Hohenfels

Chapter 34

Arne felt Katharina’s irritation slowly morph into apprehension and distress. Even their two fellow students were nervously shifting in their seats.

“...You’re a sorcerer,” she finally said. It was not a question, but a statement.

Professor Nowak smirked. “Not wrong, but not entirely correct either.”

“A shaman, then,” Arne mused, eliciting a raised eyebrow from the teacher.

“Oh? Have you met a shaman before?” His aura gave off a strangely distorted feeling of curiosity.

“Well, I wouldn’t say ‘met’,” Arne replied evenly. “Of the four I’ve encountered, I killed three.”

He had expected to unsettle the strange man with such a blatant threat, but his curiosity only intensified. “Oh, were they from the steppe folk?”

“...Indeed.”

“Fascinating. Unfortunately, I never got the opportunity to study their practices directly. Do you happen to–”

“All I know is that each of them had a significant escort of Keshigs, who had remarkable resilience and fought without regard for their own lives.”

The Professor sighed and adjusted his monocle. “That’s a shame. Still, I find it quite interesting that they ride into battle themselves. Personally, I have no confidence in my ability to survive even a tavern brawl.”

“Why are you so forthcoming about this, Professor?” the young woman from Marbach asked hesitantly. “Are you not worried about… Well, you know.” Awkwardness. Stress.

“Not particularly,” he shrugged. Amusement.

Arne sensed a sudden spike of understanding, worry, and motivation coming from Katharina. When he looked over, he saw her furiously writing notes on a piece of paper underneath the table. ‘Good idea.’

He mulled over the idea of arresting – or killing – the Professor on the spot. He was clearly doing something to their minds, and Arne was not particularly interested in becoming compromised. ‘Not that I have the right to complain…’

He leaned over to Katharina. “Keep writing down everything you see and hear,” he whispered. She threw him a glance and nodded.

Then, he rose from his chair and drew his saber. Everyone in the room tensed at the sound, and Professor Nowak’s eyes went wide. “Wait–” Panic.

Arne flooded the classroom with his magic, carefully sweeping over everyone and everything with his senses. There were no signs of active magic whatsoever, and he was relatively sure that the Professor’s aura was far too weak to hold any danger even to the lower nobles in the room. He needed more certainty, though. So, the shaman soon found himself pressed against the blackboard, the banesilver blade at his throat.

“Give me one reason not to execute you for your transgression against House Hohenfels.”

As Professor Nowak stammered meaningless words, Arne inspected the way the saber interacted with the man’s aura. The moment the banesilver touched his skin, the odd fraying and pulsing of his aura ceased, leaving behind nothing but a pathetically underdeveloped practitioner. It was clear that he had started late in his life and lacked the means to – quite literally – feed his magic.

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Arne leaned in close and lowered his voice so that only the shaman could hear him.

“I’ll give you one chance. Does the banesilver stop whatever it is you’re doing?”

The Professor nodded frantically, the saber cutting lightly into his throat. He didn’t even notice it in his panic. Fear. Stress.‘No signs of deception. Good.’

“Do you own an amulet?”

He shook his head.

“I will have one arranged for you. You will wear it whenever you’re in my presence.”

“U-understood,” he stammered.

“On top of that, you will personally instruct me in whatever it is you’re doing.”

His eyes went even wider. But instead of the reluctant acceptance Arne had expected, there was a spike of curiosity and anticipation.

“By your will, Your Highness,” he promised, now remarkably more composed. Sincerity.

“I will have the banesilver amulet delivered to this room tomorrow,” Arne said, now loud enough for Katharina to hear. “If I ever see you without it, I will cut you down on the spot.”

“Understood, Your Highness.”

He kept the blade on the shaman’s throat. “Let’s end this lesson for today. Leave the room. You can return later to collect your bag.”

Nowak nodded carefully. Arne prodded him with the saber, and he started moving backwards in the direction of the door. When he was almost outside, he spoke up. “One moment, please?”

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Arne looked at him skeptically, but inclined his head in assent.

“Today, I would have taught you about small everyday rituals from the former Northern tribes. They’re not very complicated, so please attempt to perform one of your choice until our next lesson,” he explained with an oddly cheery voice. “Since there are only two books, you’ll have to work in pairs.”

“All right,” Arne affirmed. “Now, get out.”

The odd man stepped outside, and Arne slammed the door shut immediately after removing the saber from his throat. With a deep sigh of relief, he leaned against the blackboard. Something dull poked against his senses, and when he looked up, he noticed the incredulous stares from his fellow students.

“You heard the Professor. Go do your homework,” he ordered, and the two lower nobles hurriedly packed up their things and made for the door.

“Wait,” he demanded. “Your names.”

“H-Hedwig von Liepe, Your Highness,” the young woman stammered, the accompanying curtsy much less graceful than her earlier one.

Arne looked over at her companion questioningly.

“Ernst von Dargitz, Your Highness,” he bowed.

He did not have the slightest idea where Liepe was, which meant that it was probably a minor barony. Dargitz, however, was a large countship close to Eisengrund’s northern border with Polania.

“I see. Be on your way,” he dismissed them, and they were all too happy to leave.

Reclaiming his seat next to Katharina, Arne glanced at the notes she had hastily scribbled down. They succinctly, but accurately summarized what had happened over the course of the last few minutes.

“Mind if I copy those later?” ‘Something to put in my diary. I should check if I wrote something about Professor Nowak… But I doubt it.’

She nodded, seemingly lost in thought. Her aura fluctuated between worry and stress, until she took a deep breath.

“What did you say to him?”

“I asked him if banesilver would stop whatever he was doing. From his reaction, it does. So, I forced him to wear an amulet from now on.”

“...You believe him? Is it really worth the risk?” Doubt. Worry.

“It is,” he confirmed in a low tone. “Just imagine all the things we can learn from him. Forbidden knowledge that we can’t get anywhere else. And since he’s a commoner, he can’t truly hurt us.”

A blatant untruth, but thankfully, Katharina jumped on the bait. A pulse of curiosity and ambition washed away her reservations, sparing him the need to explain why he was willing to trust the shady Professor.

“That is an excellent point,” she mused, before her expression and aura suddenly went back to worry and uneasiness. “...Can we head to the library now, please?”

“Sure.”

Arne grabbed his bag, stuffed the heavy tome inside, and offered Katharina his arm. She accepted mechanically, and they walked in contemplative silence.

Upon arrival in the hidden niche, she sat down across the table instead of next to him. ‘It’s serious, then…’

It took her a while to find words. “Prince Ludwig is trying to blackmail me,” she finally said. Anxiety. Stress.

Arne raised his eyebrows. “Let me guess: He wants to use you as a spy.”

“Indeed,” she nodded dejectedly. “He’s threatening to oust my family.”

Not unexpected, but still not a particularly wise move by Ludwig. Katharina was obviously intelligent enough to realize how bad of an idea it would be to acquiesce to his demands.

“Do you think Duke August would go along with that?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

“Unlikely. But one day, Prince Ludwig will be Duke,” she replied quietly. “And then, he will do everything in his power to ruin Silberthal. You know what kind of man he is.”

Ludwig would never let a perceived slight go, and that was exactly what Arne had been counting on in this regard. Though isolating Katharina from Ludwig and his allies had not been his main objective when he made his visit to Sonnenfeld Hall, it had been a consideration. Now, it would be nigh-impossible for her to sell him out to the West, should she ever figure out his secret. It would mean throwing away her singular lifeline in favor of endless exploitation.

He did feel bad about throwing her to the proverbial wolves and sealing House Silberthal’s decline, but in the end, her own choices had led her to this point. On top of that, he would ask Elisabeth to intervene on Silberthal’s behalf should it become necessary. His honor demanded as much.

= = = = =

Katharina failed to suppress a shudder when something crossed Arnold’s scarred face. It almost reminded her of the expression he had shown in the arena. It was cold. Distant. Even more so than the expression he usually adopted under pressure.

She didn’t like it.

And then it was gone as suddenly as it had appeared, replaced by a worried frown.

“Is something wrong?” he asked, having noticed her discomfort.

“...I’m at a loss. What should I do now?” she sighed, hoping to distract him with a more pressing matter.

She could see that he did not buy it, but he accepted the change of topic nonetheless.

“What else is there to think about? You made your choice,” he smiled warmly.

Despite her earlier uneasiness, she felt her face heat up just a little.

“W-well, I suppose so.” ‘Christ, why did I stutter again?!’

“The smart way to play this is to feed him unreliable information until he notices,” Arnold mused. “Or do you have a better plan?”

“I’d suggest feeding him unimportant truths at the beginning,” she replied after composing herself. “That way, we can get him to fully trust my reports. Afterwards, we intersperse fabrications to steer his actions.”

“Good idea. So, what should we tell him first?”

“Perhaps we should try to widen the rift between him and Lord Leonhardt. I sincerely doubt they are on good terms at the moment.”

“Mhm, sounds good,” he hummed. “What if we told him something about… me planning to invite Leonhardt to a ‘friendly spar’, now that he ‘gained my respect’ after the duel?”

He paused. She could see thoughts race behind his eyes.

“No. What if I actually did that?” he murmured, a mischievous smile forming on his lips. “I’m confident Leonhardt hates my guts… But nothing stops me from inviting him, right?”

“...If anything, it would make you look magnanimous,” Katharina reasoned. The idea was sound – it would be a grand gesture that might shift his current public image away from the cold and domineering warrior, and into the direction of an honorable prince.

“Magnanimous in victory. I like that,” Arnold chuckled.

“You could also put a pious spin on it,” she suggested. “Throw in a bible verse about forgiveness.”

He laughed out loud at that. “That’s a great idea! My sister is a Paladin, after all!”

“That makes it even better,” she giggled. “But please don’t overdo it, or Ludwig might just explode from anger!”

“I would never.”