The Lady in Armour

Chapter 4 - ZENILE

CHAPTER 4               -               ZENILE

Liam watched silently as his brother walked away from the prisoners. He couldn’t hear a thing from their conversation but from the look on his brother’s face it seemed like they had a pretty nice conversation. What Liam couldn’t understand was why his brother was acting strangely to the point of showing his kremp to the prisoners. He wouldn’t let him – his own brother – or any of his friends see it yet he showed it to them with no hesitation at all.

“You better watch your brother carefully,” Maki whispered to Liam. He was leaning on a large rock with his head slightly bowed and used his long blond hair to hide his slightly opened eyes from Travis. “Coir might think he is trying to help the prisoners.”

Liam was not at all surprised to see that Maki was also awake and silently watching everything. Among his men, he was the most vigilant and shrewd. He was lucky that he was on their side because he was a big help in making plans and executing them. He was also their spy. Rem was fond of him because Maki once saved his life so he shared most of the king’s and generals’ secrets like their kremps to him. These secrets were very important to their secret group because they gave them ideas that could help make their plans more successful.  

“Is Coir awake?” he asked and looked at Coir’s direction. “I couldn’t tell from here. Rem’s large stomach is blocking my view.”

“At first I thought he was asleep but then I saw his hands tighten on his sword when Travis showed a piece of paper to the prisoners. Coir has no idea that it is his kremp so I think he thought it is a secret message for the prisoners from a secret organization to bring down the king.”

Liam thought about it for a moment but then decided to just wait until morning before doing anything. He couldn’t simply jump into conclusions and act without a well planned strategy because everything that he and the others had planned for three weeks could go into waste. For now, he will stick to their plan. There were other more important things that needed to be done so he’ll just stay awake and look out for his brother in case Coir decided to attack him while everyone was asleep.

He envied his brother because Travis seemed like he finally found the true meaning of his kremp while he, on the other hand, remained as clueless as before. Five years had passed and he still couldn’t find who were the black knight and the lady in white.

“Have you finally realized what your kremp means, Maki?” he whispered.

“Yes.”

“What’s your kremp?”

Maki glanced at everyone to make sure that no one was looking before throwing a crumpled paper near Liam’s face. “Keep it for me.”

Liam nodded and read his kremp silently.

You are given with great knowledge

That even the king fears to acknowledge

Use it to find the black knight

And end everyone’s fright

Liam reread the kremp three more times before folding it and hiding it in his satchel with trembling hands. He couldn’t believe that he and Maki had kremps that were somehow related to each other. Both his and Maki’s kremp mention about a black knight and he was sure that his black knight and Maki’s black knight was the same person. Thanks to Maki’s kremp, he was starting to gain more confidence on his kremp.   

An hour had passed and Coir had already fallen asleep but Liam still cannot relax because he was too happy of what he found out and too curious of what his brother was up to. His brother rarely kept a secret from him and when he did it was simply to infuriate him but this time he knew Travis was keeping it from him for a different reason he could not think of.