Aparchi 33, Imperial Year 1645
Luminara – The Hunters' Hall
The door chimed.
Ghislaine stepped inside. The Hall was crowded for once. Hunters filled the tables, their voices a low rumble of boasts and complaints. A fire blazed in the hearth, and the stuffed wolf's head above it seemed to watch him with its single remaining eye.
He moved between the tables. The firelight slid across his new pauldrons – large, rounded, each plate overlapping like the scales of a serpent. A hunter near the hearth looked up, then quickly looked away. The shadow of the pauldron fell across the man's cup.
The X‑shaped harness across his chest creaked as he walked. A buckle caught the firelight, glinting once, then fading.
His cloak trailed behind him – dark charcoal wool, its hem frayed into wispy, smoke‑like tendrils. It brushed against a chair. The hunter sitting there shifted, as if touched by something cold.
The new helmet was a greathelm, fully enclosing, its top slightly pointed. The face was a mask of angular steel, the cheek and jaw plates sloping downward to a sharp, almost skeletal point. A narrow vertical slit ran down the front, with a short horizontal crossbar near the top – a T‑shaped opening, dark and deep, revealing no eyes. No face. Only shadow.
A hunter at the corner table muttered to his companion. "New armor. New helmet. You think he's hiding from someone?"
"Maybe he's hiding from himself."
The companion snorted. "Same thing."
Ghislaine did not react. He reached the counter.
Margot looked up. Her quill stopped. Her eyes moved over him – the greathelm, the dark hood draping loosely around it, the tattered cloak – then back to where his face should have been.
"You're different," she said.
"The armor is new."
"I can see that."
He set a sack on the counter. It clinked. Scales, iridescent green‑black, the size of saucers.
"The cockatrice," he said. "Dead."
Margot opened the sack. She did not flinch. "The head?"
"Outside. By the door."
She nodded to Elara. "Go fetch it. We'll need it for the bounty."
The younger clerk grabbed her coat, walked to the door, and opened it. She stopped. Her hand went to her mouth. She stood there for three heartbeats, then bent down and dragged something heavy inside. The head was massive – crest of iridescent scales, beak like a spear, eyes still open. She set it on the floor near the counter, then wiped her hands on her apron.
"It's… big," she said.
"It was a cockatrice," Ghislaine said.
Elara returned to her place, her cheeks pale. Margot made a note in her ledger. "Four hundred silver. Half now, half when I've confirmed the bounty."
She counted coins. Her fingers brushed his gauntlet. She did not pull back quickly.
"The new armor," she said. "It's different."
"It is."
"Who made it?"
"A smith in Verdon. He does not ask questions."
Elara leaned forward. "Why the new helmet? The old one was…"
"Recognizable."
"And this one?"
"Anonymous." His hand, resting on the halberd shaft, tightened for a fraction of a second. Then it relaxed.
Margot noticed. She said nothing.
He turned to leave. He paused at the notice board, scanning the parchments. A missing person. A stolen shipment. A beast in the northern hills. A goblin nest.
The door chimed. A young hunter entered, his armor too clean, his sword still shiny. He walked to the board, reached for the goblin nest contract.
The door chimed again.
The Goblin Slayer stood behind him. No one had heard him enter. No one ever did.
The young hunter turned. His face went pale. His hand dropped from the board.
The Goblin Slayer said nothing. He simply reached past the young hunter and pulled the parchment from the board. He folded it. He tucked it into his belt.
"Goblins," he said.
He left. The door chimed.
The young hunter stared at the empty space. Ghislaine watched.
"Do not take it personally," he said. "He does that to everyone."
He walked to the door. The bell chimed. He was gone.
The Hall exhaled. A few hunters laughed. Renard, the scarred man, shook his head. "Every damn time."
Elara looked at Margot. "He's even stranger than before."
"He's been through something."
"The armor?"
"The armor is new. The silence is old."
Margot glanced at the shelf behind her. The ruined hat. The new hat. She touched the crimson band, then returned to her ledger.
"Elara, take the head to the back. We'll need to preserve it."
Elara sighed, grabbed the head by its crest, and dragged it toward the back room. The door chimed as she pushed it open.
Margot was alone. She dipped her quill.
The fire crackled. The stuffed wolf's head watched the door.
The Hall breathed.
End of Chapter One Hundred Twenty-Three