Chapter Text
These days, there were few things that lured her away from her lonely cottage up on the hill. Occasionally, it was the need for a new book. Research was severely dependent on her relationship with the bookkeeper, so it was a blessing that the kind old man had only her company among the population of the whole town, aside from the frequent wandering merchants.There was Lena and Emily, who were her reasons to sweep through the town this time. Then, there was the one who’d beat her to it already, waiting for her inside the bakery and nodding solemnly with Emily behind the counter until he caught her eye and smiled.
“Angela,” he said softly, head bobbing to both acknowledge and welcome her into the establishment. “I was just talking with Emily. About Lena.”
Though his smile had quickly fallen away in light of the discussion topic, Angela could feel his warmth towards her, wordlessly inviting her into his space. She obliged, gliding over to a counter that divided the customers and their baker, Emily, whose weary expression only barely lightened at Angela’s presence.
“She’s still away?” Angela heard herself ask gently. Emily simply shook her head, and Angela felt a knot form in her stomach. “Still no letter?”
Again, Emily shook her head only this time, her expression crumpled under the weight of the admission. The woman strained herself not to cry, but a loose whimper escaped her and Angela reached out to touch her shoulder. Genji shared a look of concern with Angela, then pulled away from the two girls.
“I will try to get more information--something seems off,” The words came out stern, as if there were someone he were fighting with, and then he spent one last glance in the girls’ direction with a much gentler tone. “If I hear anything, Emily, you will be the first to know. I will find something.”
Then he was off, leading Angela to offer reassurance to Emily before she skipped after him.
Genji was a handsome man. Among their small town, he likely had the most suitors pining away at the sight of him, and Angela couldn’t blame them. He was handsome--tall, with dark hair that made funny looking eyebrows, and mysterious scars thrown all over his skin like confetti. It was Angela who brought him into the village after she found him just outside of her cottage tip-toeing the line between life and death. She saved him, just as anyone might when they find a man soaking their garden in a tangy iron smell and an absurd amount of blood, and since then she could not remember a time where she’d been without him.
Rumors continuously suggested that the pair would be wed the minute Genji was able to move, and yet a year had passed by unceremoniously and it seemed that there was no progress on either end. Angela was used to rumors. People had all sorts of things to say about a woman who reads and isolates herself to the furthest end of the town; Gorgeous, but still unmarried at 37 years old? Outrageous. The only victim of this circumstance was Genji himself. Nobody was quite certain where he’d come from, only that it was somewhere east, but Angela could tell he’d never been anywhere so bold or blunt before in his life. The man was extremely polite, and anytime he’d been pressed on the subject of their relationship, she’d watch as his neck and ears flushed red while his arms flailed uselessly around in an attempt to explain his actions. He was too gentlemanly for his own good, and had no idea how to disengage or differentiate anyone making fun of him. Still, most people found it charming--that perhaps he treated every woman with such respect, and that he was naive and it was ‘cute’ in a way.
Angela quite liked him, sure, but to be wed by him? She’d spent the whole year deliberating on this thought.
“Genji,” She huffed, handling her skirt so that she might catch up to him though he’d already stopped his leave knowing full well she’d trot right behind. “What are you going to do? Nobody has heard anything at all, and it’s been weeks.”
His chest heaved with a sigh, and for a moment he gazed at the clouds hanging just above her head.. “...I know. But I need to do something. Rumors are spreading…” He winced at the thought that occurred only in his head, tensed before stepping closer to her with a hushed tone. “They’re saying she eloped, Angela.”
“That’s absurd. They don’t even know anything; They don’t know Lena.”
“I know,” Genji brought his arms up across his chest, heaving another sigh. “I know they don’t. But Emily shouldn't hear that kind of talk. That, or anything even slightly worse.”
She knew what he meant. It was bad enough that Lena had been gone for a week already with no sign of correspondence. Emily must’ve been going mad--Angela herself was familiar with the feeling. She bit her lip and stared at the ground. If another few days went by without hearing back from her…
“I’m going to pack my things. If she’s not back by the end of this week, I’m going to go look for her.”
Angela’s head snapped up to find Genji staring down at her, unwavering. “What? What are you talking about--You don’t even know where she was headed!”
“I can ask. She was trying to get to an adventurers’ guild? I’ll find it.”
“You don’t even know which direction she went, Genji! What if you get lost--”
“When she left, it looked like she was headed north. I’ll start that way and ask around. Nobody could miss her, she’s very identifiable all on her own like that.”
The thought of his friend, Lena, tugged on a corner of his lips, but Angela was still not amused. “But what about your wounds? You don’t even know the land that well--you’ve hardly gone out that far!”
Something in his expression changed, tugging on his brief amusement and turning it into something more. He raised a gentle hand to her shoulder and let her ramble on.
“You don’t know the land, Genji. Not like I do--Let me come with you, at least. If you’re going to be so reckless, that is.”
“No,” he shook his head softly, a faint smile lingering in spite of her nerves. “You have to be here when I—we return. I’ll want to see you.”
That choked the words in Angela’s throat until her lips formed a straight line and she held his even gaze.
Rumors floated among the surface of the town, sure, but those with eyes could see that regardless of the factors that pushed them together and pulled them away, something undeniable bubbled up between Angela and Genji when the time was right. Married men often saw themselves in Genji’s persistence, and the wise old women hardly needed so much as a glance between them to tell that there was something. Something that Angela was fighting so hard not to see herself, even when it was so blatant like it was now.
She swallowed, hard. It was reaching a point, wasn’t it? One of them would budge, and one of them would cave, and… Her life would be as ordinary as any other. A handsome man and a handful of children. Just like anybody else. Her books and the tales she enveloped herself in could not tear her away from this reality. Castles and adventures were not real, and not for women anyway. Perhaps, she thought she’d be able to live through Lena and her attempt at adventure, but now… Even that was too distant of a dream.
“Genji,” She said, the name huffed out of her mouth. Briefly, she searched his eyes, but that only made his feelings more real. She bit her lip and found her gaze somewhere amongst the dirt and grass.
She could only imagine how strong he had to have been to carry the weight of every hesitant glance she offered, and every instance she could no longer stand to look at him. He was too bright. Too warm.
He pulled his hand away from her shoulder, but not without tracing his knuckles down the length of her arm. Whether he could pinpoint her exact thoughts, he had a knack for giving her space. Over and over again, he stepped back three paces after having only marched forward once.
“Okay,” With a sharp inhale, she brought herself to Genji’s level once again, observing how black irises contemplated her stillness. “Okay, fine. In a week, Genji. No sooner. And I get to help you pack, since you have no idea where you’re going or what you’ll need.”
Genji cracked a smile, likely aware that his ease annoyed her even further. “As you wish, Doctor Ziegler.”
She shot him a glare, one that deepened his grin, and then gave him a punch in the arm that didn’t sway him in the slightest. “Watch it, Shimada. You’re gonna be on the top of my shitlist if you get lost or hurt or worse.”
“Hm,” He huffed a quiet laugh. “Noted.”
She just rolled her eyes. “I’m serious, you know. Come on--You’ll need my maps, and perhaps a few books on the terrain…”
Angela marched ahead, her psyche spared another day of agonizing over her future with a new task sitting right in front of her face, and Genji was sentenced to another few weeks of waiting. Neither of them lingered too long in their thoughts. For now, the goal was to set their sights on finding Lena, and that’s what they would do. For now.
‘'
It was hours after Genji had left her lonely cottage that Angela was stirred awake by the disturbed trotting and whinnying of a familiar horse outside her door. At first, she thought she’d been lost in a dream somewhere, but the poor creature was persistent, desperate for attention and for all its efforts, Angela staggered to her front door in a half-dazed state.
Rubbing her eyes, she began to make out the beast until recognition had jolted her awake.
“Oh my God it’s--” Her palm covered her mouth that hung wide open as she moved quickly to its side and calmed the horse with urgent coos and hushes. Only when it settled did she stroke its mane and call its name. “Tracer… How did you…?”
Her brain was still clouded with sleep, but fear shot down her spine in hopes of clearing out the fog.
“Lena must be…”
Angela glanced down at her garments, then at the horse. Gears had begun to turn again, though perhaps the idea that formed was still evidence of a brain without sleep. There was too little time though, she reasoned with herself. If Lena had lost her horse, then she must have needed immediate help, and to leave to get help would involve causing a fuss and waiting for backup to arm themselves and--
In a handful of moments, she’d been in and out of her house in borrowed menswear, loose and ill-fitting, and a large blue cloak that tucked away her blindingly yellow hair. Just in case, she packed her usual garments away with a small dagger folded beneath them. Genji had the maps with him, but she had the curves of the land committed to memory by now. All that time spent wishing she could follow them, and now…
For a moment, she struggled with Tracer, clamoring up to the horse’s saddle with little help from the poor anxious thing, but eventually they were in sync. Angela handled the reins the way Genji had shown her many nights ago, when the rest of the town slept on the idea that they might be in love, and she thanked him for all that time he spent waiting. One last glance was spent on her cottage--she’d not left a note. There were no markings, no proof of where she’d be headed, only a best guess. The blood in her veins was pumping. This was adventure. This was heroism. And maybe it was freedom, too.
A long, slow inhale filled her lungs as the decision had been made. If Genji were to find her, if she had actually found Lena and had to return, then she would. She’d live right and proper, like everyone else. But for now, going forward, Angela was an adventurer. A nameless figure, a cloaked shadow. She was herself and no one else. She was gone. Lost into the blackness of the night and the shadows of the forest.
‘’
Having settled into her role, Tracer seemed to be amenable to Angela’s frequent stops. Horseriding was different when it was for real travel rather than the educational purpose around her little cottage, trotting around in circles at dusk. If Genji could see how she handled the reins now, he’d laugh. The stars, too, were different than they were at home despite being as versed as she was in astrology. Out here, where the wind combed through her hair as her hood fell behind her, the stars actually moved--well, they didn’t actually, but it felt like they did. The world around Angela was rich and real and she was part of it like the constant of the ocean’s waves.
It was a handful of days until she breached the northern village’s cold front, the sun climbing in the sky only to be blocked by the clouds and the mountains. So far, five days out seemed to match how long Lena had been gone, and yet as Angela passed through the town to inquire about the girl’s whereabouts, it appeared as if she’d never gone this way at all.
Impossible, Angela thought in the faces of those who merely shrugged their shoulders and shook their heads when she’d asked about Lena. Angela knew the maps well enough to pinpoint the village, and she knew that the adventurers guildhall sat just on the northern-most edge of the town and yet…
Nothing.
Angela made a beeline for the guildhall. Bustling, warm and chatty adventurers, and they had no eye for the girl at all. None. There was, however, a woman who found herself tickled by Angela’s desperation, though she’d been of no help at all when prompted with the question. Still, Angela felt there must’ve been something that made the woman grin and shake her head as if she knew.
“I’m sorry, is something funny, Miss…?”
The woman, pale skinned with snowy hair, huffed a laugh and shook her head again. “Naw, nothin’s funny sweetheart. Well, maybe just a little. Your friend… Lena, was it? You said she wanted to be an…’Adventurer’.”
She said the word with a hint of a snicker and hid her lips behind a hand with painted black nails. Angela turned to face her head on.
“Yes,” Mocking or not, Angela could bite her tongue if it meant she’d get a sliver of information. “You must have an idea where she is then?”
With a chuckle, the woman took a step towards Angela. “Right as rain,” she sang.
“Then you must tell me! I need to find her and bring her back--”
“She got taken by the castle,” the woman said with a shrug, as if this information was enough to punctuate Angela’s line of questioning. When her brow furrowed in response, the woman pressed on, only this time she spoke in a dramatic whisper. “The haunted castle out in the west woods. They say there’s a beast there who captures mindless wanderers who stumble across those gates. Tortures em’ for aaaall of eternity.”
Silence hung between them, and the white-haired woman drew away from Angela’s face with a smirk as horror overtook Angela’s expression. Then, she stepped right back into the act.
“You don’t want to have to risk your life for this, little girl. I, however, happen to have experience with this sort of thing. For the right price, I might…”
Her words trailed off as Angela started backwards, one slow step after another, up until she burst out of the guildhall aiming for her friend’s horse.
“HEY!” She’d barely heard the cry of the bounty hunter as it was drowned out by the sound of Tracer’s hooves in packed snow.
‘’
It was dark by the time she’d infiltrated the west woods, and ever since her entrance, Tracer had been determined to give her a hard time. As shameless as she was, that woman at the guildhall must’ve been telling the truth--some truth, at the very least. Tracer seemed to have an idea of where they were at, showing her rider mercy only when they tracked backwards, away from their true destination. Perhaps Lena had been plainly abducted from her horse and dragged away, thus frightening Tracer down to her core. Perhaps it wasn’t as mystical as that woman portrayed it to be.
Regardless, Tracer was leading her in circles, and fighting to break away from the path when Angela managed to nudge her in the right direction. She had to make progress here, and with Tracer tied to a branch nearby, she was no longer sitting around waiting to simply be abducted somehow. Angela stomped through the snow, frustration fueling her march towards the dark, looming mass of brick and glass lying in the distance.
The rucksack slung across her shoulders provided her with a handful of snacks that were completely gone by the time she’d finally stumbled across rusted metal gates. Despite the cold, despite the slow growing fear of the direction her adventure had taken her, Angela pressed through the gates with ease.
The courtyard was snowed over, so there was hardly anything to look at other than the wooden doors that towered over her when she reached them. At this point, the cold would be the end of her if she didn’t stumble across Lena soon, so after only a handful of knocking, she tried the doors.
The wood crackled as light from the outside peered into the dark manor and Angela took a cautious step forward. If she’d wanted to conceal her presence at all, her entrance brought with it a symphony of screaming winds and croaking wood that squashed that possibility immediately. A mere seconds upon her entry, the walls cried in unison, echoing as if she’d tripped an alarm:
“Personne n'échappe à mon regard.”
French, from the sound of it, and possibly urgent. With less than a moment spared attempting to scan her environment despite her still adjusting eyes, Angela darted off in the direction of the nearest hallway with quick, quiet steps.
Each step hastened the next, and though she hadn’t been exactly stealthy, fear was beginning to wear down her composure. Swift but thoughtful steps turned into an outright sprint, limbs flailing as they needed. The weight of the gaze the walls gave her was almost crushing, and the air in her lungs was fleeting by the time a stone archway caught her eye. A dungeon, perhaps? A dead end, maybe. A choice? None at all.
Angela flung herself to the left, through the archway, just as she caught the slam of the doors being forced closed and the sound of heavy boots trailing patiently behind her. Stealth didn’t matter now, so she rushed down a twisting set of stairs huffing with Lena’s name on her lips. If she was here, maybe they could escape somehow together! Maybe then she’d have some semblance of a chance, at the very least.
“LENA?” Her voice was squeezed out of her, desperate and uneven. “Lena, if you’re here, please say something… anything so I know this wasn’t just… stupid!”
The name formed quickly on her tongue again, but right as it was lined up to spill out, another voice returned to her. Fortunately, a familiar one.
“Angela!?” it was half gasp, half shout, and it echoed. “Angela, is that…? Oh my word, Angela!”
Her legs were just about ready to give up on her, but the voice ignited a burst of awareness to the cellar around her that begged her to move just a bit further until…
“Oh my god it’s really you! You are here! Lena!”
It was certainly a cellar they were in, dimly lit and housing nothing but cobwebs and barrels that looked only about a hundred years old. She found Lena wearing the same bright orange colors that she’d left in weeks ago, handling a wooden broom until Angela launched herself at her.
Lena laughed a familiar laugh when she caught her, but abruptly pushed her back to arms length. “Was that--Did you break in?”
Angela nodded in a hurry while she caught her breath. “Yes! Well, the door was open, but I heard someone chasing after me and--” All of a sudden Angela squeezed her companion’s arms in horror. “--Lena! Are you okay? Did they hurt you?”
“I’m--”
Footsteps, a familiar, evenly paced march, echoed one step following another down the path that Angela had just taken. At nearly the same time, Lena tugged Angela off her feet with a yelp and away into a hall of stone.
“I’m okay--!” Lena called back to her, almost appearing to be grinning as they made their daring escape. The sheer absurdity of their scenario nearly choked a laugh out of her as well! “I’ll tell ya more later! Let’s get you out of here! I know a way!”
Angela couldn’t sit on this notion, that Lena readily had a way out or that she hadn’t looked like someone who’d been held against their will in the clutches of a witch’s ill intent. That, and how quickly they were moving. Lena must’ve become exceptionally quick over the few days she’d been gone or Angela was just crazy. Maybe the running was getting to her?
“O-okay!” Was all she was able to get back to her as they threaded through the long hallways.
After way too much sprinting, Lena stopped and lured Angela in close. While the Swede huffed her lungs out, Lena made it a point to speak in a hushed tone all of a sudden.
“Look, Angela, there’s a cellar door here that goes out ‘round the back,” Again, Angela found that Lena did not look or sound like a person clutching their fragile life to their chest. Instead, she was embracing a pleasant thrill, like she’d been waiting for ages to break out in a sprint just like this. Angela just spared a glance at the door, curious as to why they weren’t already making a run for it as they spoke. “But I’ll bet my best shoes that the sniper's expectin’ us to leave out here.”
Between breaths, Angela’s eyes widened with a worrisome brow. “Sniper?” Was all she managed.
Lena looked like she wanted to laugh. “Yeah, that was the sound you probably heard earlier. She must’ve been looking for ya!”
An exasperated sigh expressed Angela’s thoughts on a sniper whose sole purpose seemed to be knowing exactly where she was while some other character chased her down. “That’s perfect.”
“Well it’s okay! It doesn’t last very long, and look—we’re gonna trick ‘em,” she said excitedly, wearing her smirk plainly now.
Angela just marveled at Lena for a long moment, observing what her adventure had done for her. Her blood was pumping, there was not a scratch on her and she was beaming. A pinch of jealousy seized Angela all of a sudden, though guilt came flooding in before she could consider why this might be.
“You…you’re enjoying this,” she said, looking her up and down. She wanted to smile, but it seemed they both needed a little more convincing when Lena’s expression faltered. “I-I mean like, I just thought you’d be a little more…damsel in distress-y.”
This made her smile again—it’d always been pretty easy to do so anyway, though this one seemed to insist upon something Angela couldn’t infer. The answer was taunting her, all while Lena kept it to herself like an unimaginably funny joke.
“Well… aren’t you having a little fun?”
Angela blinked. The question stumped her a bit more than the lack of context for her surroundings. “I—I… don’t…"
“Listen, we’re gonna go back up through the front door since they’ll be expecting us out back here. You didn’t happen to see Tracer while you were out there, did you?”
Angela flushed just as Lena turned away to continue on their path up a new set of stairs. In a whisper, she muttered, “Ah…yes. I rode her here, actually.”
“Really? You came out here all on your own?” She’d turned to answer with a surprised whisper of her own, but eventually turned to continue creeping up the stairs with an even pace. After a beat, she pressed Angela further, though this time she didn’t turn around. “Without Genji?”
“I left without telling anybody, really…”
“Oh, that must’ve been a blast!”
“No…! Ach, well--”
“We’re running out of time!” Lena was whisper-shouting now, and she dared to glance back only to grab Angela by the wrist. “We gotta make a run for this, now. Ready?”
Angela could only swallow her pride alongside everything else. With a deep breath, she nodded, newly determined to make it out so that she might live a little longer. “I’m ready. Let’s go.”
In a flash, both Lena and Angela had launched themselves forward.
The hall they were in vaguely resembled the hall she’d leapt through to get Lena in the first place, but it was nowhere close to familiar. Even though her eyes had adjusted, it was still dark. Lena led ahead of her, much quicker but at a steady pace so that Angela could keep up, and there appeared to be a room that opened up just ahead. Winded, but feeling like freedom was just around the corner, Angela spared a glance back at where they’d come from.
At the end of the hallway, where they had just emerged from below, stood a dark figure with an expressionless mask, unmoving, clenching its fists at its side. At the sight, fear sunk into her gut and gripped her limbs, causing her to stumble in order to look ahead to Lena. As she turned, the figure slipped away into its shadow.
Her lungs were too busy to make room for a warning call, but even so, Lena was suddenly much further than she’d been before. She didn’t look back when she shouted, “Here--It’s ‘round this corner here! Come on, Angie! We made it!”
They made it? Truly? Lena was a little distant, but the man in the shadows was much further. The running was hell for someone so unprepared for adventure, but it was so close! She just needed to round the corner! She was almost there!
Lena was out of sight as the sound of the cold air came whistling through the doors tugged open once again by her, then the light painted her exitway.
Just as she neared the corner, the light was concealed by a misplaced shadow. While the sight was confusing, Angela couldn’t stop herself now. The momentum she gained was necessary for making it far beyond the gates, and a little darkness wasn’t going to stop her. So she didn’t stop, couldn’t, as the shadow grew physical, tangible, right in front of her eyes. It was clear now, that what she had seen was the shape of a man, not a shadow. A man who was merely cloaked in blackness, waiting for Angela to make his job easy. Angela plummeted into the darkness.