Heartglass

Heartglass 24: Snow Storm

My heart pounded against my chest. My forehead was already covered in cold sweat despite the freezing temperature of the room.

I raised the knife when the intruder was about to approach my position. I was already ready to swing and to fight back when I suddenly heard a loud thud on the floor.

My eyes widened. Something fell on the floor and when I peeked outside the canopy bed, a man wearing black with his face covered with a silver mask knocked down the intruder.

I froze when the masked man turned to my direction. He noticed my presence and I felt like my knees started to melt from fear. My eyes were wide open because what if he was the real assassin? With trembling hands, I managed to point the knife in his direction.

I won't easily give up on this life of mine.

"Who are you?" I asked, trying to hide the fear in my almost shaking voice.

"I was sent by His Royal Highness to guard and protect you, my lady. Rest assured. You are now safe from harm," he answered without any emotion at all. But he kneeled down on one knee—maybe to quell my suspicion and fear against him.

The man had a deep baritone voice and I noticed the Crown Prince's seal engraved on the forehead of his silver mask that I could confirm that he was a royal knight.

I felt a slight relief. My eyes wandered at the man on the floor who had his throat slitted and blood pooled from his neck. I was stunned by the sight that I didn't manage a reply.

"I have to clean this mess, my lady. I thought you were sleeping and I was planning to clean as quietly as possible. My hands were a little numb from the cold that his body slipped from my grasp. My apologies," he explained further.

My gaze went back to him. I was a little guilty that he had to protect me even when there was a snow storm. "Thank you for saving me. You may now stand. You can stay here for a while. To warm yourself," I said. His clothes were a little drench from the snow.

The man nodded. "Thank you, my lady. Please excuse me. I have to check his body." He began to inspect the dead body.

I stood up to close the balcony's glass door. Gladly, the fire in the hearth was still ablaze but I fed some firewood in it.

When I looked back he was already checking every part of the man's dead body. As if he was looking for something. He even carefully inspected the marks on the assassin's sword.

"Are you the only one who is guarding me?"

"No. I was taking shifts with another royal guard, my lady. Since we were inside the palace grounds, we didn't expect a lot of assassins to be sent to you."

"Can you identify this assassin? And the master he is serving?" I asked. I sat on the nearest couch.

The royal knight shook his head. "He didn't leave anything on his body to be identified. Even the sword doesn't have any special marks on it. It's a little hard. I need to further investigate his origin and master. I will let His Royal Highness know about this. He will definitely fill you up with the details if I found something."

The royal knight pulled out a black cloth to clean the blood on the floor. And then he lifted the dead body over his shoulder. I even noticed the sheathed blade of pure silver attached on his waist—probably the sword he used to silence the assassin.

"I will be going now, my lady. I can't stay here any longer. I will ask someone to take over on my shift. You may continue your rest now," he formally said. It was so straight and emotionless that I didn't know what to feel. He was just doing his duty diligently and I wondered if he cared that I was actually trembling in fear from this incident. I haven't used a knife before. . . to kill. . . but I mustered all the courage to do it tonight for my own survival.