Chapter - 21
"Now I am going to remove my hand, you better start chirping like the little bird you are, or we are going to have a deep, long chat. Where only you will scream, and I will listen."
"Do we have a deal, darling?"
Brena nodded hysterically when she heard Leo. She was desperate now.
As she stared at him, he was no longer the boy who got lucky and killed his partners.
He was a monster. Just as terrifying as those bandits she was hand in gloves with. But, now she was on the receiving end. It was bone chilling.
"Good girl," Leo smiled and removed his hand.
"I will talk!" she finally choked as tears formed in her eyes, "I will tell you everything! Just stop it… No more."
"It's painful!" Brena cried, "Please! Please!"
"That's it baby… I knew you would come around sooner than later," Leo loosened his grip, and leaned in closer to listen, "Now don't be a bitch and bite me. You will regret it."
~~~~~~
"I heard some noise. Was everything alright?" As Leo walked out of the chamber, the guard standing outside asked.
"Oh everything went well. I just had to take the wild cat at the start. But eventually…" Leo smirked as he told the guard.
"But you might have to clean up some mess. The cat wet the floor." Patting the guard, Leo walked away, leaving the confused guard behind.
"What a weird guy," The guard muttered, but just as he popped his head inside the prison chamber, his jaws dropped.
"That fucking bastard…"
~~~~~~~
Leo walked out of the dungeon and by now the sun was brightly shining in the sky.
He looked up and a calm smile crept on his lips.
"Now where will I find him?" Leo mused to himself and then stopped a maid walking by.
"Where will I find Captain Valerius?"
"Ummm…" The young maid felt timid in front of Leo, " Captain… He should be in the training grounds. He… He trains the guards there every day."
"Training grounds… Huh…" Leo nodded to himself and then smiled at the maid, "Thank you,. pretty lady. I won't take anymore of your time."
And with that Leo made his way to the training ground that was at the back of the Lord's castle.
He was going to drop the bomb in the mud and see who gets dirty.
The training ground was spread vast. It was at least 4 to 5 times the area of the Lord's castle.
From where Leo entered, there were wooden dummies erected in rows. They were in bad shape, hacked and beaten by constant use.
Just beside the dummies were racks of swords, shields, and spears lined one side. In the middle of the ground, a big wooden platform was there that most likely served as the sparring stage for the soldiers.
Right now, a dozen or so guards were training under the sun, their silver and blue armour shining as they clashed their wooden swords, and the gruntled groans echoed through the ground.
On the sidelines, Captain Valerius stood there with his arms crossed as he barked orders. He looked dissatisfied with these wussy soldiers of his.
But they had an audience as well. The survivor of the latest kidnapping attempt, Lady Aliana was on the stoned balcony of her room. She stood there with her arms closed, staring intently at the sweating men on the ground.
But everything came to a stop when guards saw Leo walk towards them.
When Captain Valerius saw Leo, he squinted his eyes, "Well, what do we have here?"
"A lost rat wandering into my training grounds?" Captain Valerius spoke, loud enough for everyone to hear, "Boy, you don't think just because you saved the young lady you can do as you please, do you?"
"Captain you are too hard on him," a guard spoke up, "Maybe he is here to sweep after the men are done."
Other guards laughed and nudged each other.
"Maybe he's our new training dummy," another one of them shouted.
"Are you mad? He looks too fragile for that," another one said with a grin, "One hit and he will break."
"What do you mean hit? Look at him. A strong breeze would snap you in half… Hahaha."
Captain Valerius chuckled, clearly enjoying the reaction of his men.
"Tell you what, boy. Run along before one of these horny bastards mistakes you for a pretty lady and knocks you down. These grounds are for real men, not some pretty ass boy."
But Leo completely ignored the taunts of the Captain and his guards.
With that practiced smile on his face, he continued to walk towards them leisurely. His eyes, sweeping across the faces of the guards assembled there, the servants cleaning up and the maids tending to the guards.
He was looking for the person Brena told him about. If he can't find the person here, he will just have to ask someone for help.
After he was done looking at all the faces in the ground, Leo turned his attention back to Captain Valerius.
"I didn't know you could joke as well, Captain," Leo finally said, "I just assumed you had a butt plug up your ass all the time for you to look at me like that."
"Butt plug?" Everyone on the ground was confused, looking at each other.
But the smirk on Captain Valerius's face froze as his face turned ugly. He did not know what a butt plug was, but anything with butt in it can be anything but good.
"You!!!"
"My apologies for the interruption, Captain," Leo interrupted the Captain, "But you see, I could not resist myself."
"I just had a very fascinating chat with our prisoner down the dungeons."
"You went to the dungeon?" Captain Valerius's eyes narrowed as he heard Leo, "Who allowed you there?"
"Well… That's a different story," Leo smiled cheekily, "But back to the topic. I had a very fruitful conversation with that bandit lady."
"She told me the most interesting story about the person who helped her."
"First of all. All the ladies can rest easy. That person is a man," Leo spoke dramatically. And as he spoke, the maids who were on the training ground sighed in relief.
"Now all the gamblers can rest easy," Leo continued, "She told me that the man was a heavy gambler. He is so drowned in debt that every tavern is on a look out notice on him."
"A man who could use every bit of extra gold and silver coming his way."
"A man who felt the Lord did not pay him what he was worth."
Leo paused, letting his words hang in the air. Meanwhile the guards started murmuring amongst themselves, glancing nervously at each other.
"I guess this is pretty much everyone of you." Leo shook his head helplessly.
Valerius's face was a mix of anger and confusion. This boy was looking down on every one of them, but why did it feel like he was targeting the City Patrol?
Were his men?
"Oh well, let me spill it out for you," Leo sighed.
"She said he was a man of authority. A man who was trusted by his fellow soldiers to lead him the right way."
"But more importantly, a man who assigned duties to the patrol guards. Who drew the route of Lady Aliana's escort. The man who assigned guards to the escort duty.
"He knew every single detail the Blackfang bandits might find useful."
"The poor girl was so afraid when she told me all that," Leo looked sympathetic at the mention of Brena, "But even with all the fear, the girl told me all the details."
"She told me everything. How he fed her the information about Lady Aliana's travel plans. How he arranged for a specific guard, his own men to be part of the escort."
"But that poor guy believed a bastard. He was always a sacrificial lamb."
"How they would meet at midnight by the old mill, outside the city, a place that has been long abandoned to exchange information and gold."
"It was clever?" Leo threw his arms in the air.
"Wasn't it, Sergeant Kaelen?"
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Author's Note : Enjoying the story? I would appreciate if you were to vote with power stones, and leave comments and a review. Golden tickets will be a bonus.
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