Instine excused himself saying that he had to take care of some matters before the rest of the members arrived. I went around the room, noticed the wall behind the chair at the head of the long table was the only place to have no shelves.. It was covered with long drapery and I could even hear some unclear voices behind it.. then I went to look at the books.. they were arranged in sections.. one section was headed.. “Human Functionality”.. it had books with titles on, anatomy, the Brain, and biology.. then there was a section about social structure.. and another on Psychology. Also, one section was about history.. another was a large section titled Science .. I reached a shelf with big volumes under a heading “Specialty” .. I picked a large book .. “The Art of Lying” the title intrigued me.. so I opened a page to sample it, “.. must be big enough to be overwhelming, but with part of the truth included into its fabric..” then I went to another page, “.. repetition is not always recommended but sometimes by repeating the same lie several times in a casual manner, you shall convince the listener that at least they have to consider it..” I had to sit down, and look at yet another page, “.. in order to be convincing, you must sound as if you are convinced yourself.. if you___”

               “First book to catch your eye.” Deemeon entered and instantly noticed, “You know, if you can master all the information in this book, “The Art Of Lying” you can become the prince of the world.”

               “Whoa.. prince of the world.. does that make you are the prince of the world.. since you are the one who wrote it?”

               “Of course ..and then some..” He answered with a big smirk on his face.

               “All these books? You wrote them all?” I put the book back and noticed he looked completely different from the Deemeon I saw at BKC earlier that day.

               “I wrote many of them, like the one you picked up.. but here you find the collective knowledge of the world.. even books written by riffraff, you shall find here.”

               “Riffraff? I didn’t know they write books”

               “Of course.. they have different kinds of knowledge and belief systems.. we have to know it in order to control them.”

               “Well, the question I have, is.. why then do you keep all this restricted .. down here out of reach of your soldiers and commanders?”

He looked at me for a long while.. he was trying to read my thoughts, which made me smile as I remembered Bryane comments.. then he answered with a sneaky smirk,

               “Which one of my soldiers and commanders would be interested in this?”

I was quick to answer,

               “I can speak for myself.. for I am one.. very interested.. and__”

The door was opened and Instine walked in, whispered some words to his father and then both of them walked out. I was left alone again in the big room.. I was very curious about how the ventilation system worked because the air was fresh and we were deep underground.. I went around the room to look for any vents.. and sure enough, there they were.. in several spots at the top of the walls near the ceiling, hidden in a very clever way.. I realized that I could hear the voices behind the wall near the top of the table because there was a large vent above those draperies. It seemed that there was a room behind, sharing the same wall.  

The horn greeting was heard, and a short while later the door was opened and Pruste entered the room. Then another horn greeting.. and several others followed.. before long the room was filled and everyone was whispering, while Trapp was still nowhere to be found..

Before long , Deemeon came back, excited and upbeat.. he rang the little bell on the long table and announced the beginning of the meeting, so we took our seats around the table.. the seat of OC Front was between the other two front castles.. so Loot was next to me.. while the UC seat was left vacant..  there were several vacant seats and no one paid attention except for the vacant seat of MEMOC.. it seemed that most of the attendees were already expecting a certain explosive session, based on the information circling around BKC about the row between Trapp and myself. with the inevitable downfall of the newly minted commander of the OC Front.. Although Trapp was yet to show up.

The first salvo was explosive indeed when Deemeon calmly announced,

               “I am very pleased that we finally caught  the most important catch we were after for several years..Dusky is already here inside this castle with a few of his soldiers.”

There was a sudden cheering and celebration around the table, while my heart sank and I almost fainted. It was a complete shock.. I immediately realized that the operation was going on that morning.. this was probably the reason why Deemeon was so distant and worried and didn’t want to talk until he knew the effort was successful.. but.. why would I feel so depressed? Is it because Trapp might be getting the upper hand.. was he the one who caught Dusky?

My mind was on a spin mode.. until Deemeon continued to calm the crowd,

               “OK everyone.. calm down.. the process has just begun, and as usual we never know the results until the very end. It is all credited to cooperation and great efforts by several fine soldiers enduring danger with great sacrifices,” He paused for a while, then added, “Trapp and Hort .. both contributed to this achievement and should deserve our respect and appreciation although the commander of the MEMOC didn’t care to show up to this critical meeting until now.”

               “This time we look very different from the last time we were here.” One attendant pointed out. Then another answered,

               “Yes, Deborge is gone.. Dinar is gone.. and Blake.. Blake is gone, Trapp didn’t show and we have a new member.”

Deemeon raised his hand to silence everyone,

               “Boon and Frey let us focus on the positive and concern ourselves with the business at hand.” He said firmly, “We normally begin with the report of the latest games, but since Trapp is not here, we shall start with.. Pruste.. go on.”

               “Supreme chief, I must bring to your attention that the DC is becoming out of control.. Bryane is making things difficult for me.. his experiments are extensive and there is no chance any .. yes any reformation can take place.. we are running out.”

               “You need more subjects? Is that it?”

               “Yes..  and please__”

               “If you want some to be sent back to the outside countries, you can arrange with Ozot to get you a new batch.. they are all over the place. And I do not want the Bryane experiments to be interrupted under any circumstances.. these are vital for our progress.”

She tried to add another comment, but he shut her up,

               “Keep the communication open with Instine and he will help with the programming system.” Then he turned to look at the person he called Frey, “Now it’s your turn.. what do you have for me?”

               “We have no changes at dreed castle.. everything is ready for our next games.”

Then Deemeon looked at Oldefol,

               “I am very concerned about what you reported last time.. did you finally find the apostate.. the one called Alore?”

               “No chief, I am sorry to say we have looked everywhere.. I think we shall find him.. there is no place to hide and__”

               “Find him.. you must find him.. this is very serious.. he had been trusted for a long time .. he worked with Bryane and Hort and Pryade.. I want you to tell me next time that you found him”

               “I shall need a lot of help to do that..I don’t__”

               “No excuses..” Deemeon interrupted sharply.

The image of Alore coming to talk to me at dawn in OC Front jumped into my memory, but somehow, I was glad I could hold this to myself.. thinking, it was real.. I was not imagining the whole thing.  

The horn was heard outside indicating the arrival of the last attendee, which meant the arrival of Trapp.. and a short while later, there was a knock on the door, but it was ignored by Deemeon who looked around and then pointed to the one he called Boon to present his report,

               “supreme chief.. I beg your indulgence.. please get rid of this pain you sent me last month.. I keep asking every time, and it is becoming intolerable.. I may end up killing him_”

               “Don’t you dare.” Deemeon boomed, “Calas is a very good soldier.. you are only scared he is going to replace you in this seat after the next games.. all you have to do is work harder to prove yourself better than him.. that is how it works.. I want no more mention of this problem. Is there anything else you can report?”

               “I have just appointed Hania as my assistant.” The poor man said in a lower tone.

Deemeon laughed heartily,

               “Very clever.. you see.. you can work your way around your problems.. very good choice.. she can deal with Calas very well.”

The knocking on the door continued, and Deemeon still ignored it.. and went to Loot,

               “any change in your situation? Is the treaty still holding?”

               “Yes.. we are satisfied so far__”

               “But I am no longer satisfied.” He snapped, “ Considering the disaster we had in Primore and now in MEMOC, we need more subjects.. almost half the rooms in this place are vacant.. you must renegotiate.. since when do we stick to our treaties? No.. don’t argue.. now, Hort, I am eager to hear your report.”

               “Supreme chief, I must begin by pointing to the incessant knocking on the door__”

               “I hear it.. I hear it too..never mind .. He comes late and then he is in a hurry to get in?”

               “But I am afraid, whatever I am going to say concerns him as well.” I insisted.

He looked suspiciously at me, and then he broke into a gentle laugh,

               “You sneaky reptile.. are you sure you are human?”

Everyone in the room burst into laughter, and he reached behind the curtains to grab a long colorful rope and pulled it.. the door was opened and a guard entered,

               “Master, Commander Trapp would like to come in.”

Deemeon waved his hand to let him in and Trapp rushed in and apologized for being late, so the chief pointed to his seat,

               “Sit down.. your success today is going to allow you room for leniency.” He turned to me then and added, “Well.. your best rival is now here.. I know what transpired.. so let us hear it.”

The crowd erupted in contradictory voices this time.. some were objecting and some were cheering. Yet, Deemeon raised his voice to silence everyone,

               “I always like cooperation.. Hort still has his arm in a sling as you see after his encounter with the Vino soldiers.. and Trapp went unceasingly looking for the runaways.. we must forget our differences and focus on the final reward.”

His voice carried a hint of a warning.. so the room went very quiet and everyone looked at him attentively.. in the mean time, my mind was still completely occupied by my concern for Dusky.. I couldn’t understand myself.. why would I worry about this soldier.. yes, he was a brilliant soldier in the battle field, and that should make me elated to have such a soldier on my side.. instead of having to fight against him.. everyone was waiting for me to speak, while I looked at Trapp who sat down across from me, with his wild stare challenging me.. but I was not actually seeing Trapp.. I was seeing dusky on his spotted horse striking Blake.. and.. It seemed that Trapp made a comment which I didn’t hear prompting Deemeon to say,

               “Commander Hort, you asked to let him in.. now you seem to be somewhere else.. are you with us in this room?”  

I was shaken out of my deep thoughts, so I looked around,

               “Oh, Yeah.. I am just thinking..” I put a contrived smile on my face.

               “He might have accidently done something right, but I believe he owes me an apology.” Trapp interjected trying to taunt me, now that he got the adoration for catching Dusky so he continued brazenly, “Besides, he had already declared he didn’t want the seat where he is sitting now.”

Deemeon didn’t like the change of tone while he was trying to keep things positive,

               “I am sure commander Hort has a plausible explanation for this.” He said in a low tone.

Now I had to really smile.. I took my time before I started,       

               “Please indulge me for a moment. I don’t know where to begin. First, I never said I didn’t want the promotion.. never said that.. I said I didn’t ask for the promotion. Anyone with a little brain should understand the difference.”

Trapp tried to interrupt, but I shut him down fast,

               “You asked that we talk in private, I insisted to talk in front of everyone.. there are witnesses who can corroborate  what happened exactly.”

There was silence for a while, then he came back to clamor,

               “You insulted me in front of everyone.. and didn’t honor my request to keep Heela__”

               “Now you admit there were witnesses. As for Heela.. you planted her to spy on me.. as soon as she got orders she didn’t like, she jumped to you  to complain.. is this the kind of soldier I should accept in my command? Which other commander here would like me to interfere in their command?”  

Everyone was silent and began looking at each other..now I took the offensive,

               “Now the critical point of argument.. you declared that you approved my promotion conditional on accepting Heela in my command.. in front of everyone.?

A huge whoa.. came upon the room… as Deemeon eyes narrowed and he glared at Trapp,

               “What did you say?” Deemeon asked under his teeth.

               “Let him deny that?” I added quietly

Trapp stammered in horror.. but I was not finished,

               “However all these mistakes commander Trapp, are nothing compared to your major horrible blunder.”

Everyone looked at me with frightened eyes.. so I said..

               “You are receiving the adoration and respect of the chief and the congratulations for your great feat.. while nobody knows that you had already burned one of our best castles to the ground for absolutely no reason at all.”

He seemed to regain his composure, and smiled as if he got me at last,

               “This was the only way to ferret them out, and we succeeded__”

               “NO.. not at all..” I interrupted sharply, “When you burned the MEMOC, they were already out.”

               “What? What are you talking about? How do you know?” He challenged me.

               “First, remember I went to check the burning rubble__”

               “Yeah.. like an idiot, you were just trying to show off and disobeyed the orders.”

               “No.. I was trying to prove a point.. and explain to your rotten brain.. why there was no resistance from the inside.. soldiers watching from the walls but offer no fire back.. why? I went to check the rubble.. to see for sure that these were sham soldiers.. helmets and cloaks.. but no corpses.”

               “Impossible.. they were inside. How would they leave without us seeing them?” He was rattled now.

               “Exactly my question.. did you and your hero, Devo, examine the rubble and find any corpses? I tried to explain to you, and you insulted me and threatened to capture me and send me to BKC as prisoner.. deny that now.”

There was silence and apprehension in the room as everyone was stunned. Then after a while Deemeon came to the rescue,

               “Commander Hort.. these are great explanations but in the heat of the battle, sometimes reasoning is not the same.”

Then Trapp found some courage to answer,

               “Yes. We were all anxious and it would be impossible for them to get out.. after all, how do you figure they could get out?”

I looked around smiling from ear to ear, and secretly said a quick thank you to Bryane for leaving his notes in my chamber,

               “You Trapp, were the commander of Malaab.. and Oldefol here is commander of Primore.. also Frey is commander of Dreed.. in other words.. all commanders of inner castles have access to the layout of their castles.” I paused for a while and watched the eyes of Deemeon go wide and wild as he anticipated what I was about to say, “So, you must know that there is a labyrinth of wide tunnels under every one of those castles to be used in case of emergency and it opens almost a mile away from the castle.”

The place was rocked with noisy chatter and exclamations, until Deemeon yelled loudly to silence everyone, while Trapp finally found it easier to admit,

               “Yes.. yes.. I knew about that of course, but they could not go out that way.. that labyrinth is impossible to navigate.. it was never used.. even our soldiers would die before they could get out.. Vino soldiers could never___”

               “Silence..” Deemeon screamed, “your explanation is worse than your crime. You’re estimating their intelligence was as meager as yours”

Silence prevailed for a long time..then I had my chance to appear magnanimous, so I said very quietly,

               “But I must admit.. it was not all your fault..”

Now all eyes were fixed on me in horror, as everyone wondered who would be my next victim. So, as I took my time, Deemeon shouted,

               “Go on.. who else is involved?”

               “Deborge.” I could hear the collective sigh of relief pervade the place, “He contributed a great deal to this.. um.. problem.” I took a deep breath and continued, “He didn’t believe the reports of the Vinovians sending a rescue mission, so he wanted to be able to brag about the number of soldiers he could catch, so he sent Kelly with his troops to lure more Vino soldiers”

               “So how did this affect the outcome?” He asked anxiously

               “on the one hand, it reduced the UC force pushing the Vinos towards the MEMOC, which allowed for the escape of three Vinos into the mountains and__”

               “What did you say?” Deemeon thundered, shaking the room and everyone in it.

I was shaken myself, but very amused, so I added slowly,

               “Yes, three Vinos escaped into the mountains.. the UC forces, as small as they were had to be divided.. some would continue the push towards MEMOC and others would try to capture the three escapees.. who were never captured.. fact is the UC throng that went after them never showed up again.”

There was dead silence in the room as Deemeon eyes were turning red and his face looked so scary.. I thought I should salvage the situation,

               “But Thanks to Kelly, the situation was improved.. because he disobeyed Deborge.. when he went half way out , he decided to return back in case there was an actual rescue as rumored, and he was right.. he found Deborge dead and Dusky had already passed through on his way to MEMOC.”

The room was very quiet.. Deemeon got out of his chair.. walked around the table silently.. stopped behind my chair and then said,

               “It is amazing that you know all this information.. which nobody else knows? How did you come by this?” He asked, still standing behind my chair.

I answered without looking back at him,

               “Unlike some other commanders, I like to listen.. I hear what others say and evaluate the validity of the information I hear.”

He walked back to his chair.. sat down and put on a devious smile looking at me saying,

               “I am beginning to think what Geetieh had done was not so bad after all.. you are very dangerous with too much information.”

               “Is it very dangerous to expose the errors?” I was quick to respond, “How else can you correct the situation and avoid future catastrophes? This makes me the most valuable person in this room. Provided with such little information, I can help so much.. imagine when I have more information__”  

               “You would want more.. dear Hort.” He interrupted and then burst into laughing. I had to smile.. then I said,

               “I would recommend this soldier Kelly, be made the next commander of UC Front.”

               “I shall certainly look into that.”

He then turned to Instine,

               “Tell us the good news.”

               “Dusky and his soldiers surrendered this afternoon and are now right here in this castle and are being processed as we speak.”

I had to jump in,

               “Surrendered you say?”

Everyone in the room was astonished for my daring intrusion. But Instine raised his brows and didn’t seem to be bothered by the question,

               “Yes, they did.. what is strange about that? They had no other choice.. they were surrounded.. it was ..give up or die.” He answered nonchalantly.

Somehow I was the only one who smelled a rat in this statement. But I didn’t bother to make a fuss about it. I was sure, Dusky was not the kind of soldier who would surrender.. he would prefer to die rather than fall in the hands of the enemy. He had to be badly wounded to be taken alive. But no one bothered to think along these lines. They seemed to be happy and satisfied to just have him in custody.   

 Deemeon looked around and asked, “Is there anything else that needs to be addressed?”

I was glad to oblige,

               “You asked the question and I answered.. I need to have access to this library.. may be others do not care to learn, but I do.. especially .. as you put it, after what Geetieh did to me.”

In a fit of unexpected admiration, he announced,

               “Well, you have permission to check the library as you wish.. let me see what you can achieve as the learned commander.”

He got up and declared the meeting adjourned. Several members rushed to talk to him about their particular requests. I went to Instine and made sure he would inform his staff of the special permission I just got to visit the library. And in a short time the room was again empty except for me wandering around and picking up volume after volume to check and get a rough idea of the content, although I knew deep down inside my heart, I was not there for the books. I was trying to figure out some plan to go through the mysterious castle and see what they do to these captives and especially now, what would be the deal with the illustrious and precious Dusky.