The moment the ships anchored and the soldiers disembarked, the pirates sent out envoys bearing white flags. Their offer: guarantee their property and their lives, and they would abandon the island without a fight.
"Guarantee their property? Are they insane?"
"W-well then, just our lives—"
"That, I might consider."
At Johan's blunt reply, the pirate envoys' tails dropped at once.
Judging by their manner, they hadn't truly expected the property clause to fly anyway. His forces outnumbered them; he owed them nothing. Why on earth would he safeguard their wealth on top of everything else?
It was their lives that mattered most. Simply not being sold into slavery would be miracle enough.
'Meanwhile, everyone around me looks deeply dissatisfied.'
Giada, who hadn't been allowed to show off a single naval engagement; Izelia, who hadn't taken a single head — the assembled company sat there with expressions caught somewhere between awkward and bitter.
The pirate envoys, understanding none of it, shrank in their seats and fidgeted nervously.
"Very well. Once you've been confirmed, you'll be put off the island."
"Thank you, my lord! Your magnanimity is—"
"Go back and send your people."
Once ashore, Johan inspected the island's fortress. Small as the island was, the fortress was decently solid. The pirate occupation had left it considerably run-down, but a round of repairs would keep it serviceable for a long while.
'More than sufficient as an outpost.'
"The enemy may try to lull us and strike at night, so double the watches. Put the mercenaries on sentry rotation."
"Mounted warriors, with me. We'll patrol the surroundings."
Giada and Izelia threw themselves into preparing for a raid with real zeal — though truthfully, they seemed less interested in repelling an ambush than in praying someone would attempt one.
Izelia he could understand, but seeing it from Giada too made him wonder what, exactly, pride was supposed to be.
"I'll be resting in the tent. Call if anything comes up."
"Yes, my lord."
"Shall I keep you company, then?"
Jannina asked, sidling up. He frightened her, that much was true — but she couldn't keep dodging him forever. While she was attached to this court, she needed to earn merit, win favor, and get herself introduced to some other noble or another.
"I don't think that's something you're capable of."
"...What do you mean? I'm a decent chess player, you know."
"No. I was planning to read a book written in the Ancient Imperial Language. And you can't read that, can you?"
"......"
Jannina had not always been wise in her life, but among the nobility she had never once lost her place as their sage and mystic counselor.
And now she was being condescended to on matters of learning by a landed knight of all people. It stung all the more because she had no comeback.
"...Then you can explain it to me, my lord. Hah, hahaha. Hahahaha."
"Mm. Very well."
Jannina was more nervous than she had been the time she'd lied her way into a pot of gold before an emperor.
"My friend. We've caught a spy."
"?!"
Johan, whose tent glowed with fire fed on the oil of a sea-king dragon while he pored over an ancient tome and grilled Jannina on her learning, was startled by Izelia's voice arriving in the dead of night.
"Where? Vinashitim? A pirate?"
"A pirate. Have a look."
Izelia seized the man by the scruff of the neck and shook him about with evident pride. Judging by the state of him, the pirate had been beaten to the point where any thought of resistance was long dead.
"I... I'm not a spy."
"No spy ever announces that he's a spy."
"Well, that's true, but... you look familiar?"
At Johan's words, the pirate brightened. By some miracle, the man remembered his face.
"Yes, my lord. You showed me mercy once and set me free."
The pirate was Tamir — the corsair freed as reward for his part in sweeping the pirates from the southern reaches of the peninsula.
"To turn to piracy again after Count Eitz granted you mercy. A man beyond any worth of forgiveness."
"B-but I never plundered Lord Eitz's own lands, did I...?"
Tamir spoke with wounded indignation, and the argument was, Izelia had to admit, a fair one.
"Well. That much is true."
"Don't concede the point, Izelia... So what brings you here, Tamir? Come to thank me for my renewed mercy? Or to ask for your property back after all?"
"Neither. The truth is, there's an imperial noble here on this island."
"There are more than three empires. Which are you talking about?"
The Holy Empire, the Vinashitim Empire, the Eastern Empire — all of them empires.
"Ah — f-forgive me, the Eastern Empire, my lord."
"And what business does a noble of the Eastern Empire have here?"
The Eastern Empire had seized the southern Ulcana Peninsula and watched hungrily for its chance to push north, but the distance remained great. Its advances were mostly stalled, its gains meager.
The sea, however, was another matter. The empire's governors and nobles hungered to take the islands and harbors by water. The western coasts were walled in by mountains, so a seizure by sea would be far easier to hold.
And so every faction stood in want of a navy.
Pirates had always been a convenient breed to exploit. The heathen corsairs, for one, frequently took mercenary work for the Eastern Empire.
The noble who had come this time was an envoy, sent to talk the pirates of these waters into entering the empire's service.
Instead, he had run headlong into a punitive fleet arriving without warning — a bolt of thunderous misfortune out of a clear sky.
"Then we must take him."
"We must."
They had very nearly let the man slip away quietly among the pirates. Johan nodded.
"You have my thanks, Tamir. Thanks to you, we won't lose the noble. What do you want?"
"I merely repaid a debt, my lord."
Tamir said it with dignity. It might have sounded rather more convincing had Izelia not beaten him half to death; as it was, the wreck of the man only inspired pity.
"Take him away and get him treated. And before the pirates leave, bring me that noble. We ought to collect a ransom."