“Your father is surely overjoyed by your piety, Your Excellency,” he courteously praised Ebel once again as they walked together.
How did Rock appear in his eyes as she accompanied them? He restlessly asked about her only after they’d reached the center of the sanctuary and he’d finished lavishing Ebel with praise.
“By the way, who might this lovely young lady be…?”
“Ah.” Ebel looked over at Rock. He lightly smiled at her as she wisely kept her mouth shut. “She’s the daughter of a distant relative on my mother’s side. She is currently staying at my residence while she undergoes etiquette lessons.”
“Oh… I see, I see.” The priest nodded several times as if impressed by something left unsaid.
“She still isn’t used to high society and is a mild-mannered quiet girl, as you can see.”
It took all of Rock’s will not to laugh after being introduced as having a personality that was a far cry from the truth. As it was, her interest lay more with what the priest was wearing than what he thought of her.
Krister’s ledger had several letters crossed out right before it said “blue robes.” What if he’d mistakenly written purple first?
Krister’s customer had been some sort of clergyman. So he’d simply assumed the order would be for purple robes and wrote that down before the fact. However, what the customer wanted was blue robes, so he hastily blotted it out and corrected the details in his ledger.
Somehow that all seemed like a likely story.
The sweet, elegant scent permeating the sanctuary seemed to support her hypothesis.
Rock and Ebel sat side by side on the sanctuary pew.
Although she was sitting down, this was the last place Rock could relax. The light shining through the stained glass shimmered on the floor like inlaid jewels. It was so quiet when they weren’t talking, you could even hear their clothes rubbing against the pew when they moved.
And then there was the sweet, luxurious smell of fragrant wood in the air.
Rock thought it smelled similar to the scent lingering in Krister’s hovel that night.
Noticing Rock’s restless energy, Ebel started a conversation with the priest to get the ball rolling.
“May I ask you a question, Reverend Father?”
“You may ask me anything, Your Excellency,” the elderly priest replied with a respectful bow.
He looked like a high-ranked priest, but even someone of his status paid respect to a count.
Ebel put his question to the priest as Rock processed the surprising hierarchy at play.
“I see you are wearing purple robes. Are there any clergy in the imperial capital that wear blue robes?”
“No,” the priest replied without delay. “Blue is a damned color.”
“….Damned?” Rock couldn’t help repeating that unsettling word.
Her voice unexpectedly traveled through the high-ceiling sanctuary, and the “mild-mannered, quiet girl” hastily covered her mouth with her hands.
“It is. There is a reason why our robes are purple,” the priest continued without minding the interruption. “Namely, the blue of water and the red of blood, the gift of life from God and the origin of all existence, combine to make purple.”
“…That’s what I thought,” Ebel whispered to Rock. He seemed to know that convention.
In that case, who in the world would order blue robes?
The blue of water, the red of blood, damnation—every word had an edge of danger to it that left Rock terribly unsettled.
“Why do you ask about such a thing, Your Excellency?”
It was the priest’s turn to question them.
“My maid said she saw a group of several people clad in blue robes wandering through the capital,” Ebel answered smoothly as Rock felt her hands go cold. “Apparently, their robes were embroidered, but I wonder what the design was…”
Ebel was awfully skilled at making up convenient lies. Rock was impressed. Meanwhile, the priest seemed to fall for it as his eyes went wide with surprise.
“I see… Do you have any idea what color thread was used for the embroidery?”
“Unfortunately not. All I can say for sure is that my maid is deeply unsettled by how suspicious and scary the group appeared,” Ebel answered as casually as if it were the truth and shrugged.
Just then, the person sitting on the pew behind them suddenly stood up. It was the well-dressed middle-aged man who’d been praying in the sanctuary before they’d arrived.
“Oh, are you—”
The man didn’t stop to hear the priest out as he exited through the thick double doors and gruffly shut them behind him. The disregarded priest seemed a little baffled by his rude behavior.
“…He seems to be in quite the hurry,” he said, unable to keep the discomfit out of his voice.
“Who was that gentleman?” Ebel asked without missing a beat.
“Someone who comes daily to pray. I haven’t asked about his identity…” The priest took a breath to dispel his confusion and looked anxiously at the door. “I believe he is a devout believer as he prays in earnest every day.”
“Then he must have left because we were being too loud,” Ebel said as if he believed that was the reason the man suddenly departed, but one look at his side profile told a different story.
After stealing a glance at his expression, Rock cast her restless gaze down at the brightly colored floor.
♚♚♚
WITH nothing else left to gain from the church, Rock and Ebel boarded their carriage and departed the holy church district. An exhausted Phoebe welcomed them outside Mateus Manor when they finally returned.
“Roxy, you’re finally back!”
Lured by the sound of the carriage, he appeared out front as if scrambling away from some monster within the manor.
“What’s wrong, Father?” Rock asked as soon as she stepped out of the carriage.
Phoebe let out a long-suffering sigh before he got to his complaint.
“That maid could be the poster child for all that is annoying. At first, she pestered me with a barrage of worthless questions, and when I said I wasn’t interested in answering, she started blathering on and on by herself. You’d think the girl doesn’t need air with how long her stories go without pause…”
Apparently, Phoebe hadn’t been allowed to spend the time in peace and quiet as he’d wanted. Johanna quickly came running out to meet them, her expression apologetic.
“Was I really that annoying, Master Phoebe? You were yawning so much, I thought you were bored of waiting…”
“I was just tired,” Phoebe snarled at her.
As Rock was trying to decide the best way to console her father, Ebel apologized to him first.
“I apologize for the trouble my maid caused you.”
“Are you stuck listening to this never-ending prattling every day, Your Excellency?” Phoebe asked with a wry smile.
“Yes. There aren’t many people in my house, so I’m grateful for Johanna’s lively energy,” Ebel responded without hesitation. Then he added, “Though I must admit I often haven’t a clue what she’s saying…”
How in the world did Johanna process what her employer said? For some reason, she tilted her head and let out a girlish giggle.
“I know it’s not much, but I do my part to make sure Mateus Manor is always filled with cheer.”
“But Johanna, you should know they are both my esteemed guests.” Ebel rubbed his temples to indicate he wasn’t praising her. “It’s rude to ask a bunch of questions just to satisfy your curiosity. Refrain from doing so in the future.”
“Yes, Your Excellency,” Johanna responded cheerfully.
Rock also believed that the manor would never become dark and gloomy with her around. But she doubted she could follow Johanna’s conversational topics if Ebel and Phoebe couldn’t.
“Please prepare tea for us as well.”
“At once, Your Excellency.”
At Ebel’s request, J
ohanna hurried back inside the manor before showing Rock and the others to the reception room.
It was the same reception room with a portrait of a young Ebel and his father Cyrille that Rock had been shown to during her last visit. Rock studied the painting that captured the father and son before their lives were cursed with a completely different outlook.
The young boy had lost the tender green hue of his eyes and remained within the manor as a werewolf. Meanwhile, his father had passed away and was laid to rest within the quiet mausoleum. Both of them had a gentle kindness to them that’d been lost to the grave.
“I’ve brought your tea.”
Rock and Ebel took a much-needed break over the tea Johanna brewed. After enjoying a few sips, Rock divulged the information they’d obtained at the church to Phoebe. While they hadn’t gathered much news, Phoebe was still fascinated about the details pertaining to the blue robes they’d garnered from their visit.
“Damned robes, huh? Who’d willingly order something like that?”
“If only we could figure that out, we’d probably be able to pin down Krister’s whereabouts.”
The missing person posters were steadily disappearing from the slums.
Some were peeled off by the rain, while others were ripped down by drunks and children playing bad pranks. Nisha seemed to create and rehang new ones every time, but it was only a matter of time before she ran out of energy and money.
“The incense is another important find. If some sorta clergyman really is involved in this, then…”
Rock and Ebel were able to confirm the church smelled of incense that very day.
What if Krister was forced to make the damned blue robes and was harmed after he did? Rock didn’t know what reasons or objectives the customer had for doing that, but she felt they were getting closer to the truth.
“We could use a few more clues,” Phoebe groaned with his arms folded. Then his gaze suddenly shifted to Ebel, who was sitting across from him.
Rock followed his gaze and noticed the deep creases in Ebel’s handsome forehead. He seemed to be contemplating something.
“What’s the matter, Ebel?” she asked, getting him to slowly raise his gaze to meet hers.
“Do you remember the well-dressed man inside the church?”
“Yes.”
He could only mean the middle-aged man who had stormed out of the church while Ebel was speaking with the priest.
“Something about him really bothers me,” he muttered with a grim look. “I heard him run at full speed a few moments after he exited the sanctuary. He seemed to have suddenly remembered he had urgent business while I was talking to the priest.”
Rock also found it strange.
He was supposedly a man who was so devout, he attended church every day to pray. Would such a man really run out of church after not only failing to say goodbye to the priest but even going so far as to ignore him simply because he remembered some urgent business?
However, there was nothing suspicious about him aside from his quick departure, and they had nothing to go off of to prove he was involved in anything, even if they chose to suspect him.
“Nothing about this sits right.”
“You can say that again…”
“Honestly…”
Phoebe, Rock, and Ebel thought alike here, their expressions equally sullen.
Suddenly, Rock noticed the gaze eating into her. The owner of said gaze was Johanna, and she broke into a big grin when Rock looked at her.
Her purple eyes sparkled with curiosity—maybe she wanted to join the conversation or to ask Rock a question.
“What is it, Johanna?”
Rock’s question was immediately followed by Phoebe clearing his throat loudly beside her. His way of saying “Don’t get her started!”
That gesture alone told Rock just how much trouble her father had dealing with the blond maid while she was away. She always had this image of her father as invincible, so it was surprising he couldn’t hold his own against a teenage girl.
“Johanna, don’t forget your manners.”
Ebel’s reminder caused her to clamp her mouth shut before she rattled off her inquiry. But their serious conversation had hit a dead end, and Rock wanted a change of pace.
“…Oh right, I heard from His Excellency,” Rock began, addressing Johanna to get the conversation going. “Is it true you come from a line of werewolf hunters?”
Out of the corner of her eye, Rock saw Phoebe lean forward with great interest as soon as she brought that topic up. On the other hand, Johanna’s cheery expression instantly fell.
“Do you believe the stories, Master Rock?” she asked in nervous tones.
What she expected to be a light conversation starter proved the opposite with the way Johanna reacted. Rock reflexively shot Ebel a look, but he just carried his teacup to his lips to hide his amused smile. Thinking it strange, Rock decided to just honestly answer her.
“I believed it.”
Johanna smiled bashfully. “Both my parents and my grandfather seem to believe it too.”
“You don’t, Johanna?”
“I hope it is true…” She suddenly started fidgeting and pulling on her pigtails. “But the thing is, neither my parents nor grandfather nor anyone in my parents’ generation had ever seen a werewolf.” Then she glanced at Ebel and sighed. “No one—not a single member of my clan—had until we met His Excellency.”
“Then how did you know you were a clan of werewolf hunters?” Rock asked the most obvious question.
“Because our homes are filled with items that fit the tales,” Johanna replied. “Everything from horrifying executioner swords with nicks in the blade to traps for capturing werewolves to large shackles and torture devices. Yet no one remembers ever using them. We’ve only the stories passed down from generation to generation.”
That sounded like quite a dangerous set of items to have passed down through the generations. It didn’t seem too far-fetched to believe the tales with all that evidence, but Johanna appeared doubtful.
“So, our clan basically threw a huge party when we received the request to serve the Mateus family. My father, mother, and grandfather were ecstatic… They seemed relieved from the bottom of their hearts to learn there really are werewolves out there,” Johanna said with a dry smile. “But as you can see, I’m just an ordinary girl who likes to talk a little more than the rest. If I’m truly the descendant of werewolf hunters, I should have some sort of power to protect His Excellency with…”
“Don’t let that bother you,” Ebel interrupted to console her. “You do your job very well. That’s all that matters.”
“Thank you very much, Your Excellency.” Despite expressing her gratitude, Johanna appeared ashamed deep down. Pouting, she muttered, “I always wished I had some kind of special power or some skill that would awaken in a moment of crisis.”
As far as Rock knew, the Ancient Empire the Werewolf Brotherhood was most active during perished hundreds of years ago. The current imperial dynasty began after that, and since then, it’d reigned as an empire without major wars or political changes.
The reason they didn’t know the exact timeframe since the change in dynasties was because the history books had almost all been burned. In any event, centuries had passed, and while some families passed down tales of their Ancient Empire glory days, others ceased to believe it.
Until Rock met Ebel, she too lumped werewolves in with the rest of the ghost stories told in the slums. Rumors abounded about them in the shantytown, but she’d assumed drunks had mistaken a large, hairy man for a werewolf. Of course, she couldn’t doubt their existence after she had met one in person.
The real question was: why did the werewolf curse still exist in the modern world?
As Rock became lost in thought, Ebel rose from his chair. His eyes were locked on something outside the window.
“There’s a carriage. I didn’t plan for any other guests today, though…”
Curious
, Rock turned around to see a single carriage parked outside the closed gates at the end of the vast Mateus gardens.
It was an awfully magnificent carriage drawn by two beautiful horses.
An unfamiliar family crest was painted on the carriage doors. Phoebe was first to respond to the crest depicting a balanced scale with azaleas growing up it.
“The Alexis family…”
Rock spun toward her father and saw his jaw was set in a hard line, his expression stiffer than she’d ever seen it before.
“Are you well-acquainted with that family, Your Excellency?” Phoebe asked Ebel, who promptly shook his head.
“I don’t know them well enough to receive an unannounced visit.”
“Then what are they here for…?”
“I hate to think it, but it seems likely they’ve caught on to you.”
Ebel looked at Rock, forcing her to quickly come to terms with the situation.
Apparently, the Alexises had successfully pinned down her whereabouts. How or why they did was still up in the air. But the one thing Rock knew for certain was that their visit was an unwanted one.
The carriage door finally swung open as they watched from the reception room’s bay window.
A woman stepped out into the strong orange light cast by the setting sun. The lady wore a sheer veil over her face and an elegant navy-blue dress. There was quite a distance from the manor across the garden to the closed gate, which made it even more difficult to make out her face under the veil.
But Phoebe shoved Rock’s head down under the window to hide her from view.
“Get down, Roxy!” He crouched beneath the window beside her and exhaled a rueful sigh. “There’s no question about it, that’s Lauretta Alexis.” Rock didn’t recognize that name, but her father quickly explained, “She’s Vale’s older sister and your aunt.”
“That lady?”
Rock fought off the desire to stand back up and take a second look. Trouble was sure to come if Lauretta saw her too.
“Did you ever meet her?” Ebel asked, directing his question to the crouching Phoebe.
“Yeah, in my mercenary days,” Phoebe bit out.
The Werewolf Count and the Trickster Tailor, Volume 2 Page 9