I Will Be the Greatest Knight
Chapter 74: Crime and Punishment

Chapter 74: Crime and Punishment

"It isn’t what it looks like, sir!"

Leif was the first to cry out and plead his case. He was the most likely not to want to disappoint the knights. He knew he would certainly do that if he was found breaking the rules.

"Then what the hell is it supposed to look like?" Sir Gunnar snapped, his arms crossed over his chest and a furious expression on his face.

The shadows cast over him made him look far more severe and the apprentices looked on in fear knowing they had messed up a lot.

"It’s all my fault," Irene pleaded, deciding a more honest approach would be better. "I forced these two to come with me. I was simply too curious, is all. They both tried to stop me but when I wouldn’t listen they decided to go with me so I wouldn’t get stabbed again."

It was a bit cruel to use her prior injury as leverage knowing Sir Gunnar had a particular weakness seeing the apprentices he looked after hurt. The knight grimaced at that but it didn’t take away his overall perturbed expression.

"These two have just as much say over themselves as you do," the knight argued.

When Felix began to speak, the knight quickly cut him off with a raised hand.

"You all will return to the barracks right this moment," he snapped. "You will need your sleep because you will be punished adequately tomorrow morning. Consider this the last time this happens or I will send all of you to the various corners of Chemois to repent for lacking chivalry and not following orders. I’m sure Sir Arthur will be none too pleased that his child is of the first to be kicked out of the knighthood."

Irene’s eyes had sprung with tears by that point. Even though she knew the consequences, she didn’t expect them to be caught. It was the perfect plan. Just see what they were up to then return home as quickly as possible.

"We weren’t going to do anything, we just wanted to see—"

"Not another word," the knight ordered even more resolutely than before.

The apprentices bowed their heads in shame and uttered various apologies that weren’t enough to wipe the disappointment off of Sir Gunnar’s face.

They lifted their heads and at least tried to seem confident as they turned back the way they came—not even bothering to look back once.

However, what they didn’t see was Sir Gunnar’s look softened and a slight smirk pulled at his lips. He shook his head and sighed, knowing that it wasn’t necessarily bad that they were out there and, if any apprentices could handle what they were doing out there, it would be those three.

He hated to be harsh with them, but he had ordered the apprentices to get sleep considering the night watch would soon start again and the schedules they were used to would soon be turned upside down once more. Part of the adaptability required to be a knight meant losing sleep over duties especially if those duties meant that someone was more safe because of their sacrifice.

Meanwhile, there wasn’t a word shared between Felix, Irene, and Leif until they were all the way back to the barracks. The apprentices awkwardly stopped outside of the entrance and gave each other looks of pure sorrow.

Irene turned to Leif and looked particularly sorry.

"I’m sorry for dragging you into all this," she apologized, feeling terrible that he wasn’t involved in the first place. "Felix and I should have done it on our own."

"I was the one who wanted to get involved," Leif responded. "I had a choice."

Irene simply shrugged and turned to go into the barracks but Felix stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.

"You didn’t need to try to take the fall for this either," he told Irene. "I wanted to get to the bottom of whatever this is as much as you do. I find their secrecy just as irritating considering we were there when they discovered the goblin bodies. Hell, you even got hurt by one of the goblins who must have tried to poison you with the stuff!"

Irene’s eyes widened and she shushed the older apprentice.

"Well, you saved me before it could get much worse than that," she reminded him. "Let’s just... go to bed. We need rest for whatever Sir Gunnar will put us through tomorrow."

With nods and a lot of relenting, they all went their separate ways once they walked to the second floor of the barracks and off to their barracks.

When Irene had her door shut, she removed her clothing down to her underclothes and sat down heavily on the bed with a sigh. She knew what she was doing was bad but she couldn’t help her curiosity. Now she and the others were in trouble and it was her in the first place who put Felix up to eavesdropping in the first place.

Those two were loyal to a fault, she realized. They were her very best friends in the world. With all of the life experience she had, she knew that to be the case. Even in the life she saw, there wasn’t anyone who had her side quite as much as Leif and Felix—and, admittedly, Sir Gunnar even though he was mad at them at that moment. Of course, her father was considered as well but he was her father so he was almost required to be supportive.

Her mother was a different story.

Even though it was hard to sleep knowing that what lay ahead of them would be tough, Irene settled down, staring out the window where there was still mostly darkness, thinking about what she had witnessed in the forest that night.

Were they figuring things out or further confusing themselves? She wasn’t entirely sure.

The following morning, the apprentices attended practice as usual, but the three troublemakers were kept back and made an example in front of the other apprentices. Sir Gunnar worked them down to the bone doing simple things like sword slashes and forward thrusts but they used their real weaponry so their arms were nearly falling off by the time they were finished.

When he said the apprentices could be finished, they all slumped to the ground which was still dewy from the morning.

"I feel a bit sorry for you three," Sir Gunnar admitted.

All three sets of eyes looked up at him, silently pleading with him to go easy.

"You decided to get in trouble just in time for Her Grace to need escorts to the southern mountains where knights from Hydrogia will take the guarding from there,"