A Coward's Wooden Staff

“Now,” he sneered, turning to Destrian and Zebril. “Let’s see the true nature of this ‘Tier 5’ power.”

He grasped the staff, his own enchanted senses searching the dark wood for the great, mythical power it was supposed to hold.

“Nothing,” he whispered, his voice trembling. “There’s nothing here. Not a single trace of real magic.” He ran a hand over the crystal at the top. “It’s just a worthless glass accessory.”

With a roar of pure frustration and humiliation, he hurled the staff against the stone wall, it just broke, splintering into pieces of common, mundane wood.

“FRAUD!” Olomyar screamed, “ALL OF IT! The title, the rank, the power—it was all a lie! Who IS this girl?!”

Destrian, who had been watching the scene unfold with a grim, stoic silence, finally spoke.

“Enough, Olomyar.”

The simple command cut through the Vice-Captain’s tantrum like a headsman’s axe.

“She is not a fraud, Olomyar, you have been played like a fiddle from the moment she appeared.”

.

.

.

As Ura was being held underground many barracks away, Sir Baltram shoved his way again into one of the overcrowded shelter. It stank of body odour and fear. Women and children who managed to survive the horrors of war, clung fearfully to his armored frame. He lifted a poorly put-together, but somewhat accurate representation of Ura.

“Do any of you know this girl?!” he barked, “She is a spy from Noston! Hiding her for the longest time is treason, punishable by death! She said she came from a shelter!”

The survivors just stared, their faces blank with terror and confusion. No one knew her.

“Useless,” Baltram snarled. He kicked over a barrel of clean water, spilling it all over the dusty floor. When a young woman let out a horrified gasp, he turned on her right away and grabbed her arm. “Maybe you know something, girl?”

“Stop it, Baltram.”

The voice was weary, but firm. Sir Seware stood at the entrance to the shelter, his handsome face smudged with dirt, his usual swagger gone.

“What in the hells are you doing?” Seware asked, his gaze falling on the crying woman in Baltram’s grip. “These are our people. Survivors. Terrifying them is pointless.”

Baltram sneered, his eyes full of a righteous, twisted logic. “You wouldn’t understand, Seware. You’re not a real knight; you’re just a preening rooster who collects women. Having five wives makes your opinion on honor completely invalid.” He yanked the woman closer, his gaze burning with a sick, possessive fire.

“You probably just want to add the powerful vampire and this little witch to your collection, don’t you? Make them your sixth and seventh wives?”

Seware just stared, a look of genuine, profound confusion on his face. He truly didn't understand.

“Wives?” he said, his voice a low murmur of disbelief. “What does that have to do with anything?” He looked at the terrified woman, then back at the snarling knight. “This is about our duty. We protect the weak. We don’t torment them. That’s what the monsters do.”

Seware, the flawed, conceited, and biased knight, made a distinct mark in the sand at that precise moment.

He was both what he was and what he wasn't. Furthermore, he wasn't a monster that hunted down the defenseless in a dark room.

“Let her go, Baltram,” he said, his hand moving to the hilt of his sword. “Now.”

-ooo-

“...and it had strawberries and chocolate, but also a little bit of mochi inside, can you believe it, Suzuha? It was so chewy and good! We have to go after school!”

Haruna’s bright smile then falters, just for a moment, a flicker of sadness in her eyes. “We have to go as much as we can… before…” She trails off, fiddling with a charm on her phone.

Suzuha looks up from her book, her own quiet smile fading slightly. “Before you leave. Will you really…?”

“Yeah,” Haruna says, her voice a little smaller. “My parents finalized the plans. We're moving to Korea right after the term ends. It's going to be so hard to meet you...”

Suzuha considers this, her mind processing the problem and seeking a solution. She reaches out and gently taps Haruna's phone. “We can still call,” she says, her voice quiet but firm. “There's Clouda right? The time difference is not a problem.”

Haruna’s face lights up again, her sadness replaced by a determined brightness. “You're right! Of course! We'll have video calls all the time! You have to show me your new university campus, and I'll show you all the cool places in Seoul!” She holds out her pinky finger. “Promise? Promise we'll meet again, after you graduate university and I graduate mine?”

Suzuha looks at the offered finger, then at her friend's earnest face. Warmth spreads through her chest, chasing away the usual loneliness. She hooks her own pinky around Haruna's. “Promise.”

They smile at each other, a perfect, quiet moment of friendship. But underneath it, the number ticks down silently in Suzuha's mind. Three weeks until graduation. Three weeks until this, the only easy, warm part of her life, would be over.

“For now, let’s just make sure that we’re happy everyday ok?”

“Yeah…”

The night was heavy with unspoken things. Anna and Zebril sat at their usual table in the otherwise empty officers’ mess, a silent understanding between them.

Want Crepe…. Macaron… Chocolate…

It was Zebril who finally broke it.

“Lady Anna,” she began, not quite meeting her eyes. “About what happened earlier, shes in the Hiraeth Cell now… I can’t do anything…”

“Ura… is probably the purest heart I’ve ever known,” she began, her voice soft and tragic. “She is, as you guessed, a royal. But she was born… different. She doesn’t have normal magic like everyone else. To survive, she learned to act tough, to put up a front.”

She paused, taking a slow sip of blood. “Eventually, she was sold as a slave, passed from master to master. She’s… mentally challenged, in a way. I saved her from a particularly nasty situation some time ago. Her showing up here… I think it was her only way of trying to say thank you. A way of protecting me. It’s a shame Olomyar did that to her. She’s fragile.”

Zebril looked horrified, her motherly heart aching with guilt and pity. To think they had thrown such a poor, broken girl into their coldest cell.

“I thought it would be a good thing to let her try to teach, you know? To see other people who are also struggling to learn. I bet with her struggle; she could be a good teacher.”

The lie was perfect. It painted Ura as a harmless victim and Anna as a compassionate, long-suffering protector.

Zebril looked down at the table, her face a mask of misery. “I see…” She sighed, changing the subject to her own logistical woes.

“On top of everything else, our stock of Grandium Cow blood is getting critically thin.”

“The blood I drink?” Anna asked.

“Yes,” Zebril explained. “We use it to stabilize knights with critical, life-threatening injuries after a major battle. It can pull a man back from the brink of death.” She rubbed her tired eyes.

“But someone burned the warehouse where we keep the reserve stock.”

She looked at Anna, her eyes full of a new, unspoken suspicion.

Anna stopped eating. She put down her fork and looked up, her orange eyes locking onto Zebril’s,

“I think someone on the inside is working with our enemies. They are trying to destabilize the barracks from every possible angle before the corruption hits.” She gave Zebril a look of grim understanding.

“This arson is just another move on the board by a traitor in your ranks. Do you really think I would do that?”

After finishing her meal, Anna stood up, the silent command clear. Maren, who had returned to her sword form, zipped dutifully to her side. “I'm leaving,”

Zebril didn’t stopped her or anything.

As she stepped out into the courtyard, Jarce was there, his shift apparently involving a lot of standing around and waiting for her. “Leaving already, Anna?” he asked, his tone hopeful. “Do you need an escort?”

“No,” she said, though with less of a bite than before. “But thank you, Jarce.”

With her mind as a roving chess board, she went out from the barracks. Her inner monologue was the sound of a plan sliding together perfectly. 

Deep in the forest away from the barracks, she put her hand into her hood and pulled out a stark white mask bleached by the sun. It felt cool and smooth in her hand. But as she was about to pull swaddle over her face, a friendly voice chirped out of the darkness.

“Anna?”

“Shit,” Anna muttered under her breath, freezing in place.