Oath of Steel

14 |Hound on the Loose|

The times that her majesty had summoned her new left hand had diminished with the course of the years, the last time she'd been privately called through a black letter had been a little over eight months ago, when she'd been asked to eliminate a growing merchant that'd been discovered plotting with the Detrian Republic.

Rosalynde orders had been clear that time, it didn't matter how she would have done it, all she needed to make sure was to find out the exact location of the weaponry shipments before they would have been placed into the Dietran Republic's hands.

It'd taken a while for him to break under her touch, for the first weeks he'd been quite uncooperative, spitting to the ground every time he'd seen her step into the cell he'd been thrown into. Things started changing after the left hand of the Crown had found out about the only true secret that the man had so desperately tried hiding from the outside world: a lover, and a son born from her.

He'd been terrorized when she'd told him that she would have payed a small visit, and fearing for his son's life the man had come clean, revealing the positon and time when the shipment would have taken place.

That, however, hadn't been enough for her to spare his life.

He'd exchanged his son's life for the intelligence in his possession, not his own, he would have needed a new deal to propose to her, but there was absolutely nothing he had in his possession that she was interested in.

He hadn't broken down when she'd ripped his nails off, nor when she'd broken every single bone inside his hands - all it'd taken had been a photo of a young child with blond hair smiling brightly at the camera. He died trying to clutch with his broken fingers the photograph of his son, his salty tears soaking through the paper as they started mixing up with the blood coming from where his nails had once been.

He died with a pained smile and tears crawling down his cheeks, displaying the most horrendous emotion Rosalynde had ever been forced to acknowledge, love.

The most useless sentiment that the living could bring themselves to experience in their lifetimes.

"Lady Rosalynde, how rare to see you leaving the side of her highness during the day." She stopped dead in her tracks and turned around, her eyes taking mere seconds on pinning the source of the voice that'd made her halt.

It was rare to find him outside the Imperial Chapel except from when he had lectures with the two imperial heirs.

"Brother Jeremias, how fancy in finding you poking your nose outside of the Imperial Chapel, has a mouse perhaps scared you off?" She asked as the man stepped forward, hiding the hand holding the letter by shoving it away from his long umber robes

Brother Jeremias Bellwhistler, otherly known as Apostle VI, he who acted as the private delegate between the Helian Church and the Des Reslows and attended court life by being the private tutor to the imperial heirs.

"I actually just finished explaining the philosophy of Saint Lauren to his highness," he replied, showing her the books he'd kept hidden under the large sleeves of his pious apparel.

Teaching the words of a Saint that'd decided to throw herself into the battlefield to aid the soldiers and that the Helian Church had exalted for the last two centuries to a swine like his highness was just like talking to a broken mirror.

"Ah. I'm sure it was a highly educational lesson from your part, not sure if the receiver actually understood a single word you tried teaching him though." She made the hand free from the letter slide up, a wicked smile replacing the usual one she wore at all times.

"I hope that Saint Lauren's preaching will root deep inside his noble heart."

Rosalynde held the snort so close in coming out, for that boy's heart could not be even closely associated with the one that her master possessed. Pharah was stern, but extremely susceptible if someone of her aides were to be thrown into the lion's den.