Chapter – 4

– Zachary Fritzki –

After Plumette had left, Zachary's day was pretty normal and went by quietly without his sister to bother him. Later, when the sun had just set, and Zachary was still in the middle of his work, he was called in by his father, Edwin Fritzki, to the back of the knights’ training grounds. Zachary left his work to his assistant, Hugh, and made his way to where his father was.

As he approached the grounds, he could see not only his father but also his father's trusted knights: Pete, Dane, and Knight Commander Conard. Zachary joined them as they conversed, and his father noticed him, giving him a cloak to wear.

“Wear it. We're going out to meet with others tonight,” his father informed him.

Zachary was quick to understand it was about the other informers having a meeting together. He wore the cloak, which slightly covered his face. Knight Commander Conard was left at the estate to guard it while the four men got on their horses and left for the meeting, which was taking place in a common gathering place — two villages away from the Count's estate, in Westfold village. They all met at a common bar, ironically named “Common Bar,” and from there entered a meeting room where the staff would lead you if you showed them your pass.

Count Fritzki, Zachary, and the knights made their way to the Common Bar. Zachary quietly followed his father, looking at the surroundings to remember the place more accurately. Count Fritzki stopped at the bar counter and showed a special badge of the secret Common Bar — a symbol of two crossed swords with a beer mug in the middle. The sign at the entrance of the bar was just a common beer sign, with nothing suspicious on the outside or inside. After showing the badge, they were led by one of the senior workers toward the back door and into a small building connected to the bar, where the meeting took place with all the nobles and informers gathered.

The worker who led them left them at the door and returned to the bar. Count Fritzki opened the door and stepped into the meeting room, where only a few nobles and informers had gathered. Count Fritzki and Zachary took their seats at the round meeting table, while the knights remained outside the small building.

Beside Zachary sat a tall figure. When Zachary observed him more closely, he figured out it was Jacob Narwing — his black hair peeked out from under his cloak, which wasn’t very good at hiding his face, to be quite honest. While Count Fritzki was busy talking with some other men, Zachary decided to talk to Jacob for any information he could get.

“Lord Jacob, I'm glad to see a familiar face around here,” Zachary said slowly so as not to disturb the others.

Jacob, as if he had been staring into space, snapped out of it and looked beside him.

“Lord Zachary — I see you came along with Count Fritzki this time,” Jacob replied.

“Yes. Since I'm new here, care to tell me what these meetings are usually about?” Zachary asked, seeing how secretive everyone was about their identity.

"It's a gathering of nobles and outside informers. They exchange the information everyone has gathered once in a while, and everyone hides their identity in case someone gets in trouble and is forced to leak others' identities,” Jacob said, sharing what little information he had.

Zachary quietly listened and asked another question. “Do you happen to know who holds these meetings?”

Jacob took a while to answer and finally responded uncertainly, “Just a bunch of anonymous nobles and maybe even a few outsiders.”

Zachary was ready to ask another question, but he was quickly silenced by the last person to enter through the door. Dressed in casual attire and a cloak like everyone else, the man stood at the meeting table, ending all conversations.

“Let us start the meeting,” the man in the black cloak said and took his seat.

A person whose face was only half revealed stood at the table with a stack of documents in his hand.

“The information I received revealed that the western border of our neighboring Empire — the Viremont Empire — is possibly plotting for war. There have been several suspicious movements. And regarding the crown prince of that Empire, I recently discovered that he entered our Empire in disguise, accompanying the delegation members, and gathered information on internal affairs.”

Before he could continue, another man raised his hand and stood up.

“Regarding the information gathered by the Crown Prince — I have an inn in the Capital, and I received a report saying someone from the delegation was moving suspiciously and asking one of our employees about internal situations of the Empire. Of course, we didn’t give away anything too valuable. He paid that employee to stay quiet. The one who gathered that information had red hair and green eyes.”

As soon as he was done speaking, he sat back down. The previous man stood once more.

“Crown Prince Aurelian matches that description based on the intel I gathered,” he said and sat back down, looking through his papers.

A third man stood up. “A barbarian group has been reported attacking trade merchant routes between the Empires, and they seem to be someone new — a group we have never heard of.”

This time Jacob stood up to share his intel. “I gathered information on those barbarians. They appear to be from an entirely different place and moved here recently — someone is paying them to terrorize merchants or anyone using that route.”

As information continued to be exchanged, everyone engaged in a serious conversation. The outcome of all these suspicious movements seemed to point to an obvious war between the Empires — and Emperor Darius Feldmark Kroscich was still keeping silent about all of it, as if he wanted to push for war quietly without taking any direct action.

After a while, the serious meeting came to an end. People left the room one by one, and so did Count Fritzki, Zachary, Jacob, and the knights who had accompanied them.

Count Fritzki approached Jacob once they had walked a fair distance from the building.

“How’s your father doing lately, Lord Jacob?” he asked.

“He’s doing alright, and he’s slowly recovering. Thank you for your concern, Count Fritzki,” Jacob replied as they walked toward the small alleyway where their horses were tied.

Count Fritzki gave him a small nod and ended the conversation, not wanting to pry too deeply into his family matters. Edwin Fritzki and Ernest Narwing — Jacob’s father — used to be friends before they received their titles, and their responsibilities weighed them down. They got married, had their heirs, and became too busy to keep in contact, aside from simple conversations after Noble Council or the occasional meet-up.

But at Jacob’s fifteenth birthday celebration, Ernest Narwing was poisoned with a paralytic drug. After much treatment over the years, he finally started to recover. The culprit behind the poisoning was his own eldest brother — Gaspard Narwing — who acted out of jealousy because Ernest was far more talented. Many suspected Gaspard at first, but it was Jacob who gathered enough information from the few clues regarding his father's assassination. He managed to imprison his own uncle and punish him accordingly.

This became widely known throughout the Empire, because a fifteen-year-old Jacob punishing his own uncle was big news for every newspaper company. Jacob had always been clever since childhood, and his father's assassination only pushed him to become even more responsible.