EL Official BK5 Chapter 18 - A Family Dishonored by Slanderous Accusations. (Patreon)

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Through some macabre irony the little brats fell gravely ill the day after I’d almost poisoned them. Fever burned them from the inside and black lines streaked their skin. Dr. Otwin was called to cure them, and both Baltzar and I watched as he failed to do so. Whatever caused it, there wasn’t a remedy.

“You acted quicker than I thought,” Hasan mused as he fell into step beside me.

“I want those letters,” I responded bluntly. He didn’t need to know that the dead plant in the corner of the room was my only victim. 

The man chuckled, “I would never keep such dangerous pieces of parchment, they are already destroyed,” he assured.

“If you expect me to believe that you’re a fool.”

“Believe what you like, it’s the truth-”

I slammed him back into the wall by his throat before he could finish speaking, “If you’re lying to me, I will rip your tongue out through your eyes,” I snarled, “I’m done playing games with you, I’m done running your errands. You understand?”

Hasan nodded fractionally in the small amount of space I allowed him. When I was young, this man was tall and beautiful. He embodied the standard for what a Fae should be, lithe, elegant, an aristocrat fit to nibble finger foods and critique wines. Now, he was several inches shorter than me and frail. Seeing him left a sour taste in my mouth.

When I released him, he gasped for air and doubled over like a crumpled flower as he coughed. I left him with a bruised throat and a reason to resent me. Having everything I wanted wasn’t enough to fill the sense of discouragement that weighed on my chest, but throwing him into a wall had helped.

*** 

The twin’s recovery was nothing short of a miracle. Their fever broke, and the lines retracted, although Peronne became very quiet thereafter. I suspected she knew something I did not, but for whatever it was I couldn’t tell and my torment in looking after the pest’s continued. 

For the most part the children were manageable. Like Lucinde before them I incorporated them into my day. They attended training sessions with me, and waited while I studied medicine. Lazarus demanded they be dressed in red and blue so they could be easily told apart—that was an order I willfully defied.

It wasn’t possible to tell them apart, and I could have switched them a hundred times, he never noticed. Only when the one I presumed to be the eldest developed his strength in his left hand, while the other the right, was I able to confidently differentiate them. After that, other small details fell into place and I began to notice patterns.

The left handed child was almost always the one to cry first. He would wake without reason to cry, and the other would join the symphony. One could have hoped gaining the ability to speak would settle this problem, but instead the pair became plainly creepy to an unnerving level.

They often spoke only to each other in a made up language that sounded like whispers. The eldest would wake in his fits of distress only to claim that the reason for his upset was because someone he needed ‘didn’t exist yet’. Which upset the other twin in turn and the cycle continued.

By the time they were the equivalent of four year old humans, Lazarus began separating them for periods of time. He sent the youngest elsewhere while I was expected to remain with the eldest. On stormy days the child sat unmoving for hours watching the rain, until one day he turned to me. 

His bright green eyes locked on mine as if he were staring deeper into my soul and he spoke, “I remember you with short hair.”

“Excuse me?” I asked, bemused as I paused mid way through an experimental healing spell.

“...Someone is going to cut it.”

I smiled, “You’re a little creepy blight, you know that?”

He watched me a moment longer before turning away. To touch a Fae’s hair is taboo, and to have it cut denotes a great shame. It implies a sin has been committed, treason or murder. He didn’t know that, he couldn’t. That it was only one of many uncanny remarks. 

The child could predict minor happenings, days his father would fly into a rage, when the centre tree in the gardens would wilt and die, the times his brother would need him. I began to suspect being a twin had granted him some additional gifts, but as he grew older it faded. He no longer spoke as if he could see the future, nor did he seem to have any memory of ever having done so. 

His personality solidified into quiet stoicism and he no longer cried, as if he were an ancient creature trapped in the body of a seven year old. The other twin was not as fortunate. For every way in which the elder became a leader, the youngest wilted. He became increasingly anxious and was prone to poor decisions that inflicted his insecurity onto others.

In the winter of the year they were to be permanently separated the consequences of his fragility affected me. It was late evening, far past any reasonable time for children to be awake. Hollow silence blanketed the endless halls of the castle, timing pendulums swang undisturbed in now empty rooms and I moved with light steps through the castle. 

I was on my way back from the infirmary after having borrowed some of the equipment for personal reasons. One can never be sure when fresh blades or smelling salts might come in handy. Especially when there are questions you hope to have answered, so when the echo of hurried footsteps through the halls reached me, I paused.

To be caught out like this would be problematic to explain, and I listened more intently. It was the sound of small feet on marble approaching rapidly, or perhaps I was simply paranoid. What were the odds that it was those two little brats? And why would they be in the halls at this hour? Moreover, didn’t they know well enough by now that running in the halls was unacceptable?

With mild bemusement I rounded the corner to investigate, and it was no sooner than had I taken a step that the two waist height boys crashed into me. Their eyes wide and auras a tangled frenzy of energy, they panicked upon contact. Initially recoiling as a fresh fear took hold, before simultaneously recognizing who they had run into and clinging to me.

They latched into my clothing, wrapping tight around my waist on either side as they buried their faces in my shirt. The entire ordeal all happened within a fraction of a second and for every arm I pushed off, another came back around. They were like barnacles–stuck to me through some impossible force and babbling incoherent nonsense.

“We heard her screaming!” “There’s a ghost in the tower!” “Some woman is being killed!” - they tried to explain frantically over the top of one another. It was difficult to tell the petulant little runts apart at the best of times, but when they were a mess of speech it was impossible.

“Enough,” I ordered and they fell silent, though their hold did not loosen. Of course I should never have used a command on my high born cousins, and if they were to tell anyone I would be reprimanded. “Speak, one at a time.”

“There’s a ghost in the tower,” the youngest began.

“No there’s not! Someone was being killed,” the other corrected.

“That makes them a ghost!”

Wonderful. Now they were arguing with each other, “Stop. !Achaicus, what exactly happened?” I demanded of the elder.

“!Nathaniel had to go to the bathroom, but father put his room nearest to the tower and I didn’t want to have to walk all the way to the other side so I told him he had to go to the one in the tower. But when we got there he wanted me to go in with him, and I told him no because if we get seen together again father will punish us and it was already bad enough that he came to get me in the first place. But we heard-”

“Someone was screaming!” !Achaicus interrupted. 

 I exhaled a controlled breath as I tried to find the will to deal with these two. 

“I’m sure it’s nothing. Now let go of me, and go back to your beds,” I announced at last.

“No, you have to go look!” !Nathaniel insisted.

“I don’t have to do anything for you brats. Now go, before someone else hears you.”

“I won’t, I’m not going back there then,” he announced and I ground my teeth. These children were being too loud, if the guards heard them…

“…Why are you in the hallway?” !Achaicus asked slowly, interrupting my thoughts.

“That’s none of your concern.”

“You’re not supposed to be here either…” he murmured, “So… if you don’t go look I’ll tell Àvila… and she will tell our father-”

“Are you threatening me?” I sneered, glaring down at the boy.

“It’s not a threat if I mean it…” he mumbled, avoiding eye contact.

“Listen you little-” I began.

“Please…?” !Nathaniel murmured, holding tighter.

I scowled inadvertently, the nerve of these two spoiled heirs. I could murder them both right now, wipe out the Klein heritage line and face Lazarus. Do what my father was too cowardly to try and claim the lands. They hadn’t any idea how I planned their deaths. Instead both boys were trembling terrified, and neither had yet let go of me. They trusted me, and I hated them for it.

“Fine. I will check, and when there is nothing. Neither of you will speak to me again for the next year. You will only do as you are told with no irritating quips. Understand?”

““...Yes…”” they mumbled in synchronization. 

I made my way to the tower in question with the twins stepping on my heels. They clung to each other now, and walked right into me when I stopped. I turned back to glare and they huddled together, looking up at me with wide terrified eyes. “Could you two consider not stepping on my heels?” I asked flatly.

“...Sorry…” !Achaicus mumbled the apology for his brother and I snorted.

I loathed these children.

Eventually, we reached the lower staircase of the tower. The steps continued upward in a spiral, stretching upward into dim gloom beyond what was visible. I continued up with irritated determination, and the twins not more than a step behind. A breath of cold air whistled through the narrow space and lifted my hair. There shouldn’t have been a breeze.

No screams reached us, but as my ears strained against the silence, an unusual sound gave me pause. It was a soft ‘shh–in-k’ through something wet against stone, as if someone were sharpening a blade. The sound repeated in irregular intervals until I became certain of what it was. Someone was carving meat.

“Wait here,” I murmured, pushing the children back against the wall and proceeding with warranted caution. 

I rounded the final bend to reach the lavatory, slow red liquid dripped over the top steps and in the room beyond was a glimmer-masked Fae hunched over two bodies. Tuffs of greying human hair and white fae hair were the only recognizable features of the victims, Lord Edwin, and his owl-eyed pet.

***

Days later I waited in a dark, isolated cell. The glimpse I had of the scene was all I was permitted before the assailant blasted me with magic and escaped out the window. It was someone older and stronger than I, but guards at last heard the commotion and came to find me covered in blood with two dead bodies.

I hadn’t seen either twin since then, nor had any chance to profess my innocence. When the cell doors eventually opened I was led into the meeting hall. The familiar Turkish carpet that made me feel sick as a child stretched the length of the room to the throne where Lazarus sat. Guards stood at each pillar, and an abundance of Fae aristocrats lined the gallery. They muttered among themselves, clucking away like chickens in a hen house, and earned my immediate disdain. 

However, it wasn’t until I noticed my father and Ælferic sitting among the group that my blood turned to ice. They had returned while I was locked away, and now sat perched with indifferent expressions. Emmerich glanced down at me and when our eyes met nausea rose like bile. I hadn’t seen my father since I was a boy and I was suddenly too warm, the collar of my shirt too tight.

My young ‘wife to be’ sat rigid in the seats closest to the front with jewels dripping off her, as if garnishing her in them would make her old enough to be here for this. !Achaicus stood equally as stiffly beside his father, while the other twin was notably missing. He didn’t look up from the floor.

Lazarus smiled, sitting forward in his seat as I was forced to my knees before him, “Young Bellerose, how nice of you to join us, we were just discussing your crimes,” he cooed like a mongoose egging on a cobra.

“I have committed no crime,” I responded with dignified calm, swallowing my anger for another fight as I struggled to overcome the strange sense of panicked foreboding rising in my chest.

“No? Then I suppose our loyal and sorely missed Lord Edwin dispatched and carved himself? His pet too?” the man mused.

“Is that whom I stumbled upon in the lavatory?” I commented as if I hadn’t been able to identify them previously.

Lazarus gave a chuckle at my expense, “Quite the cunning little fox aren’t you? Unfortunately for you, I have witnesses.” 

“C’est du pipeau.” (That’s bullshit.) I muttered, but he only sat back and waved someone from the stands forward.

Hasan stepped elegantly down to speak, “Lord Ælferic, Lord Lazarus,” he bowed, greeting them formally before beginning, “As many of you might have learned in the past days, dear Lord Edwin has met with a most gruesome end. Cut down while trying to use the lavatory in what can only be described as a disgraceful, callous, murder. This man, Markos Bellerose, was caught red handed at the scene and yet still denies culpability. 

He is a sly natured man, and known delinquent. Many of his crimes have been overlooked; threatening highborn noble officials, facilitating fraudulent exam participants, cheating in exams, espionage, and not least of all theft. Lord Edwin confided in me his deep fear of this man after several of his weapons were stolen, including the scythe found in Markos’s possession. 

These crimes have shown an alarming escalation and speak to a pattern of delinquent behavior. It was only a matter of time before such an event was likely, and it has now come to pass. No other had as much motive to kill Lord Edwin as Markos Bellerose,” he concluded his statements with an accusatory gesture toward me that earned him a leveled glare.

“Prove any of it,” I snapped back reflexively as my mind raced to find the way out of this,  “I won my scythe off him, we had no quarrel and you have motive to lie. Weren’t you the one who said I would pay for rejecting your depraved advances? I’m sure many here could attest to that.”

Hasan paused, startled, as if of all the things I could have said that had never crossed his mind. He glanced up to Ælferic and then back to Lazarus for help. Neither gave any indication they would say anything, and his jaw set.

“Slander,” he muttered, but the damage was already done. He’d been seen hovering over me far too many times, handing me letters, and while I couldn’t voice that accusation without proof, it certainly looked like something else.

“Perhaps we should call a more reliable witness?” Lazarus suggested with feigned concern, “!Achaicus, why don’t you tell us what you saw on the night of the murder.”

He nudged the boy forward, drawing the full weight of the room’s attention. !Achaicus swallowed, his fear filled eyes met mine for a brief moment before he averted his gaze to the floor and I snorted softly to myself. It made sense now. !Nathaniel wasn’t here because he was leverage, and this boy was about to lie. 

There are only a handful of glimmer masks, only a small number of people who might own one. The murderer was someone older than I, stronger by default… My attention drifted to Lazarus and he smiled as if he knew that I knew it was him. 

“!Achaicus, don’t keep us waiting,” he pressed his son and the boy began to tremble.

“I-” the boy sounded like he couldn’t breathe, “I don’t remember, I-... I-it was dark…” 

“Surely it’s not difficult to recognise your own nanny? Was Markos there or not? Answer.” Lazarus commanded.

“...yes…” the boy whispered honestly, unable to give further context. These twins were going to get me killed.

“Then the matter is solved!” the man clasped his hands together, “Guards, bring me my sword.”

I stalled internally as he took up the sharp blade, he was going to execute me in front of my father and the man would let it happen. There had to be a way out, something I was missing. Should I issue challenge? —No, I would die. Should I try to flee? —I wouldn’t get far. I felt as if I were suffocating as Lazarus began to speak again.

“The traditional punishment for murder is death. However, in stealing a man’s prized possessions and murdering him for the sake of his own gain, Markos Bellerose has committed a far greater crime than merely murder. He has shown the ugliest side of Fae nature, selfishness, and for the crime of egotism in the first degree, I suggest an alternative punishment. This egregious outcome of events is far more akin to treason. A betrayal of our values as a society and he should wear that shame for all to see.” 

As he spoke, he took the long curls of my hair into his fist and pulled upward before slicing clean through the hair at an angle, earning an audible gasp from the gallery. The soft lengths of my hair fell to the floor in sweeping waves. Marking the utmost disgrace another could inflict on a Fae.

I stared at it in mild disbelief. To have been executed would have brought less shame. This was an action that would ripple back and reflect on my very lineage and I dared not look up. I knew my father was watching. If he could have spoken he would have told me this was my own fault, that ambition is the death of pride and I had failed him as a son and heir. 

“You may never again grow your hair longer than your ears. May all who glance upon you know your crime and remember this day,” Lazarus announced. 

I was still too shocked to move when a softer voice spoke up as clear as a bell, “Father,” Lucinde began, “I have a request.”

“Oh?” I watched as the man’s feet turned toward the gallery, not daring to look up.

“It has become apparent that this man is no longer fit for our heritage. I wish to repudiate the marriage,” she announced as if she were a true lady of the court.

I almost laughed. She was wise to use this opportunity, but it only added to the humiliation, and I feared I would be unable to bear it. I should have seen this coming, known better or more...

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