Chapter 39: Isekai Life & Stark Realities

“Well, that was just short of a disaster,” Raszil muttered, eyeing Voss as we were escorted through the halls of the Mist King’s palace, escorted by Siora ... and now two armed guards. Sentinels, I noted, not the Ravenwatch which supposedly served the royal family directly.

“He was accusing us of turning that poor girl into some kind of sex slave,” Voss replied, “What was I supposed to do, just let that happen?”

“I understand your feelings, Voss, but attempting to assault the king’s High Priest was not the way to handle that,” Calliope pointed out.

“If you allow a lie to rest unanswered, it will put out roots,” Yua countered.

“Well, there are better ways of going about it.”

“Let’s focus on the important things here, everyone,” I interjected before people could get to arguing, “Princess Kythaela is accused of treason, and our heads might be on the chopping block next.” I turned my head to look at one of the Sentinels, and switched to elven. “Pardon me, but are there any charges being levied at us?”

“None ... yet,” came the response, “We will see how the assembly finds you in the morning.”

“We’re not being charged yet,” I translated for everyone else, “But the guard implied that we might be on the hook as of tomorrow, so we had best think of our defence now.”

“Oh, good,” Voss replied, “If only we knew a damn thing about their system of law. Where the hell is Haseth, anyway? He’s a witness in our favour, and you know he wouldn’t take this accusation against Princess Kythaela lying down.”

That was a good question- the elven knight hadn’t been seen since we arrived that morning. I hoped he didn’t get caught up in some kind of conspiratorial masterstroke by these guys who obviously had it out for both us and Kythaela.

“We’re going to have to sit down and share information,” Calliope suggested, “Obviously I’ve missed something with regard to the princess and this ... other fellow. And I can catch you up on what I know about what’s going on here.”

I nodded to that, but I was acutely aware of the Sentinels walking with us. Just because they refused to speak in common, that didn’t mean they couldn’t understand it.

When we had returned to “our” corner of the palace, the Sentinels took up guard positions- one at the top of the stair at the far end of the hall, that we ascended earlier to get up here from the courtyard, and the other standing in the middle of the hallway from where we just came. The intention was obvious- we weren’t going anywhere with one of the Sentinels knowing.

“Come on,” I said, waving people towards me, “We can discuss things in private in my room. Siora, would you please get us refreshments? Thank you.”

The elven maid bobbed a brief curtsy and gave me a small smile. “Of course, Sir Theodore, I’d be honoured to.”

In the meantime, I was herding my entire party into the sitting area of my little suite, away (hopefully) from the hearing of those guards. I realized that could have some obscure or setting-unique magic item that left them spy on us ... to say nothing of just standard scrying. This whole situation was making me feel paranoid.

Once the door was shut and we were (theoretically) alone, I rounded on the party. “Okay, so, this is bad. The guards that were escorting us seemed to think that we’re going to be charged tomorrow during this ... trial? Hearing? Whatever it is that’s happening tomorrow.”

“Of course we’re going to be charged,” Raszil replied bitterly, “We already know what they’ll find when they examine that poor girl, after the hell she’s been through. And we also don’t know this kingdom’s laws, so we haven’t the least idea of how to defend ourselves.”

“But you’re ... we’re ... everyone here is innocent, right?” Sorrel asked, “That should count for something, right?”

“When you are seated before the God of Judgement, perhaps,” Raszil replied patiently, “But in my experience laws serve the people who write them, not some larger idea of ‘right’ or ‘justice’.”

“Excuse me, but I think it would help a little if everyone were to catch me up,” Calliope interjected, “What happened to the princess, and what does it have to do with you all?”

“After you ... after we sent you here with Seran, we recovered for a day, then immediately went with this other elf-knight to deal with the goblins directly,” I explained, still finding it difficult to speak about Calliope’s death, even though she was standing right in front of me, whole and healthy, “We infiltrated the tower that the goblins were using as a base, and after ... well, a lot of fighting, we managed to rescue Princess Kythaela and a number of other people enslaved by the goblins, including some of Kythaela’s bodyguard.”

“That’s the missing company of Ravenwatch, right?” Calliope asked, “All the royal guards are technically Ravenwatch, but I understand that the ones assigned to the Princess vanished with her?”

“Yeah, we don’t have a complete story, but from what it sounds like the princess ran off with her personal bodyguard,” Voss explained, “They attacked the goblin camp, and mostly got captured or killed, including Princess Kythaela. Two of them, a man named Haseth and the knight who brought you here, Seran, got away. We made a deal, Seran would get you raised from the dead while we helped Haseth free the princess.”

“Alright,” Calliope nodded, “I think I understand. And from what Raszil said, you rescued the princess, but not before...”

“Yes.” Sorrel’s voice suddenly sounded thick and strained. I turned to her, and was surprised to see a pained expression on her face. Normally she was bratty and defiant, but now I could see that was just a front, and right now, that front was lifted. “The goblin chief would take women. Always one at a time. And after a few days, come get another. We never saw the others. At first it was farmwives and girls, but the chief, he was mad at the elves. Really mad.” Her voiced cracked then, and the young squire squeezed her eyes shut and took a deep breath before continuing, “There were three women among the princess’ bodyguards. One by one, they all volunteered, to protect her.”

Silence reigned as the implication of that statement settled in. No wonder Kythaela looked so haunted all the time. Three people who she had probably known her entire life had submitted to rape and torture for her, just to buy her a little more time. And in the end, it almost didn’t save her- who knew how much longer she would have held out before I rescued her?