Chapter One - 6
6
At night, Marie was stopped by Geoffroy in front of the great hall. Marie took a step back, then turned to face her father. Geoffroy looked pale, perhaps fatigued from his journey.
“Marie. Have you ever wondered why you were born?”
“...Father?”
“Have you?”
“No.”
“Very well,” said Geoffroy, stroking his beard. “The moon is beautiful tonight. Observe it carefully.”
“Yes, father.”
Geoffroy disappeared into the great hall. Marie sighed. “The moon is beautiful tonight” was an outright lie. It was raining. To Marie, it seemed that Geoffroy was off living in his own private world. He must have been in his other world, watching some other moon. Marie felt a sudden chill and returned to her room. She curled up in her bed for a while. Various past events ran through her mind. Her mother, disappearing into the wall. The huge stone cross and the moving Cross Spring. The experiment with the cloth and the secret window. Unconsciously, Marie had started gripping the necklace at her chest tightly. She didn't know when she'd started, but Marie had developed a habit of gripping the gemstone on her chest when she felt anxious. She believed that if she did, evil things would avoid her. She heard the sound of the rain. Where was the moon? Was it beyond this night rain? Marie slowly sat up and looked around. In this dark room, the desk and paintings she usually saw blended in with the darkness and became invisible.
Marie got off the bed. She slowly walked over and stood in front of the door. She felt as if something was calling to her. She opened the door.
On the floor in front of her was a large iron helmet.
It was a grand helmet fit for a warrior, with a flat surface which covered the entire face like a mask. Two holes, one right next to the other, seemed to be looking up at Marie. A cross shape was engraved on the face. Marie stood staring at the helmet for a while. Fearfully, she reached out and poked it with her toe. The helmet rolled to the side with a clanging like a heavy bell. The sound was so loud and unexpected that Marie almost jumped. The inside of the helmet was empty.
Marie carefully looked around, then picked up the helmet. It was a bit too heavy to lift with one hand, so she used both. She approached the candle in the corridor, which had been left on, and looked inside the helmet. Raine's name was engraved on a spot that would have been right over the neck.
Marie had a terrible feeling.She ran out of the corridor and down to the basement. She staggered down the unlit stairs. The helmet was heavy against her chest. But she couldn't let it go. She remembered something, turned back and returned to the corridor, grabbed the candle, then went back down to the basement. Without the candle, it would be too dark to walk. She dashed into a room to the right of the basement.
This was where the knights kept their equipment. Dozens of wooden figures floated in the candle's blurred light. They were lined up in orderly rows, as if to greet her. The wooden mannequins were dressed in the knights' armor, and were arranged in rows to store and organize them. They were simple wooden figures, too crude to be called sculptures, but too human-like to be called mere blocks of wood. They silently wore the heavy helms, chain armor and quilted underarmor under their surcoats, held wide shields, and wore thick leather boots. However, only one of them was different from the others.
This one had no head.
A white shield lay next to the headless figure. A black cloak had been placed next to the shield. Marie used the light to search for the mannequin's head. It was nowhere to be found. Fearfully, she moved the cloak. There was still nothing.
The false knight's head had been taken away, and the helmet it had worn was now in Marie's possession. She picked up the cloak and looked for a name. Raine's name was embroidered on the edge of the cloth.
Marie looked at the heads of the other mannequins. Their faces had no eyes or noses and were perfectly flat. Of all the wooden parts that made up the mannequins, the heads were the smallest.
Marie put the helmet on the floor and leaned against the damp wall, enduring the ominous feeling that rose within her. It was less of a premonition and more of a certainty. A headless figure.As she stood thinking, Marie felt dizzy. She felt so dizzy she could hardly stand. She held her head and focused on her breathing, and eventually, the wave receded.
Leaving the helmet behind, Marie returned to her room and crawled back into bed. As soon as she curled up, she fell asleep.
The next day, six headless knights were found on the banks of Cross Spring, upstream of Lourdes River, far west of Lapis Lazuli Castle. They were discovered by a farmer who lived in the area. The farmer spent a whole day traveling to the castle to report what he'd found. A knight was dispatched and spent another day traveling on horseback to journey to the scene and identify the six bodies.
A report was made to the castle that the Order of Marie's White Shield had been annihilated. Geoffroy received the report himself.
No one had left the castle. That much was clear from the gatekeeper's testimony, and from the fact that there were no footprints on the ground, which had been made muddy by the rain. No horses had been taken from the stables, either.
The real problem was that, even though the knights' bodies had been found at Cross Spring, which was a full day's journey from the castle on horseback, all six of the victims had been seen alive in the meeting room at midnight, half a day before they were found dead by the farmer.
They could only assume that their corpses had flown to Cross Spring.
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