Deus Necros

Chapter 580: Enemies Within

The chancellor sighed. “Fine, Guard captain, priestess, do you vouch for this man.” He looked at the two next to Ludwig, with scrutinizing eyes.

“With our lives,” they both replied at the same time. There was no hesitation in their voices, and that steadiness changed the shape of the room more than any drawn blade.

“Then come with us, we’ll need to take a look at his majesty, guards, follow us,” the chancellor said as the group walked out of the room.

As they moved, Ludwig felt that he put himself in a bit of a pickle, but he wasn’t too worried, all he needed to do was inspect the king, and see the cause for his sickness. Finding the solution to the issue lies with the rest of the people here. He counted doors and corners softly, a private map that could be folded in a breath if needed. The palace hummed with a contained tension he recognized from barracks before dawn.

“When did… his majesty start having issues…”

“Early last year, when things got awkward with the empire to the point of war.”

“I don’t think that can be called awkward, but I see.” Ludwig did not say the other thought aloud. If a sickness had been planted, it had been planted with care and patience. That kind of work often wore a smiling face.

The group continued moving until they reached a room where there were more than twenty guards stationed around. Their armor was not parade-polished. It had the flat, practical finish of men who gave up shine for quiet. The air was denser here, as if every order spoken within these walls had remained to listen for the next one.

Soon the doors opened, revealing a veiled woman. Her body was embraced by the silk she wore like a lover’s grasp, unwilling to let go. While her eyes seemed to want to swallow the world whole. The perfume that followed her had the warmth of spice and the cool of some nocturnal flower, and for a breath the corridor seemed to tilt toward her in a silent bow.

Ludwig’s heart couldn’t help but beat once like a thunderous drum. He knew who she was, and she simply ignored the group. The space she left behind felt warmer by a degree and thinner by a measure, and then it closed as though nothing had passed.

“Your majesty!” the chancellor said as he bowed his head, but she didn’t even give anyone a glance as she walked away.

After a few steps, she stopped, turned and seemed to notice something, but the group soon walked in, and she simply turned and continued her walking away. The edges of her veil murmured along the stone, and then even that small sound was gone.

Ludwig’s entire body was shivering. Not out of fear, but out of excitement that he couldn’t understand where it came from.

Soon though he realized, that his heart wanted to fight. A worthy fight. And she was the one that can provide it… the Lustful Death.

However, the interior of the room pulled Ludwig’s attention away. There were matters to tend to, and revealing himself to the Lustful Death here will definitely cause a few lives, most of them his. And that was not something he needed right now.

In the main chambers, a middle aged man was resting on his bed. His hair was half white, though he didn’t look that old. His body was emaciated, as if hadn’t eaten in a while. The skin at his temples had thinned until the veins drew faint blue lines beneath, and his lips had the dry crack of a man who drinks but does not quench.

Around the king were several guards even inside his own chambers. And the smell of said chamber was worse than that of a gutter in the slums. Beneath the perfume lay the sour cloth of fever and the cloying sweetness of fruit gone past ripeness, and under even that was a strange, metallic stench that did not belong in a living man’s room.

“How is he?” the chancellor asked one of the servants who was wiping some of the sweat away from the king’s body.

“He woke up for half an hour, when her ladyship came over… he needs rest,” the servant said. He kept his eyes properly lowered, but his voice shook like a rope under weight.

Ludwig on the other hand said, “May I approach, for a better look?” he said.

The guards in the room seemed rather intense as they all had their hands on their swords.

“Yes, carefully and slowly,” the chancellor said.

Ludwig took another glance at the servant who immediately shuddered, looking at Ludwig like he was some sort of monster. The flinch was too quick, too cold, like a muscle memory learned from a different body.

“What sir? Is there a problem?”

Ludwig smiled, “No, just tell me, how long have you been tending to his majesty?”

“Me? Just last month, why?”

“Ah I see…” Ludwig smiled as he got closer to the main bed, “Seems like you treat him with the respect he is due,” Ludwig said.

“Of course, we love and cherish our king, I hope he wakes up soon.” The servant said.

“Well, as long as you’re doing what you’re doing here,” Ludwig smiled, “I doubt he’ll ever make it to next fall.”

The servant’s eyes widened and immediately without missing a beat, Ludwig summoned Durandal from within his lantern, the motion was too fast and too sudden for anyone in the room to even realize it as the sword cut right through the surprised servant’s neck. The blade’s voice was a soft, clean syllable, and then the head left the body as if relieved of a burden.

Without any other wasted second, Ludwig stabbed the sword in the ground and raised his hand up.

“I surrender!”

Every sword in the room was a centimeter away from Ludwig’s neck. Steel circled him like a crown with every point pointed inward, the air in that tight ring hot with breath and outrage.

While on his face a wide smile couldn’t be covered. The smile was not mockery. It was the even baring of a man who had chosen his moment and would not run from the cost of it.

“WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS!” the chamberlain howled, “IS THIS THE MAN YOU VOUCHED FOR!” he howled again. His voice cracked and came back richer, outrage feeding on itself until it was almost courage.

Both the guard captain and the priestess were completely surprised. They had no words. The guard captain’s features folded once, the way a man folds when the punch arrives from the side he did not guard. The priestess’s hands had stilled on the edge of her sleeve, and still they did not tremble. While the ship captain was hoping that the guillotine was well oiled and sharp. For he felt today was the last day he had in this world.

“To dare brandish a sword in his majesty’s chambers! Death is the least of you-” one of the guards said and then stopped, “What is that smell?”

“Ah, finally you realized it?” Ludwig said.

Everyone in the room began to shiver, it felt like their noses were being assaulted with something worse than sulfur on fire. The stink crawled behind the eyes and made the tongue feel coated. Perfume could not climb over it. Incense would have only taught it to dance.

“What the bloody hell is that smell!” the chamberlain was about to gag, and the only two that didn’t feel too nauseous were Ludwig, and the physician.

“I see,” the physician said, “Lower your weapons… this young man did us a favor we didn’t even know we needed…” he said. His gaze had narrowed to the severed head and the stump, and a physician’s hunger had replaced his offense.

No one however lowered their weapons.

“I SAID LOWER THEM!” the physician shouted, “Unless you want the savior of his majesty to die!”

“But sir, he raised steel…”

“And he killed a demon.” The physician’s reply was instant and full of seriousness.

Everyone looked at Ludwig like he was some sort of monster, after all, no one ever realized that a demon was this close to his majesty… even under their eyes. The head on the floor had begun to forget its borrowed shape. Where hair had been combed and oiled, small nubs pushed through like stones under thin soil. The nose swelled and lengthened into a snout with the wrong sort of wet shine, and the pupils spread into flat circles that reflected the room in two pale coins. The blood that should have obeyed gravity clung instead with a glutinous reluctance, and a greasy sheen rode its surface like oil on a black pond.

Swords eased away from Ludwig’s throat by a finger-width, then two. The quiet that followed the physician’s words had a pulse, and in that pulse the king’s breath could be heard again, a rasp at the edge of a dream. The captain exhaled a thin thread he had been holding since steel first left scabbards. The priestess closed her eyes once, perhaps to thank her god or to steady her own anger at how close this thing had stood to the man they served. The chamberlain pressed a handkerchief to his mouth and nose and stared at the head as if it might deliver an apology that would make sense of what had been allowed to enter this room.

Ludwig did not move. He kept his palm open, his other hand away from the sword sunk into the floor, and he let the room look at the truth until it had no choice but to see it.