章節 26: 26. Ren Explores The Keep
Unready yet to commit to a plan for dealing with Lord Kirri and his lower-case servants, Ren put everybody back to work on repairing the fortress. She set Jekyll to work with Ritsu on trying to reactivate the fortress's invisibility shield—not something she had strong hopes for, but it seemed like the theoretical work that Jekyll excelled at, and Ritsu's luck couldn't hurt. Jack she assigned to help Merlin with the masonry reconstruction, because Jack's Merlin Resistance seemed to be at least A-rank.
Cú she let choose his own task, asking only that he avoided fighting and that he spent time with Tora, encouraging her to believe they could win. He grinned at Ren, and invited Tora to help him clean out one of the outbuildings. Tora had agreed, her dull resignation temporarily receding at the thought of spending time with the warrior she so clearly admired.
As for herself, Ren finished her sweeping and then spent some time roaming through the fortress alone. She peeked in on the portal chamber, where Jekyll and Ritsu sat together with her storybook and a notebook Jekyll had manifested. She judged from Jekyll's guilty look that he hadn't made any progress on his assigned task but had definitely found something that interested him. Ritsu's foxette dozed beside her knee while Ritsu chattered cheerfully, her gaze fixed on Jekyll's handsome face.
Wondering how Jekyll would cope with a young girl's crush, Ren returned to exploring. She cataloged the other accessible rooms in the underground part of the fortress and then worked on getting to the upper levels. She found a gallery around the Great Hall that she could access by climbing over some fallen rubble, and by going up further managed to make her way onto the roof of the Great Hall where it extended out past the keep's central tower.
From there she could see not only where Merlin and Jack worked in the courtyard, but the top of the ramparts. To her very great surprise, she wasn't nearly as afraid of the drop as she'd been out on the wall. She didn't want to sit on the edge kicking her feet or anything, but she could be aware of the drop without a trembling in her limbs or a clouding of her thoughts.
Merlin's reconstruction work involved a lot more drawing on the stones and a lot less heavy lifting than she'd imagined. Jack mostly sat on tumbled masonry watching him, except when she trotted across the courtyard to tuck a flower between some blocks at Merlin's behest.
Ren couldn't see Cú and Tora anywhere, nor even tell which of several outbuildings they'd decided to work on. She frowned, circling the central tower to inspect the far side of the keep, careful to test each step. It was a slow, mindless trip and she worried at the problem of not just killing her enemies as she went.
The biggest problem, she decided, was Jekyll. From what Ren knew of his parameters, he—or at least Hyde—could easily keep Blue Violet and their lionbolt occupied. He might even do better than Cú at fighting both of them at once. And Jack and Merlin could probably handle Shina the archer and her dragon, potentially non-lethally, which would allow Cú to face the Avenger-powered Lord Kirri.
Ren would have to pay the cost afterwards, of course. With her bracelets, handling Cú and Jack would be feasible. But she hadn't even picked up Jekyll's bracelet from Merlin yet, and being close to him had… risks, even if he'd allow it.
Merlin was technically correct in pointing out that she could always call yet another Servant from the portal. The thought filled her with dread, though. Without looking too closely at the story bubbles that still made up most of her memories, she knew there were plenty of other Servants she could summon that would demand much more of her. Vampires and stalkers and idol singers lurked in the depths.
But strategy demanded she choose at least one of the three to accept: sending Jack on a murder spree; draining Jekyll and Hyde to the point that they needed recharge from her; or summoning more allies.
Cú and Tora weren't around back, either. Old fruit trees clustered around two outbuildings, but there was simply no sign of them or their efforts. Strange. Ren hesitated, and then reached out along the mental channel Cú had once spoken to her on.
<Cú? Where are you?>
A pause, and then: <Ah—give me a minute, my lady?> He sounded… odd.
Ren frowned and reached out again. <What are you—> Suddenly her knees gave way beneath her as what Cú was experiencing slammed into her, taking over her senses and running through her nerves.
He was in the darkness of one of the outbuildings in the little orchard, and the sweet old smell of ancient apples mingled with the scent, the taste of Tora's skin. He had her pressed against the wall, her clothing half-removed, her hands tangling in his hair as she moaned. His own hand cupped one of her breasts and he'd been kissing her neck when Ren had called for him.
Ren clutched her head as Cú's arousal raced through her own body. Falling back on the Great Hall roof, her hand went instinctively to her own breast. Then, as the vision's immediacy ebbed, and embarrassment took its place, she gasped, "No. Never mind. I didn't want anything important…"
But before she'd finished, Cú had materialized on the roof not two meters from her. "My lady, why are you up—" He didn't have a hair out of place, but his usual garb was a skintight reinforced bodysuit. As her fevered gaze swept down his body, he looked her over, said, "Shit," and took an involuntary step backward. "My lady—"
"Sorry," Ren mumbled, trying to gain enough control of her body to at least sit up. "I kinda got an eyeful. Mindful. You should hang out a Do Not Disturb sign…"
Something flickered on Cú's face and then he was kneeling beside her, picking her up. "Never for you, my lady. You're my entire reason for existing here." As he stood, he said, "I'm sorry I didn't shield you from that, though."
Ren tried to struggle but only managed to squirm against his chest instead. His hot, muscled, hard chest. Every inch of her suddenly hypersensitive skin demanded to be pressed against him. "This… isn't really helping." She gave him a half-hearted glare. "I don't have your super-human body control, you know."
Cú chuckled as he carried her to the stairs. "I know. But if I'm going to have to fight you off, I'd rather not do it on a roof, especially given how unstable you were on the wall this morning."
Ren couldn't help asking wistfully, "Do you have to? Fight me off, I mean?" as they arrived in the Great Hall after a few short leaps. But when he set her on her bed, she didn't cling to him.
Something sparked in his eyes as he looked down at her, and then he gave her a twisted half-smile. "Yes."
"That doesn't seem very like you," she said reproachfully, but straightened up as her hormones finally started settling down. "Why?"
He crouched down and she suddenly had the impression of an adult kneeling to talk to a child. "I prefer my sex uncomplicated, my lady, and you have plenty going on already. Less annoyance if I find my fun elsewhere."
It didn't feel like the complete truth, but there was enough that Ren frowned. "You consider Tora uncomplicated? Even with me hoping to recruit her Lord?"
Cú shrugged. "She's willing and interested right now, I don't think she'll be clingy later, and there's no other loyalty between us. As for her Lord… If he has feelings for her, she's clueless. If Merlin's right, that's her Lord's problem, not mine. But Merlin lives in fairy tales."
A nagging thought surfaced. "Uh, did you leave her without—"
A grin tugged at his mouth. "Since you didn't have an emergency, no, I didn't vanish without a word. You know, my lady, if you're this interested, I could warn you next time and you could use that little power you've unlocked to ride along."
Ren turned crimson all over, even more embarrassed by the suggestion than by what she'd already witnessed. She puffed out her cheeks and then abruptly buried her face in her blankets. When Cú queried, "My lady?" in an innocent voice, she waved her hand at him without lifting her head.
"You just… go away," she mumbled. The blankets pressed to her face almost entirely stifled her words, but Cú must have got the gist anyhow, because he laughed, tousled her hair, and vanished.
Ren rocked back and forth for a few moments, trying to tame her rampaging emotions. How old was she, anyhow? She had no idea. When she looked at Ritsu, she felt like a responsible adult. But Cú and Merlin could both reduce her to a blushing teen with just a few words. It was ridiculous.
As she calmed down, it occurred to her that maybe it wasn't her, it was them. Maybe this was an undocumented Noble Phantasm they'd perfected. She was just a victim, really. She'd have to be much more careful.
To distract herself further, she thought about the ability to connect to Cú, and wondered if she could reach out to her other Servants the same way. After a few moments of thought, she decided to experiment, starting with Jack.
<Mommy?> Jack was seated on a fallen stone, listening to Merlin as he rambled about some fairyland he'd visited while marking circles on a crumbling wall. Just looking at him made her kind of irritated and hungry, but she was enjoying the rain-scented breeze on her skin, and the thought of taking a nap later. She kind of wished she had something else to do, though…
>I'm just checking in. Jack… why don't you ask Merlin to give you some of that chalk? You'd like to draw, wouldn't you?>
Okay, Mommy. Jack bounced to her feet and marched over to Merlin. "Mommy says give me chalk, too. Or else."
Merlin blinked up at Jack and then grumbled, "Fine, fine." He gave her the piece of chalk he'd been using. "Just… do your drawing over in the center of the courtyard, please."
Ren smiled and pulled her attention away. She spent a while thinking it through before reaching out the same way for Jekyll. It felt risky but it would be better to know now rather than find out later.
For a moment, she saw Ritsu's beaming face through Jekyll's eyes, heard the echo of Jekyll's gentle laugh in her ears. But abruptly, walls closed around her and she found herself in a parlour unevenly divided down the middle.
The side closest to the door was neat and orderly: sparsely furnished with a carefully sorted bookshelf, a marble-inlaid chess table with a game in progress, a green couch, an end table and a matching footstool. A spray of dried lavender in a cut-crystal vase decorated the end table, along with a familiar notebook. The vase sparkled under the bright gas light. A painted cherry blossom screen with holes torn through it stood at the edge of the clean side: a pitifully insufficient attempt to block the mess on the other side from the couch's view.
The far side—the larger side—was dim and cluttered, lit only by a fire flickering in the hearth. Broken chairs abutted a lovingly polished ancient wooden table. Books were scattered everywhere: some torn apart, some facedown with their spines cracked, some yet to be opened. There were shelves, but they held grisly, organic trophies of dubious origin, along with dozens of blackened vials. Trash crowded the table: the remains of meals, old clothes, and newspapers—but thin golden chains, as for jewelry, cascaded off the edge of the table from under the mess.
Both sides were occupied, too. Hyde lounged on a worn red velvet chaise longue that had one broken leg held up by a stack of three books. He looked up from a naughty magazine as Ren materialized in the center of the room and grinned.
As Hyde bounded to his feet, Ren was suddenly yanked into the clean side of the room and propelled toward the door by a scrawny, small version of the real Jekyll. "No, no, no," he said, panting at the effort. "Go, go, go! Don't do this again!"
The door swung open wide. Ren found she could dig in her heels if she tried… but she did this only once before allowing Jekyll to kick her out of his head.
Well. Ren huddled on her bed, recentering herself. In a way she'd expected that, but she hadn't expected it to be so real. So visceral. She could still smell the fire, the dried lavender, the newsprint.
It had worked, at least. Now she knew. She probably didn't need to test anything more. Merlin had already demonstrated his ability to come when called.
_I mean, why push things?_
The inside of Jekyll's head had been so vivid and detailed. She felt like she understood him better just from that glimpse.
Bluebeard. One of the story bubbles in her mind popped and she saw the shape of yet another Servant she really, really didn't want to summon.
Because Ren couldn't resist. She sent her thoughts toward Merlin.
.
.
.
Nothing. No response. No connection.
Then he whispered, <Hello Serendipity> and he was too close, _too close_. He was all around her, overwhelming her, his floral scent making her dizzy and breathless. She gasped and the sense of his presence retreated.
Then he was nothing more than a voice in her head. <Hey, hey, Serendipity. If anybody's going to slack while everybody else is working, shouldn't it be me? I'm pretty sure it's in the contract somewhere…>
Ren wanted to withdraw and hide, pretend she had never reached out. She resisted. <Why can't I see through your eyes? I could with the others.>
She felt a touch of that overwhelming presence again, just for an instant, before Merlin said, <Because I've become very good at keeping witch-queens and mage-kings out of my mind. Which is great for you because it wouldn't be very healthy for you in here. Consider what I eat, Ren.>
A hand brushed her hair away from her face and Ren realized she had her eyes squeezed closed as she curled around her knees. She opened them and Merlin stood before her, an odd smile on his face. "You do keep surprising me, though."
Ren peered up at him uncertainly. "What, by reaching out? Nobody else was surprised… I thought it was a common magic."
"For trained mage Masters with reasonable Magical Circuits, yep. But we've already established that you're not that." Merlin's smile became his usual light-hearted expression. "But now I get to tease you about once again leaping before you look, so I forgive you."
"Uh-uh." Ren shook her head. "You can't embarrass me today. Cú already took the gold."
She realized as she said it that it was a mistake offering Merlin a challenge like that. Internally she cringed back, waiting for him to pounce, to give her his most teasing smile before saying something outrageous.
Instead he pulled a sad face. "Aww, did he? I wonder if he'll tell me how?"
He watched her with anticipation, but Ren didn't let herself think about what he'd suggested. Instead she thought very hard about the inside of Jekyll's head, about the local warriors waiting outside, about Lord Kirri and Tora, about Tora and Ritsu, about a map full of black columns, and finally said, "You know, I think Jack may be messing with your pretty chalk circles. You should go check."
"What?!" Annoyance flickered across Merlin's face as his gaze went distant. Then he focused on her again. "Ahaha. Clever girl, making me look. Why don't you put that mind to work figuring out a strategy rather than harassing hard-working mages like myself?" Without waiting for an answer, he vanished from the room.
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