(THOB) Chapter 100: The Problem (Patreon)

A distance past the camp blacksmith Ezril caught sight of Lenaria. Beside her walked a young soldier doing his best to make conversation with her. It was the third soldier to make an attempt since their return.

The third Ezril had seen.

Lenaria wasn’t quick to note him so he slowed his pace and observed them both. Although a young soldier Ezril had no doubt the man was at least a summer older than he was. He had thought the man young not in his years but in his years as a soldier. Still walking with the discomfort of a man who had barely worn his armor a year and whose steps had yet to adjust to the sword strapped at his hip. It had been one of the reasons Ezril had opted to keep his Sunders strapped to his back. It did little to hinder his step. It also did much in helping him support the weight.

The soldier was saying something Lenaria had no obvious interest in, and considering the direction they were headed Ezril could only imaging they were headed for his tent. He side stepped a few soldiers who offered him simple greetings he returned with a quick nod.

You seem to be doing a lot of following today, he told himself. Do you find yourself lacking in a task?

Lenaria took a detour from her initial path and the soldier followed, leaving Ezril wondering where exactly she was leading the man. The fact that she hadn’t scared him off already had Ezril worried for the man’s safety.

It didn’t take long for Ezril to note the growing lack of soldiers in the part of the encampment they now walked. A quiet place. A secluded place. He had thought it impossible for an encampment so busy to have such a place.

Lenaria stopped abruptly, surprising both Ezril and her companion.

Despite a lack of people, there were tents set up around, and Ezril found himself watching from behind one.

Lenaria offered the man a place on the grass to sit beside her. When he had taken his place, she took hers opposite him. After a moment’s pause, the man dropped back into whatever he had been telling her before the interruption, and Lenaria nodded at intervals.

Ezril found himself wondering if she had developed an interest in what the man was saying or if she was simply being polite. Although, he couldn’t imagine the latter being the reason.

Why am I hiding? Ezril felt a flush of embarrassment at the thought. Still, he remained behind the tent. Watching. Waiting. For what? He could not say.

Then it happened.

Lenaria tilted slowly from her seated position. She leaned forward, pulled closer to her companion. The action was easy, simple even. It was so natural Ezril had almost thought it a normal thing between the both of them. But the look of surprise on the face of the man told him it was as new a thing to him, as it was to Ezril.

Now she sat next to the soldier, shoulders grazing while he continued to voice whatever he had to say amidst an obvious discomfort. Lenaria continued to lean closer. There was nothing mechanical about her actions. For the first time since he’d known her Ezril found her appealing in a way he’d never done.

He gulped visibly. As if following a mental script, the soldier gulped immediately after. When Lenaria pressed a kiss to his cheek Ezril’s discomfort seemed to wither away. In its place was a near irrational anger.

Lenaria’s hand slipped beneath the soldier’s armor. The man’s lips parted in response, the words that had been in a position to pour from them lost somewhere in his throat. She kissed his neck gently. There was a kind of hunger in it, as a lord would a refined meal.

Ezril watched Lenaria shrug the armor over the man’s head with his assistance. She discarded it to the side. Now the man moved with a hurry of his own, whatever he had to say was gone, like warmth in the presence of winter. His hands unclasping his leather braces wrapped around his wrists, he turned his head so that his eyes met Lenaria’s.

Ezril gritted his teeth. His mind filled with anger and ire. Mine, the word forced its way into his mind. It was incomprehensible, foreign. He sought to ignore it but it stayed, like dew on wool, clinging at the edge of his thought stubbornly. His fingers flexed, searching, needing. He tried to convince himself it was simply a discomfort. He couldn’t. He was grimly aware of the weight of his Sunders. This is wrong, he thought. This is very wrong.

Then something went wrong.

Whatever it was, Ezril wasn’t sure. Lenaria moved her hand beneath the soldier’s grey cotton shirt, untucked from the removal of his armor.

The man went rigid. All enthusiasm gone in an instant, he caught her hand. Halting its progress, he forced a smile on his lips. What followed were a few words Ezril couldn’t hear. The man’s lips moved in a hurry. It reminded Ezril of a child trying to convince an adult he had done no wrong before the adult steps into a room.

The easy smile that had long been playing on Lenaria’s lips faltered but remained. No words escaped her lips. She took her other hand to his hair, running it through. It was a dirty blonde. Long enough for her to grab a handful, playfully. But no longer.

Ezril thought to reveal himself. His fingers flexed again. The weight of his Sunders bore heavily on his back. Something told him coming out would not end well. Lenaria might forgive him for spying on her, however, soldiers spread rumors. Lenaria would not mind them but Darvi would. He remained in place, seething in his confused anger, completely unsure of what transpired before him.

Lenaria took her hand from the shirt. The man relaxed. She cupped his chin, tilted his face up to meet hers. Ezril hadn’t been aware of when the man had fallen on his back, but there the soldier was, lying back almost too happily.

Lenaria’s next actions were a blur. Her fingers gripped the man’s jaw tighter. Her hand left his hair. It moved quickly, disappearing from sight as his head fell to the grass. When it returned she held a throwing knife no longer than three inches in length.

Ezril lost his anger and confusion at the sight of the knife. It was the kind priests owned. He knew it without mistake. Ezril let out a long breath in relief. Then recognition colored his eyes with disbelief. Isn’t that… His hand reached for his vest reflexively. It took him a moment to remember he wasn’t wearing his cassock. The knife she held was his, as clear as the clouds in the sky. It was also meant to be in his cassock back at the tent.

Deciding things had gone far enough, Ezril looked around quickly, confirming what he already knew. Three of them were the only ones around. But they weren’t so far from the rest that a sufficient enough sound wouldn’t draw attention. He’d known Lenaria had planned to be alone with the soldier. A few reasons for it had crossed his mind while he had been following them, however, the scenario playing out before him was the last thing he’d considered.

Oddly, he found himself savoring it over the alternative.

He stepped out of his cover, hands out before him. “Hey! Hey! Hey!” he drew their attention as he approached. Lenaria looked surprised. “Let’s think about this for a moment, why don’t we?”

The soldier took advantage of Lenaria’s surprise. He turned to Ezril. “Father, help me. She’s trying to kill me.” The words rushed out of his mouth before Lenaria pressed the knife to his throat.

Ezril sighed and rubbed his forehead. The man was most definitely new. He ignored him and turned to Lenaria. “What’s all this about?”

Seeing he would get no immediate help from Ezril the man began trashing against Lenaria’s hold.

“Quit it!” Ezril hissed. “I am a priest and she a priestess. If anyone comes running over, I’ll accuse you of the most heinous crime I can think of. Now tell me; who do you think they’d believe?” Seeing the man’s panic grow but silence descend, he added, “Now shut up while I try to get you out of this in one piece.”

“Good,” Lenaria finally spoke. She turned to Ezril. “Now help me lift his shirt.”

Ezril stood puzzled for a moment. But all he needed was a moment. In an instant he was with her. He lifted the hem of the grey shirt. Below it was exactly what he had expected. A simple set of stomach muscles covered by a sparse expanse of blond hair, nothing too trained, and nothing spectacular.

“By Ezril, when will they stop sending them?” Lenaria scoffed in annoyance.

He looked at her dazed, unable to comprehend what she was talking about. Then a moment later he cocked a brow at her when her words settled in. “By Ezril?”

Lenaria shrugged.

“You see the dots at the base of his stomach?” she pointed out pushing the topic aside. When he gave no answer, she continued. “The ones trailing off into his trousers.” Ezril trailed his eyes down the man’s abs and found three dots barely visible above the man’s belt and nodded. “It’s the Venin guild’s markings,” she said. “He’s one of them.”

Ezril shook his head. “No. The Venin guild uses a blue spiraled snake. I’ve seen it.”

“That’s for the full-fledged.”

Ezril paused. “Full-fledged?”

“Those designed to be the faces of the guild,” Lenaria answered. “People like him require something less obvious but good enough to show as identification should it be needed.”

Ezril frowned. The feeling of recognition gnawed at him the more he looked at the dots. He looked back at the man briefly and saw the hope in his eyes. But behind it he saw the calculation. The man was not stupid enough to leave the choice of his life in the hands of one priest.

The chance of Ezril freeing him was no more than a possible calculation. Another priest wouldn’t have believed Lenaria’s tale. Ezril sighed. He wasn’t another priest.

He let the man’s shirt fall back down over his stomach then made a resigned gesture with his hand. “Fine.”

The man managed to let out a muffled protest in the brief time he had before the throwing knife flashed across his throat.

“You could’ve gagged him,” Ezril told Lenaria while she held the soldier down through his last buckle. The man hadn’t had enough time to accept his demise.

“Nowhere to hide him,” she answered. Her body moved in response to the man’s final activity. “Besides,” she continued. “They never talk. These kind never know enough.”

Ezril regarded her with a questioning look. “And how often do you do this?”

Lenaria shrugged, smiling innocently at him as she was prone to. She took the man by his legs and dragged him across the grass. “There were more of them where I was stationed last,” she said. “Despite wanting to kill me, some of them still harbor the possibility of recruiting me.” She shrugged again. “Rin thinks they’re a parasite. It’s the only thing I like about them,” she added. “Their very existence makes her too angry.”

“Quite the life you’re living, Aria.” Ezril got up and followed her. “Need any help?”

She stopped, thought about it, then continued dragging the body with relative ease. “I’ll be alright.”

She took a turn that led out of the camp a while further, and Ezril followed.

“So how did you know where to find me?” she asked. “I doubt you were simply taking a stroll.”

“I assure you, I was not looking for you.”

Lenaria stopped again to look at him. One corner of her mouth quirked up in a wry smile. “How long were you behind the tent, Ezril?”

Ezril looked away. “From the beginning.”

Lenaria’s smile faltered briefly and Ezril couldn’t help the heat creeping up his face.

“Where you following me?”

Ezril hesitated.

Lenaria let the man’s legs fall. They were almost out of the encampment and into the forest. “You were following me.” She smirked. “You saw me talking with a soldier, and you followed me. What did you think? I’d made a new friend and you wanted to know what kind of person he—” she gasped, her fingers against her lips. Behind them she grinned. “Were you jealous, Ezril?”

It was amazing how she was able to pull off such drama with the blood on her hands and the body between them.

Ezril let out a deep breath. “How many times have you done this?” he asked, ignoring her display.

“Done what?” She grinned. “Led an unsuspecting stranger to a private place and done despicable things to them?”

“No,” Ezril disagreed, frustrated. “How long have you been doing unsuspecting things to them with my throwing knives?”

“Oh, that.” She shrugged. “This is the first.” She bent and picked the man’s legs and returned to her dragging. “It was the fastest concealable weapon I could find before leaving the tent.”

“And you were going to tell me about this… when?”

Lenaria tilted her head. “A few days.” She made it sound like a question.

“…Days?”

“…Weeks...” she corrected.

Weeks seemed more believable. “And you were going to tell me because you used my knife?” he asked. “Or because you’d want me to know there are people around trying to kill you.”

She made a noise between a grunt and a groan. It could’ve easily been mistaken for nonchalance. “Everyone’s trying to kill me, Ezril. Besides,” she added, “these ones aren’t trying to kill me.”

“Then how did you know he was from the guild?”

“No one spends as much time as he did talking to me even when I’m not answering. He was also new, and nobody paid him any attention.”

Ezril let out a long sigh of exasperation. “And to think I’m the one from the underbelly.”

Lenaria chuckled.

They spent the next half hour digging a deep enough hole to house the man’s body. They covered it after depositing the body.

Ezril noted the smell of blood in the forest while they covered the hole and wondered just how many bodies were hidden beneath their feet. However, he thought it better if he did not know. Sometimes, not knowing was a useful thing. Thinking more about it now, he worried he was given Lenaria too much favor. She had practically just killed a defenseless man, and he had allowed it.

She said he was after her, he thought, his mind trying to justify her.

And that's the problem, he answered himself. All he'd needed to believe her were her words and three dots that looked eerily familiar. He could swear he had seen them somewhere once upon a time. He frowned at his inability to remember who or when. What he did know was that it had been on a person he had spent a long number of time with.

He really hoped it hadn't been on a brother of the seminary.