Kingdom Fall (Ethereal #1)

- Chapter 23 -

The Masked Phantom

Gentetsu

The night was silent as ever.

Gentetsu felt rather guilty about spying on Prince Earic and Prince Tyler. But he didn't take too much of it to heart. He knew he had to be there. He knew that he would never forgive himself if something had happened to his savior. He slipped down from the wooden ceiling beams above. It was fortunate that Prince Tyler had left his room.

Slowly, Gen crept towards the lattices window and opened it. A cold breeze blew into the room, sending the soft pink curtain into frenzy inside the room, fluttering like a mad thing. The cold bit into Gen's face. Ignoring the pain, he jumped down, his feet landing on the section of roof below. He managed to close the window, but not properly. He just hoped the prince did not find it unusual.

In a distance, the lights in the ballroom shone bright. But there were no sound from it. It seems that the feast has ended and that the servants were cleaning it all up. Above him, the moons bobbed in between the clouds. With a sigh, Gen crawled along the roof and hauled his body into the nearest corridor below him. Everywhere was silent.

Gen didn't bother about concealing himself in the corridor. He was already Prince Earic's guard. No one would dare to accuse him of snooping around, except Prince Tyler of course. Just as Gen was about to slip back to his room a flash of a shadow caught the corner of his eye.

For some reason, Gen tensed and he drew his sword out. There was a bad feeling in the air. But when he looked around, there was no one in sight.

He strode along the corridor and turned a corner.

For a minute, Gen almost sheathed his katana.

It was a maid, just a simply maid wearing a black dress, facing her back to him. But her posture was somewhat too straight and stiff; also, maids don't usually wear black. Aryans are not too fond of the colour.

'Miss?'

The maid turned her head over her shoulders. What Gen saw, made Goosebumps appear all over his skin. Instead of a face was a white mask. Gen stepped back for a while, utterly confused. The maid turned around completely.

Gen, for the first time in his life as Earic's guard, ran for his life.

He couldn't even hear the maid's footsteps, but he knew she was behind him. He looked back for a bit and noticed that she was catching up to him.

'What kind of demon is she?' muttered Gen as he turned another corner. If only he could get to a place with palace guards.

A dagger flashed by him, almost cutting his face.

'Help me ancestors!'

Gen could not curse his luck for the fact that the whole castle was either asleep or drunk. Feeling that running was a fool's option, he stood his ground and drew both of his katanas. The maid stopped a few feet away from him, cocking her head like an animal trying to decide what to do.

'This is your chance, yokai.'

The maid leaped at him, trying to claw at his neck with a dagger. Gen had a hard time just deflecting the dagger paint away from his face.

'What is_'

'Backup!' thought Gen as he turned to the direction of the voice. His hope diminished the instand he saw who it was.

The Shokrean boy.

The boy was weaponless and utterly useless in Gen's opinion.

'Get. Help.' Gen screamed. The boy nodded and ran.