“I’m sorry,” he said.
We were running out of places for her. At that point, the best option was to take her out of the town, but if even the local officials were in on the game, we couldn’t go through the gates—it would be marching her to her own imprisonment. Old Toby would help her get out, but those routes were watched by the mobsters, I assumed. The more time passed, the fewer means of escape she had. The more we wanted to break free, the more trapped we were. Like birds in a cage.
I let go of Vincent’s shirt and turned to Arwin.
“Is there anyone else you know? Some heroic knight or miraculous prince who has sway with the powerful and is completely unfazed by the criminal element? Even a prince knight.”
“…I’m sorry, no.”
“Don’t apologize. I shouldn’t have asked.” Taking it out on Arwin wasn’t going to solve this problem. “All right. So basically, we’re playing one big combo game of hide-and-seek and tag. Got it.”
The entire town was “it,” and if we got caught, we might die. We had no choice but to play, and refusing was likely to cost us our lives. It was a shitty game, but I could handle that. My life had been an unfair game the whole time.
“Let’s go, squirt.”
I supposed we’d go to Dez again. He wasn’t intimidated by mobsters or officials. Now it was just a race against time. Would the old man get released first, or would April be caught and suffer a cruel fate?
“……”
April didn’t respond. She just stood stock-still, staring at her feet.
“What’s wrong? If you need to piss, I can wait for you.”
“…Forget it.”
“Forget what?”
“Just forget all of this!” she shouted, trembling. Her eyes were brimming with tears. “No one’s going to help me. Grampa’s not around, and everyone’s after me. Eventually it’s going to get both of you killed…”
She shook her head back and forth, hair flailing wildly.
“I’m not going to die,” I said. “I’ve never died before.”
“This isn’t the time for jokes! Just forget about me! Let me go.”
“I can’t do that,” I said, shrugging. “Who’s going to teach me how to read?”
“Anyone can!”
“But I want you to do it.” I knelt and put my hands on her shoulders. “I know you’re a good girl and you mean well, but you can’t do this. It’s not something a child should say. This is all the fault of those mad, greedy fools. It’s not because of you.”
“But…but what should I do? I just don’t know…”
“It’s simple,” I said. “Just say, ‘Help me.’ Easy as that.”
She was too sweet and pure to ask for help. She’d lost her parents at a young age and been raised by a wicked old grandfather instead. She needed someone around she could lean on for help.
I brushed the tears from April’s eyes. “You’re free to cry, but you should save those tears for some handsome man or another. All you have here is a stubborn princess knight and her degenerate kept man.”
One day, April would be a beautiful woman. There would be plenty of men willing to step forward and be the hero for her.
“The old man’s gonna be sad if you’re not around. So will Arwin,” I said.
“Even you, Matthew?”
“Of course.”
She threw her arms around my neck.
“…Help me, Matthew.”
“Of course I will,” I reassured her.
“And I will, too,” said Arwin, kneeling before the girl. “I’ll give you my word. I will see you safely returned to your grandfather.”
“Thank you.”
And just like that, her mood was better. How quickly things turned.
“If you’re leaving now, I’d recommend the back door,” said Vincent. “There are some unsavory characters posted out front.”
“I’m not thanking you,” I told him.
“Nor would I deserve it.”
He couldn’t save her; he couldn’t even help. He knew he didn’t have the right to receive gratitude. Had to be an uncomfortable life, being forced to abandon even your own principles to survive.
“So long. We’ll see you again sometime if we survive.”
“Wait,” said April, stopping just as she walked past Vincent. She turned, bowed, and thanked him, then rushed back toward me.
“You didn’t have to thank that guy.”
“What are you talking about, Matthew?” April scolded me. “He looked like he was going to cry the whole time. I felt bad for him.”
We put Oliver the cat in a little cage for transport and left through the back door. If we took the main streets from there to Dez’s house, we’d be quite visible, making an attack less likely. Even the folks who passed bribes to the guards until their arms got tired had a limit. If rampant violence was happening out in the open during the middle of the day, things would get out of hand.
But my idea turned out to be naive. There was a barricade erected before we could get to the main street, attended to by some rather professional-looking gentlemen.
Arwin put her hand on her hilt, but I held out my arm to block her. Some of the men in the group had throwing nets. There wasn’t going to be any escape. And if we fought them there, April was likely to get hurt.
The mobsters’ presence pushed us back from the street, where we found a huge man blocking our way in the other direction. He was a bit taller than me and looked to be in his thirties. His hair was short and blond, and his eyes were sharp and beady like a hawk’s. At their thickest, his arms and legs were as wide as a woman’s waist. Even when he was fully clothed, it was clear at a glance that he was all muscle. A large scar, seemingly from a blade wound, decorated his forehead.
“Nice try.”
His voice was surprisingly high-pitched. If that was all somebody heard, he might seem like a handsome fellow, but the visuals added plenty of menace. He was clearly used to threatening people. If he tried to seduce a woman, all she’d do was pee herself in terror.
He blocked my path and said patronizingly, “There are three things that are important in life. Do you know what they are?”
“Well, I know they don’t include lecturing people by asking a question.”
One of the other mean-looking men slugged me and shoved me to my knees.
“The answer is trust, money, and time.”
“C’mon, give me a bit of a wrinkle in the formula. It’s such a straightforward answer, I find it boring.”
“The truth tends to be simple. But simplicity is boring. So people come up with all kinds of silly little word games to dress it up—but that only pushes it further from the truth. Just describe things as they are. That’s all you need.”
“Very true. You need that level of honesty to be able to tell people things like, You, too, will die one day.”
April and Arwin stepped forward to stop the men before they could beat me again. Their resolution in the face of danger was very heartening. My ladies were strong and brave. I could cry.
Meanwhile, in the face of this grave danger, Oliver’s furry little ass was yawning in his cage, the ingrate. He could at least growl and hiss or something.
“Well, let’s spare that precious time by getting straight to the point,” the man said. “Hand over the kid.”
April flinched. I saw Arwin reaching for her sword, so I quickly said, “Easy, easy,” inserting myself into the touch-and-go situation. “We’re all strangers to each other, right? Let’s start with some introductions. I’m Matthew. And you are?”
“Harrison. Fire-Lightning Harrison.”
I’d heard of him. He was a senior member of the Devil’s Alliance and clearly a fighter. From what I’d heard, he had once been a member of an illegal fighting league. Some said he’d crushed a dragon’s claw with his bare hands before. Well, so had I.