Episode 3 The Day of the Semites - Part 2

 And again, behind him, the lock of the prison slid down with a heavy thud.

 Shrugging his shoulders, Guin stood with his back against the stone door and looked around the prison to which he had returned. The Prince of Paro, who was curled up on his bed, wrapped in his furs, turned his head, but a noise at the door caused him to jump up and look at the warrior, who was about to shout something in panic. However, when he saw the Black Knights behind him, he did not say anything, but climbed down from the bed and ran to Guin and clung to him.

 Guin nodded reassuringly as his slender arms clung to him. He was weak after the battle, hungry and exhausted, but his heart softened as he stroked the boy's silvery, silky hair with his scarred hands.

"You're back, Guin."

 Remus whispered in a whispering voice and watched as the door closed behind him.

"I was so scared. I didn't know what I would do if they killed Guin."

"Don't worry. I'm alive."

 Guin laughed.

"What can I do about this? I'd rather have some food. And some booze."

"Yeah, Guin."

 In a panic, the boy went to the table, brought a lump of food and a jar, and watched the leopard-headed warrior grind up a cold piece of roast meat, press it with his fingers into a paste of grain powder, and gulp it down.

"What's wrong?"

 Guin said, noticing the look on his face.

"Are you still worried about your sister? Don't worry, your sister is a girl who can take care of herself."

"No, Guin."

 Remus went to the door and looked out, then came back and whispered into the Leopard's round ears.

"The guy next to me is ...."

"The Red Mercenary."

 He drank honey wine of gola from a jar and said.

"What's wrong with that guy?"

"That's ...."

 Remus clammed up.

 Guin looked at the wall. The stone is still in place and the hole between the two rooms is blocked.

"I was asleep at .... I dozed off. And when I woke up..."

 Remus explained slowly, as if he were afraid that Guin would be angry. Istvan told Remus to take up the bedclothes of his chamber and made a rope ladder with them, and then he lay down on the couch and began to snore loudly.

 For a boy who had been brought up in the beautiful palace of Paro, and who had met nothing but elegant nobles and dignified servants, the coarse behaviour of the mercenary was a constant source of annoyance. Remus tried several times to speak to Istvan, but when he received no answer, he gave up, and in the course of time he fell into a drowsy stupor as he waited for Guin.

 Then, suddenly, I felt a movement next to me,

"Yarn!"

 He whispered, and a secret activity began. Remus jumped up and peeked, and was astonished.

The Demon Warrior was about to crawl down from the hole in the wall of the tower, suspended by the rope ladder he had just made.

"Wait! That ladder belongs to us too! Where are we going when Guin's not coming back? Wait, wait!"

 Remus put his face to the hole in the wall and shouted. And Istvan glared at him,

"Keep quiet, keep your mouth shut, you idiot. The jailer will notice."

 As soon as he had said that, without regard to Remus's embarrassment, he slid down the ladder and disappeared into the night.

"He tricked us. He pretended to run away with us."

 Hearing that, Guin laughed in a barking voice.

"So I see. Istvan has escaped. Don't bother. He's got his own agenda. You can't go from this room to the next through this hole anyway. He didn't want to go with us. If it were me alone, I'd take him because he's my sword to fight with, but with kids around, he's a liability. That's what he'd do, he seemed like a clever man."

"Because you tricked me into taking the blanket!"

 Remus was livid. Guin laughed harder.

"You are an honest child, my prince."

 He said, waving his hand vaguely across the wall.

"If you trust people so easily and get angry at them for betraying you, you'll never be able to be called a great king. Don't worry. I'm on my own with you. I'll find a way to get you and your sister out of this fort safely. Let Istvan follow his path. But I'm exhausted. Let me get some sleep.

 Guin closed his eyes and lay down directly on the floor. Remus went to the far side of the room, so as not to disturb him, and crouched down quietly, but Guin immediately opened his eyes again and said, as if remembering.

"Your sister is the seer Linda, isn't she? If she's here now and can help me solve the mystery I just saw, I'll do whatever it takes!"

"What the hell is that thing?

 Remus asked angrily as he was compared to his sister and touched the most painful part of his body.

 Guin shook his leopard head violently and pulled his fur up over his body, as if he wanted to forget what was burning behind his eyes.

"I hate going through the gates of Staphorus," my sister said. She said there was an ominous miasma in the air. I wonder what she was feeling. I had no idea what she sensed at the time, but just now, when I was fighting the great ape of Gabor in the dark basement of the tower, and afterwards, when I was trying to escape from here with the lord of the castle, I saw something strange."

"Something bizarre?"

"Yes."

 Guin sat up shakily. Huddled on the floor in his furs, he gazed into the darkness. It was as if, through the stone walls of the tower, the shining eyes of a ghost were staring down upon him, covering the whole of Staphorus.

"Strange" may not be the right word. Because all I saw was Vernon himself, the Black Count, Lord of Staphorus. Maybe it was an optical illusion. That's why I wanted you to tell your sister that what I saw was a blur and the horrible cold I felt was a blur."

 Guin shakes himself,

"Do you understand? When I stood very close to the Black Count with the long sword against his accursed body, I suddenly felt myself start to tremble like a sick man. I tried to stop my trembling lest he should discover the wanderings of my mind. But all my five bodies continued to tremble like little birds in a snake's nest, and I felt as if I were hanging by a vague thread at the edge of the mouth of hell, peering into its unfathomable depths.

 My fears intensified when Vernon laughed in a magpie-like voice and threatened to take off this mask and expose his accursed flesh to the air. I stood closer to the Count than any of the knights. So I saw what none of the knights could see - or rather, what they could not see, I saw even less."

"--?"

"I mean."

 Guin unconsciously crossed her fingers and did the Janus spell.

"I saw the sick man's covered hand pull down the mask.

 There wasn't a single thing inside that mask!"

"No way."

 Remus shouted.

"No, it is. I couldn't believe my eyes. I was so dumbfounded I didn't even notice the long sword fall from my hand. My eyes could see the Baltic birds beyond the treetops in the forest of ludes and the grass snakes the same color as the undergrowth.

 No matter how many times I saw it, from the Black Count's neck up, instead of a sore head, even if the infinite stars of the universe were shining there, I wouldn't have shivered like this. What I saw through the mask was an abyss. An abyss just like the hell that was Doll's place. I only glimpsed it briefly, but the indescribably lukewarm breeze that blew through the gap was soothing to my skin, and my nostrils smelled an unbearably strong, musty odor.

 Who in the world is Vernon, the Black Count of Mongol?"

 Guin and Remus looked at each other in silence. The words of Istvan, the Valakian warrior who had rushed out of the fortress as if he knew that his life would be in danger if he did not leave before dawn, came to their minds at the same time.

This is a hell of a place. I'll be leaving this cursed castle soon, and when I do, you'd better get out of here... or every stone in this castle will fall on you.

"Guin..."

 Remus whispered in a trembling voice.

"I wonder what's gonna happen to us now."

"I don't know."

 Guin regained his composure somewhat,

"Anyway, it's certainly not a good idea to just sit on our hands and wait for our fate. I don't care what happens, you should get out of this tower and go into the outlying areas. It's a demon's territory anyway, but you know, child, I'd still rather have a zombie in the Forest of Ludes than the horrors that lurk in this castle!"

"But--but Linda is ...".

"I'll see what I can do about that.

 Guin said, tipping back the jar to drink the remaining honey wine, and curling up in his fur once again.

"Let's not think about the demons of Mongol if we can't help it. In time, what will be will be."

 So he closes his eyes and tries to sleep in order to build up his strength.

 Remus stared at it, crouched. Dark, anxious thoughts burned in his eyes, and he could not shake his stance, even after the leopard-headed warrior had slipped quietly into sleep.

 But in any case, they were not to rest that night either.

 Not long after they had prepared to spend the night, they heard the sound of many soldiers rushing up the stairs of the tower, and when the door was opened, torches were shone on them. Some of them looked in,

"Mmm, it's definitely two people. The leopard man and the prince of Paro."

 A rude voice cried out. Guin turns round and curses loudly that the prisoners of Mongol will not even be allowed to sleep.

"This room is good."

 The tall knight who first confirmed it ordered the others to..,

"Among the prisoners," cried the guard, "there was one who threw himself over the wall into the stream of the Kes."

 I explained.

"It would be a foolish thing to plunge oneself into the river Kes, which is said to be a dark stream, but there are some Semites in this tower now. A Semite would have been able to escape through the stream of Kes. That is why I am going around to check on the prisoners."

"Why do you decide to be a prisoner?"

 Guin said interestingly.

"It could be a soldier of Gora who's lost his mind in the hard life of the defenders."

"There are no such weaklings in Gora."

 The Knight of Gora proudly ,

"The sentry said he did see a figure leap down from the tower and climb the walls."

"I don't know about that. After all, there's a demon lurking in Staphorus Castle."

 The knight's face changed color so that even the night eye could see it. He was about to close his hand on the hilt of his long sword when he turned blue,

"All right! The prisoner in this room has escaped!"

 The loud voice of the fellow who was changing next to me rang out.

"A stone has been cut and a hole made. Hey, jailer, who's the prisoner in this room?"

"A Valakian-born mercenary who was punished for disobeying the Count."

"Then the current of Kes will not be so easy to wade through. But you're a Valakian. You're near the sea. You're used to swimming. Very well. We don't need to send out rafts. Send word that we'll light the surface of the Kes with lamps and check for corpses. Very well."