Scenes from an Unholy War Page 19

  The metallic petals continued to move, opening a full ninety degrees, while amidst the collection of unknown machinery within, a figure rose from what appeared to be a couch of sorts and stood, shrouded in black fur.

  “Baron Macula?” D inquired.

  A murmur went through the crowd. Did this gorgeous Hunter know the name of this Noble from untold antiquity? On further consideration, the ruins were called Castle Macula, making it possible to imagine the name of the lord of the manor. However, the people were so mesmerized by the gorgeous young man and his actions that they couldn’t even conceive of it. At the same time, another suspicion formed in the crowd’s mind: Could it be this Hunter knew these strange events would take place today and he’d encounter a Noble? But this suspicion vanished like mist thanks to the question D had posed and the answer that came next through the faint haze.

  “That’s right,” a grave voice had replied.

  “I’m D, a Hunter. You need to come with me.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “What?” the mayor and sheriff both exclaimed. Unlike the fearsome Noble’s first reply, the second had been casual and flippant.

  “This should be good,” a hoarse voice from the vicinity of D’s left hand murmured with amusement. “Looks like we’ve been thrown a curve.”

  “Give us some wind,” D said in a low voice.

  No one would’ve believed the sudden gale had gusted from the left hand of the inhumanly beautiful Hunter. Blowing away the faint steam, it left the Noble born from those petals exposed in the light of day.

  The murmur that shook the air was like the deep rumbling of a quake.

  —

  III

  —

  The Noble floated a foot and a half off the ground. From there, he ceremoniously lowered his left foot toward the ground—but just as the tip of his boot was about to make contact, it halted. He didn’t pause because he’d remembered something. He was simply physically incapable of reaching the ground. Taking hold of the edge of one metallic petal, the man fidgeted a bit, then gave up.

  “I’m getting down,” he declared haughtily. Then, in a lower voice, he added spitefully, “Are you going to give me a hand or not, you dolts?”

  To the people, he called to mind nothing more than a bear cub slipping and sliding its way down a tree trunk while a gigantic predator waited below. The Noble they’d so feared was stocky, not quite five feet tall, and from the top of his head to the tips of his toes, he was covered with black, bristly fur. However, what brought gasps from the onlookers and made terror bubble up from the depths of their souls was the demonic bronze mask he wore on his face. Though they could tell at a glance that it wasn’t his real face, these people of the Frontier also felt it wasn’t just a mask.

  “Give me some help,” he bellowed gruffly. “I can’t get down.”

  It wasn’t so much an order from the mayor as a shove from behind that sent two men, presumably from the town hall, forward, with trepidation. However, just ahead of them the man-bear seemed to have a change of heart. Stretching out a plump arm, he said, “Do you think a Noble would place himself in the hands of some hideous humans? Hey, you over there—come here.”

  On seeing who he was addressing, the whole group gasped; it was the handsome young man in black. The Noble’s sentiment was understandable. But wasn’t the young man a Hunter?

  It may have been on account of this fact that the man-bear toned down the arrogance in his voice when he said, “What are you doing? Are you going to help me or not?”

  D stepped forward. For a third time the crowd gasped. Before the ruckus had faded, D made his way through the people, took the man-bear by the arm, and roughly tossed him to the ground, chilling them all with terror.

  Flipping over once, the man-bear hit the ground back first. “Oof!” he groaned pitifully.

  A Noble’s pain turned to rage, which would be visited on mankind—from the age of legends right down to the present day this horrifying truth had been etched into human DNA with bloody chisels and mallets of cold terror. But the man-bear lay sprawled in a mess on the ground, just groaning for a while before slowly picking himself up like a centenarian.

  “You son of a bitch. You’re going to wish you hadn’t done that!” he cursed.

  However, the way he massaged and patted the small of his back was enough to cause someone to remark, “He’s like a little old man or something, isn’t he?”

  It seemed their terror and expectations may have been too great, or there was something fundamentally wrong here—suspicions began to creep into the minds of the spectators, but they were still dealing with a Noble. The tension might’ve vanished from their faces, but the people surrounding him made no attempt to press any closer.

  “Upsy-daisy!” the man-bear cried out like some countrified codger as he stretched his back out. Looking up at the heavens, he lifted his stubby arms as if cheering hurrah! “Ah, what marvelous weather! And my first peek at the sun in five millennia. It hasn’t changed a bit,” he remarked with pleasure. After a pause of about two seconds, he glared long and hard at the crowd around him, asking, “Who the hell are you people?”

  Though they couldn’t see any eye openings in the bronze mask, the people backed away noisily.

  “What are you gawking at? I’m not on display!”

  The mayor looked at D. He wanted the Hunter to begin a dialogue with the Noble. However, the handsome man in black just stood there, silent as a statue. Abandoning that notion, the mayor cleared his throat. The cough echoed through the area like the roar of a greater dragon. The silence ran that deep.

  Perhaps the daunting position he was in impressed itself on the mayor once again, because he rested a rough hand against his chest, got his breathing under control, and desperately choked back his fear before saying, “I’m the mayor of the nearby village of Satori. Who in blazes are you?”

  His voice trembled horribly, yet two thoughts occupied his brain at the same time. First, a Noble who walked in daylight—this was an exceptional fiend unlike any ever described. Second, a Noble who walked in daylight couldn’t exist. Based on his words and actions up till now, he had to be lying. If that were true, the mayor decided that things would not go well for this man. Or such was his intent . . . but it didn’t pan out as he’d planned.

  The mask turned to him, asking, “What the hell do you want, sod buster?”

  A great wind suddenly gusted by. The mayor tensed.

  “So, you say you’re the mayor of these parts, you little prick? Have you forgotten my name, then? Have you? Have you forgotten the name of Baron Macula, Greater Noble and ruler of northern Frontier territories where so many rustic, pissant Nobles swaggered about?”

  “No, I know that,” the mayor said proudly. His face was as drained of life as that of a wax figure. “But I’d heard that the baron died more than five thousand years ago. The very thought of him showing up again in this day . . .”

  “You great, thick-skulled dunce. Whoever said I was dead? Who saw it? I’m right here. I never set foot outside my dominion. I’ve remained here in hiding for a certain lofty purpose. But it would seem I may have been a bit too relaxed.”

  “What do you mean . . . a l-lofty purpose?”

  The man-bear spat in disgust, “The brain of a Greater Noble is like the universe. Can the lowly maggots that crawl across the ground fathom the infinite vastness of the cosmos? Away from me!” He made a flourish of his arm, and the crowd backed away.

  “But, um . . . You . . . Well, you’re walking around in daylight . . .

  You c-couldn’t be a Noble!” the mayor stammered in reply.

  In return, he got a sneer—no, a mocking laugh. “Bwahahaha! Do you still have such stubborn notions stuck in your heads? So, am I to believe that through the five millennia I’ve slumbered nothing has changed, that you still fear the night, and when the sun goes down you shut the village gate and bolt your doors, quaking at the slightest howl of a monster through sleepless nights? H
alf your short lives are night. That you would sacrifice all that to pointless, antiquated notions—well, you really are a hopeless lot. Bwahahaha!”

  “But . . . that’s the way it is . . . for all Nobles,” the mayor insisted, though he seemed to be speaking deliriously.

  However, his words had an unexpected effect. The laughter of the man-bear, Baron Macula, stopped dead. His bronze mouth muttered a hushed, “What?” Then, “You say the Nobility don’t walk in the light of day? Impossible. This is no laughing matter. You mean to tell me even now Nobles live solely by the darkness of night? I can’t believe it!”

  The voice that issued from the mask churned with deep-seated surprise and turmoil. But before the mayor could capitalize on the Noble’s melancholy, he was silenced.

  “Nobles are still creatures of the night,” a steely voice had said, causing all to turn and look. “Even now, the radiant light doesn’t belong to your kind. I need you to come with me.”

  At that instant, the chubby figure leapt from the spot beside D to one ten yards distant, like a rubber ball with a good bounce.

  “My guess is you have some of our blood in you. Are you one of those dhampir deals? And such a killing lust—you plan on destroying me, don’t you?”

  D stepped forward without a word.

  “Hey, now!” the pudgy figure exclaimed, making another jump that put him in front of the crowd. Screaming, the people pushed backward. And another leap—this time bound for an area behind the crowd.

  The wind howled. Catching the baron’s body in midair, it sent him back the other way, despite his alarmed protests. D’s left hand was raised. No one there recognized the tiny mouth that appeared on the palm of his hand for what it actually was.

  As the terrific gale stopped cold, the baron was unceremoniously plopped down at D’s feet.

  “That hurts,” the Noble said, rubbing his back.

  True to form, D asked, “You don’t have any other tricks?” He sounded quite surprised.

  “Don’t screw with me, or—oww!” the baron cried, glaring up at D from the ground. “I may be a Noble, but I’m a pacifist. Hereabouts, I led the peaceful life of a scholar. I had no use for all that fighting and parrying and fleeing nonsense.”

  “Then what was all that jumping and bouncing around?” asked D.

  “Just a few abilities pertinent to my hobby.”

  “Your hobby?”

  “Yes—martial arts, actually.”

  Although the man-bear hardly appeared suited to hand-to-hand combat, D didn’t comment on that, saying only, “Next time you do that, I’ll cut you down.”

  Fright seemed to coalesce in the baron’s features, and he fell silent. He wasn’t alone; the faces in the crowd surrounding them also went ghostly pale. They all believed D was serious.

  “Sheesh. Do whatever you like,” the baron finally said in a rotten little voice, after some hesitation.

  A streak of light zipped out. A glint was all the people saw. By the time they’d blinked their eyes, the bronze mask had fallen at the baron’s feet. It was split in two. However, no one had seen it break.

  A murmur that defied description ran through the crowd. It was one of amazement at D’s skill, then acceptance, but the people’s expressions were those of disbelief.

  The features beneath the mask were almost exactly what the people had imagined. In other words, the pudgy egg of a face had heavy eyebrows that looked like smears of charcoal, narrow eyes agleam with craftiness, a short, fat dumpling of a nose, and thick lips that looked like they might disgorge vomit at any moment. Yet it may have been his triple chin that leant an undeniable charm to his features.

  Here and there, various comments were uttered. Glaring at those responsible, the baron asked in an intimidating manner, “You got a problem with me?”

  D turned to the mayor. The old man appeared quite satisfied, with rosy color swiftly flooding his face. “We’ll hold onto the device he came out of,” the mayor said. “A pod that actually concealed a Noble—tourists will be coming to see it for the next century. Don’t touch any of the controls inside! The thing’s dangerous.”

  Then turning back to D, he continued, “A Noble is more than even our sheriff can handle. If you’d be so good as to escort him back to the town hall. You’ll be paid there.”

  The mayor grinned like a man enraptured. It was fairly unsettling to behold.