THE LADY AND THE LEFT HAND

CHAPTER 6

I

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Still on edge but unable to get rough with the people to whom the mayor had given protection, the villagers set off in search of Ann, at which point Juke said to Sergei, “I’ll go with their group. You stay and take care of things here.”

“To be honest, I don’t know if I can handle it. We’ve got Rosaria to worry about, too.”

“She’s Sleeping Beauty.”

“Yeah, the Sleeping Beauty Gaskell made. But I don’t have a clue when something other than a prince’s kiss might wake her from the general’s spell. After she slits my throat, it’ll be a little late for me to say I trusted her.”

“Then tie her up good. It doesn’t look like she’s strong like the little lady was.”

Sergei sighed. “Do what you like, then. Anyway, be careful out there,” he said, waving his hand. Outside, the torches and lanterns the villagers carried danced like fireflies.

After seeing Juke off, Sergei headed straight for D’s room—in all the commotion, he’d forgotten to check on the Hunter’s left hand, which he’d been so worried about. Closing the door, Sergei was a little unsteady on his legs, but he hastily pulled himself up straight and rubbed both temples firmly.

Must be tired, he thought.

Coming up on D’s left side, Sergei knelt down. He had a grim look in his eye. Putting a piece of glass to D’s lips, he confirmed that the Hunter was barely breathing, and that the sleep upon him was so deep it was nearly death before he stood up again.

In the misty depths of his brain, a gray-haired old woman with red eyes was ordering him to do something. It seemed Gordo was there, too. Sergei was certain of what she’d said.

Taking a machete with a blade a foot and a half long out of his jacket, Sergei adjusted his grip on it time and again until he finally settled on a satisfactory stance.

Look for an opportunity to cut D’s left hand off. That’s what the old woman had told him. Although Gordo had apparently made a move first, he’d been unsuccessful. Oddly enough, the girl had interrupted him when she’d come to get rid of D’s left hand.

“Wish you could see this, Lady Ann. I’m getting rid of it now!”

Taking D’s desiccated left hand in his own and pulling it well out, Sergei swung the machete down without taking particular aim. For a second there was about as much resistance as hacking through a sapling, and then he went smoothly through the left wrist. Staring intently at the limb that was as motionless as a dead branch, Sergei tossed it to the floor. And it made a sound just like a dead branch hitting the ground.

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“What a troubling little tomboy you are,” said Mayor Camus—or rather, Dr. Gretchen in the guise of the mayor—as she quietly rose from her seat. “All your beloved flowers have closed their buds and gone to sleep. How do you intend to slay me?”

“Oh, I still have flowers.”

The mayor cocked an eyebrow, for she’d just watched Lady Ann bring her right hand up to her mouth. Lips like delicate petals opened, and the girl expelled a pale pink shape into her hand.

“This one’s called Fragrant Silent Night—it was my mother’s favorite flower. She was destroyed by my father.”

And with these words, Ann blew gently onto the tender bloom in the palm of her hand. Like a petal borne on the wind it sailed, and though it should’ve been easy enough to dodge or catch, the mayor didn’t manage to do either. Standing as still as a flower picker enthralled by a bloom, she took it right in the middle of the forehead. Roots ran beneath the skin and the light pink flower swiftly turned a darker shade.

“Dear me,” one of them muttered, but it happened to be Ann.

The flower was a far deadlier weapon than it appeared, but it had turned a horrid color and withered feebly.

“Ann, didn’t your father ever tell you my specialty was the field of toxin research?” the old woman laughed sinisterly. Her solemn features overlapped with a youthful countenance of unimaginable beauty. Even when the laughter stopped, the old face didn’t return.

“Dr. Gretchen!” Lady Ann said, shouting the name of her formidable opponent once more.

“Young lady, are you acquainted with the portrait of me from before my resurrection?” asked the beautiful woman dressed in the mayor’s clothes. Apparently she was a narcissist and shameless self-promoter—she wanted to talk about her past so badly she couldn’t help herself.

“Not even I know for certain when it was that I was born, aside from the fact that it must’ve been more than six thousand years ago. I first became interested in toxins at the age of two. Yes, I believe I recall it quite clearly. My father concocted poisons as a pastime, you see, and he experimented on me. He said he wanted to see just how much the agony could distort my lovely face. And his wish was granted; I went through hell. Every drop of blood boiled in my veins, and my brain and organs melted. Blood shot from every pore on my body, and I even spat up my own entrails. I cursed my father. I cursed the Sacred Ancestor, too. But a miracle occurred. In the midst of that pain and torment, my soul knew the joy of triumphing over it all. Can you understand that? The sweet taste of pain that you might never savor, the splendor of the poison that produced it. Shocked by the results, my father apologized to me, and I asked him to teach me about toxins. And you know the reason why three millennia later I’d earned a place in the history of the Nobility as ‘the woman who never should’ve been born,’ don’t you?”

It was a long, boastful talk. Ann nodded numbly. The answer she knew to that question didn’t make listening to Dr. Gretchen’s gasconade any more agreeable. Showing no fear, the girl said in a voice that was like a song, “You administered poison to more than fifty thousand Nobles, knowing full well that even the most virulent toxin you made wouldn’t kill them. Instead, your concoctions had the power to make those Nobles suffer for all eternity. You kept them hidden in the basement of your castle, where you toyed with them.”

“I gave them every conceivable poison and studied their reactions. Immortal and indestructible—can you think of anything more perfect for experimentation than subjects who would last forever? Still, men and women reacted differently. The effects of the drugs were different on babies and old people. Ah, what sweet, happy times those were! One drop of the beautiful drugs I concocted would make a little girl’s abdomen swell up like an ant’s and burst, or make the naked body of a countess melt away like mud. I believe it was the ruler of the Duchy of Richeur whose agony was such that he clawed at his own body, peeling off skin and rending flesh until he was nothing but a skeleton and a brain. Nevertheless, he didn’t die. Torn apart or liquefied, they would live forever, tormented by unending pain. When the Sacred Ancestor apprehended me, fifty thousand dying but deathless Nobility were found in my domain, so that was the official toll given for my victims. But in the Mountains of Madness in a location unbeknownst to the Sacred Ancestor, a hundred times that number still groan in agony. At present, I’m considering going back to them someday and continuing my experiments. Actually, I’ve already engaged in some—in the castle of the great General Gaskell. I can’t change what I am. I can’t be stopped. After capturing you and slaying D, I intend to return to the general’s territory as swiftly as possible.”

Despite the fact that anyone would’ve found her experiments abhorrent, what radiated from every inch of the woman who’d conducted them was a fascination with the unknown and an enthusiasm of a purity beyond compare.

“No matter what else that Hunter may be, he’s a human half-breed, after all. Though I’m sure he can’t begin to compare to the Nobles I’ve used, his beauteous countenance makes even my heart beat faster. I wish to see him suffer from my poison. I wish to watch as blood runs from his every orifice, as his eyes pop out, as he bites through his own lips. And I’ve already given two humans orders toward that end.”

“Two humans? Gordo and—”

“You said it yourself earlier, did you not? Who was with him when I put him under a spell?”

“Sergei!” the girl exclaimed, literally leaping into the air. The name of the other man the dreaded toxicologist would’ve encountered had flashed before her. He was still with D!

Turning in astonishment—in other words, turning her back to the doctor—was a mistake Ann made out of concern for D. A needle was thrust deep between her shoulder blades. A foot in length, the needle had a semitransparent tube less than a millimeter in diameter stretching from its back end into the mouth of the mayor—or Dr. Gretchen. Suddenly, an ocher liquid flowed through the tube. One of the doctor’s beloved poisons was being injected into Ann’s body.

“First, let’s start with a little game,” the doctor said with a grin.

Lady Ann had bent backward the second she was pierced, and she ran now for the door without ever breaking that pose. The needle came free, whistling as it was sucked back into the doctor’s mouth.

As Ann got to the doorway, she coughed violently. She could feel terrible fever and chills racing through her body.

“What do you intend to do?” Dr. Gretchen called out, her voice following the girl out the door. “D still sleeps, and two of the men who guard him are my puppets. And all of the surrounding villagers respect me. D must die here!”

Ann ran to the front hall. When she was ten feet from the door, it opened from the other side and villagers came pouring in. Seeing Ann halted there, they were stunned for a moment, but they quickly turned and shouted to those behind them, “Here she is!”

Ann jumped to the left. There was a window. The glass glittered like fragments of the moon as it shattered. Crushing a number of those pieces underfoot, the lovely little girl ran on by the light of the real moon.

Where are you going, and what do you seek? There can be no salvation now, Ann!

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II

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Ann was irritated by how slow her legs were. Near and far, here and there, she could hear choruses of shouts announcing they’d found her or asking where she was. As long as she could hear them, she knew she could move with relative freedom.

Suddenly catching a bit of “—to the assembly hall,” Ann was horrified.

A number of the torches that danced in the darkness were moving in the same direction as her goal. They were probably going on instructions from the mayor—Dr. Gretchen. But at their current speed, she still had a chance.

Racing back like a gust of wind, Ann found no sign of anyone around the assembly hall and made straight for D’s room. Running over to where D lay all alone, Ann pulled back the sheets and was left breathless. D’s left hand was gone. From the look of the wound, she could guess the weapon and the way it’d been used.

Glancing at the floor, Ann called out, “Where are you, Mr. Left Hand? I need your power, you see. Aid me for the sake of my D.”

After that, she listened hard for a response.

Five seconds . . . Ten . . . Twenty . . .

Off in the distance, she could hear people’s voices growing nearer.

“I’ve no choice but to take him with me,” she said, starting toward D’s bed.

Just then, there was the small, hard knock of something weakly springing from the floor. There could be no mistaking the direction Ann’s eyes turned: under D’s bed.

Kneeling on the floor, Ann craned her neck to peek beneath it.

The withered hand was in such a sad state, it wouldn’t be surprising if she’d failed to tell it from an ordinary piece of trash.

“Say, can you hear me? My name is Lady Ann.”

If she didn’t get an answer, she intended to pull off a finger or two to bring it back to its senses. After all, it was Lady Ann who’d put it in that shape to begin with. There were any number of ways she could fix it.

“What do you want?” said a feeble and painfully hoarse voice, but it was definitely the same one as before.

Ann’s little chest was filled to bursting with hope and relief.

“You’re still alive, just as I thought.”

“I might’ve shriveled up, but I don’t die that easy. So why is it . . . you’re looking for me?”

“To save my beloved D. There’s no time now so I can’t explain in detail, but the mayor is Dr. Gretchen in disguise. She’s the most dangerous poison specialist in the entire history of the Nobility. She’s using Mr. Gordo and Mr. Sergei to go after my D.”

A faint sound spilled from the left hand—a short, feeble sigh.

“There’s no one who seems likely to cooperate with me aside from you and Mr. Juke. That’s why I’ve come back.”

“I see . . . The way you feel . . . about him . . . it’s no joke. First thing to do . . . is get me and D out of here. Can you do that?”

“Yes.”

Just as Ann was replying, there was the sound of the front door being thrown open, and footsteps and voices soon followed. Quickly reaching out and grabbing the left hand, Ann stood up, got D from the bed, and threw him over her shoulder. Although her intentions toward the left hand were now the complete opposite of what they’d once been, the girl didn’t find this the least bit strange.

With a full-grown man over the shoulder of what looked to be a ten-year-old’s body and the severed left hand in her right hand, she started at an easy run toward the window, and then fell forward.

“What . . . are you doing? You little idiot . . .” the left hand cursed weakly as it fell on the floor, but then it gasped in a louder tone.

While under the bed, it hadn’t been able to make out Lady Ann’s face because she was backlit, but now it saw with perfect clarity.

“Who the hell are you?” it asked.

The ever-innocent face of the girl struggling madly to rise from the floor had ballooned to twice its normal size, and probably due to the fever it was also bruised a deep black. And it wasn’t just her face. Her arms, legs, and the rest of her body were so grossly swollen that no trace of the innocent little girl remained.

“You . . . got poisoned . . . right? Surprised you made it this far . . .
in the shape you’re in . . .”

Ann didn’t hear the left hand’s words of praise. She was desperately trying to get her poison-filled body to rise again.

Somehow making it to her feet, she’d no sooner resumed carrying D and the left hand when the door was thrown open and human figures spilled through the opening like a pile of soapsuds.

“There she is!”

“She’s trying to make off with that injured guy!”

“Where are the stakes? And somebody bring me a hammer!”

Three men with rifles appeared in the doorway and, after looking at Ann, they moved to the very forefront of the villagers, dropped to one knee, and took aim. Their stake-firing guns were already cocked. Propelled by compressed gas at an impressive sixteen hundred feet per second, the rough wooden stakes would probably have little trouble piercing Lady Ann’s heart.

It appeared the admirable fight this fearsome little girl had put up had come to an end.

“Cover your mouth with my palm,” the hoarse voice told her.

She said nothing either in agreement or disagreement. Out of pure reflex, Ann pressed the mummified palm to her mouth. Something soft touched her lips—the tiny pair of lips that’d formed on the palm. And from between them, something warm went into her mouth.

“Fire!” someone cried.

Three wooden shafts flew toward the innocent little girl’s chest faster than the speed of sound. As proof that their aim was dead on Ann, all three shafts collided in the same spot, sending each other flying. One of the three flew toward the window, and at the very same moment a strange little figure slipped out through the now glass-free window, becoming one with the darkness.

As soon as she landed, Ann raced for the nearby forest.

From the left hand she gripped with her right, a fragmented tone was heard to say, “Well . . . how did you like my kiss?”

“I feel much better now,” Ann replied. She still felt languid to the marrow of her bones, but power was filling her. Though it had been only a minute amount, the energy the left hand’s lips had blown into her mouth had been of a high purity. The swelling in her face went down rapidly.

“That’ll hold you . . . for two hours,” the left hand said. “Bury D in the ground. It’s all . . . up to you.”

Even Ann could tell the energy she’d just received had been the left hand’s last. Her right hand grew heavy. Whether the limb she held had died or merely fainted didn’t matter to Ann. Ordinarily, she would’ve discarded it at this point or finished it off. The only reason she’d saved it was in the hopes of helping D.

The area around the assembly hall was full of silhouettes and streaks of light. Weaving her way between them, Ann made her way the better part of a mile into the forest. She knew what she should do.

In an inky darkness not even the moonlight could penetrate, her dainty hands began clawing at the earth. Her sweet little face had nearly returned to normal. Partway through the job, the sound of digging halted—it was a nasty trick of the blocked poison. Horrible chills threatened to rob her of her consciousness, but the little girl battled through them, her hands and clothes smeared with dirt as she continued digging up the ground.

In no time, a long sigh of satisfaction flowed from between the clustered trees.

“I wonder if I should bury your head as well,” the girl mused. “No, then you wouldn’t be able to breathe.”

She carried D into the hole, laid him out, and covered him with dirt.

“This will bring you back to life,” she said, and though she was breathing quite raggedly, there was a ring of relief to her voice. “But if by some chance it doesn’t, I won’t let anyone touch you but me. If you don’t awaken, we’ll stay here forever—no, I shall find an opening, and together we’ll run away. All you need to do is keep sleeping. I’ll look after you for the rest of your days. And if, I say, if your dhampir mortality can’t be overcome, then at that time I, too, shall pass, my beloved.”

The ardor the innocent girl’s heart contained must’ve been great, for her confession in the darkness laid bare her true feelings—feelings so intense and painful her body burned with them. But there was no one there to listen. D continued to slumber quietly, and his left hand was also out of commission. Though it was pointless to go on speaking, Lady Ann didn’t see the pointlessness of it.

When her monologue was finished, the girl’s eyes burned with a fierce determination, and her brain worked incessantly. Sooner or later, someone would come looking for them. Before that happened, she had to break through their perimeter and get D out of the village—and by dawn at the latest. After that, it would be a journey just for the two of them. The ten-year-old girl fantasized lovingly about traveling around carrying the unconscious D—it was perhaps the first satisfaction her soul had ever known. If only he would truly never wake again! Exaltation and a counterbalancing sadness rose in Ann, bringing her to tears.

It was probably due to being lost in these powerful emotions that she didn’t sense anyone approaching. The instant the sound of a twig snapping underfoot echoed against her eardrum, Ann spun around.

A white light shone directly in the girl’s face.

“Don’t move!”

“Here she is!” a man said, turning and cupping his hands around his mouth.

“Don’t call anyone!” another one told him. “We’re gonna take care of this little girl ourselves. There’s the next election for the mayor to think of.”

“Damn, you’ve got a point there.”

By this time, Ann’s eyes had clearly picked three strong men and the stake guns they carried from the darkness.

“Freak, we won’t let you get away this time!” said the man carrying the incandescent lamp, his voice trembling—after all, they’d run into a Noble in the middle of the night. Obviously he’d never experienced fear quite like this before.

Thousands of years had passed since the Nobility went into decline, so there weren’t very many chances now to encounter a Noble, especially not one who was a little girl as pretty as a doll. It was on account of this that the men didn’t faint or flee from abject terror and shock. They also had another very good reason—the election for mayor one of them had mentioned.

“All three of these things fire stakes,” one of the men said. “And we’re the best shots in the village. No matter how you try to run, we’ll make sure at least two of them hit the bull’s-eye. Just accept it.”

“There’s one thing I must verify,” Ann said fearlessly. “You won’t do anything to him . . . Am I correct?”

The light of the lantern shifted, revealing D’s face. Any way you looked at it, it was a horrifying sight, but the handsome features the light fell upon had a beauty so intense it left the men dazed. The lantern was lowered. The man who carried it had a blank look on his face.

Taking a hard kick in the ass, the man with the lantern came back to his senses. The light was raised again.

“Snap out of it!” the center figure snarled at him in a harsh tone. He was the same one who’d said not to call anyone and who’d mentioned the election.

Turning to Ann, he said, “Sad to say it, but this trouble started with you two—because we let a Noble and Noble half-breed into the village. Those freaking transport guys will be looking at some fines, I’m sure, but we’ll finish with you two right here. After that, it’ll just be a matter of convincing everyone I made the right decision.”

His ghastly determination had given rise to this bold tone.

“If it were a matter of me alone, I would’ve been in a quandary, but now you say you mean to harm him as well,” Lady Ann said in a tone that was actually quite bracing, delivering the words like a soliloquy. But as she stood next to where D’s head poked from the ground—with her sweet little face glowing pale in the circle of light and her eyes alone raised to stare at the men—something terrible lurked in her gaze. The second she’d heard they’d take the life of the man she loved, the dear little girl had been transformed into a demoness.

However, the center man shouted, “Fire!”

Was there anything that could be done to save Ann in the heartbeat that followed?

Perhaps there was. As proof, all three of the men clutched at their throats, clawed at the sky, then toppled every which way. By the time they hit the ground, black blood gushed from their noses and mouths and they’d breathed their last. They’d gone through their death throes while they fell.

Perhaps the way they died tipped her off, or maybe it was the superkeen senses unique to the Nobility, but Ann put one hand over her mouth, then crouched down to press the other one over D’s.

From the depths of the darkness a voice carried on the night wind could be heard to say, “You can relax for the time being. For those of Noble blood, it’s no more than a sweet perfume.”

“Dr. Gretchen!”

Mayor Camus walked out of the stand of trees that towered behind where the three men had fallen. Despite the fact that the terrain was a twisted mess of snaking tree roots, her gait was as smooth as if she were on level ground.

“I sowed poison in the wind. Now, leave D there and go. If you don’t, then Noble or not, I’ll send a deadly poison at you that will leave you in eternal pain.”

Just for a moment, Ann hesitated. Dr. Gretchen’s experiments had been so outrageous not even her fellow Nobles could hide their disgust. It came as no surprise the girl’s tiny heart nearly stopped. However, a second later Ann cursed herself for her indecision.

Who cares if she performs vivisection on me or dissolves my body? It doesn’t matter what happens to me. So long as I can save my precious D, I shall gladly go into the sleep of death.

Ann spat another flower up into her hand, this one a pale purple bud. In the same manner as before, she breathed on it and sent it flying at Dr. Gretchen. Again the blossom withered and fell from the doctor’s brow.

“Stop this foolishness. I don’t know how it is you still have enough strength left for that, but let my poisoned wind now ravage both of you.”

But before the doctor/mayor had finished her declaration, the ground shook. The doctor was thrown well off balance, and her sinister wind blew off into the ether.

Stumbling and falling on her back when her foot caught on a root, Ann saw an enormous silhouette rising from the earth between Dr. Gretchen and herself and cried, “Father!”

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III

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“Duke of Xenon—does your madness extend this far?” Dr. Gretchen shouted as she barely managed to regain her balance and secure her footing, but a second later she peered at the figure dominating the darkness and cried out in astonishment, “Grand Duke Mehmet!”

“Indeed, it is I, Mehmet,” the huge figure said, bowing.

Though the movement was fluid, the doctor was familiar with this Noble’s name and his style of combat, and she’d also determined the true nature of the gigantic silhouette.

“Mehmet’s machine man,” she muttered.

Standing more than twelve feet tall, the enormous humanoid machine was Grand Duke Mehmet’s weapon. This robot—or android, to be technical—was a device born of the Nobility’s science, but capable of far more intricate movements than other machines, which made it as graceful as any human. Just look at it. Black hair swaying in the night breeze, a dauntless mask of oriental styling resting on a bronzed face, threads of gold and silver, blue, red, and purple—his dazzling cape and clothes were stitched with the most brilliant hues. It didn’t differ in the slightest from the real Grand Duke Mehmet—aside from the fact that it was gigantic, its face and build were a perfect duplicate of his own. In comparison, the combat exoskeleton worn by Ann’s father—the Duke of Xenon—was a rough suit of armor utterly devoid of artistic sense.

And there was another difference between the two.

“Where are you, Grand Duke Mehmet?” the doctor said to him.

“In the basement of General Gaskell’s castle. I fear I’ve imbibed a bit too much wine,” the giant doll of Mehmet replied.

Although the Duke of Xenon’s armor required him to be inside the exoskeleton controlling it, Grand Duke Mehmet’s machine man was, as the name implied, a marionette that could be freely operated from a great distance. It went without saying which of the two offered the greater safety and convenience for its operator.

“How enviable, Grand Duke Mehmet. In that case, why don’t you relax and dream of your long-lost kingdom?”

“Actually, I can’t do that,” the great image of the grand duke said, placing a hand over his mouth and letting a gentle burp escape.

Gentle? It sounded like a rumbling deep in the earth!

He said, “The great general told you what would happen if you threatened the duke’s precious daughter. Anyone can see that the general is going about this the wrong way. On hearing that you’d been sent out, the duke informed the general that if so much as a scratch came to Ann, he and all his clan would be turned against Gaskell, at which point our great general hastened to send me. My, but he has the strangest weaknesses.”

Letting out what sounded like a sigh, he continued, “From his basement I sent out my reconnaissance bugs, which finally found you. I made it here in the nick of time, thank goodness. Now I’d like you to cease and desist.”

“That precocious little princess is crazy with love,” the doctor said, and she too heaved a sigh, only hers was a hundred times more refined than that of the grand duke’s stand-in. “Without eliminating her, slaying D will be impossible.”

“You will have to leave that to me.”

“I can’t believe this.”

“Hey, now!” the false grand duke said somewhat sadly. “I thought that might be the case, so I brought the written orders from the general with me. Satisfied?”

“They’re fake.”

“Doctor . . .”

“I healed the great general’s wound so I might gain permission to be out here now. I won’t allow anyone to interfere with me. D is my prey! Step aside.”

“Then there’s no avoiding this,” the gigantic Mehmet said, his upper body bending back far.

He took a deep breath in preparation for the coming battle.

Still looking up at the night sky, he said, “This me is a machine. Your poison won’t work on me, Dr. Gretchen.”

“I wonder about that,” the doctor replied, her words suddenly halting with a choked groan. The fake grand duke’s hand had seized her neck with lightning speed. Gasping unintelligibly, her agonized face turned purple before the Nobleman’s night-piercing gaze.

“Now, let us return to the castle, Doctor,” the giant declared gently. “Oh—I almost forgot the most important part.”

His body turned to the right and he extended his other hand to Ann, who was still on her rear on the ground.

“Back you go to your father—”

Sheathed by an enormous armored glove, the hand convulsed terribly.

“Wh-why, my body’s going numb . . . It can’t be . . .”

“It worked on you, didn’t it, Grand Duke Mehmet?”

Swiftly slipping free from the grasp of the trembling fingers, Dr. Gretchen took cover behind a thick stand of trees, and then began to explain what she’d done.

“Which one of you is in pain, milord? This odious impostor, or the real you far off in the castle?”

“W-why me? You—when did you poison me, Doctor?”

“Back at the castle.”

Ignoring the agonized giant, the doctor focused her attention on what lay beyond its massive form.

“I don’t believe in any of that nonsense about working with colleagues toward a common goal. It was my misfortune to be born into a world where enemies surround me. That’s why I dispersed poison in the castle, too. Since this isn’t the great general’s domain, this probably won’t reach his ears,” she laughed.

“How could you . . . do such a thing? Do you intend . . . to do away with the lot of us?” he cried, spitting the words like a gout of blood, and then black blood actually did fall to the ground like rain.

What an intricate device this was! The instant Grand Duke Mehmet vomited blood off in the distant castle, the machine man spat up blood here.

The ideal machine, it was truly one with its operator. What allowed it to mimic every little movement of the operator were devices developed by scientists of the Nobility called “synchronizing circuits”—also known as “doppelgänger circuits.” It was said a machine man equipped with these circuits would shed sorrowful tears when its operator wallowed in an abyss of grief, and if that person were wounded, the machine would bleed from the same spot. And that was indeed the case.

“This poison only goes into effect when the person exposed to it harbors murderous intent against me. But fear not. As a Noble, you should recover from it in less than an hour. In the meantime, I shall be busy,” she continued, circling around the writhing machine man.

“They’re gone!” she exclaimed, her eyes wide with astonishment.

Surely the little girl possessed abilities far exceeding anything any of them could’ve imagined. In the scant time the doctor and the machine man had been fighting, Ann had unearthed D—who’d been buried up to the neck—and carried him as she made her escape.

“Damn that little bitch!”

As the doctor stood there, the sound of her teeth grinding ringing out, voices cried out behind her.

“The earthquake was this way.”

“Oh, there’s something over here!”

“Bring the stakes!”

The voices of the villagers sailed through the air, about 70 percent tension and the remaining 30 percent full of fight.

Clucking her tongue once, the doctor turned in their direction with the face of the mayor and shouted in the voice of the same, “Over here! There’s a Noble about! Somebody help me!”

And to the machine man, who was panting breathlessly, she said, “People are coming. Go wreak some havoc before you leave.”

What followed was a tremendous nightmare for the village of Krakow. The colossal figure of a suspected Noble appeared from the forest and trampled every villager that crossed his path or struck them dead before vanishing into the darkness. In the time it took him to leave the village, the death toll reached twenty, and eight houses were utterly destroyed. Witnesses testified that its face was just like a human’s and that it walked almost like it was drunk, but these accounts were attributed to the trauma and excitement of the disaster.

It was nearly dawn before a brief period of peace was finally reclaimed thanks to the mayor’s instructions. With no place else to direct their rage, the villagers naturally turned to the transport party. Though Juke had been involved in the search, he was tied up, while a mob burst into the assembly hall and hauled Sergei, Gordo, and even Rosaria off to the local jail. It should be noted that this treatment wasn’t the norm—the code of the Frontier said that anyone connected to the Nobility was to immediately be expelled. This was due to concerns that the Nobility would take revenge if any harm were to come to their cohorts. But it was Mayor Camus who’d instructed them to do so.

She’d told the frightened and perplexed villagers, “This isn’t merely about what happened in our town; it’s a perfect opportunity to show the world that we’re all sick of being threatened by the Nobility.”

A number of the villagers voiced their objections.

In reply, she said, “If they go to another village and do something similar, we’re going to regret tossing them out for all our days.”

That shut them up.

“In light of the village’s losses, they’re all to be beheaded. The sentence is to be carried out publicly at noon tomorrow,” she said, for some reason giving them another day to live.

__

†

__

Ann was happy—she’d managed to get out of the village with D and his left hand thanks to the mayhem the fake Grand Duke Mehmet had caused. After running on and on through the dark of night, it was nearly dawn when she hid in some ancient ruins several miles from the village. Though the foglike shield that General Gaskell had given her to allow her to move about in daylight covered her from head to toe, daybreak couldn’t help but pain this child of fiendish blood. Ann writhed in agony in the watery light that speared in through holes in the roof and walls, panting as she tore up the brick floor, dug into the black earth that was exposed, then buried D in it. Around the time she finished doing this, the sunshine grew stronger and the light that’d come to the world while she was occupied seared her diminutive form mercilessly.

“That shield will only last three days,” the general had instructed her sternly. Still, when the girl lay down in the shadows formed by the stone columns and walls, her heart was filled with both relief at having protected the one she loved and joyous anticipation of the night to come. There lay the world of the Nobility, where human hands could never reach them. Even if her shield failed, she didn’t think it would be terribly difficult to hide themselves from humans and the sun by day. She would just keep on going—through a world of moonlight and star shine and night winds, just D and her.

Without having a chance to investigate the furthest reaches of the ruins, Ann fell fast asleep. When she awoke, her body told her it was still the middle of the day. She recognized the young lady who now stood before her. The people in the wagon had called the one who’d been asleep the whole time Rosaria.

“What do you—” Ann began, her tone like a cry of agony as she tried to go into a combat stance but failed.

The young lady looked at her sadly, and then turned around.

“Where are you going?”

Trying to stand but unable to do so, Ann used her hands and feet to crawl across the floor. When she rounded a column, D came into view. Rosaria knelt by his side, and she seemed to be telling him something. Only bits and pieces reached the girl’s ears, things like “tomorrow morning” and “execution.”

She felt a terrible foreboding. That young lady was trying to bring D back to his old world, wasn’t she?

“He can’t hear you,” Ann shouted, clinging to the column to pull herself up. “Really, he can’t—so go back.”

By the time she’d spat one of her deadly blooms into the palm of her hand, Rosaria was fading as if she were dissolving into the abundant glow. A ray of the refreshing light burned Ann’s body, but the agonized girl crept toward D.

He was there.

“Ah . . .”

A glittering something spilled from the girl’s eyes. Ann had forgotten that they were called tears. But her heart still clung to the melancholy feelings that had given rise to them.

“Don’t go . . . Please don’t go anywhere. Stay with me . . . always.”