So, I said this would be a bit different. For starters, it involves combat – though it's not the most dramatic of action sequences, I admit – and almost the whole thing is from a certain PoV – it should become obvious whose, even before the name is mentioned, or I didn't do a very good job in this Chapter's first few vignettes.


Vignette 20 – Cold

North Gate of Lionel Castle, early afternoon

Look at that cocky little bastard just nonchalantly climbing over the wall there! Just who does the little shit think he is?

Of course, apparently, a couple of days before Gaffgarion arrived at Lionel that stupid bitch he'd assumed was a total waste of space had stormed the Cardinal's Palace on her own, having used this route to get in, and had nearly succeeded in rescuing the princess, after indiscriminately killing Griffon Knights, left, right and centre, so maybe a little of the cockiness was warranted, since she'd be on the other side of the gate. He knew that Holy Knights were generally considered to be more powerful than Fell Knights, since half of their Sword Techniques could hit multiple targets - and though it galled him to admit it, even to himself, it was true to some extent. Of course, his Techniques allowed him to keep himself alive so much more easily that her, so it was swings and roundabouts...

He continued to watch that bloody idiot, Ramza Beoulve, obliviously climbing over the castle walls as if he didn't keep getting ambushed because he never planned, just reacted. In his own way, the useless little bastard was just as arrogant and smugly self-righteous as his half-brothers. If it hadn't been for the reward he'd known he'd get from Dycedarg Beoulve – Lord Dycedarg and for the gods' sake don't forget to use the man's title anywhere he might hear about it or he got very nasty very quickly, so it was best never to form the habit of not using it, even in one's own thoughts – yes, if it hadn't been for the potential reward, he'd have told Ladd exactly where he could stick the idea of taking on the useless little prig. Just one glance, though, he'd realised exactly who he was; the boy's resemblance to his father, as well as to his brother, Dycedarg, for that matter – Lord Dycedarg – was very clear from the first moment.

It had been very interesting that they boy had acknowledged himself to be a bastard. He'd wondered, for a moment, if he had the right kid but everything fit together too well for him not to be the missing Beoulve brat that Lord Dycedarg had told all of his contacts to be on the lookout for.

He'd checked into that, last time he was in Eagrose, and the Church register made for very interesting reading – at least, one of the pages did – the record of the marriage of Lord Barbaneth Beoulve to Miss Merissa Lugria, when Ramza must have been about five years old. That meant that the fine young lady who had looked down her nose had him when he'd been at Eagrose Mansion last week was also illegitimate – uppity little madam!

He hadn't yet worked out a way to extort a sum worthy of keeping his mouth permanently shut about that little titbit from the Earl of Eagrose – not and keep himself alive, anyhow; crossing Lord Dycedarg was a good way to dramatically reduce your own life expectancy. After he'd been forced out of the army, he'd heard rumours that the old Earl had had a fancy piece, he'd just never realised that said fancy piece had managed to snare the old lord so thoroughly. He was pretty sure that Lord Dycedarg must have had a hand in hushing the whole thing up – that situation had the feel of his work about it.

"Wait there. I'll open the gate." He heard Ramza call, as the boy leant over the parapet.

Really? Good gods! Could the useless little bastard honestly think it was going to be that easy?

Well, enough was enough, time to take the boy down. He stepped forward and saying something about letting the gate remain shut, swung his sword, sucking away Ramza's health from a distance, even as he replenished his own – or it would have, had it needed any replenishing. Damn, the boy had instantly whipped out a Potion – no, a Hi-Potion, by the looks of it – and immediately healed right back up. Well, that always had been Ramza's favourite counter-move in a fight; he might call the boy a useless bastard but the kid was actually a cautious one, who never took risks unnecessarily – in that, the boy was obnoxiously like his father! That man had coddled his troops to within an inch of their lives; so damned reluctant was he to spill a drop of his own men's blood. What the hell were foot-soldiers for, anyway, if it wasn't for flinging straight at the enemy, so that you didn't have to risk yourself?

Ramza had raised a hand in his gesture of casting as he carefully clambered down from the wall and Gaffgarion could feel the tingle of magic aimed right at him. Well, whatever the boy was doing Gaffgarion would just suck enough health right back from him to heal up and he could keep doing that up until the little bastard ran out of Hi-Potions.

Shit! Shit! Shit! Disabled! He should probably give that bastard more credit; legitimate or not, the kid was a Beoulve and they were invariably good, tactically speaking. But, hell, unless that was a lucky hit, the boy must have some pretty impressive magic boosting stuff on under that dingy-looking armour of his, to land a Hesitation spell and make it stick; the two of them were both the same birthsign, he believed, so they weren't even unusually compatible. He ran, trying to get enough distance between him and Ramza, but he didn't get far enough and he couldn't help but let out a groan of pain as the next spell – Thundara – lanced through his body.

Rather than coming to finish him off, though, Ramza had darted past him. What? Ajora's arse! Straight for the gate release lever. To add insult to injury, Ramza simply ignored him and dashed off again, this time through the gate. What the hell was going on? This wasn't at all what he had expected.

He was reluctant to put himself in harm's way until the spell wore off, but he needed to see what was happening, so he hovered within the shadows of the gatehouse's archway and watched the fight. Reluctantly, as he assessed the ebb and flow of the battle, he had to admit that Ramza moved with the grace and confidence of a born warrior – useless little bastard though he was. He certainly didn't look or act like the usual fragile mage... in fact, it was like watching Barbaneth Beoulve reborn.

That was slightly frightening, actually; even though he hadn't been able to use Sword Techniques - and Gaffgarion usually had little to fear from anyone who couldn't - the previous Earl of Eagrose had been terrifying for the opposition on a battlefield and Gaffgarion had always secretly been pleased that they had never fought on opposite sides. It shocked him to realise that Ramza had the potential to induce as much terror as his father – more so, perhaps, since he could use magic proficiently, which could often do more damage than any weapon, especially due to its ability to hit multiple enemies. Barbaneth had been no mage, though. If what he understood was correct, that had been the province of the old man's fancy piece and, in that, the boy had obviously taken after his mother.

This fight was not going well for the Griffon Knights. The summoner and both of the archers – who he had bloody well hand picked – were already dead, soon to crystalise, if nothing was done... Ah, but this was more like it! All three knights were now surrounding that smug bitch, Agrias. One of them had already smashed her breastplate off her and, as he watched with barely suppressed glee, another managed to splinter her sword, rendering her useless. The third, unfortunately, had just been hit by that bloody Machinist and seemed to have just been Immobilised, the way she had gone rigid on the spot. Shit, just out of range of Agrias too. He wondered how you did that with a gun; buggered if he knew, even though he'd been hit like that himself at the beginning of the Galllows fight two days ago.

He watched with a wince as both of the still-mobile knights were hit simultaneously by a Thundara from one of Agrias' two bitches, whose names he had never seen the point in learning, and then he felt the Disable begin to lift, so he hefted his sword and stepped out of the shadows.

Before he could get close enough to any of them to do anything, he felt the tingle of magic again. Ramza, the little shit, must have known exactly where he was all along and had just been ignoring him as if he was of no consequence. He didn't have time to do anything but wait to see if the first Hesitation had really just been a fluke.

Apparently, it hadn't. Again Ramza followed the Mystic Arts spell up with Black Magick and this time the Thundara drove Gaffgarion to his knees. Then a shot rang out and as well as being Disabled he was pinned to the spot. So this was how his end was to come about...

But no, apparently not quite yet, anyway. He was going to be ignored again, while they finished off the three knights. It had been against his better judgement to use bloody female knights – useless bitches all of them; women were good for only two things, housework and spreading their legs – but sodding women were what he had been given, so that was what he had to use. He grudgingly admitted to himself that the three men he'd picked out himself had, if anything, fared worse.

When the Immobilise wore off he'd have to see about making a run for it... well, dragging himself to safety was more likely than actual running! He wasn't going to let the Beoulve bastard take him down this way, not if he could help it. He was better than this and, as far as he was concerned, the Cardinal could go and fuc-...

Oh, Ajora's arse and armpits! The last of those useless bitches fell dead, Ladd's fist smashing into the side of her head – since when was he a monk, anyway? And now he was the last one left alive, though he didn't suppose that would be for long. None of them had any reason to let him live...


Ramza watched impassively as Lavian's Thunder spell hit Gaffgarion, the last of their opponents. The man's eyes began to glaze over and he slurred out something about being cold.

"Goodbye, Gaffgarion." He murmured as the body slumped forward and, shockingly, instantaneously crystallised. Ramza mouth dropped open and he stared. That definitely wasn't supposed to happen! Something was very strange, very wrong here; they'd need to be extra wary as they moved on into the Palace.


Author's Note:

Sorry about the bad language and the tone; it's just how Gaffgarion is. I've had it in my head for a long time that I wanted to do his death-scene from Gaffgarion's PoV, but that was actually fairly unpleasant to do, given that I had to write from his bitter, twisted and utterly misogynistic point of view. My fault; I decided that was the man he was.

Sorry, also, to be demanding but, since I was trying something a bit different, I'd appreciate any feedback you can give about this one, if you have the time to review.

There will be an epilogue, and it will be set on the same day as this, a little after the next (Lucavi) fight. It won't be an all-bells-and-whistles affair, like the epilogue for the last one, though; I don't have anything special planned, just your run-of-the-mill scene detailing their reactions to finding out that demons actually exist.