#106

“You’re sweating a lot today. Looks like the medicine is working well. That’s good.”

“…Medicine?”

“Yes, yes. Don’t worry. The priest said this is a sign of regaining strength. When harsh energy enters a weak body, it tries to push it out. The weaker the patient, the stronger the reaction, he said. That’s why some people find steam therapy difficult. But young lady, you must endure it.”

I gasped as I received Alyona’s care. Even if it’s the medicine’s effect, does it have to be this hard? I even resented this tasteless and odorless liquid that reminded me how weak my body had become. Still, it’s supposed to get better soon….

“In my opinion, this is all because you loved him.”

Alyona suddenly spoke while I was just breathing heavily. I looked at the girl with slight confusion. Alyona continued with a slightly angry tone.

“It’s true, isn’t it? Who else made someone who was barely recovering end up like this again? So when you regain your health, you should either run away or find some other way to take care of yourself.”

“You… Earlier you said Johannes was scary… but you’re… speaking quite boldly?”

“Hmm.”

Alyona’s eyes seemed to sink for a moment as she made an embarrassed groan.

“Well, well, he is….”

Alyona’s gaze, stumbling over her words as if feeling a bit guilty, occasionally lowered. It soon slid past my forehead. The girl, showing me her profile, wiped her sweaty palms on her apron and touched around her chest. Come to think of it, was this child quite a devout believer? I thought vaguely with my dizzy head. It looked exactly like Alyona was clutching the necklace inside her clothes.

I heard a deep breath above my head. Then a moment of silence.

“…He will be punished by heaven.”

Alyona murmured softly. I opened my eyes wide.

“Someday, for sure. Really.”

Alyona’s voice, quietly reciting, was strangely resolute.

***

…That is, if I may speak out of turn, young lady. He will truly be punished by heaven.

I know more than I appear to. Because I hear a lot from here and there, I even know secrets about you that you don’t know yourself. And I also know what the knight has been doing outside.

I mentioned before that a peddler came, right?

He’s a merchant who enters mixed with traveling performers and sells all sorts of things within the castle, as well as in inns like this and taverns. But you know, this time, for some reason, he came carrying a load that looked less than half his usual…

When we asked in surprise, he said it was because he couldn’t enter Indriedassen Castle. Afterwards, not just me, but all the guests in the dining room gathered to listen to the eyewitness account he rambled on about…

You see, he was following the main road as usual and entered the approach to Indriedassen, but that day there was no official collecting the toll. A poor man’s heart is the same everywhere, I suppose, and thinking this was some windfall, he quickly passed through. But the further he walked, the more uneasy he felt.

‘Hey, were you worried about being caught passing without paying and getting beaten? How do you travel with such a small liver?’ we teased, but he shook his head with a pale expression. He asked if we knew the feeling of seeing nothing where there should have been something. He said not to comment if we hadn’t experienced it ourselves. We who were listening were dumbfounded, not knowing the story.

So I asked what was empty. The peddler took a swig of alcohol and listed what he saw.

That day, strangely, the whole fief felt eerily empty, he said. The main road that would usually be bustling with people was as quiet as a mouse, and every time the wind blew, a strange rotten smell was so strong it made his nose sting. Occasionally when he caught some serfs passing by, huddled like mice, and asked what was going on, they would just scurry away without giving any answer. Some even ran away in a panic, pale as a sheet, as if they had heard something they shouldn’t have.

Why are they like this?

There wasn’t a single shadow of a person around, and although he had a bad feeling, it would be a waste to lose a day’s work, so he kept walking, he said. After all, what could a mere merchant do about an ominous feeling? With no weapons or money to take care of himself, even if the road didn’t seem right, he had to accept it as fate and go on. But then…

From halfway through, he got goosebumps all over.

Strange, strange. Having no choice but to keep walking, the road was empty the whole time, and right before his eyes, the tip of the distant central spire gradually rose…

You know how Indriedassen Castle is milky white? Usually that tower shines brightly, but that day it looked black, so he frowned and looked closer, and there was a flock of black birds gathered and perched on it, he said.

No, what is that? Why are the soldiers there letting a flock of birds set up camp on the castle walls? Could something have happened? After seeing such a sight on top of the serfs’ strange behavior, his legs felt weak, he said. By that time, forgetting his place, he thought about turning back to the approach road and bypassing Indriedassen…

But a merchant is a merchant, and he kept walking until the moat came into view, he said. Then he was startled to see the drawbridge raised and stopped abruptly, and standing there…

It wasn’t a flock of birds.

What he thought was a flock of black birds perched on the spire throughout his walk turned out to be human corpses hanging outside the loopholes, he said. Not just one or two. Their bodies were all torn up, hanging one by one from each loophole like executed criminals at a mass execution site… As if for someone to see…

He said he only then became completely panic-stricken and ran here in one breath…

From what I heard, it seemed people were dying in droves inside the closed Indriedassen Castle and rotting as they were. With no survivors inside, the bridge wasn’t lowered. In the end, the serfs with nowhere to go were left stranded in the fief overnight, not knowing what to do.

After that, a few more merchants came. They had also passed through Indriedassen. One of them said that the old lord of Indriedassen took a mad princess from a devil-worshipping family as his wife and was caught up in divine punishment.

Another person listening said that the mad princess was actually lustful and seduced her stepson, earning her husband’s hatred, and then summoned a devil unable to bear the vulgar internal strife. And then she ran away with the stepson. They said it was a terrible thing, whichever was true…

Young lady.

I was already almost certain for several days that you must be the princess of Gustavus, but I didn’t fully believe all the rumors they were spreading. If the dates I overheard are correct, the day Indriedassen became a field of corpses was after you arrived here.

No, it doesn’t make sense. You were lying unconscious before me for days and days, in a body that clearly seemed to have endured harsh married life, so when and how could you have summoned a devil? Seducing a stepson? This is also absurd. The young lady I saw didn’t seem to look at anyone but the knight… Right? Am I correct?

Young lady. I’m saying this only now, but I’m so worried. To my eyes, you two… don’t seem to be cousins at all, no matter how I look at it… And, and…

About the devil…

Do you perhaps know? That on the night they say a bloody wind blew through Indriedassen, the knight secretly went out. And the very next day, he paid the room fee with Indriedassen gold coins.

Eck… Are you saying I’m suspecting the knight based on circumstantial evidence without clear proof?

No, young lady. If it wasn’t the knight, who else could have done such a thing? It’s strange, isn’t it, going to all that trouble to kill everyone but not taking possession of that luxurious castle. If it wasn’t coveting the castle, it must have been out of some grudge to risk divine punishment and even summon a devil to commit such a horrific act. Moreover, the knight and your maternal family are… ‘that’ Deukomen, aren’t they.

You wouldn’t have known because you were unconscious, but the day the knight confirmed your back, he looked like he could have summoned a devil ten times over already. His face was completely frozen, and I learned for the first time that day that a person could look so ruthless with an expressionless face…

…You say it’s just baseless rumors? That there’s no way something like a devil could exist?

Oh my, young lady…. Do you know why the wandering knights are gathering these days? They say ominous rumors have spread. They say it’s all over the southern region. That a battle for occupation of Indriedassen will break out soon. The knights certainly seem to know more than the peddlers.

Right now, they all look like they’re turning their backs and coughing pretentiously, but in reality, they’re just watching to see who makes the first move while pretending to be indifferent. It’s clearly an ownerless land, but there’s no proper justification to claim it. Still, they say as soon as one person steps up, the others will rush in like a breaking dam.

Well, with even Indriedassen’s eldest son’s whereabouts unknown, how could any neighboring ruler just sit and watch that golden land? Wouldn’t their hands and feet be itching? The first one to make a move will be the owner, right? The eldest son over there can probably be found among the corpses left in the castle, so once it starts, there won’t be anything to hold them back… Actually, this is what the knights are saying too.

Anyway, those knights were saying similar things to the peddlers.

It’s the work of a devil, they say. Someone must have summoned a devil, they say.

You see, that was right in the middle of harvest season. So no army from anywhere in the south had moved, they say. And looking at the walls of Indriedassen Castle, there were no signs of a siege, they say. The knights say this is impossible. To secretly infiltrate a well-armed great castle without a sound and in just one night, to completely… eliminate the lord of that castle, dozens of his household, and hundreds of soldiers like that.

They say it’s impossible unless a devil was summoned.

Young lady.

I think your knight, no, that deranged incestuous beast who locks up my ignorant sister and torments her every night, summoned a devil. So I feel so sorry for you.

No matter how angry he was, surely the almighty God will never overlook his violation of His laws. You happen to be receiving the love of this cruel man who will soon be punished by heaven, enduring his atrocities with your whole body and going along with him… No, young lady, really, do you like such a person that much? You really need to see the world…

Anyway, that’s why I’m doing this, young lady. I’m not taking this risk and mustering up courage for nothing, you know.

You understand, right? I’m telling you he summoned a devil. And now that he has nothing left to fear, isn’t that why he’s tormenting my sister so terribly?

………

Oh, young lady.

………

Young lady?

………