The Faithful and the Brave Part 11
They entered the castle in the late afternoon. Heero and Trowa joined the tail end of a merchant's entourage. Quatre blended in with a small group of priests. Wufei offered his arm to an older woman that was not having an easy time of the cobbles. Duo was simply outside helping the others choose their camouflage, and then he was inside, meeting them in the meditation gardens.
They passed some time there, inconspicuously waiting for the bustle of nightfall to cover the next phase of their plan, when staff would be hurrying about, trying to finish their tasks before the sunlight faded. The guards would change shift, visitors would leave for the day, preparations for dinner would reach their peak.
When the time came, Duo and Heero began their infiltration at the service entrance near the stables, whose presence Duo had marked when they had been here last, stabling the very chocobos they had then ridden into Goug. Princess Relena's suite had not been in the same corridor as their own when they had visited, but Heero was familiar enough with the look and layout of the average castle to get them going in the proper direction.
Once within, Duo found his rhythm easily and inserted them into the flow of the castle staff. They walked simply and straightforwardly down many a hall, appearing as if they belonged there, for the castle did regularly host a small but significant number of guests at any particular time, just as they themselves had been guests not so very long ago. And where appropriate, Duo waited until they were between the flow of castle traffic, finding pockets and lulls and sliding through them unnoticed.
Things were quiet in the honored guests' wing, but they could tell by the lighting which of the rooms was occupied. Heero clapped a hand on Duo's shoulder in acknowledgment of his hard work in getting them here, then knocked briskly upon the door in front of them. He expected Sir Noin to answer for her lady. He did not expect the crash of something hitting the floor within, followed by several loud thumps.
They exchanged a quick look before drawing their weapons and throwing the door open. Heero hadn't entirely expected the door to be so unlocked and so unblockaded. He entered the room with a little more momentum than he had intended, and was farther into the room before comprehension of the situation came to him. The door shut behind both him and Duo, and they were left facing Odin, his hand resting on the back of a heavy chair, a decorative vase shattered into large pieces by the feet of a female guard. The woman stepped to the side and drew her sword.
"Odin," Heero said evenly.
"Heero," Odin responded in kind. "Duo."
"Fuck you," Duo greeted in return.
"Where's Princess Relena?" Heero asked.
"She's no longer your concern. Why don't you just forget about her?"
Duo snorted. "And what? Rejoin the Bolts?"
"It's an option." One with a small probability of actually happening, but an option nevertheless. They were dependable men, generally speaking. Even now, they were outnumbered but unfazed. "Or... I could drop you off up the chain of command. I'm sure they could put men like you to good use."
"I don't think we'd like your chain of command."
"You have one attack of good morals and suddenly you're too good to be mercenaries?" Odin shook his head.
"Hey, a guy's gotta have standards, you know!"
"There will be no negotiations," Heero declared flatly. "Where is the princess?"
The boy was showing the entirely wrong kind of nobility. It was impressive, in a tragic sort of way. Odin tsked. "So, you're siding against your brother, then?"
Heero frowned, unsurprised that Odin knew what family he was born to. "My brother has nothing to do with this."
"Ah, that's right. You still think you're rescuing the innocent princess, don't you? Well, you missed her. Fact of the matter is, she chose to join with Duke Weyridge. She doesn't need to be rescued."
"I doubt she had much choice in the matter."
"And ultimately, what noble does? All of them, constrained by their bloodlines to act a certain way."
Heero's expression darkened. "I'd like to think we can rise above that."
"Ah, well, you're only half a noble yourself, so perhaps that explains that. Perhaps it's your mother's blood causing you sympathy for the princess' plight."
"It was my father that taught me to care for my people, to protect those that need protecting."
"Yes, I have heard many great things spoken of your father's benevolence... But don't forget that he was also the leader of the Knights of Romefeller, and many not-so-benevolent things were done under his command. Benevolence and good will toward others will only get you so far. Use of force takes care of the rest."
"And that's what's going on here, I suppose?" Duo interrupted. "You tried the benevolent bargaining thing on us and didn't get anywhere, so now you're going to use a little force?"
Odin laughed sharply. "Or a lot. It's nothing personal, you understand. I assume you'll resist?"
"Might as well make you earn your pay. And who are the goons?" Duo gestured vaguely at the others in the room with them. He didn't recognize any of them as recent colleagues. "The thugs you've hired to replace us?"
"They're borrowed. After what happened with the last crew I brought with me on this job, it seemed prudent. It does seem a bit overkill now, with just the two of you. I was hoping to get the others as well, but it seems they'll have to wait their turn."
Heero attacked. It was perhaps dishonorable to attack a man that had not yet drawn his weapon, but this was a trap, he and Duo were outnumbered ten to two, and Odin would have plenty of advantage once he could channel his Dark Sword techniques through his blade. Heero went straight for Odin's sword arm, trying to even the odds, but was rewarded with only a scratch as Odin twisted to dodge out of the way.
Though he hadn't been expecting it, Duo followed up on the initiative immediately, flicking a throwing star into the throat of one unlucky guard. The man went down with a panicked gurgle, but now that the others were ready for such tricks, there would be no more easy kills. Duo drew his second knife without taking his eyes off the others, taking advantage of their conservative approach to maneuver himself into a position where a table was to his right and he could still catch an occasional glimpse of Heero's fight with Odin if he turned his head just a bit.
Heero had fought against Odin before, but only in practice. Odin liked to have the measure of his men. Still, it prepared him for that distinct chill that ran down a man's spine once the Dark Sword energies were summoned, and it reminded him that Duo had only ever come close to matching Odin when he'd managed something sneaky, and so despite the odds, it really was the best idea for him to fully engage Odin's attention. Duo had a better chance of doing something sneaky against all the guards arrayed before him than he did against Odin.
Duo had been in a number of interesting scraps in his time. This one was going to end up somewhat high on the list. Though Heero and Odin were now crossing swords, he took a step closer to them. He could tell by the distraction in their eyes that his opponents were wary of getting too close to a Dark Sword engaged in combat. It wasn't Duo's favorite thing either, but he knew Odin preferred fighting in more open areas himself. Though these 'borrowed' men were not his own, Odin did not like the sloppiness known as collateral damage. He tended to save his more destructive attacks for special occasions.
A brave soul attacked Duo, but the woman was on her own for now. The terrain was to Duo's advantage for the moment, limiting his opponents to one or two if they didn't know how to work together, and despite his quick kill at the outset of the battle, he probably didn't look like he needed to be mobbed. Closing the distance easily negated his throwing arm.
He parried the first blow, pushed her back with a swipe of his second blade, and thought quickly on how to keep his advantages. His eyes located what he needed, but he would need to coordinate with Heero to make it happen, and Heero was a bit busy to sit down to a quiet conference on tactics. Well, Duo could only try his best. "Hey, Heero," he said cheerfully.
He heard a grunt unconnected from a clang of blades and assumed he had Heero's attention.
"So... you know how I'm always wanting to jump into bed with you?"
Heero dodged a slice with a little less grace than he was aiming for. "Why are you --" He interrupted himself when forced to block a hard follow-up coming from Odin. It rattled his teeth, but didn't draw blood, which was the important part. The power in Odin's sword technique would slowly leech its victim's life energy beyond the severity of the actual wound.
"No time like the present." Duo suppressed his grim amusement at the frown of confusion on his opponent's face, possibly capitalizing on it when he landed a deep cut on her sword hand. With a curse, she backed off and another guard took her place. "So, whaddya say? You, me, bedroom, soon?"
Odin laughed darkly. "What makes you think you're good enough to bed a --"
With a shout of exertion, Heero lunged. Odin sidestepped, but Heero expected that, using his momentum to swing around and change the direction of his attack.
Duo grinned lopsidedly, reorienting himself to maintain the proper position between them and the rest of their enemies. "I'll take that as a yes."
The chilly tingle in the air intensified as Odin stepped up his offensive. "Sorry I can't let you live long enough to see that through."
~*~
Quatre stared with unfocused eyes at a particular row of windows two stories up and a third of the castle away. They most likely didn't belong exactly to the Princess' suite, but after conference, they had decided on the windows to use as their landmark in their planning. "Something's off."
Wufei and Trowa exchanged a look before the mage asked, "Very off?"
Quatre blinked back to attention. "I think we need to go in."
Without another word, Trowa slipped away to begin enacting the back-up plan they had already agreed upon.
"What do you sense?" Wufei asked.
"I'm not sure," Quatre answered with a frown more of concentration than annoyance. He had a natural facility for Libra techniques, employing them even before he had officially learned them, and he supplemented that learning with research based on hints and snippets found in pre-Cataclysm writings. His reading of energy flows to analyze not just physical strengths and weaknesses, health and sickness, but also intent and emotional state was novel in this day and age, and still an art in need of refining. It was not giving him all the information he wanted at the moment, but it was more than he would otherwise have. "But it feels like the jaws of a trap preparing to be sprung."
A few minutes later, Trowa was back wearing a tabard of the castle guard that they had snatched from a supply storeroom during their wait and stashed nearby for safekeeping. Their journey up through a servants' entrance and down the corridors went much more quickly than that of their comrades. Those two had moved with stealth, wishing to avoid the possibility of anyone noticing or recognizing them. These three moved with purpose. If Quatre's senses were to be trusted, a clean in and out was no longer their top objective. Trowa played the part of the bored guard escorting the two journeymen through the castle, and they encountered no resistance until reaching the turnoff for the special guest wing. It was the place they had last seen Princess Relena and her bodyguard, and they knew that there were not normally two guards stationed at the threshold.
Trowa walked calmly up to them with a friendly nod, but one of them lowered his spear to block their passage. "State your business."
"These two wish to pay their respects to the princess."
"There is no princess here."
Trowa frowned with all the annoyance of someone whose time has just been wasted by bureaucratic nonsense. "I was told the princess was here. When did she leave?"
The second guard had a little more sympathy than the first. "You missed her."
Quatre pouted convincingly. "Do you know where she is now? We were hoping to offer her our services."
"I doubt she needs them, mage," the first guard responded. "Now, move along."
He sighed dramatically. "And we came all this way to see her, too! Do you suppose perhaps she's gone to join Duke Weyridge's camp? Where are his headquarters, do you know?"
Trowa caught the glance of the second guard and rolled his eyes.
The first guard thumped the butt end of his spear a bit irritably against the floor. "Look. All we know is there's no princess here, okay? Now --"
"Excuse me," Wufei interrupted politely. "But if the princess isn't here, then... who's that?"
The guards automatically turned to look where he was pointing past them, at which point Quatre hit them with a spell of confusion, just enough to ease their passage into unconsciousness as Trowa knocked one out with the application of the shaft of his polearm to the back of the guard's skull. Wufei performed the same duty on the other guard with a swift kick to the side of his head.
Quatre rushed past them as Trowa started pulling his victim to the side of the hall. "Forget that! They're in trouble!"
"A trap as you feared?" Trowa asked as he hurried forward to take point for the mages.
They were closer now, and as soon as Quatre concentrated, his sense of wrongness grew stronger, but it still lacked in detail. "There's a fight.... Too many people...!"
They rounded a corner and sighted a door with three men standing guard outside. The guards immediately roused themselves and shouted out. Trowa didn't stop running, pushing them back from the door with a fierce sweep of his glaive, managing to cut the one that couldn't get out of the way quickly enough.
Quatre wasted no time in wrenching the door open. "Duo!" he called out, smashing the business end of his staff into the face of the unprepared guard standing closest to the door. She rebounded off the wall and fell to the ground with a strangled groan.
"Quatre!" Duo acknowledged with relief as he rebuffed his opponent's attack and threw a quick kick to knock him further off balance. The act gained him a moment's breath, but he didn't press his advantage since it would mean leaving the protection of his door frame. Instead, he chanced a quick glance over his shoulder.
"Heero!" Quatre gasped, catching a glimpse of their beleaguered friend engaged in solo combat against their former boss.
"Still in one piece!" Duo announced breathlessly as he turned back quickly to meet his recovered opponent. For now, Duo thought grimly. In one piece, but not unscathed. With each cut a wound in his life force, Heero could only get weaker by the minute. Perhaps with reinforcements, they could finally bring this battle to a close.
Now that the other guards in the sitting room were shifting their attention to the newcomers, Duo shifted from a defensive stance to an offensive one, and a quick feint and then a feint that wasn't a feint, and that tingle down the back of his neck gave him enough warning not to be distracted by the sound of a bed post splintering behind him, but not so his opponent, and Duo disabled him with a final cut during his moment of inattention. Another guard quickly took his place and engaged with a certain degree of ferocity, hoping to try his luck against the lone rogue in the doorway rather than face who knew what forces might be entering the room.
Heero heard their calls and denied himself a moment of relief. His battle was not yet won. He tried to suck in the oxygen he needed to ease his tired muscles without giving his fatigue away to his opponent, but at least Odin was breathing heavily himself. They stared each other down out of reach of each other. Out of current reach, specifically, for while Heero hadn't managed to cut Odin's sword arm deeply enough to keep him from wielding his weapon, albeit with both hands now, he had more importantly succeeded in rendering that arm too weak to channel Odin's more powerful Dark Sword techniques.
"Well now," Odin said. "This changes things, doesn't it?"
Indeed, time was no longer on the mercenary's side. Even if Heero succumbed to his wounds, he wasn't going down without a fight, and the others were still out there, doing well enough from what he could tell. "Not really," he answered anyway. "Either way, I feel only one of us will be walking out of this room."
Odin smiled grimly. "True enough." He shifted his grip on his sword and measured the situation.
Heero did the same. With his dominant arm injured, Odin's swing would be weaker to the right, less tightly controlled. But the gash in Heero's leg, traded in exchange for that damage to Odin's arm, Heero was starting to feel it now, that peculiar mix of pain from the wound itself and numbness from the Dark Sword technique. He took a step to the side, positioning himself, testing his leg, before commencing his attack. Their blades met with a loud clang, and they each struggled for a moment before Odin threw Heero back and countered. Heero regained his footing just in time to push himself back and avoid the blow. Odin was upon him in a moment and he parried quickly, but was not in a position to capitalize on the opening. He used the opportunity instead to re-square his stance.
Odin continued to press his offensive, as was typical of a Dark Knight. Their technique often put opponents on defense, wary of taking even the slightest wound. That was no longer a concern for Heero, but even so, his opportunities for meaningful attacks were few. He grit his teeth against his growing weakness, silenced the voice of anxiety urging him to finish things quickly, and waited for his chance.
Several exchanges later, he failed to completely get out of the way of a technique-enhanced stab. Odin's power punched him first, like an icy gust that sucked the air from his lungs and twisted his insides. The blade followed, but the ripple of power and Odin's weak arm knocked it off course. It slid through several of the chain links of his armor, but the mesh at his side held. The force of impact didn't keep Heero from noticing when the point of the sword snagged in one of the links, changing its trajectory yet more and dragging Odin's arm with it, shifting his balance just enough for an opening. He gathered his strength, his focus, his determination, and channeled them into his sluggish arm with a shout of effort. His blade landed true, swinging low beneath Odin's deflected sword to catch the inside of his leading leg.
Their eyes met for a moment, and then Heero yanked his sword back to unblock the severed femoral. His legs were unsteady beneath him, but they got the job done of stumbling him out of reach of his former boss, even if they gave out after a moment and landed him flat on his backside. Odin went down with a cry of pain, his sword clattering to the ground as he reflexively clutched at his thigh as if he could stop the crimson flood gushing out from his artery. He recognized the futility though, and chuckled darkly. "Maybe I was wrong about you, kid..."
"Odin..." Heero gasped the name out between heavy pants.
"You just keep following that... misguided nobility of yours... and maybe... jus' maybe..." The conclusion would remain forever unsaid.
Duo finally finished his opponent with a jab to the belly and turned. "Heero!"
Heero glanced up automatically at the sound of his name, and snapped out of his daze when Duo began moving toward him. "I'm fine," he insisted firmly, adding a wave of his hand toward the others. "Go!"
Duo frowned, but he did as requested, dashing back out into the sitting room and appraising the situation quickly. Only four guards left. He sidled right up behind Quatre's opponent and stabbed the man in his kidneys. "Quatre!" He jerked his head back in the direction of the bedroom.
Quatre nodded and ran to the other room. Heero was dragging himself over to the wall so he could sit upright with support. Quatre landed beside him and helped, even as he scolded, "Heero, stop moving."
"I'll be fine," Heero said tiredly, unable to find the strength to bat Quatre's hands away. He couldn't seem to catch his breath, and his pulse continued to pound loudly in his head, but the leeching effect of Odin's power was only temporary.
"Your physical wounds aren't major," Quatre answered after a moment of scanning him. "But the 'bleeding' from the Dark Sword hasn't stopped yet. Now stay still."
Heero slumped against the wall and let Quatre work his magic, trying to do his duty by his friend by keeping an eye out over Quatre's bent head. His view was limited through the bedroom door, but it seemed as if the fight ended before he even managed to assemble the glimpses and sounds into a coherent picture in his head. Wufei and Duo entered the room soon after, and Heero felt free to close his eyes and let his guard down somewhat.
Wufei noted Heero's condition, then surveyed the damage in the room with a raised eyebrow -- the three-poster bed, the wrecked chair, the side table on its side, the pillow with half its down spread out around it. And that wasn't accounting at all for the dead man on the floor curled up in an impressively large puddle of blood. "Where's the princess?"
"Who knows?" Duo answered, eyes fixed on Heero's face. He seemed to be getting some color back, and his breathing seemed less labored. "Odin said she ran off to join Weyridge."
"Any reason for him to lie?"
"Other than pissing us off? Not really. But she coulda been less than willing or whatever. At any rate, her stuff's not here anymore."
Trowa came in after finishing his examination of the bodies outside. "We ran into guards on our way in here. Seemed like they were trying to keep things quiet. But we should get away from here as soon as possible. Someone will seek the outcome of this battle sooner or later."
Quatre put a hand to Heero's shoulder. "How are you feeling, Heero?"
"Better." Still drained and somewhat exhausted, but getting better, not worse. With a deep, unfettered breath, he opened his eyes. "My thanks."
Quatre squeezed his shoulder reassuringly before turning to the others. "I've finished cleaning up the remnants of Odin's skill. I still need to patch the rest of him up, but you're right, we should leave here quickly."
"Where to?" Duo asked. "Are we washing our hands of this or what? These are the Cardinal's own out there. Odin didn't just 'borrow' them without permission."
"Yes. But we need to think carefully about this."
"Can we at least move this to one of the other suites in this wing?" Trowa interrupted. "Being surrounded by all of this incriminating evidence is making me twitchy."
"Of course." Quatre stood and helped Heero to his feet.
TBC...
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