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Arvur ran his fingers along the spines of the books on the desk. They were well-kept and incredibly beautiful on a scholarly level. To Arvur, they were such a pleasing sight to see that he couldn't help but pick one up and open its cover. He did not bother to read the title, or to read its contents, but he did skim through the pages, feeling the soft parchment under his fingers.
When he was finally satisfied with the feel of the book, he sat it back down on the desk before him and continued to look about the room. This was Sylvestor's quarters, which was a room in the library that was normally off limits to other visitors, except for the Archiving Division's members.
The walls of the room were lined with bookshelves, which were filled to the brim with books and manuscripts and parchments. Arvur didn't bother with reading any of them. If Sylvestor had been targeted by any kind of assassination attempt or something of the sort then he most likely would not have had time to leave some form of evidence, unless there was a struggle.
Of course, there was no sign of a struggle, which could mean that Sylvestor was led astray, just as Victor had been. Despite the apparent lack of evidence, Arvur looked around the room, managing only to find signs of the past night's dinner. With a sigh, he crossed his arms and scratched his chin.
After a moment of hesitation, he withdrew the parchment from his robe's pocket. It was the same parchment that Ardid had left with him just a short while ago. He hadn't bothered to read any of the written statements that his brother had recorded, but he figured that now was as good a time as any to do so. So, he unrolled the parchment and looked it over, noting that there were different sections for each of the missing officers.
He scanned the parchment until he found Sylvestor's name and then began to read the statements. The majority of the statements that were recorded seemed to lack any important information. For instance, several of the quotes said things such as, "Sylvestor? I haven't seen him since earlier," or, "Sylvestor was here earlier, but he has not been around recently."
However, some of the quotes managed to draw his attention. One of which said, "Someone wished to meet with Sylvestor earlier and was firmly rejected." Arvur furrowed his eyebrows at this statement and rolled the parchment back up. He placed it into his pocket once more and stepped out of the room. Finding the nearest librarian, he began to inquire about who had met with the Archiving Division officer and what had happened when he was rejected.
"Well, I recall that the person was a woman. I couldn't manage to get a good sight of her face, but she did have long, blonde hair. She seemed quite upset about her meeting being rejected, but Sylvestor didn't empathize with her. I was the one who had informed Sylvestor of her desire to meet with him, and he only responded with, 'I'm not taking any visitors right now. I'm incredibly busy.' Busy with what, I don't know, but I didn't ask, either."
Arvur listened intently, making sure to draw the scene in his mind. Visualizing it helped him to create more inquiries, which could lead him to an answer. In his mind, he imagined a faceless woman with long, blonde hair, and the librarian at the service desk. His visualization made him wonder, why could the librarian not see her face?
"Well, I was deeply immersed in a book, and of course, I was incredibly busy. Sylvestor had me working incredibly hard to decipher a journal that he had found. He gathered up a bunch of us and we each took up roughly five to ten pages. It wasn't too terribly difficult to translate, but it was in an older language. Most people don't know it anymore. The people in the west used to speak it before the days of Alnia."
Arvur asked if he could see the pages of the journal that were translated, thinking that whatever Sylvestor was working on might have been of importance to his own investigation. After he was confirmed access to the journal, Arvur asked the other librarians if they had seen Sylvestor leave the library, to which he received the mysterious answer of, "Not today."
Evidently, Sylvestor rarely left the library to return to his actual quarters. The majority of the Archiving Division had noted that the scholar would sleep in his study in the library, rather than returning to his quarters. He would not leave for meals, either. Instead, he relied on his underlings to fetch him food when he desired it. "Sylvestor must not be an easy man to work for," Arvur jested to the librarians when they were questioned. To his surprise, they all nodded and sighed in agreement.
Because of this, he noted that Sylvestor very easily could have made an enemy from within his own Division, but dismissed the idea, simply because the chance that a member would strike his or her own officer, on the same day that an assassin were to strike all of the other officers, no less, was too thin.
When he was satisfied with his interrogation attempts, he went to Sylvestor's study once more and began to read the requested documents. However, not all of the pages were completely translated, and the old language was completely foreign to him, so he was unable to completely read its contents.
However, he gained enough information from the translated pages to make a connection to Sylvestor's disappearance. Even the title of the journal raised a red flag for Arvur. He read it aloud to himself, emphasizing the part which was most important to him with a pause. "The Marvelous Works... of Aias," he said.
Claude's steed did not slow, not even after an hour of riding. When he had made his trip to Lelantos, he did not spur the beast quite so roughly as he did now. Ardid, however, trooped along beside Claude without much effort, gently kicking the horse's sides every few minutes. The beast did not seem to struggle to keep up with Claude's mount, which was immeasurably frustrating to the Guildmaster.
He kept his eyes forward, however, ignoring the nonchalant grin on his former Guildmaster's face. Ardid glanced around at the environment around the company, which was riding southward, towards the forest camp at Rustkeep. Despite the environment to the south of Port Rap being completely forested, everything in between was dull and bland.
There were no trees, nor were there shrubs or grasslands. The entire area was simply covered in dead or dying bushes and dirt roads. What little grass grew here was yellow and seemed to lack nutrients. Of course, the Yellowdale Kingdom was not known for having fertile lands. All of the fertile lands were in the east, in the Lelantos Empire. The only thing that the Yellowdale Kingdom had to offer was lumber, which prospered in the pine forests in the south.
As the company galloped on, the environment slowly and steadily began to grow more grassy and luscious. Trees began to sprout up every few miles, and, as they continued to travel, they became more and more numerous. Eventually, the treeline could be seen in the distance, indicating that they were nearing their destination.
"Rustkeep should be roughly a mile into the forest. What danger lies there, I don't know. So, I ask that you all be ready." Claude said to the troops as they stopped at the treeline. "Keep your ears and eyes open."
Ardid rode up beside Claude when he had finished addressing the troops and spoke in a low whisper, "If there is a trap, you know none of them will be able to spot it. Whoever we are up against is not so idle as to leave his or her trap out in the open."
"I cannot help that. If I do not give them fair warning, they will not understand anything when and if it happens." Claude gripped the reigns defiantly and spurred the horse ahead, leading the troop into the forest. Ardid followed after him hesitantly, shaking his head.
The group quietly trotted through the forest, with every member of the company feeling anxious and alert. The horses' hooves crunched over fallen pine cones, and the sound of a gentle wind could be heard, rustling the treetops above. Ardid took in the forest around him, seeing the large trunks that reached up into the sky and the canopy that roofed the forest above them. He had not been in the southern forest of the Yellowdale Kingdom in several years, since he had been residing in the Lelantos Empire for so long.
The soil here was incredibly fertile, and beautiful flowers could be seen growing in the darker depths of the forest. Birds tweeted in the branches above and other creatures quietly crept through the shadows. It was a mysteriously eerie environment, but beautiful nonetheless.
Eventually Claude slowed his horse at the sight of the stone walls of the old keep. The company behind him followed slowly and eventually they all came to a complete stop, meters away from the walls. Sun shown down from above, but only in certain spots. The keep was completely overgrown with trees, which reached high into the canopy. When the keep was made, the trees were cleared in the area, and the sun used to shine down on the keep, making it a beautiful sight for travelers. However, now it had a mysterious green glow about it, matching the dark forest around it.
"We'll go on foot from here," Claude called to the company, cautiously dismounting his horse. The others did the same, causing a loud clatter of iron as the Defense Division troops' armors shook when they landed on the ground. Ardid followed closely behind Claude as they quietly made their way around to the southern side of the fortress.
As they circled around Rustkeep, they could see the battlements on the crumbling walls, and the old towers where archers once kept watch. Behind those crumbling walls and towers was the actual keep, which stood erect in the clearing, with trees grasping at it from inside the outer walls of the fortress.
When they reached the southern gate, they saw the splintered wooden doors hanging from their hinges. The wood that fashioned the doors was ancient, and not well-kept. When the Defense Division had obtained the fort, they did not plan to fix the building, but just keep a garrison of troops there. Hence why Rustkeep was in shambles.
Claude's white hair fell about his shoulders, as he approached the doors. They were fallen inwards and were overlapping each other, blocking the opening. "I do not recall our garrison being so careless as to leave these doors in such disrepair," he whispered to himself.
Ardid stepped forward and scratched his beard. "I do not believe that the garrison had a say in the matter." He reached for one of the doors and pulled it away from the remaining hinge easily, feeling the ancient wood snap from the steel hinge. He sat the door against the arched gateway and stepped inside, with Claude at his heels.
As soon as they passed through the gateway, a sudden putrid smell permeated their senses. Claude and Ardid immediately gripped their weapons, sensing something ominous.
Ardid stepped to the structure in the center of the clearing, which was the large keep, where the garrison was kept. Guards normally would have been posted on the walls outside to keep watch, but evidently, something had gone wrong.
Claude searched the clearing inside the walls but could not find any hint of the garrison that had remained here. All he had found were the tents in which they stayed, all of which were empty and untouched.
Ardid found his way through the brush to the door of the keep and called over several of the troops. Claude made his way over as well, circling the building and meeting from the opposite side in order to finish his search of the clearing.
The two men drew their weapons anxiously as the troops began to grasp at the door. It would not budge, so two of them retreated a few feet as they planned to break it down. With a charge, they slammed into the door and knocked it clear off it's hinges. The momentum of the charge forced the two to follow the door and fall to the ground on top of it.
Stepping over the two troops, Claude and Ardid stepped inside, furrowing their brows and gritting their teeth. The other soldiers that were at the door gasped and were speechless at the sight. The two soldiers that had fallen with the door looked up and screamed at the sight, immediately falling backwards when they tried to spring to their feet.
Ardid stepped forward and spoke quietly, "I suppose that's it then. We were too late."
Claude had his arms crossed and did not answer. He only continued to stare at the burnt mound of flesh before him. Limbs stuck out from its depths, and smoke rose from its peak.
The bodies had been piled against the back wall of the keep and had been burned there, sometime recently. But what displeased Claude the most was the arrow that was stuck into the wall above the peak. It was firmly planted into the wall, piercing through the eye socket of the head of the Defense Division officer, Victor.
 Ty-Harukii · Wed Aug 09, 2017 @ 11:25pm · 0 Comments |
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