Chapter 168 – Saint Kaede Yamaoka

Aki

Sleeping together with Caei and Lilyth in an actual bed was a luxury I had missed so much over the past month. We only had one real chance after our return and afterwards Lilyth got into her Staffmaking trance. It wasn't all that bad. I got Caei to myself for two nights, and her brand of warmth and softness was equally enticing. That and her boobs made for an excellent pillow.

Still, I was hoping for a chance to finally make up for the lost time. Which is why, when Phosi and Deirdee burst into the house shortly after midnight, I wanted to strangle them both.

‘What’s going on?’ Nyx, dressed in blue pyjamas with smiling white clouds on them, asked after she and Savri, wearing a grey t-shirt and black panties, dragged themselves out of the medic’s room.

‘There is a party of what seems to be members of the Church of Light camped maybe ten kilometres from the village,’ Phosi rasped.

‘So nothing that can’t wait until morning,’ Malika said with a shrug. ‘Don’t worry. So long as I am here they won’t dare to do anything.’

She then gave Phosi a wary glance, but did not comment further on the matter.

‘Unfortunately, I cannot get involved with this one,’ Nyx said with regret in her voice. ‘But Mal is right. I doubt they will be here before noon. Come back to bed, Sav.’

‘Wait… that's it?’ Deirdee asked.

‘What the fuck do you expect us to do?’ Lilyth asked with irritation. ‘Murder them? Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the early warning, we all do I think, but unless they act against us, there is fuck all we can do.’

And with that, we all went back to our rooms. Phosi wanted to go back to her cave, but Ireela would have none of it and ended up making one of the couches in the salon for her. The Sconryoll seemed embarrassed by this, but it seemed that our gracious host appreciated having an extra person staying in the estate given the likely impending trouble.

I was worried I would have trouble falling asleep but being in the embrace of both my warm and soft plushies solved that issue pretty quick.

Baerniel

Baerniel awoke to the sounds of people shouting, running around the village and was that clattering of weapons?

His instincts honed by decades of service in the Temple Dragoons, he jumped out of bed and looked out of the window and discovered that he had heard it right. Village militiamen were preparing themselves for something, but what was it?

‘Someone must have noticed our friends from the Church of Light,’ Raeliar said, suddenly appearing next to him.

Baerniel jumped and said:

‘You almost gave me a heart attack.’

‘I apologise for that, friend,’ the sneaky knife-eared bastard mentioned. ‘You must have been too absorbed by the sight.’

Baerniel just shook his head and let it go.

‘You really think this is about the Church?’

‘Can’t think of any other reason. And given what happened in Dan-Hem, I cannot really fault anyone for taking… precautions.’

I guess not.

Baerniel met Raeliar on his way to Ror-Bhyk. The elf was travelling in the same direction along with two harpies, a man and a woman, so he joined them.

‘So our merry band of old farts grows by one,’ Harkan, the harpy man said upon this development.

He wasn't wrong, as he and his wife Vaeelia appeared to be in their seventies, yet still seemed fit like a fiddle with almost no traces of ageing, not even a wrinkle. Both of them had red-and-white feathers on their wings, white hair and black-and-yellow eyes.

Baerniel, being sixty-two, wished he looked this good, his hair and short beard having gone completely grey, his hands being covered in liver spots, and one of his knees slowly going bad. Still… he figured he still had a few more good years in him.

The black-haired elf was a mystery. He looked to be the youngest of them all, maybe in his early forties, yet there was something about his overall demeanour that was off. He only spoke when he had something valuable to add, was polite to a fault and seemed to carefully consider each step that he took. And if he turned his green eyes at you… There was something in them that made you feel as if the man was examining your very soul.

Still, Baerniel couldn't deny he had fun travelling with the rest of the old farts, as he never had much chance to interact with people his age.

Maybe I really should retire after this.

His travelling companions were allegedly heading to Ror-Bhyk to see their family, though he suspected there was more to that. Harpies were fairly insular and he had never heard of them intermarrying with elves. When he broached the subject, his companions explained that Raeliar’s recently deceased son married the daughter of Harkan’s and Vaeelia’s, and they were heading over to support her in those difficult times. Baerniel didn't broach the subject further.

He was also coy about his real goals. He told them he was a swordsman going to Ror-Bhyk to retrieve an old pupil of his to offer them to take over the school he was running. That was mostly true.

His second goal was, technically speaking, completed, when they came across the Saint and her party in Lin-Vyme, but what he saw only raised more questions. She was wearing the traditional white-and-gold robe and veil and was escorted by two men in scale mail and white tabards as was the procedure. The problem was… the post was obviously prestigious and granted to the most distinguished members of the Church. And yet those two men were complete strangers.

The two harpies have shown little interest in the Saint, as their clan still worshipped the Old Gods, and Raeliar… well… Raeliar just said he wanted to take a detour to Mer-Cas to see the place of the now-famed battle. Harkan and Vaeelia were in favour of the idea, so Baerniel figured he might as well go with them. He had no idea where to even start looking for Arcarius, so Mer-Cas would have been as good a place to start as any.

The mystery of the Saint would need to wait for another day, which would come sooner than Baerniel expected as the Saint and her troupe started heading towards Mer-Cas as well.

Luckily for them, she was taking her sweet time, so the gap between them widened to the point that the old farts made it to the village long before the Saint.

They were tired, so they immediately asked for the directions to the inn, where they were served by a nice ghûl girl. The sight surprised Baerniel, as you rarely saw sentient undead out in the open.

Is she the one that Vanek mentioned? Certainly doesn't seem like she's a bloodthirsty monster.

While Baerniel was duty-bound to investigate this, seeing how friendly everyone acted towards this Anika, he decided to pretend he didn’t notice the girl being “pulse challenged”.

Starting to see why Arcarius got into trouble.

Which is why one of his first thoughts after Raeliar pointed out the reason for the commotion was to warn the girl.

‘A fine idea,’ the elf conceded. ‘ In the meantime, I’ll go wake up our companions.’

It turned out, however, that Baerniel’s worries were unnecessary.

‘Thank you for your concern, sir,’ Gerra, the inn’s owner, said. ‘Arcarius already came to retrieve her and took her to Lady Ireela's estate.’

So he is here. And gone native it seems.

‘So what should we do now?’ Baerniel asked.

‘We eat breakfast,’ Raeliar said, once again suddenly appearing right next to him.

‘Godsdammit, Knife-Ears!’ he shouted. ‘And what do you mean by “we eat breakfast”?’

‘Do you really want to get between the Saint and the Heroes of Mer-Cas? Let’s wait for Kaede to start making her way to the estate and then follow her.’

He knows. How?

‘I never told you her name,’ Baerniel asked.

‘You didn't have to. I am in the business of knowing things, Lord-Captain Baerniel Zi-Vexhin of the Temple Dragoons.’

Kaede

She hated the stupid veil they made her wear. Still, Kaede had to maintain the illusion of being a good member of the Church. Lord Light seemed fine with it for some reason. In general, other than granting Kaede her powers he did not take any further actual interest in her.

Though, probably even though I have some status, I am not actually worth his attention. I doubt that any god would ever stoop so low as to talk with us mortals.

The hostile greeting she got in the village was both insulting and something she should have expected. Maybe twenty spearmen in leather armour awaited her in the village. At first, she thought they were an honour guard assembled for her, but the hatred in the men’s eyes told a different story.

I guess I have Vanek and Kojiro to thank for that. Couldn't those two idiots have done anything right?

Halveck was furious when the invasion failed. His being exiled from the province didn't help his mood any. Kaede was his last chance to make things right. She could only hope that the two men she dispatched to infiltrate the estate through the escape tunnel would have been enough, and she would arrive at the estate full of corpses of her enemies. She would be able to handle the insolence of the locals at her leisure then. The assassins, of course, would need to be executed.

Someone has to be to blame.

The fact that both men could have been aware of the plot twist and be long home by the time she arrived has never crossed Kaede’s mind. Likewise, the idea of her catspaws completely failing was inconceivable to her, which is why what happened next was a very unpleasant sight for her.

When Kaede and her troupe entered the courtyard of the Yamaoka estate they saw that six women were waiting for them: an orange-haired Kitsune, a blue-haired young demon girl with a dark metallic arm wearing a weird plant-based armour, fucking Riftseeker Savri, Caeileera who was missing her mask and wings, some blue-skinned woman that, judging by the lure she had on her head, seemed to be a water fae of some kind, and, last but not least, her “beloved” cousin Ren.

They were framed by the corpses of her blue shirt-clad two men hanging from the balcony on which there stood her “aunt” Ireela and another pink-haired demon who could have only been Lady Malika.

All confidence fled Kaede who realised she would need to tread very carefully to survive her visit here.

So as a friendly gesture, she removed her veil.

‘Kaede!’ Ren gasped, followed by the sounds of weapons being drawn and two clicks that once again drew her gaze to the balcony.

Two new figures emerged there: a pale red-haired girl holding a magitek rifle of some kind and a pallid woman with black hair aiming a bolt-action rifle straight at Kaede.

‘I didn't think you would have the gall to show your face here after trying to assassinate me in Len-Cas,’ Ren spat.

‘That wasn’t me!’ she protested. ‘I barely escaped them myself!’

‘Which is why you were able to escape to an island only accessible by boat and escape it unmolested,’ the Kitsune pointed out. ‘And now you appear in our lives again and once again there are assassins skulking around. That's quite a coincidence there, bitch.’

‘I have never seen those men,’

‘Sorry, if we had more time and they were still alive we would have crucified them. Perhaps their screams of agony would have jogged your memory a bit. It would also leave more of a lasting impression on anyone willing to follow in their footsteps. Alas, they fought to the death so hanging their corpses as a warning will have to do.’

Shit!

‘Y-you are insane!’ she shouted.

‘No. I am being perfectly rational here. Anyone threatening my loved ones will die. Anyone associated with the Red Masks will die. You happen to be both.’

‘Lady Malika,’ she turned towards the demon noble. ‘Stop this madness!’

‘If you haven't noticed, me, my daughter and my son were all in the house you have sent assassins into,’ the noble said coldly. ‘I am afraid, I concur with my friend Lilyth here.’

Isn't she the one that Kojiro… oh… oh no…

She focused her magic on the teleportation prism that was inside one of the inner pockets of her robe. This was going downhill fast. Still… she had to try one more thing.

‘You have no evidence of any of that!’

‘And had we been in a court of law perhaps it would have mattered,’ Malika said with a shrug. ‘Unfortunately for you, we are not.’

‘I am a Saint! If any of you dares to hurt me the Church won’t rest unless it punishes you!’

A shadow orb appeared over Lilyth's shoulder and shot towards her. Before Kaede could even react it flew past her head painfully grazing her on the cheek. She could feel blood beginning to pour out of the wound.

‘I dared,’ the Kitsune spat. ‘Now what?

‘I think it is best if we cool our heads a bit,’ a very familiar voice said from behind her.

Reflexively, she turned around and saw four people standing at the entrance to the courtyard. An old man, two harpies and a black-haired elf, the sight of whom almost made Kaede piss herself from fear.

‘Grandpa?’ Ren asked in disbelief.

‘Hi, Rennie,’ Yachiro Yamaoka smiled in return. ‘Long time no see. Now can anyone explain what is happening here?'