A Most Profitable Hostage
The Knight Investiture.
It was the ceremony every young knight-in-training dreamed of.
In truth, on the surface, there was little difference between a mercenary who rode a horse, carried a blade, and loudly insisted he was a knight, and a man trained from boyhood and formally invested into knighthood.
But behind that surface lay an enormous gulf.
The former was utterly alone in the world, while the latter gained ties to the noble who performed his investiture, to the knights who had trained alongside him under that noble, and to every other noble orbiting that lord's patronage.
It was, in a sense, a social sacrament — a rite of profound importance.
A rite that conferred an honorable station no amount of gold or sword-work could ever buy!
And for precisely that reason, the investiture was never bestowed lightly.
First, certain customary obligations fell upon the noble granting it.
And it didn't end there.
The newly invested young knight would spend years riding the circuit, entering tournaments and slaying monsters to make a name for himself — and in that period, the noble was expected to bankroll his activities.
In other words...
An investiture was not simply a gift bestowed upon a young and valiant knight. From the noble's perspective, it was an investment made only with the firmest resolve.
Through this act of patronage, the noble gained a young knight who would follow him.
Isn't this overdoing it?
Johan was taken aback. He knew he'd rendered a service, but an investiture felt excessive. The custom was to train under a noble for a decade or more, earning merit as a squire before earning the sword. Or else to accomplish some staggering feat on a desperate battlefield.
"Me, a knight? I hardly feel worthy of it."
"Worthy? What could be too good for a young knight who smashed through enemy lines and dragged their commander back a captive? Nothing. Not a thing."
There's certainly nothing bad about accepting.
Frankly, from Johan's standpoint it was pure profit. He'd be entangled in Count Zarfen's debts of gratitude, but where in this world was anything free? And besides, he was already entangled to a considerable degree.
"My lord, if you don't explain matters properly, Sir Johan may be given the wrong impression."
"Ah. Right. It isn't I who will be performing the investiture."
At the words of the knight standing behind him, the count said it as though remembering something.
There were cases of summoning a renowned bishop for an investiture, but that didn't seem to be what the remark was driving at.
What's this?
"I could perform it myself, yes — but there is one better suited than I."
"...?"
"Hmm. I apologize for getting ahead of myself when I haven't even received your answer yet. In any case — are you willing to accept?"
"Coming from a noble of your honor, my lord, how could I possibly refuse?"
Count Zarfen's stone-faced expression cracked into a wide grin.
"That much I can guarantee. It's against my nature to speak of things that haven't even come to pass yet, but with this matter I needed to confirm your intentions first, so I asked ahead. My apologies for the confusion. I'll have an answer for you as quickly as I can manage."
"Not at all. In circumstances like these, what does a little haste matter?"
"Circumstances like these?"
"The castle is under siege, is it not."
"Thanks to you, not for much longer."
The count spoke with absolute conviction. He might as well have said the army outside had already collapsed. Johan found it strange. Certainly he'd captured their commander, but did that mean the rest would simply melt away? They had their pride too.
But the count was right.
When dawn broke the next day, the soldiers occupying the villages near the castle had vanished without a single straggler left behind.
"May I ask you something?"
"Yes! Ask me anything at all."
The castle's clerk, having heard Johan's name, was deference itself. He checked his ledger, then produced a small chest mixed with gold and silver coins and handed it over. At the heavy weight of it, a shiver ran through Johan.
Back on the estate, I never imagined I'd get my hands on money like this...
To hold real wealth, one had to climb. Grind away down below as a peddler or a sellsword, and all that ever landed in your palm was a few coppers or silver.
A knight's life was high risk, high return in the classic mold. Drag an enemy in alive and collect his ransom, and staggering sums flowed in. Fail to catch him, and the money bled out in an instant. And if it was you who got caught, the coin flowed out several times over.
"Please, count it. We exchanged the man's assets."
Johan, of course, didn't count a thing. That was work for later, behind closed doors — the sort of thing you most emphatically did not do in front of others.
"With money like this, couldn't you have simply hired more mercenaries and fought it out?"
"Count Abner overreached. The enemy was far more numerous than expected, so rather than strain himself meeting them in the field, my lord chose to hold the castle."
Just because your opponent overextends himself hiring mercenaries doesn't mean you match him — you wait for your moment. It was a sound strategy, and in practice it had worked exactly as intended. And the unexpected hostage Johan had delivered was icing on the cake.
Thanks to that, pleasant conversation flowed freely through Zarfen County — talk of extracting a ransom from Count Abner and then sealing a truce. And as pleasant as things were here, in Abner County at that very moment the atmosphere was surely murderous enough to make breathing difficult.
"How did you find the shield and sword you received, sir?"
"Fine pieces. The horse is well trained, too."
"I knew you'd be pleased. Donum is the cleverest and finest-blooded animal in these stables. The trainers say there must be monster blood somewhere in his line."
He was delighted with the merchant's converted fortune, but the other gifts were far from trifling either.
Donum, the count's gift, had shown his intelligence the moment Johan mounted him. He read his rider's intent and moved with eager tact — a quality Johan had never once seen in Fern.
And beyond the sword and shield, the count had gifted him a full set of chain mail. The mail made in Zarfen was far thicker and heavier than what Johan had been wearing — double-woven chains, forged by dwarven smiths. Heavier, but the protection was beyond question.
Flushed with such rewards, Johan had been eager to try his new gear out at once...
Only to find, to his surprise, that there was nowhere to use it.
The castle's knights, apparently under orders from a count wary of friction, never once asked Johan for a sparring match — and as their honored guest, Johan felt it would be gauche to make the request himself.
When he'd traveled with Suettlgr he'd at least had chess; alone and treated as a precious guest, all that remained to him was training and riding.
Bored stiff, Johan called in Goidun and the mercenaries. Gowan and Kahn, who had received generous rewards from Johan after entering the castle, went off expecting some further windfall — and walked straight into a lightning strike.
"Ugh... gah... hnnngh..."
"Hey. Up. You have to get up."
"J-just... let me rest a moment. Sir knight."
"S-Sir Knight... I'm too old for this, I'm telling you..."
The mercenaries kept themselves in fair shape, but Johan's methods existed on another plane entirely. His systematic, relentless conditioning of every part of the body had the men turning green.
They'd been delighted when a knight offered to train them personally — eyes shining. This was not what they'd signed up for.
"S-Sir Johan. If you're feeling restless, might it not have been better to simply tell me?"
The clerk came hurrying over in a fluster at the sight of Johan playing with the mercenaries. To his eyes, it looked very much like a protest.
"Why, what do you mean?"
"Sir Johan. Allow me to introduce someone better suited to you."
"Oh. Who?"
At the clerk's words, Johan's interest was piqued. He'd been bored, after all — he'd only been resting a few days after living at such a fever pitch.
Anyone worth building a connection with would do nicely.
"......"
"...Did you genuinely think that man was suited to me?"
The clerk's introduction turned out to be Stefan, sitting hostage in their midst.
"Sir Stefan is a knight, and Sir Johan is a knight. Wouldn't it be lovely for two knights to pass the time in conversation?"
The clerk wasn't wrong — not if Stefan had been the kind of knight who acknowledged his defeat and honored his victor. A knight in the truest sense.
But Stefan was a very different breed.
"The moment I return to my lands, I challenge you to a duel."
"Why not now? Ah — right. You're in custody. Pity. Though honestly, you'd be just as useless if you were free."
Johan's sneer turned Stefan's face red.
"Mind your tongue! I carry the blood of House Abner. Its sanctity is a world apart from the likes of you!"
"Didn't you fail to inherit the title, though? You'd need to earn military distinction as a knight to ever... oh. Dear me. You threw it all away this time. The next chance will be a long time coming, won't it."
Stefan had never stood a chance of out-arguing Johan in the first place. His circumstances were bad enough, and the whole ground he stood on — the upbringing, the background — was different.
"Th-then, if you'll excuse me, I'll take my leave."
Realizing his blunder, the clerk bolted. Johan looked at Stefan and asked — part boredom-killer, part a chance to pry loose some information about House Abner. Not a bad trade, all told.
"So. How much do you figure your family will pay for your hide?"
"......"
"Not going to answer?"
As he spoke, Johan plucked a fire poker from the hearth. The white-hot iron hissed menacingly. Stefan's eyes went round as saucers.
"Wh... what are you doing?"
"The disposition of my hostage is my right as his owner, isn't it?"
"K-keep your honor! You mean to collect the ransom, don't you?"
"A few scars won't stop anyone from paying. Now. Are you going to answer, or keep your mouth shut?"
Stefan nearly died of fright. When the man holding you hostage stopped caring about the ransom and went at you like that, there was nothing left to do but fold.
"The family will bring at least a hundred imperial gold... no, two hundred coins!"
"Oh. Truly?"
Johan asked, tapping the poker lightly against the floor near Stefan's feet.
"My ransom is easily worth that much!"
A hundred to two hundred imperial gold coins was an enormous sum — the yearly income of a famous knight. For landless minor nobility, it was a figure they'd struggle to even aspire to.
Johan smiled to himself.
So glad I caught this one!
"See how pleasant things get when everyone just answers honestly? Now then — tell me about Count Abner."
"Wh... what?"
"Anything. Why? Or does a man need to get closer before you'll talk?"
When Johan brought the poker up near his face, Stefan shuddered violently.
They told me he was an honorable knight — but the things he does are every bit as vicious as a sellsword's.
Stefan's mother, Countess Abner, was a noble who loved gold and silver every bit as much as any merchant.
To her, the silver vein discovered along the border between the two territories was a prize to make the mouth water.
But as ill luck would have it, no matter how the documents were turned over, the vein sat squarely within Zarfen County...
So Countess Abner had shrewdly demanded the land containing the silver vein as a marriage dowry.
"What dowry?"
"A m-marriage dowry."
"...Between you and Count Zarfen's daughter? Isn't that demand a bit shameless?"
"What in the blazes are you talking about?! I'm speaking of Lady Ulrike!"
The title of countess was borne by high nobility or the heirs of high nobility. Lady Ulrike was Sir Stefan's elder sister — the countess's firstborn and the heiress to the county.
"Ah. She's not married yet? Then I suppose the demand is plausible."
But even a marriage to an heiress didn't justify demanding a silver vein as a dowry, and Count Zarfen had refused outright, as any man would.
Countess Abner had used that refusal as her pretext to raise her soldiers...
The two houses were, in fact, closer than most realized. Then again, noble families were by their nature a great tangled knot of intermarriage and old debts.
"The Countess never meant to break the marriage off entirely, so a peace will be concluded soon enough! And then, naturally, the ransom will come through — so kindly take that fire poker away from my person!"
"Ah. My bad. I was thinking, and my hand just sort of drifted here."
"Your wine, sirs."
While the shouting was going on, a servant entered. At the sight of the bottle borne on a silver tray, Stefan's mouth watered.
Isn't that the wine that Doris fellow was carrying?
They said goods went around and came around — but who knew they went around quite like this.
Johan watched the approaching servant, musing idly on such things. The servant bowed politely, set down two cups, and withdrew.
"Wait."
Johan called him back. Not for any concrete reason — some instinct, some formless something. He would only understand what it was after the fact.
"Why are the cups upright? You carried them in standing up, not turned over?"
"...F-forgive me."