This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.
BLADE AND SOUL
First edition. June 26, 2017.
Copyright © 2017 C.M. Estopare.
Written by C.M. Estopare.
Table of Contents
Copyright Page
ONE | Reine
TWO | Marceline - One Month Later
THREE | Dimitri
FOUR | Reine
FIVE | Marceline
SIX | Marceline
SEVEN | Dimitri
EIGHT | Reine
NINE | Marceline
TEN | Marceline
ELEVEN | Dimitri
TWELVE | Marceline
THIRTEEN | Reine
FOURTEEN | Dimitri
FIFTEEN | Reine
SIXTEEN | Marceline
SEVENTEEN | Marceline
EIGHTEEN | Marceline
NINETEEN | Marceline
TWENTY | Marceline
TWENTY-ONE | Marceline
TWENTY-TWO | Marceline
TWENTY-THREE | Marceline
TWENTY-FOUR | Marceline
TWENTY-FIVE | Marceline
TWENTY-SIX | Marceline
TWENTY-SEVEN | Marceline
TWENTY-EIGHT | Severin - Several Hours Earlier
TWENTY-NINE | Marceline
THIRTY | Marceline
THIRTY-ONE | Marceline
THIRTY-TWO | Marceline
THIRTY-THREE | Marceline
THIRTY-FOUR | Marceline
THIRTY-FIVE | Ludovic
THIRTY-SIX | Marceline
THIRTY-SEVEN | Marceline
THIRTY-EIGHT | Marceline
Epilogue - Lucius
Other Books by C.M. Estopare
About the Author
ONE
Reine
This was a night devoid of stars. Tonight, there were no mechanisms by which she could slow her breathing by counting...one star, two. Three stars, four. Tonight, the black void of night assailed her. Hugging her close with its icy gossamer arms.
Planting her sweat-drenched palms to the thin pearly balustrade before her, Reine held tight as her heart lodged itself into her throat. Choking her as red hot coal piled up behind her eyes. She couldn't breathe—she couldn't pull herself together long enough to even hold back the tears. They came—they came as easily as the tremors did. Her legs and arms shivering as if she were in the midst of a screeching blizzard. Despite her tensing them until they cried out in burning pain, they still shivered as tears rolled down her cheeks. They still shivered and she still cried.
Poor Reine, the poor Odette, Lady Valentine had tittered earlier while Reine had sat and dined with the others in the crypt's hall, as her father huffed beside her at the table, someone should bring her a tissue—a napkin.
You haven't felt true pain yet, Reine remembered her whole body tensing as her father snapped, leave until you can control yourself!
And so she did. With tears trailing down her face and soaking her new velvet gown, she fled the dining hall and escaped into the crypt's moonlit gardens.
Yet, tonight, there was no moon. No stars. Only darkness.
Darkness befitting a funeral.
Clutching the balustrade, Reine pulled herself towards the sea of rose bushes basking in the darkness below her. They were infinite—much like the deceased woman she remembered. They were infinite, the shivering sea of verdant leaves darkened by a starless night.
Something soaked through her slipper as she tapped it upon the ground. A puddle surrounded her, soaking through her the thin silk. Warm water.
Reine glanced down.
Crimson—a trail of it crept down the garden path. The blood snaking through the cracks in the stone-strewn pathway like bloody fingers prying through stone.
Blood.
Reine snatched her foot away and contemplated running as a voice wafted down the path. High-pitched notes swung past the hanging green hedges only to latch on to her. A man's voice coupled with a woman's throaty wail.
Picking up her skirts, Reine's legs shivered as her knees knocked together. Bunching the smooth fabric of her dress between her sweaty fingers, she swallowed at a growing lump in her throat and took a single step up the path. Another.
She followed the trail, tiptoeing upon the stones.
Whoever did this—whoever was doing this...
Reine had been warned previously that something strange had been going on at the crypt after the duchess's death. Upon bringing the woman's body to her final resting place—the Crypt of Queens—people had been systematically going missing. People who had been close to Duchess Mariett in life. Friends, those privy to her secrets. Old handmaidens.
Rounding a corner, the trail of blood grew thicker as it swung around a towering conical hedge that rose up like a fat lance high into the black sky. Dropping her skirts to the ground, Reine clutched at the vines and branches of the hedge as she peeked around the corner. Slowly, slowly, her eyes following the trail as it became a thick pool.
How much blood could one person have?
In the midst of the high hedges of the garden, she saw two people. One tall, swallowed by a black cloak and hood. Another tiny, pudgy in the waist and attempting to hide it with an overly tight scarlet bodice hardened and shaped with steel boning.
“Lady Valentine!” Reine called, stepping out from her hiding place.
The figure turned, its drooping hood following like a listless patch of loose skin.
Reine lifted a finger and jabbed it at the man swathed in black. All fear and trepidation gone as ire surged through her veins like fire. “You!” she screamed, taking a step forward as the man moved to drop Lady Valentine. Her body as limp as a used rag doll, “How dare you do this to us!”
The man tensed. Jerking the corpse from his arms, Reine sprinted forward to catch the old governess. The woman landed into Reine's outstretched arms like a large sack of rocks. Heavier in death than she would have ever been in life. “How dare you!” Reine screeched as Lady Valentine's head lolled to the side, her alabaster skin papery as a dry trail of blood stained her neck in strange circular lines.
“Who are you?” Reine demanded, her knees coming together as her legs began to shiver. Turning on her heel, she screeched and ducked as a massive pair of bloodied hedge clippers dove for her neck. The clippers snapping overhead as Lady Valentine's lifeless body slammed into the ground.
Reine followed it, palms slapping to the bloodied stones. Slipping.
As a gush of cold air nipped at her neck—the hairs on her nape rising. Standing. On edge.
“Whoever you are—you'll—you'll pay!—,”
Reine froze as the clippers snapped.
And fluffy blonde locks rippled past her shoulders. Floating to the ground.
Her assailant didn't talk—didn't converse. He groaned. He hissed out a heavy breath.
Reine hefted herself up—panting. Her body ignoring her once again as her arms and legs shivered—more from fear than from sadness now—as she turned on her heel and snatched a loose stone from the ground. Holding it with both hands, she flung it at her assailant. The fist-sized stone connected with his chest as she screamed.
He didn't budge. Didn't move. He simply froze.
As she turned on her heel and sprinted down the path.
Behind her, steel hit stone as the hedge clippers clattered to the ground and her assailant sprinted after her. Charging—his breath silent. His every step overtaking two of her own.
She'd have to make it back to the crypt—back to the dining hall and warn the others. Reine had found the murderer—of all people—she had found the man who had been terrorizing Safrana ever since the duchess's death!
Of all people—why
me? Why not someone else?
The Crypt of Queens loomed before her like a fortress. The garden's exit called out to her, a steel arch with the crying head of an eagle urging her forward as footsteps whispered behind her. The hedge clippers were gone—but this man could surely kill her with his bare hands. He had already killed four of the duchess's friends with nothing but his fingers—leaving dark strangulation marks bruising their distended necks. He could surely catch her and kill her if he tried.
But Reine could not die—she was the court's Odette.
She was invincible.
Or, so she thought.
Racing through the archway, she entered the crypt at a breakneck pace. Skittering torches lining the dusty brown hallways met her at every turn as she sprinted for the dining hall—her assailant unforgiving as the hairs on her nape rose again. Her neck and shoulders sweaty as her chest heaved. Her breath surging out as wheezing gasps.
Reine wasn't sure how long she could keep this up—but if she valued her life...
She met the bronze doors of the dining hall—the gateway tall and overbearing as she flattened her sweaty palms against it. A high-pitched whimper escaped her as she threw her shoulder against one door—knocking with her entire body. Praying someone would hear her as her assailant's echoing footsteps slowed.
It wouldn't budge—no one was coming to her aide.
They had locked her out.
“Daddy—daddy, it's Reine! It's Odette!”
Nothing. Nothing as the echoing footsteps came to a halt and a black cloak opened before her.
Nothing. Nothing but silence.
Reine whimpered as she slid to the floor. Tears began to cloud her eyes.
This man had to be...human—if anything—right?
Tears began to trail down her face, breaking through the sweat that stained it.
Appeal to his humanity—no man likes a crying woman.
Did Lady Valentine cry? Cry before he gut her?!
She had no choice—there was no other way. If she valued her life...
Reine began to sob, her shoulders racking, her lips twisting down into the ghost of a frown.
“Please...” she whimpered.
Her assailant simply stood there, face eschewed by a drooping hood. Reine watched his arm move and vanish beneath his long cloak. She watched him lower his head, his hood drooping as he produced a satchel.
Reine stood—whimpering still—as his gaze left her.
I should rush at him, she shivered at the thought of touching him, —no—if that rock couldn't hurt him...
She quieted as she approached him, her gaze flitting to the right—to another passageway. Another hallway she could lose him in.
I could talk my way out of this—I could follow father's advice—
The man's hood shivered. His gaze connected with hers. She saw stars—eyes bright as death.
Reine sprinted.
Zigzagging through the hallways like an erratic cat, she took a sudden right. Orange torchlight shivered as every brown hall seemed to blend together, her vision blurry as she looked for more opportunities to lose him.
Panting, she took a left.
And froze.
Thick bronze doors stood in her way. Flowing script etched into the shiny bronze face cradling her eyes.
Echoing footsteps tore her away from the words and she shoved her shoulder against the door.
It moaned. With another shove, it belched dust as it opened.
Reine entered a dome-roofed sepulcher as the footsteps grew closer, the man's running dying to a shuffle as a painful groan echoed up the hallway.
Reine's mouth fell open.
How far had she gone?
It didn't matter—she thought, nodding as she eyed five raised stone daises cradling iron coffins in their slate gray hands. She picked a coffin and rushed towards it as the shuffling outside the room halted—silence overcoming all. Pressing her fingers to the iron lip of the long rectangular coffin, she fell to all fours and crawled behind it as the doors at the entrance of the room moaned open once more.
He entered with a slow step, every movement careful.
He looked for her—scathing eyes bore into her like a heated brand. It was almost as if he could see her as she pressed her back up against the cold iron of the coffin. She held her breath.
As the door to the room moaned to a close and he walked. Every step a rebounding echo. Click, click, click...
There wasn't much she could do now—stuck in a sepulcher with a murderer. Angry tears burned her eyes—was this it? Was this how she'd die?
The deep echo of his steps ricocheted around the massive room, the noise bouncing off the rounded dome of the stone ceiling.
Risking a peek over the iron coffin, she watched his dark form skulk away into the yawning hallway of an attached antechamber.
Reine's heart drummed in her chest as she risked a glance at the bronze doors leading out. Could she make it? Could she sprint for the doors and make it before he heard her steps? Everything echoed loudly within the massive room—could she make it?
Would she make it?
Reine shook her head. She couldn't risk leaving. Not now.
Crawling around the side of the coffin, she froze—listening for footsteps—before undoing the metal clasp holding the coffin's lid down and opening the iron box.
She'd climb inside with the dead if she had to—if only to save her life.
Ignoring the stink wafting up from the coffin's iron innards, she slid inside and pushed the body away as she closed the lid. It locked automatically, clicking as metal slid against metal and the clasp's magnetic pull forced it to lock.
Reine heard his footsteps again. Her assailant skulking back into the sepulcher. Looking for her.
Reine turned her head.
And yelped before silencing herself.
The footsteps died.
TWO
Marceline - One Month Later
THE FIVE STOOD HUDDLED. Tall figures draped in black, their faces concealed beneath scarves and low hanging hoods. A heavy morning mist crept along the black leather of their boots. The white haze concealing cracks in the stones littering the chateau's wide rampart. Foreign boots clicked through the mist, alerting the group as cloaks shivered and bodies stiffened.
A happy whistle haunting the long stretch of stone and haze made Marceline freeze.
“Remember the name—Ghyslain Savatier. Remember it.” Lucius hissed before her, the black clasp of his cloak disappearing as his arms dove into a satchel near his belt. “if you'd like to return to the Bann—this is your last chance.”
The clicking of boots continued, Ghyslain striding closer. The pitch of his whistle picked up, the notes soaring ever higher.
No one made a move to leave. The chateau's ramparts were high—high enough for Marceline to see over the steep spires of cathedrals and cloisters. The chateau sat at the heart of a massive citadel—the citadel itself a maze. Its towering pearl walls a hindrance. Marceline had barely been in this city for a day and she was already beginning to hate it. Everything was too pompous and pretty. Everyone was too prim and proper. Every building was too tall, as if everyone in this city wanted to touch the sky.
If anyone in the huddle wanted to return to the Bann—they would have to jump.
The thought made Marceline's stomach clench.
The whistling stopped. As did the click of Ghyslain's boots.
“I count four of you. Where is the fifth?” Ghyslain called, his figure a gray silhouette cast against the morning mist.
Their reply was silence as Marceline bristled. She was the shortest of them—but they were surely five. Ghyslain simply could not see her.
She stepped aside, standing to Lucius's right.
“Ah! I see now!” Ghyslain chuckled as he approached, “You've chosen a dwarf for this mission?”
Marceline bit the inside of her cheek, the jest about her height irksome.
“A changeling as well.” Lucius quipped as he
produced a thick book bound in stained leather from beneath his cloak. “This is for you.”
Ghyslain's laughing gaze strode along the face of the bound book. Opening it with a ceremonial flick of his manicured fingers, the sunburst of color smashed upon his silken doublet winked in the dull morning light. Rolling his thin shoulders, he worked through the entire book in the span of a few breaths.
Seconds passed as he nodded. Closing the book with a snap, he held it to his chest, “Then the Bann accepts my contract?”
“Gratefully.” Lucius replied, bowing from the waist. Marceline and the others followed suit, flourishing their arms out like ravens readying to take flight. They rose in unison, lowering their hoods in a gesture of goodwill.
Ghyslain smirked, “Death pledges its allegiance to me. A rare occurrence indeed.” the man made no effort to hide the mirth in his eyes as they twinkled and the sides of his lips rose, “May I invite you all inside? There's a morning chill in the air that this old northman is far from used to.”
“And the details of our contract?” Lucius intoned, his words mimicking the groups' thoughts. “We are men of habit,” Lucius explained as Ghyslain's smirk faded, “and our fingers grow itchy absent the tools of our trade...”
Marceline met Ghyslain's eyes. Her face remained stoic. Emotionless.
Ghyslain's gray gaze met Lucius's, “Of course, of course. What else am I paying you for? To speak with an old crow like me? Non!” he tilted his head, the smirk returning, “But wouldn't weary travelers, such as yourselves, like to sup first? Break your fast and warm your tired bones?”
Marceline stepped forward, earning Ghyslain's attention, “Agents do not tire, Monsieur Savatier.” she began, her patience as thin as the veil of mist littering the chateau ramparts, “Per the notes of the contract, and I recount, 'In order to escape her assailant, the infamous Slayer of Safrana, Reine Savatier locked herself in a casket with Safrana's recently deceased Duchess for two days. While she was absent and presumed missing, the slayer murdered again—,'” she sucked in breath as Ghyslain's wizened face darkened, his eyes narrowing into two dangerous slits, “'—taking my former wife away from this world—'”
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