An hour later, Kentario and Maro had finished interviewing the housekeeping staff, and Kentario’s patience was wearing thin. They were no closer to a breakthrough, with none of the staff knowing where or how the Nalmagian raiders had got into the palace, nor of any reason why any of the staff would be willing to assist such a bloody and brutal mob. Queen Elise had always made a point of making sure all the palace staff were well treated, and that kindness seemed to be paying off now.
“Let’s head down to the kitchens,” Kentario said next, more an order than a suggestion. “It’ll be quicker than dragging all the staff up here one by one.”
Maro nodded, eager to cooperate, for the time being at least, so they headed out the door and turned right, then through a narrow door that lead into the staff area of the palace.
Inside the spacious kitchen, half a dozen staff were huddled on chairs, looking tired and miserable. Only a skeleton staff would have been on duty last night, dinner long over, but with guests in the palace, someone had to be on hand to provide for any late requests for food or drinks.
“Saki,” Kentario called, finding the woman in the group. She was the most senior member of the staff in the room. “Come this way.”
They headed for a small anteroom, but only two minutes later, it was clear that Saki didn’t know anything. “I was stationed in the bar last night, serving drinks to the Arctesians. I didn’t hear of anything until the raiders broke into the hall.”
Kentario dismissed her and headed back to the kitchen, Maro at his heels… but just as they were about to step back through the kitchen door, a new voice had him stopping in his tracks.
“Kentario! Oh, thank Selene!” The Goddess was certainly getting more than her fair share of praise today, but this time, Kentario wasn’t about tocomplain. He turned to see Emica rushing towards him and caught his sister in a bear-hug as she threw herself into his arms. She hugged him back just as tightly, then pulled back so she could look at his face. “Are you okay? Where’s Ryu? Were you injured?”
She patted him down, but he gently pushed her back. “What about you?” he asked, sidestepping her questions. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. A few bruises, but I’ve been mostly just helping the nobles make sure everyone’s safe and accounted for. Right now, everyone’s staying put back inside the cottages,” she reported to Maro, glancing over Kentario’s shoulder at the older man. “Aside from three people who’ve been sent to hospital. None of the kids were hurt, but I’d strongly recommend we get a counsellor over there in the near future. Some of them are pretty shaken up over the whole screaming-running-gunshots thing. Have you figured out how they got in yet?”
Maro didn’t answer, and Kentario was left to field the question. “Not yet, no. We’re still interviewing staff.”
“Do you need any help?” Emica offered immediately, and a part of Kentario was grateful for the support. Right now, there was no one in the palace he trusted more than his sister.
But a stray glance at Maro caught her attention, and it was only the fact that she’d known him her entire life, that they were as close as brother and sister could be, that allowed her to immediately deduce the meaning of the look.
“What’s wrong?” she asked. “What’s Maro done?”
Kentario considered how best to answer the question. “Maybe you and I should have a private chat,” he suggested, then, without waiting for an answer, headed back to the anteroom where they’d been interviewing the staff.
Inside, she fixed him with a steely glare. “What’s going on, Kinto?” she asked, calling him by her childhood name for him. “Where’s Ryu?”
“He’s safe,” he told her. “That’s all I’m prepared to say for the moment, and that information is classified.Absolutely no one elsegets to hear about it, and that includes Maro.”
“But he’s the Captain,” Emica protested, looking confused. “Surely he would…” Realisation dawned, and her expression turned grave. “You don’t… You can’t seriously think he was involved in this?”
“Until I find out exactly what happened here, I’m not taking any chances. The Nalmagians – if that’s even who attacked the palace – managed to get all the way inside and kill the king and queen.”
“Maro was not responsible for this,” Emica stated flatly. “I was here, Kinto, I was fighting right alongside him.”
Kentario felt his blood run cold at the news, though not for the obvious reasons. “You werefighting? What the fuck do you think you were doing?You haven’t finished your training. You’re not anywhere near ready to be involved in gunfights in enclosed spaces!”
“What the hell was I supposed to do?” Emica shot back at him, the one person in the world who had never been the slightest bit intimidated by his temper. “People were dying. I wasn’t going to go sit in a corner and feel sorry for myself while that was going on. But my point is,” she insisted, swiftly coming back to the topic at hand, “I was fighting alongside Maro. I’ve trained with him almost every day since I joined the Guard. I know his fighting style. I know what he’s capable of. I know when he’s holding back. And you would have seen exactly the same thing I saw, if you were there when we were facing those raiders. Maro was fightingfor his life. He’d been shot, but he just wouldn’t give up. We were facing squads of eight or ten raiders at a time. Fifteen members of the Guard are dead. You can’t honestly believe he’d orchestrate a situation that would put his own guards in that kind of danger.”
“There were no guards in the residential wing,” Kentario said. “Why weren’t they sent there the instant the king was attacked?”
“It was complete chaos down in the main hall. We didn’t know what was going on. We didn’t know where they’d come from. And Maro did send a group of guards that way, but they couldn’t get through. The raiders had barricaded the door.”
“Did you see that yourself?”
“Not at the time, no, but I tried to go that way after everyone had been arrested. The guards ended up having to break a couple of windows on the ground floor to get back inside the wing. And yes, I saw the barricade. Tables, chairs, cupboards. They’d done a thorough job of stopping anyone trying to get through.”
Kentario felt a trickle of relief at the news. Maro had been telling the truth – on that side of things, at least.
“Come on, Kinto. Maro’s on our side.”
“I’ll believe that when I know how the attackers got into the palace,” Kentario said. “Like I said to him earlier; even if he wasn’t involved, he still failed in his duty to protect the palace.”
Emica’s shoulders sagged a fraction. “Yeah, well… I guess you’ve got a point there. But at the same time, it sounds like you need my help. You’re not exactly capable of staying impartial at the moment.”
