It takes courage to face the night on the frontier.
Even with a roof over your head and a wall around you, it's like that. If you were a sensible person, you wouldn't even think of camping out in this area.
The twins of Paros had grown up in the rich midlands, and although they had been told of the harshness of the frontier and the threats of demons, barbarians, and wild beasts, they had not been able to immerse themselves in it. And that is why he was able to be so thoughtless as to spend the night in the forest of the Rood, with the bushes of the Vasya tree as his shelter.
Linda and Remus did not know that they had been protected by an unseen good fortune, but on their second night in the frontier forest they were a little more cautious than usual. The bodies of the knights of the stronghold of Staphorus lay untouched around them, and it was certain that, in due course, men of the Hand would arise from the stronghold in search of the knights who had not returned.
"Hey, Linda, ...."
It was probably because of this gloomy outlook that Remus's voice sounded so low in his mind.
"Hey, why don't you go get some more weed?"
The older sister, who took the lead in everything, washed the wounded man's strong limbs with a wet cloth and spread out medicinal herbs, without looking back.
"I don't like it. The sun is setting."
"I know."
"The night is coming, you know."
"I know, I know. That's why I'm not in a hurry, you idiot."
"Hey, I'm gonna gather some weed, and we're gonna build a fire."
"No."
Linda said plainly.
"If you can see smoke coming from the fort, you're in trouble."
"Because, when the night comes, ..."
"I know, I know. You're trying to tell me we're in the middle of nowhere."
Linda picked up the Leopard's head and said, trying furiously to pour water on its lips.
"I know how scary the frontier can be. But what are you going to do, go to Fort Staphorus and ask them to stop for the night because you're afraid of the monsters changing."
"Linda, Linda!"
"Don't you ever say, 'Linda, Linda! "Linda, Linda!"
Linda disapproved.
"How dare you, the rightful heir of the Holy King of Paros?"
"Because--"
"Pull yourself together, Remus. We've got to survive somehow. We've got horses, swords, food in the knights' stores. If we can make it through this night we can get out of the woods and onto the road to some town. But tonight, we have no choice but to stay here."
"You should have just gone on and on and on without worrying about such a monster."
"And then we lose our bearings and go around the forest of ludes forever? Don't be silly! I can always see the right way. I just..."
Linda added thoughtfully, frowning.
"I'm Linda... the seer, Linda."
His brother was silent. For it had been his unalterable debt for fourteen years of his life that he had not possessed the psychic powers of his elder sister, the powers of prophecy, clairvoyance, and foreknowledge which were thought to be the condition of royal blood, though they were twins of Paros, alike as two grains of pearl.
Linda, however, did not even care for such a hurtful silence on her brother's part. Suddenly she bent over the sick man in a show of enthusiasm.
"Look, Remus! He's on to us!"
The Leopard's head swung feebly and then distinctly from side to side. In the violet twilight, in the dimness of the hour of meeting, its strange yellowish eyes widened, and it recognized the faces of the children crouched above.
The huge mouth moved faintly, and a roar came out. Remus ducked in a panic, but Linda crouched down and held his head in her gnarled hands, trying somehow to make him see that they were on the same side.
"What is it? Water?"
The head of the leopard suddenly arose and stretched out his hand to it, his eyes shining.
But as he brought the bowl to his mouth, he let out a maddened groan of disappointment and frustration. The leopard's mask had become a harsh barrier between his face and the water, and there was nothing he could do to quench his thirst.
Linda gazed at his disappointment with her pretty head. But suddenly she thought of something, clasped her hands together, stood up, and began to search everywhere.
At last he found what he was looking for, and, with a proud face, he brought back and presented to him a straw of wheat. He took it and drank it as if he were devouring it to quench his thirst.
Ninety percent of his weakness seemed to be caused by severe thirst and hunger. He was almost back to his normal state when he drank up the water in a large headband.
"It's a terrible thing to do."
Linda says, staring thoughtfully into the Leopard's face.
"If you wear this mask, you won't be able to drink, let alone eat, if you leave it on. I tried to take it off you while you were unconscious, but you seemed to be under a curse and I couldn't do anything about it. How on earth did such a great swordsman like you end up with such a thing on his head?"
The leopard head listened carefully. As proof that he understood everything Linda said, the leopard head's inner eyes were gazing at her with a sharp light. The mask was hollowed out only at the eyes to reveal his true face, but the two eyes were yellowish with suppressed rage and an iron will, and it would not be wrong to say that they were the eyes of a true beast. When he heard Linda's words, he raised his strong hands and tried again to take off the mask.
But the attempt was unsuccessful. With a low roar of distress, he lowered his hand and took the dried meat that Linda had offered him, the kind of food that knights wore on their saddles, and popped it into his mouth. This was easier to put into the back of his mask than water, and soon he began to chew the dry meat eagerly.
"Apparently, you can do what you need to do to survive, even if you can't take it."
Linda concluded, sitting comfortably on her knees and staring at the man who was devouring her flesh.
Remus stared beside him, rolling his eyes, but ,
"So, is this guy really human?"
I asked suspiciously.
"You idiot!"
Linda kicked in,
"This leopard's head must have been forced on him by some king or nobleman or mage who was angry with him. There's no way anyone would like to wear it. It must be some mage's fault. we helped you and we helped you. So we're on the same side. What do you say?
The latter part was addressed to the leopard-headed warrior.
The leopard head had apparently regained its vitality. He had always possessed extraordinary physical strength and resilience. He held the meat in his hands and let out a muffled roar. Linda was frightened and almost jumped out of her skin, but she finally realized that although it was muffled by the mask he had put on her, it seemed to be a language that they could understand, and focused her attention.
"Huh?"
"Guin--"
He's apparently been repeating it.
"Guin-- that's your name?"
"Yes, apparently."
This time I could hear more clearly.
"I'm Linda. This is my twin brother, Remus. Where are you from, Guin? From the color of your skin, I'd say you're not from the North, at least."
"Aura..."
That was his answer.
"Huh?"
Linda listened back.
"What?"
"Aura--"
"Aura--what? Is that where you've been?"
"I don't know--"
The words were very heavy and indistinct, for once they were passed through the mask of the Leopard's head. Linda, annoyed, clucked her tongue in a temperate manner and started.
"Aura--Guin."
"Hey, tell me how you ended up with this thing over your head."
"Linda."
Remus may not have been as brilliant or as prophetic as his sister, but he was at least practical and rational. He had been looking anxiously out into the dark blue of the night, and when he saw that his sister had become so absorbed that she had forgotten what was going on around her, and even where she was, he leaned forward and grasped Linda by the shoulders.
"Oh, my God, you're hurting me.
"Hey, Linda, night's coming!"
"I know."
She said in return, but Linda, too, looked somewhat uncomfortable. She looked around again, and, noticing that the darkness was creeping closer than she had expected, she cut the Janus sign.
"Hey."
She whispered to the leopard-headed man.
"Night is coming. Night is coming!"
"Looks like it."
Perhaps it was because the sisters had grown accustomed to the words of the man who called himself Guin, or perhaps it was because his thirst had been quenched to the point where he could speak clearly, but the conversation was becoming somewhat easier than before. The man looked about him, and skirted the depths of a strange and disquieting forest of horrors and unknowns, swathed in a purple, sticky darkness.
The undergrowth rose and rustled. A breeze came up and carried a lingering, sinister smell. In the treetops, bloodsucking rabbits hissed, and among the undergrowth, the eyes of grass snakes and other things began to glow a faint red. The forest, which had been silent during the day, was finally returning to its original state.
"So, what's the big deal?"
Guin asked. Linda clucked her tongue in disappointment and disbelief.
"Well, I don't know where I am! We're not in the Middle Kingdom anymore. Fort Staphorus stands on the border between the frontier and the Middle Kingdom. Even Gora's rule is nominal on the frontier and even the Black Knights of Mongol won't let a single platoon enter beyond the Forest of Ludes. That's why we fled to these woods, knowing they belong to the monsters.
Hey, night is coming! Not just any night, the night of the frontier, the night when goblins and barbarians and forest dwellers begin to move about!"
"Hey, let's build a fire."
Remus suggested, holding his shoulders with both arms and softly snapping his teeth. Linda also ,
"No."
I was going to kick him out, but then I thought about it and agreed.
"It's the only way. The vasja tree protected us for a night, but you're too big to fit in the vasja bush. Or, hey Guin, are you half demon blood and don't care about the night on the frontier?"
The first time she said the name, she felt a strange, cosmic shiver run through her body.
What's wrong with me?
She had always been good at sensing signs, but suddenly Linda feared to grasp the meaning of the shiver that now ran through her own body. She hugged her shoulders with her arms, imitating her brother, and pretended that the shiver that now ran through her whole body was due to the chill of the Rude Forest.
The leopard-headed man didn't seem to notice Linda's confusion. He held his huge hand out in front of him and gazed at it intently.
"He had a scar."
He mumbled. But only Linda could hear it.
"There's a sword wound here too. That means I fought. This-- but it looks like a whip wound. The frontier-- the stronghold of Staphorus?
The Forest of Ludes--it sounds familiar,..., but I don't know why I'm here.
Speaking of not knowing, this is the same--"
Raise your hand and rub the neck of the Leopard that covers your face and head,
"Why in the world am I doing this?"
"Don't you get it?"
Linda screamed and put her hands over her mouth.
"You have no memory?"
"Thanks, but it looks like it."
Perhaps it was because they had a certain degree of psychosensitivity from the start that Linda and Remus, especially Linda, were able to hear Guin's words easily once they became a little familiar with them. But that was because they were the ones who could hear him, and to other, more careless ears, most of the words that came slowly and muffledly out of the Leopard's huge mouth might have sounded like mere grunts and groans.
"Who did I--who did I fight?"
"At least we wiped out one of the Grand Duke of Gora's Black Knight Platoons."
Linda said, indicating with her hand. The leopard head looked at her and shook his head as if he was wondering.
"I did that?"
"And he saved us."
"Hey, Linda, let's build a fire!"
Remus yelled in frustration. Linda came to her senses again and realized the situation they were in.
"That's right. -- "Hey, we can't just live out the night here and be safe."
"The demons love the smell of blood."
Remus shared some knowledge he learned a long time ago.
"It's not safe for you to be with that corpse."
"There was a fountain, wasn't there?"
Linda thought about it and said.
"Let's stay up all night with our backs to the spring and the fire burning. Water demons don't harm themselves on land and fire is Janus' talisman to protect us from everything. and I'll bring three horses. I want to be through the forest of ludes by sunrise tomorrow morning."
"You guys--"
Guin struggled to find the words.
"Why are you guys in this dangerous place?"
"We are..."
She pinched Remus' arm as he was about to answer.
"We are being pursued by the Grand Duke of Mongol."
That's all she said, and Linda stood up.
"Come on, we gotta go."
"Who the hell am I?"
Her voice was filled with a languid anguish that escaped her lips involuntarily. Linda couldn't help but turn her head, forgetting her impatience.
"What am I--Guin? Is that my name? Who am I fighting and why am I in these woods? Why do they put this on me, what curse can't even take it off, and here I am, unable to remember what my true face looks like? I'm doing this and I can't even remember.
Was I hunted, or did I escape crime and execution - I can't even remember where I was born, who taught me swordsmanship, or what kind of life I've led.
And Aura--Aura? That word has been ringing in my head since a while ago, along with a familiar crack that seems to be my name. Aura--Aura? What or whose name is that? What does it mean?
Where is my port--or my roof, my armor, my lord--where are they? Where can I sleep peacefully in the arms of my friends, and where can I be pointed out as a wanted man and have my life threatened?
I don't know--"
The warrior grabbed the Leopard's head in his huge palm and tried madly to pull it off. But it clung stubbornly to his head. He covered his head and cowered.
Sympathy flooded Linda's tender heart. She put her hand on the warrior's shoulder and tried to give him childlike comfort.
"I'm sure it's because you're tired, and you've been fighting it, and you're hurt."
She whispered in a sweet voice.
"In time you'll remember everything and you'll take off that mask. I can help you with that.
So let's go. We're not supposed to be here anymore. In the morning, everything will be better. ..."