“Again! Again!” said the Lord, joyfully. He grinned at the Jester who graciously bowed at the command.

“As you wish, my Lord!” The bells on the Jester’s long hat tails jingled as he began flinging his multicoloured juggling balls high overhead. The Lord gawped in astonishment as each highly flung ball was palmed effortlessly by the Jester and flung once more. The blur of colour as the Jester pranced and span never ceased to amaze.

It was at the height of the Jester’s prancing and spinning that the Rider sprung into the room with an urgent and startling cry of “my Lord! The Crimson Hood approaches!” The Jester screamed in such a way as might shatter crystal. It needn’t be mentioned that his balls were scattered about the room, his routine nought but memory.

The Lord’s gleeful gaze crumbled, the pieces resembling more closely a perturbed grimace. “What is the meaning of this?!” he bellowed, rising from his throne. His heavy cloak parted as he strode down the two stone steps before him and darted across the room towards the stone arch entryway. The Jester dove from the Lord’s path, his very existence now forgotten.

The Rider stepped toward the Lord as he approached. “The Crimson Hood, my Lord, he—”

“I heard you the first time, you bloody peasant! Who let this swine into my throne room?!” The two Pikemen, one stood rigidly in ceremonial uniform and pike in hand on either side of the arch, shared an uneasy glance.

A huffing and laboured voice floated through the arch. “M’lord! M’lord!” Larry followed, as if his physical presence was on a delay. He rested a hand on the arch, his other clumsily checking that his weapon and accoutrements were all accounted for. “A force— is gathering, my Lord. It is— it is sizable.”

The Rider once again addressed the Lord, who had become solemn. “That is the reason for my barging in, my Lord. I have an urgent message from the Crimson Hood himself!”

The Lord scoffed. “The Crimson Hood? Nothing but a myth, boy. Tales told to children and daydreamers alike. Nothing more.”

“Sire, he most certainly is more than just a myth! His army, as seen by your own guard, awaits word of your surrender.”

“Boy, you are testing my patience. To whomever that force pledges allegiance, it certainly is not the Crimson Hood!”

All heads turned as a further commotion drew their attention back to the arch. Larry had seemingly returned to his post or found an alternative location to catch his breath. In his place, a pair of soldiers, trimmer and fitter than Larry, dragged a wet, scruffy, beaten prisoner along the stone. They relinquished their sturdy grips on his arms and the man fell to his hands and knees. His soaked, scraggy hair obscured his dirty face. One of the soldiers spoke: “Sire, we captured this disgusting wretch on the battlements. Scaled the wall, ‘e ‘ad. Says the castle will be rubble come dawn.”

The Lord sighed. “What madness is this? This bloody pillock charges in ranting about the Crimson Hood and now I have this…this wretch climbing over the walls with messages of impending doom!”

The Jester yelped again as a hand grabbed at his collar. “Silence!” shouted the woman standing behind the Jester, her knife taut to his neck. “Every word this man speaks is the truth! The Crimson Hood is very real, and he provides no mercy to those before him!”

“Oh, for God’s—” The Lord couldn’t find the words. There were now three unwelcome bodies in his throne room. He was enjoying an exciting juggling act in peace only minutes prior. “This is beyond a joke now! If the Crimson Hood is so real, if he poses such a threat to this court, and it appears as though entering my very throne room is as easy as dropkicking a child, where is he? Where is the Crimson Hood?”

“Behind you,” came a deep, raspy voice that shook the Lord down to his soul. The air turned cold at the utterance. The guards before the Lord looked as though they had seen something most utterly foul, their faces turning a disturbing shade of grey. The Lord spun purely out of instinct to see the Rider ripping and tearing at his face.

A soldier fainted as the Crimson Hood revealed himself. The remnants of what was the Rider’s face lay strewn about the stone floor. In its place, a simple yet mesmerising sack. Crimson in colour, it was pulled taut across the wearer’s face. Eye holes cut in the thick woven fabric enabled his emerald eyes to glare out menacingly at the men before him. “’Tis I,” he said, drawing his sword and pointing it skyward. “The Crimson Hood!”

The Lord called out for his guards, but the Crimson Hood was there and lunging forward, his sword now extended in front of him. The tip made easy work of the Lord’s eye, pushing through his orbital bones and slicing a path through his brain. The steel blade emerged from the back of the Lord’s skull, his cry devolving into a gargle as his brain shut down. He sank to his knees as his guards watched on, eyes wide and unblinking.

Hood gave the Lord a nudge with his boot, and the body slid from his blade to the cold stone. He flicked his sword, blood spattering across the throne room. “Avenge your Lord. Or join him.”

One of the soldiers had already taken off in terror. A Pikeman relinquished his grip on his weapon, the wooden pole with elaborate steel spike clattering to the ground as he backed away nervously. The other Pikeman lowered his as he charged forward with a battle cry.

Hood was prepared, sidestepping and slicing the pike thrust at him clean in two, knocking the guard off balance. He swung his sword up from the stone with all his might, the remaining soldier stepping into its trajectory. It bit deeply into the soldier’s cheek and nose, spinning him away with a spray of blood. The pikeman regained his balance, his eyes on the falling soldier. He dropped what remained of his pike and took off through the archway.

Hood returned his sword to his sheath, the scene that he had left before him barely a thought. “There was no need for your intrusion, Klár. Everything was going according to plan.”

Klár released the Jester and stepped towards Hood. “We thought you had been foiled, my Lord. Your theatrics certainly require a level of patience that I do not possess.”

“Regardless, using Stultus as a decoy to mask your entrance. Very impressive.”

“Thank you, my Lord, but not entirely accurate. He too, was supposed to have arrived undetected.”

Hood laughed, his whole body invested in the act. He swatted Stultus’s shoulder as he shrugged awkwardly. “Stultus! You play your part so readily, no matter how badly fluffed.” Hood observed the Jester cowering by the wall clutching his balls. “You. Jester.”

“Yuh— Yes, Sir?”

“I trust you know your way to the treasure room?”

*******

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Chris