The two of them were still making their way down a corridor.
His rough fingers gripped a foot-long iron skewer. The skewer ran through a human left hand.
“Also, fragments of the grand duke’s memories flow in our blood. Apparently D’s left hand gives him power.”
“In other words, without this, he should be an ordinary dhampir?”
“Yes, probably.”
“In that case, we must hurry and finish him off.”
“Only after we’ve shown this to the grand duke. It’s a curiosity. Perhaps it will enable us to learn more about D.”
As the robed figure and the one in formalwear went down the corridor, a diminutive shadow followed after them.
“Found ’em at last,” Pikk said, and though he wanted to snap his fingers he somehow restrained the urge. “Hold on, little lady. I’ll save you for sure!”
Nothing burned in the boy’s eyes but a fiery dedication toward his rescue mission.
The Dark Story of Creation
chapter 9
I
The boy’s initial impression of the Iron Castle only grew firmer as he trailed after the two Noblemen. This thing they were currently riding in absolutely did not seem like a train. Consider the lavish use of gold and jewels, the corridor ceiling and walls adorned with such intricate carvings they conveyed a sense that its builder wouldn’t allow any surface to remain mundane, corridors with carpets that had a pile so deep it looked as if you might sink up to your knees in it, the fact that having elegant crystal chandeliers grace the ceilings was the norm, a lobby so vast and opulent it might be mistaken for an actual room, the restaurant.
The concert hall looked to be on the scale of a hundred times the size of a village chapel; musicians the likes of which Pikk had never seen produced music sweeter than any he’d ever heard, flowing out constantly over the uninhabited rows of seats. There were no people anywhere, not even a sense that people had been there, and when passing through halls with cathedral ceilings the boy looked up to the windows set up so high he got the feeling he might’ve glimpsed some figures there, and when he went through the dancehall he distinctly sensed figures in formalwear and dresses executing the steps of an elegant waltz behind him. Here on this train, the past lived on in silence.
But most startling of all was the length the train boasted. When Pikk, whose legs had earned him a reputation for running like the wind, was finally out of breath, his surroundings abruptly changed. Now there was no trace of the train as dazzling as any hotel. Transparent walls stood to either side of the corridor, and beyond them were innumerable beds and mechanical devices whose purposes Pikk didn’t fathom. As white predominated the floors and walls, these were obviously operating rooms. And each and every one of them had been laid to waste with savage force, committing them to the care of the shadow of death.
“What the hell happened on this train?” the boy murmured.
“We shall tell you,” said a voice that rained down on him from above.
Although the pair of Noblemen had been nearly a hundred yards ahead of him scant seconds earlier, they now stood to either side of Pikk, flanking him tightly.
“How nice of you to tail us. Was it treasure you sought, or the girl?” asked the grinning Gorshin, pearly white fangs peeking from between his lips.
“It ain’t like that!” Pikk bellowed, and as he did so he slipped from between them to stand in the center of the corridor.
“Wait!”
Benelli tried to grab him, but Pikk avoided his arms, running straight ahead. In this case, that was toward the rear of the train.
Suddenly, his balance was upset. The floor beneath his feet had disappeared. Undoubtedly this was a trap for intruders. Pikk seemed to fall forever in the pit that’d suddenly opened.
The next thing he knew, blonde hair swayed overhead and lapis blue eyes were looking down at him.
“Awake, are you? Such a brave lad. I am Countess Genevieve.” To the dumbstruck Pikk she continued, “That hole is for dealing with invaders, though it also doubles as a device for accommodating guests. It’s so vast, even adults might find themselves lost down here.”
Pikk sprang up. He already understood the situation.
“Where is she?!”
“Be at ease. She’s in the safest place on the entire train. Are you her little brother?”
“That’s a laugh. Who’d wanna be that prissy’s—”
“Don’t say such things. Be nice,” the Noblewoman said, her sensual red lips making an almost innocent smile.
“So, where is she, then? That’s where I’ve gotta go, too.”
“Will you be nice? If you will, I can take you there. However, in order to see her, you must first get the grand duke’s permission. I wonder, are you brave enough to meet the grand duke?”
“Yeah, of course so!” Pikk said, throwing back his shoulders with bravado. “I don’t care who it is, Noble or monster, I don’t show my back to nobody. Bring me to him right quick!”
His face, red and puffed with fight and feigned cheer, stiffened at once. The countess had brought her own face closer to his. The beauty of the Nobility had a strange air that made it differ from that of humanity. In addition, there was something regal about this woman that could inspire even the mind of a child.
“You’re a spirited boy, are you not? How I wanted to have a son like you. Can you walk?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“Then let us be off. It’s only five minutes on foot.”
Sounds like part of a realtor’s spiel, Pikk thought, despite his fear.
When they stepped through the door, Pikk froze solid. Xeno Gorshin and Benelli were standing there. They gazed down at him intently, evil in their eyes, but the boy immediately scowled back at them.
“W-w-what the hell? You bastards want a piece of me?!” he snarled, taking a brawler’s stance.
“Calm yourself. The countess here has told us not to do anything to you.”
“This time, we’re your escort. This time.”
So, next time we’ll throw down, eh? Pikk thought in his heart of hearts.
“What of the ‘failures’?” asked the countess.
“At present, a peacekeeping unit is in operation. We should have the results soon,” Benelli replied.
Shifting her gaze, the countess said, “You do not look well.”
Xeno Gorshin had been looking down at the floor, but he raised his face. His long formal jacket was completely soaked with blood.
“The wound from D’s sword still hasn’t healed. It won’t even stop bleeding.”
It was Benelli who offered this explanation. Gorshin looked down at the floor once more.
Feeling a strange presence, Pikk looked up at the countess. Her lovely visage was warped by surprise.
“Impossible . . . The two of you have the grand duke’s blood . . . You are not the Nobles you once were . . . And yet you were dealt a wound that will not close . . . This cannot be.”
“Yet it is,” Benelli said, looking askance at Gorshin. “The man known as D is no ordinary Hunter. Let me say this—I feel the same something from him that I do from the grand duke.”
Silence rolled by.
A voice like death itself said, “That something is ‘power.’”
It was Xeno Gorshin. His face was white as a sheet, yet crimson eyes blazed from it. Burning with anger and hatred—and fright.
“When his blade cut me thusly,” he continued, “I felt something more than just flesh and bone being cleaved. Perhaps I could call it the source of my life. The wound will not close, the bleeding will not cease. If this continues much longer, I will be gone. At present I can barely restrain them, but soon I will be unable to keep my blood beads from running amok.”
The countess had her eyes shut. Immediately opening them, she said, “Let us make haste. It may be that we face something incredible.”
The countess had said it was five minutes on foot, and sure enough at the end of the corridor an
enormous metal door different from all the others came into view. Completely free of ornamentation, its surface gleamed starkly from the illumination.
“It would seem we have arrived without incident.”
Sensing the genuine relief in the countess’s voice, Pikk was a little surprised. This was a woman who didn’t think those two devilish Noblemen were worth the time of day, a woman who ordered around a gravely wounded Noble—yet something was prowling around here that frightened her?
“Not yet,” Benelli said, his right hand touching the great scythe on his back. “Stay on your guard until we are inside.”
“I know,” the countess replied, yet her elegant stride never faltered as she walked up to the door.
It was then that an almost indescribable sound reached the ears of all of them. It was a human voice. But could any human, or even a Noble, raise such a cry, like agony seared them to the marrow of their bones and their soul was being carved out? It would be better to die than to meet whatever fate prompted such a scream.
Pikk covered his ears. Even the pair of Noblemen turned their cruel faces in all directions, looking around.
“Going in.”
Remaining expressionless, the countess nodded in reply.
Xeno Gorshin pulled the chain next to the door. Without a sound, the door slid to the right. First Gorshin entered, with the countess and Pikk following after. Last was Benelli, who stood lookout in the corridor, and once he joined them the door shut.
Though the agonized voice ceased, Pikk didn’t take his hands off his ears. Something hot spilled from the corners of his eyes, rolling down his cheeks to his jaw.
“Are you crying, little boy?” Benelli sneered. “Taken in by that pitiful, effeminate voice? But then, you are only a human brat after all. A coward to the very pit of your heart.”
A crack resounded from the Nobleman’s jaw. Not his cheek. Benelli reeled backward for two steps before finally righting himself again.
Rubbing the delicate hand that’d delivered an exceptional right hook, the countess said sternly, “I will not have you taunting this child. To protect the girl in the grand duke’s custody, this boy followed the two of you, knowing it might well cost him his life or his soul. I cannot allow such resolve to be belittled. I, Countess Genevieve, forbid you from ever doing so again.”
“Understood,” Benelli immediately capitulated, though his eyes had a malicious gleam. But even that was shaken.
It was that voice again, only now it began to echo through the room.
“There it goes again,” Pikk groaned, clamping his hands back over his ears.
“No, it’s not the same,” the countess told him.
“Huh?”
“It would seem everyone has their own worries—let us go.”
At the urging of the countess, the group began to pass through a chamber that looked to be a lobby. On opening the door at its far end, they found another corridor. Unlike the others, this was all gleaming silver. The four of them halted before the door at the end of the corridor. There could be no doubt that this was where the anguished cries originated. As the countess advanced, the door opened naturally.
It was a strange room. Apparently it covered more than seven thousand square feet, yet aside from an assortment of bizarre devices seemingly placed at random there was nothing to be seen but five couches, with a gigantic figure resting on the center one. It was the grand duke. Sitting back against the sofa with eyes closed, he was directly across from a clear glass pane that ran the entire length of the wall.
“What the hell is that?”
Pikk’s query referred to the grand duke—and to what lay beyond the glass.
In the distance there loomed an ancient stone wall, of all things.
The ghastly voice continued even now. Pikk could see with his own two eyes that it came from the grand duke’s throat. Surely this was the cause of the mournful expression the countess wore. But what could cause a Noble among Nobility—a Greater Noble who treated Xeno Gorshin and Benelli like babes—to fall into such a turbulent state even in his sleep?
It’s behind the glass. Unconsciously, Pikk was certain of that. He didn’t know why. Behind the glass. That’s where the cause lay.
Pikk didn’t care in the least about the grand duke’s torment. His thoughts were dominated by the face of the girl on her way home from the Capital. Yet somehow, he was hopelessly drawn to this. Drawn to whatever lay beyond the glass.
Still covering his ears, Pikk realized he was moving toward the pane. The countess and the two Noblemen were so focused on the grand duke they didn’t even glance at the boy. So as not to draw their attention, he let his focus drift—only fifteen feet to go. He made a dash for it. No one intervened.
Pressing right up against the glass, he peered down.
II
The boy fell with a cry from his throat that sounded like he was being strangled, and taking note, the countess flew over to catch him. She bridged the fifteen feet in one effortless bound. Yet her action stirred only the slightest breeze.
“You saw, didn’t you, you foolish lad.”
The countess gazed down at Pikk lovingly, but his little face was pale and his eyes had rolled back in his head. What’s more, he began foaming at the mouth and his body twitched violently. He was most certainly not a cowardly child—to the contrary, at that age he’d already been through more hardship than most adults, and his heart was tough as a dragon’s armored hide. That being the case—what was below the pane of glass?
“I shall take him to the examining room,” the countess said, looking at the grand duke and heading for the door, but just then the agonized cries that’d filled the room stopped dead. Gorshin and Benelli each took a step back and fell to one knee, while the countess set Pikk down on the floor, bent her left arm in front of her chest, and took her dress in her right hand to curtsey in greeting.
The giant was just getting up from the sofa. His face called to mind stone, and two eyes opened in it like fissures breaking wide. The room was tinged with red. Though this was due to the grand duke’s eyes, it was unclear if they gave off that red glow merely because they were bloodshot.
“I was dreaming,” he said in a voice like rock scraping rock. “Will he give me naught but nightmares for all eternity?” And then his eyes turned not to the countess, not to the two Noblemen, but to Pikk where he lay on the floor. “Has he come in search of the girl?”
His guess was precisely on the mark.
“Let him see her as soon as possible. Now, D—what has become of him?”
“These two fought him and cut off his left arm. However, one of them was gravely injured, and even now the bleeding won’t be stemmed.”
Looking not at Gorshin or Benelli but at the countess, the grand duke said, “His blade cannot be tamed even after receiving my blood? Yes, it’s just as I thought. This has become most interesting. He is certain to come here eventually.”
“Before he does, we shall—” Benelli interjected.
The grand duke merely shot him an ill-tempered glance before continuing, “Nightmare or not, this is a vision he has given me. It taught me a number of things. Not only of the past, but of the future as well. Though the message is yet shrouded in mist, it would seem this train will not run smoothly.”
“Due to D?”
There was no answer.
The countess’s eyes turned red, and she asked, “There are other troubles as well, then?”
“Perhaps. At any rate, it would seem there was some merit to being awakened. Both for me, and for you.”
An expression that beggared description flitted across the countess’s face. One of both pleasure and grief. It was the one she’d found only after millennia of living.
“That’s—fine,” the countess replied, her voice now changed.
Glaring intently at Xeno Gorshin, the grand duke said, “I shall set him right. Come.”
He beckoned with a nod.
For some reason, Gorshin shook his head. N
ot only that, but he also backed away as if he were going to flee.
“Damn you for having the heart of a flea. Come.”
The grand duke’s eyes gave off a red glow. It burned itself into Gorshin’s retinas.
The young Nobleman stood stock-still, but coughed as if in one last act of resistance. He spat up blood beads. Benelli groaned and backed away. Their poison was so virulent, it’d rendered D helpless enough for them to lop off his left arm.
“Parlor tricks,” said the grand duke, opening his mouth wide.
An incredible wind resulted. The hair of all save the grand duke billowed in the same direction. The grand duke had inhaled. Every single blood bead was sucked into his maw. No doubt the deadly beads burst in his mouth.
The grand duke’s Adam’s apple bobbed as if he were swallowing something, and then he remarked, “That might be sufficient to kill a field mouse.”
Having said that, he stood before Xeno Gorshin. Grabbing the young Nobleman by the throat, he lifted him effortlessly, and Gorshin could do nothing to stop him. The countess looked down at her feet.
Before long Gorshin was thrown to the floor with a thud, where he twisted weirdly, then quickly got to his feet. Neither his face nor his physique had changed. However, the pained expression was gone, and his bleeding had ceased. All that differed was the pair of teeth marks that remained in two spots on his neck.
Gorshin must’ve felt this full yet incomprehensible recovery, because he twisted his lips into a grin. His expression and the fangs that peeked from the corners of his mouth were the same as before, yet an entirely different Nobleman stood there.
“I’m cured. And I’ve changed,” he said in a voice that seemed to echo from the depths of the earth, and there was something about it that resembled the grand duke’s tone.
“My apologies for letting you see me in such an unseemly state,” he said, bowing deeply to the grand duke. “Together with Benelli and Braylow, I will see to it that the maggot plaguing this train is eliminated once and for all. We shall set out immediately.”
Throng of Heretics Page 16
