The Princess of Wrath

Chapter 15 - Part II: Alexandros Krueger, the Alchemist of Sin

Elfriede was spitefully silent, unable to contradict that primordial truth passed down from generation to generation in the Ithryl family; the desire to unify all nations under one banner.

Roland took the opportunity to look back with the hope of seeing his apprentice arrive with help. His attention was briefly focused on Alexandros, who had crouched next to Viktor's body: he was lightly touching the mortal wound on the soldier's chest with his fingertips.

Then he saw that the Imperial Guards and Wraiths were grouped at the doors and watching uneasily what was happening, although without taking a single step into the hall and almost all of them armed with their swords, spears, rifles and pistols.

"Ada!" he yelled her name when he saw her coming through that wall of guards and assassins in the company of a tall man with a long beard who, because of his age, could not run as fast as she.

"Professor, I ...!"

"No, stop right there!" Ada and Octavius ​​Walker did not go beyond the threshold of the doors after hearing Roland's quick and desperate command to not to take another step: Diana had risen from the throne and was walking slowly down the stairs, still looking at Elfriede just like a dangerous and hungry predator watches easy prey.

The Empress did her best to stand up but the widespread pain throughout her body did not allow her to move, not even with Roland's help if she had requested it.

"I will come here to visit you every night, starting tomorrow." The blonde knightess crouched down to be on the same level as the Empress and stroked her cheek lovingly, very close to the cut on her cheekbone. "Until my wife returns to me... You're mine."

"No, Diana: you've done too much damage already. This is as far as your foolish frenzy go," Roland warned her seriously. That made Diana cut eye contact with the irate but helpless Empress to look at him with utter and fearsome coldness.

"I'd like to see you trying to stop me," she hissed, raising a threatening hand and planting a seed of fear in the Alchemist's soul. "Maybe you need me to remind you that you and I are on the same level, with the difference that I can make you suffer in an unimaginable way..."

Roland truly feared for him and Elfriede's life at the time, but a voice behind him reminded him that he had truly nothing to be afraid of if he had a Warlord on his side.

"Excuse me, miss, but could you walk away from Lord Casimir and the Empress?" Diana glanced forward sharply, frowning, and then she slowly stood up. Roland glanced sideways and realized that Alexandros was standing a few feet away from them, his bloody eyes staring straight at them.

"Who the fuck are you?" Diana asked him, visibly confused but with the clear predisposition to want to kill that blind man because of his daring, due to the way she passed by Roland and Elfriede to go towards him. "I thought you were a healer stupid enough tonot know the difference between a seriously injured person and a corpse... But you are something else, aren't you? I cannot feel a trace of your spirit."

"I'm Alexandros Krueger." Diana suddenly stopped on her tracks. Roland could only see her bare back covered in old scars and her blonde hair tied like a ponytail, but he caught a glimpse of the sudden tremor in her fingers that could signify fear or excitement. "I hid all traces of my spirit so that you wouldn't feel threatened and could dialogue with Roland peacefully, but I cannot sit idly by while you threaten him."

Making Roland feel a chill run through every corner of his body, the blonde knightess let out a laugh that echoed throughout the hall.

"Yes... Blind eyes and tears of blood... Your famous Book of Sin... I was very inconsiderate not to identify a man of your caliber, my apologies," she said before glancing back, meeting the gaze full of tension of her associate to instill even more terror in his soul as Elfriede clung to him more tightly thanks to all that helpless anger she felt. "You could have told me that you had brought one of the four Warlords with you, Roland."