Death to an Odd Sort of Noble

Chapter 1

There was only the faintest of winds. It wasn’t on account of the figure the hue of darkness, who entered through the main gate, that the blades of green grass filling either side of the marble road swayed. The boots the figure wore didn’t make a sound. There was nothing at all to betray his presence. Even the cowardly insects that were like a blanket under the moonlight wouldn’t move. Perhaps he was made of the very same stuff as the darkness.

The figure went into the ruins. The front garden was so vast it seemed it would take the wind days to sweep across it, though naught but weeds grew there, poking their faces from tumbled stone walls and mounds of rubble to give the place an air of desolation. It was clear that the ruined minarets and ramparts in the distance had suffered explosions. Even the paved stone road the figure traveled showed definite signs of damage from fire. The light of the crescent moon poured down like a white waterfall. As if to say, This is a world of decay, and there are none of the living here.

The shadowy figure halted.

The half-collapsed marble gate could be considered the main feature of the garden, and beneath it there glowed a silent woman in a white dress. Black hair that hung all the way down to her waist swayed incessantly. There was no wind. It had died out a short time ago.

The woman called out the shadowy figure’s name. “D”, she said. Her tone was low, like a sigh. A pale purple veil covered her mouth.

“Yes,” the figure said. He had a cold, hard voice that seemed as if it could freeze the moonlight or the wind. “Are you Sirene?”

“Indeed, I am.”

“I’d like to confirm the job—you wish me to do away with Duke Van Doren, administrator of the northern Frontier sectors?”

“You are correct, sir.”

“A hundred thousand dalas.”

“Here,” the woman said, taking something small and glittering off her right index finger. “Catch.”

It arced through the moonlight, as if drawn to D’s left hand.

“It’s moonstone,” said a hoarse voice that didn’t reach the woman’s ears. “Just a chunk of rock to the Nobility, but humans would pay a million dalas for it. If folks find out you’ve got it, everybody we meet’s gonna try and make like a thief!”

“I’ll give you your change,” D told the woman—Sirene.

She shook her head and replied, “You needn’t bother. I won’t be needing it anymore.”

“In that case, give it to your relatives.”

“Please do that for me. Give it to Myosha Lanaway in the village of Wihemin, Darigles County, the northern Frontier.”

“My job is doing away with Nobility.”

“I don’t have time to look for anyone else. I must be going soon.”

“Oh,” the hoarse voice responded.

Whether or not Sirene took that for D’s voice was unclear as she continued, “My real name is Cecilia Lanaway. A century ago I became the wife of Duke Van Doren. Myosha is the name of my former husband.”

D didn’t say anything. There was no way her former husband would still be alive. And she must’ve known that, too. But the young man in black had no interest in other people’s lives.

“Your request is accepted. Where is the duke?”

“In his primary castle, about forty miles northwest of here. He didn’t even flee when the people under his dominion rebelled.”

“I understand,” D said, turning his back to her. The hem of his coat sailed out like the wing of a supernatural bird.

“Please, wait,” the woman said to him, extending one hand. The voice suddenly sank.

D halted.

“I say this just so you’ll know. Both the citizens of his domain and bandit groups are after the duke. And in a few days, an armed ‘survey party’ from the Capital should be coming. Please don’t slay the duke until he has slain all of them.”

“Sounds like Mister Popularity,” the hoarse voice said mockingly. This time, it reached Sirene’s ears. “Everybody’s underestimating the Nobility. This Duke Van Doren guy seems like he’s incredibly lazy or just a coward. But even at his weakest, he’d probably have enough power to turn those under him to dust with one finger.”

“You’re exactly right,” Sirene said, a ring of surprise to her voice. She hadn’t taken those disparaging remarks just now as coming from D.

“So, you hire this guy to do away with your husband because you don’t want the greedy bastards to get to him first? Which means what? You want your husband destroyed at your bidding?”

“A very good question. I—I simply couldn’t let him go on that way.”

“Sometimes there are folks like that. As a human, you’re odd enough for wanting to serve the Nobility with all your heart. Love ’em too much, and you push yourself to the point where it can’t help but destroy you. Let’s get one thing straight; a Noble can’t love a human as a person. At best, they might love ’em about as much as people love cats or dogs, you—gyaaaaah?!”

His hand still clenched in a fist, D started to walk away.

“There is something I’d like to ask you about,” said Sirene. “Why didn’t you ride your horse all the way in here?”

There was no reply. The figure in black just kept dwindling in the light of the moon.

“Could it be that it was because the paving stones were simply too beautiful? These stones were chosen and their arrangement decided by my beloved.”

The figure had nearly vanished.

Sirene reached a hand around to her back for her dagger, tossed away the scabbard, and plunged the blade through her own heart without the slightest hesitation.

“I hear that dhampirs have Noble blood in them,” she said. “I hope my beloved might, at the very least, be destroyed at the hands of one who understands the Noble mind before he’s swallowed up by tragedy. Death and destruction are the end.”

Bluish-gray dust flowed from the bottom of her dress. The white garment lost its shape as the body within it became something else.

“D . . . I beg of you . . . let my beloved . . . be buried . . . with my thoughts and memories,” said a girl who looked to be only sixteen or seventeen, barely squeezing out the words before she turned to dust.

“She’s gone,” the hoarse voice said wearily as the Hunter was up in the saddle, riding his cyborg horse away from the castle. “Suicide, eh? Been a while since I’ve seen one of those. A rare thing with the Nobility dying out, but leave it to a human to do that.”

“She was a servant of the Nobility.”

“Hey, now,” the hoarse voice started to say, but then it stopped. It had given up. No one had a harsher opinion of the Nobility and the humans they’d bitten than this young man.

“But the job itself is a problem,” the left hand continued. “From what I hear, Duke Julius Van Doren, administrator of the northern Frontier sectors, is a valiant leader and soldier. Even you couldn’t tackle this like you normally do. And the bandits prowling the area are the Pitch Black Gang. They’re a band of ruthless outlaws that’ve tamed monsters the Nobility created, and rumor has it they can even use some of their weapons. Plus, there’s that survey party from the Capital—‘survey’ has a nice ring to it, but they’re all just a bunch of jerks slobbering over a chance to swipe some of the Nobility’s inventions or technology and make themselves rich. And they ain’t above murder.”

And after saying that, the voice trembled a bit as it continued, “And now you can’t drop it. A curse on her for setting it up that way. She might want Duke Van Doren to have a peaceful death, but it sure ain’t gonna be easy.”

Not even the hoarse voice’s assertion could draw an answer from D.

Light like ice spread across the eastern sky, and the darkness around him was losing its hue moment by moment.

The northern Frontier was called a land of black forests and lakes. Paint a page completely black, add a few splashes of blue, and you’d have a map of the northern Frontier. Winds constantly roamed the plains, nimbus clouds relentlessly hung overhead to provide rain, but occasional sunlight was allowed to peek from between the clouds. When it did, the light gave the mountains, plains, and villages a golden glow, and children and animals alike raced outside to enjoy the sunlight to its fullest.

It was thirty minutes later that D arrived at the base of the hill overlooking Castle Van Doren. He’d covered forty miles at a gallop. For him, that was slow.

There was no rain, but the color of the heavens was far from blue, and there were occasional rumbles of thunder in the distance, investing the heavens with a dull light.

“Strange domain, ain’t it?” remarked the hoarse voice from the vicinity of the Hunter’s left hand, which gripped the reins. “Here’s a land where the Nobility still has complete control over the folks in their domain. Through fear, namely.”

“Can we get in?” D inquired. It was rare that he asked a question.

“Easy as pie. He ain’t even got a force field up. Either he’s a Nobleman who likes to leave himself wide open, he’s incredibly self-confident—or he ain’t even trying.”

The reins shook, and then the cyborg horse started down the road to the castle. To either side of the road stood a row of enormous Legran cedars, with branches large and small intertwining to form a natural canopy about a hundred and fifty feet above the road. Even when the sun was at its highest, the road would likely remain in gloomy darkness.

Climbing a stone-paved road with a gentle incline that couldn’t have even been ten degrees, the Hunter came to a square before the main gates. The stones that made up the road spread like wings there, paving the whole ground.

“What, no welcoming committee?” the hoarse voice jibed.

From dawn to dusk, the abodes of Nobles had impenetrable defenses for two miles all around. Lasers and land mines and monsters for starters, dimensional cannons or orbital plasma cannons, systems for using asteroids from our own solar system as meteorite bombs, temporal vortex cannons and the like would be waiting for any invaders.

There was none of that here.

“On top of that, there ain’t any signs at all of fighting here in the square. I’d heard there hadn’t been any rebellions, and it looks like it’s true. Wonder if that outpost castle we were just at was destroyed after it was abandoned. I don’t care how mild-mannered a Noble is, humans would’ve left a mark or two on their castles back in the days of the Great Rebellion. Was this Nobleman really that good of an administrator for ’em?”

As the voice spoke, D rode on.

Before the main gates was a moat about sixty feet wide. Its black waters reflected the cyborg horse and D where they halted at the brink.

“So, how are we getting across?” the hoarse voice asked, but then it immediately groaned, “What the hell?”

The distant gate was slowly falling. It doubled as a drawbridge.

“Strike that remark about the welcoming committee. This is a real warm welcome.”

Ignoring the hoarse voice, D rode onto the bridge. Perhaps he gave no thought to this being a trap, for he rode on in silence, crossing the bridge without saying a single word.

Within the gate was an inner courtyard. Ramparts that looked to be about a hundred fifty feet high surrounded it, and from atop those walls countless old-fashioned cannons were pointed in the Hunter’s direction. By the look of them, they used gunpowder and fired cannonballs. There were figures beside the cannons. Beneath that ash-gray sky, they gazed at D without moving a muscle.

“They’re androids. I don’t sense any human presence or vitality around the castle.”

If one were to look more closely, they might have spied figures in the windows of the towers and minarets. They took the shape of young Noblewomen with golden hair, red-headed ladies-in-waiting, and black-haired servants. Those in uniform were probably guards.

When D reached the very center of the courtyard, a voice from the top of the castle walls to his right called down to him, “Halt!” It was youthful. The voice of a man in his thirties. However, it was that of an android.

Halting his steed, D turned toward the speaker.

“Someone will be out to meet you presently. Wait there,” the android said, rather unexpectedly. He wore a deep blue cape over his military garb. He was an officer.

“I’ll be damned. Not only are they gonna sit back and let you waltz in, but now they’re sending somebody to greet you? Watch yourself. No telling what they’re up to!”

D turned forward again, for the doors to the castle had opened.

A golden light had come into the dim world.

The trio of women had blonde hair that nearly touched the ground, and it swayed faintly in the breeze. Leaving the ones in the cerulean and indigo dresses behind, the woman in the azure dress came forward. She halted about a yard shy of the cyborg horse. She was so lovely the left hand let out an appreciative groan. And the instant she saw D, the woman brought her hands up to her cheeks. Pink quickly suffused her face. She wasn’t a human being. This was the reaction of a mechanical person—an android.

The left hand let out another gasp. This time it was for a different reason.

“I am known as Shyna. The master is waiting.”

If ever there was a voice like golden chimes, it was hers.

“Van Doren can remain awake in the morning?” asked D.

“For a short time. This way.”

Shyna turned, introducing the waiting Mysch in the cerulean dress and Najina in indigo. The cheeks of both had long since flushed. The two of them flanked the cyborg horse. They were not simply a reception committee. They also doubled as guards. And they had another role—as assassins.

D got off his steed just in front of the door.

The castle was filled with the light of morning. There was no frosted glass, no curtains or shades drawn.

Letting in an abundance of natural light—though that hardly suited a vampire’s physiology, it was wholly in keeping with the “nostalgic taste” imprinted even more deeply into the DNA of the Nobility. The Nobles had taken no greater pains than to ensure so much sunlight got into their stone castles that it seemed like it would melt the place. It was this very abundance of light that always surprised scholars investigating the Nobles’ ruins.

On seeing the round stones paving the floor, the hoarse voice said, “Must be an old-timer.” It wouldn’t reach the ears of the three women. Fooling androids was quite an accomplishment. Naturally, there was a reason for its snide remark.

Even Nobles had their own personalities, and each of them had their own favorite “era.” Two styles of architecture from human history were favored by the Nobility. There were those who preferred the baroque architecture of the modern age, while others insisted on rococo style or nothing at all. Sixty percent of the Nobility fell into one of those two camps, twenty percent had varied tastes, and the remaining twenty percent liked the most ancient styles—to wit, the fortresses of medieval Europe, which were focused entirely on practical concerns and gave no thought at all to aesthetic matters.

While the main design naturally reflected the Nobility’s super science, the castle through which D strode had no walls or cathedral ceiling embellished with lavish murals, and illumination was provided by dishes of oil resting in recesses carved in the stone. There wasn’t even glass in the windows, but iron frames and heavy woven curtains kept the wind at bay. Instead of “simple,” “stark” might’ve been a better word to describe the place.

“Hurry,” Shyna said, raising her right hand when she came to the first corner. A crimson ring glittered on her third finger.

Though the stone pavement beneath his feet began to move, D showed no surprise.

The transportation system flowed along much like the waters of a canal would. The flow rose vertically up a wall. The force of gravity shifted accordingly, and D continued right up the wall. They were traveling at quite a good speed—over a hundred and twenty miles per hour.

In less than a minute’s time, they came to a wooden door, the surface of which had been scorched black. Taking the brass communication tube from beside the door in hand, Shyna announced, “I have a guest with me.”

“Enter,” the voice of a man of advanced years replied without a moent’s hesitation, sounding somewhat melancholy.

Shyna took hold of the brass door knob.

At that point, D was looking down at the blurry streaks of black that stretched from the sides of the door. There were two of them. Both of them seemed to reach all the way back down the corridor.

The door opened.

It was a large room. Some might even call it vast. Even D, with eyes that could see as well in pitch blackness as in broad daylight, took a little while to make out the figure who stood before an enormous stone desk that was set in the center of the room.

He was a towering figure, wearing a long, long cape of the fur of the sacred fire beast, and in his right hand he held a black cane with a golden handle. His crown was of the very simple spiked style, fashioned from a silvery, nearly indestructible metal and, oddly enough, devoid of so much as a single jewel. Though it was a tad comical in appearance, it didn’t make him look like a jester at all.

“D, is it?” he said, his voice low but seeming to reverberate through the vast chamber. “So good of you to come. I am Duke Julius Van Doren. Sirene told me about you. She left a note relating exactly what she was thinking before she headed out to meet you.”

“And you didn’t stop her?”

“This is the act of a woman who stood by me for a century without once complaining. No one had a right to criticize her. Myself included.”

“Then you must know what brings me here, right?”

“Of course. For your information, you need not heed Sirene’s wishes. Worry not about the human invaders. I shall be happy to settle with you here and now.”

“Sirene’s stipulations were to the contrary.”

“After I’ve eliminated those who are out to take my lands, my fortune, and my inventions, then?” Apparently she’d written about that, as well. “Although I don’t fail to see what she was thinking, it still strikes me as a foolish human notion.”

“If my aim were to slay you, I would cross swords with you here and now and be done with it,” said D.

Why had Sirene hired him to do it only after those who threatened the duke had been dealt with? And why did they have to die by the duke’s hand?

“I, too, see no reason why I should be quick to throw away a life I rather enjoy,” the duke replied. “I shall do battle with you after I have rid myself of those greedy churls.”

“I heard about a survey party from the Capital, a bandit gang, and a force of rebellious villagers. When will they be here?”

“The survey party should arrive on the morrow, the bandits two or three days hence. The village ingrates should take just about as long, I warrant.”

“Well informed, ain’t you?” said the hoarse voice.

Not seeming particularly surprised, the duke replied, “This is my domain. The rustling winds, the wheeling birds, the creeping insects, even the lifeless stones themselves tell me things.”

Was the duke trying to say he was privy to D’s conversation with Sirene? Still, to happily allow an assassin like D into his abode, even knowing that the Hunter wouldn’t slay him immediately, took an astonishing amount of nerve.

“Be that as it may, today is peaceful enough,” the duke continued. That, too, was remarkable. “And you have been good enough to grace us with a visit. There are two or three sights here that might interest you. Shyna, show him the way.”

When D had entered the room, the door had shut behind him, leaving the lady-in-waiting outside. Now it was open again.

D turned right around. Since he intended to honor his contract with Sirene, Duke Van Doren wasn’t his prey at this very moment.

Just before he passed through the doorway, D turned and looked back. The duke had one hand resting on the back of a huge chair as he stared straight ahead. D didn’t seem the type to have much interest in the art treasures of the world, but even this Tiger King, mightier than any beast, looked terribly weary to him.

“This is an image of the Sacred Ancestor,” Shyna said, looking up at the colossal statue that towered before her.

She was about thirty feet from the statue’s pedestal, which was about ten feet high, although to the viewer it would’ve looked practically flat. The statue that stood on the pedestal was so enormous it overwhelmed its surroundings. The right half of the figure was covered by a cape, and it vanished at a height of about a hundred feet, with his left arm looped around behind his back at waist level. It was as if the vast chamber were losing its darkness to the rays of dawn stabbing in through scattered windows and skylights.

“In the distant past, statues such as this one towered in the manse of every Noble, bathed in the light of the moon. Though the doleful winds of ruin visited our world ere long, the statues could not be melted down, so they were carried off and cast into the depths of the sea or the bowels of the earth, but still the glory of the Sacred Ancestor didn’t fade in the least. And it probably won’t for all eternity.”

And then a voice said, “But then he knew winter.”

Though Shyna turned and looked, she could see no one who was likely to have said such a thing. No one in the world should’ve known the Sacred Ancestor well enough to speak that way. The android thought she must be imagining things.

“Must’ve heard that wrong,” said a completely different voice, confusing her electronic brain even further.

“Did you look upon him?” the woman asked.

There was no reply. The young man in black was as still as the darkness that remained at dawn.

Gazing at him in rapture, the android then looked up at the statue as if she would flee in terror, and that was when a terrific weight crashed down on her heart. It was troublesome having the same thoughts and emotions as human beings.

“No . . . You . . . It can’t be,” she said, her lovely pale countenance shifting between their two faces, studying them closely. It was only several seconds later that she remembered that the statue had no face.

The same was true for all images of the Sacred Ancestor. No sculptor could possibly render it. But not because the face of the Sacred Ancestor was unknown. Because it was known too well.

A second later, Shyna didn’t know why it was she’d been so afraid. It occurred to her that perhaps it hadn’t been fear but rather just extreme surprise, but she only had that thought for a moment. The statue of the Sacred Ancestor and the Hunter before her must’ve had some kind of connection. A faceless statue and a gorgeous young man. What was it that she’d seen—or rather, felt?

He was too beautiful. So much so that he couldn’t be of this world.

Giving a shake of her head, the female android started for the door that led out to the corridor.

From behind her, the hoarse voice said, “That’s one big statue there. But it ain’t just big. He wanted it to be thought of as him, so even though he was destroyed, he’ll never be gone completely.”

There was no reply to the hoarse voice, and the figure in black began closing the gap on Shyna without his feet making a sound on the marble floor.

On entering the next location, the hoarse voice let out another gasp.

It was a stone chamber without a single window, and gigantic cylinders stood in a row there. Masses of metal that stood as high as ten-story buildings, they seemed to stretch on forever in a sight that could only be described as magnificent.

“So the ceiling has a stone lid—do they turn moonlight into energy or something?” the hoarse voice asked, its words still ringing with the same excitement from its earlier gasp. “That might be the best sort of energy for the Nobility, but it’s just the light of the sun reflected off the lunar surface. In other words, sunlight. The Nobility lived by the light of the moon, though. You might even say they lived by a concept called ‘moonlight.’ Nobody ever even tried to turn it into a physical form of energy. On account of that would’ve shaken the very existence of the Nobility. That, plus the fact that even if you turned the light of the moon into energy, it still ain’t nothing compared to solar power. Hmm. Did that rascal Van Doren manage to make an unprecedented ‘concept amplifier’? Looks like he had a hell of a scientist working for him. Hey, android lady, you happen to know that scientist’s name?”

“I am unsure whose voice it is I hear,” Shyna replied. “It was Professor Damien Krutz. He was still quite young.”

Another voice—one like steel—said, “Is that the reason Duke Van Doren is called the Tiger? Physical and conceptual energy would’ve been sure to garner high praise from the Nobility. Enough that he could’ve taken on ten thousand Nobles alone, or moved with some degree of freedom in the light of the sun.”

The female android kept her silence, as if to indicate just what a startling occurrence that was. The speaker knew these things.

When Duke Van Doren fought against twenty-three thousand Nobles of the anti–Sacred Ancestor faction in the northern Frontier’s Darnell Straits and on the Ragakiseha Plain, he had only two hundred men with him for his shocking victory in what became known as the Battle of D.R. Ordinarily, even the most valiant of commanders could hold out against no more than a hundred to one odds against his fellow Nobility. The only other exception to this was the Greater Nobleman Lord Greylancer’s victory alone against three thousand foes long ago, but that was now half the stuff of legend and the details of his battle were lost to time, while the details of the exploits of the “Tiger King” in the Battle of D.R. were still quite clear.

“What became of that scientist?” said a voice that was hoarse again, causing Shyna to furrow her brow.

“Word is that he was banished.”

“What?! The developer of moonlight energy? Are Nobles in the habit of showing their gratitude with spite?”

“Apparently the order came from the duke’s heir—his grace Leavis.”

“Oh, and daddy just sat back and let his boy call the shots? I find that hard to believe.”

Shyna turned around. As she gazed at D in rapture, there was a certain determination in her eyes.

“Until now, we believed his grace the duke alone was fit to control this power. However—now, there is one other . . .”

“And what became of sonny boy and the rest?”

“Leavis, the firstborn, died young; Kazel, the second son, was taken away; and the third son, Sebastian, left of his own accord.”

“Taken away?”

“Yes. Kindly ask his grace the duke for more details.” And after the woman had given that acceptable response, her lovely visage flushed with pink.

With three sons, Van Doren was guaranteed an heir. Yet they were all gone, leaving the duke alone.

“There is something that has been on my mind since I first saw your face, sir. Are you—”

The woman had said that much when there were suddenly indications of someone coming up behind D. From the crunch of hobnailed boots, it was a soldier.

“General Kiniski,” Shyna said, putting one knee on the floor and spreading her hands as she bowed her head.

“You’re D, are you?” said a man of about fifty with a face and body built for battle. Beneath a light yellowish-green cape he wore a dark yellowish-green uniform. The decorations he wore on the left breast of his uniform were all gold and platinum—proof that he was a military man of the first order. His left arm was missing from the shoulder down, and a mechanical device was slung over his right shoulder like a handbag.

This wasn’t some sort of hologram, like the one where any one piece contained an image of the whole. He was the genuine article.

The girl didn’t conceal her anxiety, but he said to her, “The duke has told me about him. And that I am not to offend him. Much to my chagrin.”

Walking over to D, he raised his beefy right hand by the side of his boulder of a face and offered a salute.

D didn’t move.

“I am General Jelmin Kiniski. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

No matter what the military man might’ve been feeling, neither his face nor his actions betrayed any hint of aggression toward this invader. That was quite an accomplishment.

“I’m D.”

“I’ve heard about you. They say you’re a Hunter who has hit us where it hurts more than any of your kind before. I am most pleased to meet you.”

“Be honest,” said D.

The general’s tone changed as he said, “I, Jelmin Kiniski, have seen no greater ignominy in life than having to meet a filthy ghoul like you face-to-face. I shall defend the duke, mark my words. Do not delude yourself that you’ll be leaving here alive!”

“That’s better,” the hoarse voice said, making the stern general look around sharply. “Humans and Nobles alike have gotta say what’s on their minds. Saves everybody a lot of needless stress. And that’s the secret to a long life.”

“Ventriloquism, I thought—but that’s not it, is it?” General Kiniski fairly groaned. “Not that it matters. No point in asking our level of perfection of lower creatures.”

“So, you’re an android?” D inquired.

Shyna covered her mouth, and the general got a glint in his eye.

“You were made too well. Your eyes have the same murderous intent as any man. Is that device a meteorological weapon?”

“Astonishing—I can see why you’ve lived this long,” said the general, not hiding his surprise. “For a filthy Hunter, you seem to have considerable abilities. I should like to freeze your very atoms, then burn you down to nothing, but that would only earn the wrath of the duke. However, keep in mind you will die by my hand one of these days.”

“Now would be fine.”

The general fell silent. The words he had to swallow had swollen with a certain emotion.

A number of figures spilled through the doorway. In no time at all, there were a dozen soldiers running over. But it was another voice that stopped the general.

“Will you not hold?”

The general turned around—and looked in the direction the words had come.

There stood the duke.

“Why—your grace!”

“Go,” the duke commanded the soldiers in a low, weary tone, and then he stared at the general.

“If I might say something,” the general began, stretching his neck and looking up into empty space. The soldier was not allowed to look his superior—his commander—in the eye.

“I know. It was D who provoked your hostility. But you shouldn’t have given in to it.”

“Yes, your grace.”

“This time, I shall overlook it—go back.”

“Understood.”

And giving a splendid bow, the android general walked away.

“Please forgive his rudeness,” the duke said as he watched the gigantic soldier leave. “But for all that, he’s a loyal retainer. I shall never have another like him. So I can’t very well have you staining your blade with him just yet.”

“We weren’t done seeing the sights,” said D.

“I had forgotten that I’m to go inspect the farmland this afternoon. Would you accompany me?”

“I’ll wait here.”

“Not interested? Well, the rebellion has laid down roots among the residents of my domain. Do you not wish to see how I conduct myself against human combatants? It should prove most interesting.”

“Okay, then.”

What was it that changed D’s mind and made him give that response?

“Come to the airfield, then. Shyna will show you the way.”

The form of the duke grew hazy, then vanished. He’d been a hologram.

Perhaps D had understood as much, because he wasn’t at all surprised as he asked, “Does the duke see everything that happens here?”

“Everything in his entire domain,” Shyna replied. “Such is the duty of the liege.”

“Sounds like a big pain in the ass.”

Startled, Shyna turned her eyes in the direction of the voice—the left hand that hung by D’s side—but naturally she didn’t see anything.

On seeing the aircraft at the broad and dusty airfield, the hoarse voice said with disbelief, “What the hell is this? Is that your liege’s vehicle?”

Even in this day and age, when a Noble toured his domain, it was usually a regal affair—they would travel with android soldiers and simulacra troops, squads of beastmen, and colossal armaments for show, as well as a marching band and huge portraits of the Noble. Rural villages, towns, and cities would be notified of the visit beforehand and were required to prepare a proper greeting for their liege and his loyal Noble retainers. But at present many Nobles avoided the fanfare of those grand tours, preferring to call on parts of their domain by aircraft. This proved much less troublesome, and allowed for a more rapid response in case of attack by rebel forces. Even without a large body of troops to protect them, Nobles were capable of defending themselves without much effort at all.

Nevertheless, the aircraft had to make a certain impression. There was no way a Noble would use a jet-engine-driven derelict like the humans did for flying. There were ion engine types, aircraft driven by magnetic force, and gravity-propelled craft, while aircraft using the more advanced galaxy drive differed little from the ships used for interplanetary travel. If a massive ship over a thousand yards long set down, that would be more than enough to cow the residents of a Noble’s domain, but it was all a charade of sorts.

It was standard practice to travel around in magnetism-powered aircraft that could hold twenty or thirty people. However, the aircraft that was waiting at the airfield was a smaller one that didn’t look like it could even carry ten. The party had two android soldiers as an escort, two other androids to serve as a doctor and nurse, and yet another whose role was unclear. To all appearances, he was a fit fellow. Adding in D, Shyna, and the duke, that made eight people in total. That hardly seemed enough people to go out on patrol. The engine was the kind that worked by gravity propulsion.

“Today we shall be visiting six sites,” the duke announced as soon as they’d lifted off.

“Sounds like a lot,” the hoarse voice said in amazement.

Even with ungodly travel speeds, making the rounds to every corner of a vast domain would take years. Normally, a tour would concentrate on just a few places to visit, and be on the move for ten days at most. Of course, the residents of neighboring communities would come pouring in, swelling the population to something more befitting a city. There were areas in the domain where Nobles had been left as chief administrators, but matters that they couldn’t settle had to wait for the liege to come and adjudicate.

“Where exactly shall we visit?” Shyna inquired. She was accompanying them in her role as D’s attendant and keeper.

“Murabak, Gorse, Toryatoo, Manook, Lilac, and Epic.”

“Those are all northern villages. And they are all far from the administrative district. It would take twenty days to tour them by horse,” Shyna whispered to D.

“This doubles as providing medical care to the remote areas, too?” the hoarse voice asked, sounding suspicious. “You do a lot of that?”

“Yes,” Shyna replied, her tone hard. Because she didn’t believe the voice belonged to D. “We spend half the year traveling around the remote communities. Naturally, we hear their appeals at that time, but recently medical service has become the greater responsibility.”

“Thought there were supposed to be a lot more hospitals staffed by medical androids out there than there were in your administrative district.”

“The rebel army keeps destroying them.”

“They as tough as all that?”

“In the old days, they couldn’t do anything more than dig up graves by day and hammer stakes into their occupants. However, more recently they’ve taken the Nobility’s weapons and copied them as well as developing armaments of their own, making them a force not at all to be taken lightly.”

“Hmm. Heard talk like that in the south and west, and it’s the same here, too, eh? The rebel armies had competent leaders in both those places. How about here?”

“The best leader the rebellion’s had since its inception. His name is Gilshark, it seems.”

“Hmm.”

“Villages near the borders of our domain frequently come under attack by bandits. They used to take whatever they wanted, but since Gilshark came to power, I hear they haven’t come around much lately.”

“Must be a hell of an opponent. No doubt he runs a tight ship, too. And the duke doesn’t go out to mop ’em up?”

“He often did, until a decade ago. However, he never could catch their leader, and lately his heart really doesn’t seem to be in it.”

“But it ain’t as if they’ve suddenly started behaving themselves.”

“No, they seem on course to overrun the capital of the northern Frontier sectors.”

“And he’s just letting them do it? That doesn’t sound like a man they’d call the Tiger.”

The two were conversing in hushed tones. Because they were hardly the only ones on board.

“What about an heir?”

The voice had suddenly changed. A dark delight spread across Shyna’s face.

“If his three children are gone, ordinarily he’d bring someone else in and adopt him,” the Hunter continued. “But he hasn’t done so?”

“That is correct.”

On hearing her reply, D said something.

“Tigris Rex?” the hoarse voice inquired. “Oh, you mean the Tiger King? Well, this king seems awful tired to me!”

At that point, the voice of Duke Van Doren, who occupied the cockpit’s single seat, rang through the airship. “We’re beginning our descent,” he said. “We shall be landing in a minute.”