The Divine Hunter

“The tragedy happened on the twenty-seventh of December, year 1260. That day, when Berschel went fishing at Wigan, he inadvertently saw a knight of the order, Simon Patrigadin, having an affair with her majesty, Queen Emilia. Taken by shock, the knight slashed Berschel and escaped with the queen. After that, Berschel was taken away by an arachnomorph, and he eventually died.” Roy stopped for a moment. “Ever since then, the queen has decided to cut all ties with Simon, but the knight was reluctant. Eventually, his hatred got the better of him, and thus the ritual of the Seven Deadly Sins rose its curtains. Simon and another believer in the ranks of the knights picked their targets, or to be precise, their sacrifices. After killing six ‘sinners,’ Simon eventually asked his comrade to kill him, turning him into the seventh and final sacrifice.” That was the end of it, and Roy kept the black diary.

“So the one who assaulted Berschel is dead.” Huckle’s cheeks were swollen after his non-stop crying. He couldn’t believe the report, but he knew that was the closure he was looking for. “He killed himself?”

“Yes. His body is still in the morgue, though not anyone can see it. If you insist though…” Roy paused. “All you can see is his comrade’s charred body. The knight’s name was Salvatore.”

Huckle closed his eyes and kept quiet for a while. Then Roy noticed he was looking more relaxed. “I see. Thank you, Mr. Roy. Since the killer is dead, I believe Berschel is finally avenged. I have no regrets left.” Huckle stared at Roy, then he pleaded, “I know I’ve promised you a reward of two hundred crowns, but I only managed to get a hundred and fifty so far. Can you give me a few more days to get the remainder? Once this place is sold, I can… I can pay you. I won’t go back on my promise.”

Roy crossed his arms and looked around. “You’ve been living here for almost thirty years, right? Are you really sure you want to sell this place?”

Huckle paused for a moment, then he stared at the oven, the old floor tiles, and the rugged wall in reminiscence.

“Berschel’s buried in this city. Where could you go after selling off your house?” Roy stared at the old man’s grey hair, wrinkled face, and hunched back. “Just keep the house.”

“Thank you for your understanding, Mr. Roy.” Huckle shook his head adamantly. “But I can’t accept this. Not after all you did for me.”

“I never said I won’t take the crowns.” He laughed. “I’ve always wanted to have a taste of your bread. Just pay it off with some fresh loaves of bread once you reopen the place. All I need is some free bread from you the next time I’m around.

“I — ”

“There’s that then. Hope you won’t mind that I’m a big eater.”

***

“Can’t believe I waived a quarter of the reward off. Guess Santa came early for Huckle this year.” Roy shook his head as he went out of the bakery with his crowns in hand.

He wouldn’t have accepted one crown less if the client was just a bigot, but Huckle was an old man who had lost his son. To top things off, Roy saw how much he had sacrificed for his son, so he didn’t want to take too much from him. “Just this once.”

***

Everyone was gossiping in the inn.

“I couldn’t believe it.” A moustached laborer gulped down his beer, and his face turned scarlet from the alcohol. “I mean, who would have expected a ‘noble’ knight to be the killer?”

His companion, a mousey man, squinted. “Those bastards pretend to be our protectors, but they’re just a bunch of traitorous rats who’d stab us in the back at the first chance.”

“You got one thing wrong. There were two killers, but they fought over the spoils, and one of them was killed by the other.”

The mousey man shook his head. “I heard they murdered all those people because they were holding a ritual. That was why Salvatore was burned at a stake, since he was involved in witchcraft. Only witches were burned at the stake.”

***

Roy downed a glass of fruit wine and wiped the booze off his lips. “Wow, they came up with a ton of stories, huh? Disagreements, arguments, and even witchcraft came out of nowhere.”

“It would have happened sooner or later.” Letho’s torso was bandaged, and his face was still bruised. “Hereward’s a prince, a duke. Of course he wouldn’t want the public to know his wife cheated on him.”

“Pity I didn’t get to meet the queen.” Roy shook his head. “She must be out-of-this-world gorgeous for even Simon to fall for her.”

It had been two days since Roy found Letho and cracked the case. Letho was healing, but he needed at least a week before he could recover fully. The knights didn’t actually beat him up when he was in the chamber, though the lack of food and water dehydrated him, weakening him. The only serious wound was the one between his chest and stomach, but Letho had sustained that during the battle with Francis.

“Let’s stay out of that higher vampire’s way.” Roy had a lot of thoughts about Francis, but he kept them away. “He’s weird, I’ll give him that, but he isn’t evil. He only fought you because you ambushed him, thinking he was the killer.” Then he thought about the poem Francis recited before they parted ways, and Roy had a feeling Francis only tipped him off because he had seen through everything.

“I know what I’m doing.” Letho sipped from his glass of dwarven liquor, and Roy wondered if he got through to the old witcher. “Let’s get back to business. You lived up to our expectations and passed the Trial of the Grasses.” Letho’s eyes gleamed expectantly. “And now, you’re the first witcher to be born in twenty years. This is divine providence, and the first step toward the school’s comeback.”

Roy held the necklace that was hanging around his neck. It was proof he was a Viper School witcher, and Letho had given him that the day before. Ever since then, he felt like the school was his home. “I can feel some mana after passing the trial. Can I learn how to cast signs now?” Roy stared at Letho, excited.

“That’s still too much for you.” Letho shook his head. “You finished a few years’ worth of training in less than one. Now it’s time for you to calm down and hone your skills. Besides, I bet your archery and swordplay have gotten rusty after spending all that time writhing in the lab.”

“A bit, yes.” Roy glanced at Letho, teasing, “But at least I wasn’t kidnapped by two knights of the order.”

Letho’s eyelid twitched, and his face fell. He was going to say something, but then a commotion erupted outside the inn, and the castle staff escaped the palace in droves. Some of them were servants in robes, some were fully armored guards, and one of them was a pudgy, middle-aged man escorted by a group of guards. The man was wearing a crown and a white cape.

Regardless of who they were, they were all screaming in fear, as if something horrible had happened in the castle.

“What is it this time? It’s not even breakfast hour yet.”

That question was answered a moment later, when Dennis and his men came to the duo for another favor. “Mr. Letho, Roy. Terribly sorry for the disturbance, especially when you’re still recuperating.” Dennis smiled bitterly. “But this is an emergency only you two can settle.”

“Another emergency?” Roy almost smiled. This cuck prince is one hell of a troublemaker. He looked at Letho, and the witcher nodded.

“Tell us more.”

“It happened this morning. One of the servants who served her majesty heard a wail coming from somewhere.” Dennis repeated what the servant told him. “The wail was filled with sorrow, hatred, furious, and everything bad you can come up with. It was as if a ghost were screaming. The servant was horrified, but she had to check on her majesty, so she went into the queen’s room. To her horror, something was standing right before the queen’s bed with its back against the door. It just stood there, head hanging low.”

Dennis paused for a moment, trying to make sense of what he was about to say. “But the weirdest thing was… that thing was floating. It had no legs, and it wore a green, wrinkly, translucent dress. Its arms were spindly and patched, and the monster’s face… I saw it too. It wasn’t human, I tell you. There were only holes where its eyes and nose were supposed to be. Its whole face was dry, green, and patchy. I think it was a ghost. The servant ran with a scream, and the ghost chased after her, but it stopped right at the doorstep. I think it couldn’t leave the room, so it only paced around the door.”

Roy had a guess about what the monster was at that point, but he kept listening.

“Everyone was alerted to the situation, so my boys and I went to have a look, but when we got there, what we saw was not one, not two, not three, but eight ghosts!”

The news caught both witchers by surprise. Eight wraiths in a room? That’s as dangerous as a vampire!

“By Melitele, I have never seen anything like that. I didn’t even bat an eye when I was facing thousands of armored soldiers in the war!” Dennis stared down, ashamed of his cowardice. “But everyone was scared out of their wits from the ghosts’ screams. Even now, I can’t understand why I turned tail and ran without a fight! It’s like I was possessed. It took everything I had to escort the duke out with everyone else.”

“They’re not ghosts. Alright, they are, but they’re called wraiths. Their scream is a form of mental attack. One scream is enough to cripple someone, so it’s not your fault you ran away.” Roy gave him a calming look, washing away Dennis’ frustration. “But there are many kinds of wraiths. Noonwraiths, plague maidens, and penitent wraiths. We’ll have to take a look to figure out how to deal with them.”

Roy stopped for a moment. “But I don’t get one thing. Why’d those wraiths go to the queen’s room anyway? I’ve never heard of that happening before. And is the queen fine? She can’t be missing, can she?”

Dennis didn’t answer that, but he looked somber. On the other hand, Letho was solemn. “Wraiths usually wouldn’t show up in human settlements, and eight of them appearing at once is unheard of. There must be a reason for that. Care to explain, Cranmer?”

Dennis was still quiet, trying to decide if he should tell them the truth or not. Then he sighed. “I would have wanted to keep this a secret, but at this point, it’s not important anymore. There’s one more thing in the queen’s room aside from those wraiths. It’s the queen’s corpse. The queen hanged herself in the room, and her body’s still in there, hanging.” Dennis trembled, looking more somber than earlier. “You know the truth behind the case, since you cracked it after all. His majesty flew into a rage after finding out about the queen’s affair with Simon, and he sentenced her to house arrest. It had only been two days, so nobody saw it coming. The queen’s suicide, that is. The wraiths came as a shocker too, of course.”

“So it’s not over yet.” Roy had a guess, since the appearance of the wraiths must have had something to do with the Great Sun’s ritual. Simon might’ve been dead, but his death brought about the Seven Deadly Sins’ completion. And there was a pair of bloody wings on Simon’s back when he died. Did that mean something? “I’m sure one of the wraiths is Queen Emilia, and in case you haven’t noticed, there are seven wraiths aside from her. That matches the number of victims of the murders.”