Chapter VI

The truck, stopping at the first piece of levelled ground – the home of a roundabout –, indicated to turn left, which according to maps and the guidance of charitable locals led to the prosthetist the blacksmith had pointed them too, but a group in luminescent yellowish-green waistcoats waving red lights shaped into cones, pointing them to the third exit. This pattern persisted at each roundabout (most of the roads being singular winding roads leading to roundabouts), redirecting them further and further from their intended destination.

Riding up the snaking tarmac roads, white lines in the scales, it becomes apparent that the town hall is their rerouted finish line. Its spire a peak amongst the mountains, clear scaffolding is present as workers tend to its burns. The exposed wooden beams bare fangs towards the outside world like vampires screaming under the light. It lacks the gold grandeur of a palace, or the mossy cobblestone of a castle, or the perfection a work of architectural genius; it is not more than a peak amongst peaks, a meeting place for the many oligarchies that lay claim to Vestmuren – belonging to them only in paper and ink.

No garden, no grand gate, no artwork, no decorator pond to waste away minutes and pennies. A single road, all crackling tarmac, to a pair of two metre oak doors with bronze door handles. Asides from its spire and signs, one would most likely place its picture amongst the common houses surrounding the area before believing in its place amongst palaces and castles.

Above its doors, below the arch that merges with the spire, a circled window, uncoloured and dim, keeps an unwatchful eye over visitors.

Two in the luminescent yellowish-green waistcoats open the doors and walks the group through the entrance and its bow desk occupied by a single receptionist, an old-fashioned English butler-like gentleman with a semi-circle grey moustache sitting under his squished nose between prominent cheekbones perfect to rest a monocle upon. He nods in acknowledgment but does not attempt to speak an attachment to the visitors, switching his attention to a vase blooming dandelions and lavender roses.

Passing through a second set of double doors on the left a corridor to the next set, curling around the natural curvature of the building in the search for the beauty of curves.

The next set of doors swung to diverge the path with the alternate right path moulding into a judge stand at its culmination. Atop it sits a man in a slightly glossier business suit than the four at his sides – and the ten empty seats – that occupy the wings of the pedestal.

The centre man stands, arms stretching out to hug the air encompassing the group, his stomach forcing out his white line shirt and his un-buttoned black waistcoat like a butler in his private quarters. A thrifty smile held upon by gold incisors, accompanied with silver chiselled canines and pearly molars large enough to hold a five-penny coin. Beneath his stout nose a moustache starting and ending with the whirling buds of Yggdrasil, glowing with the colour of Freya's necklace. His hair ages little, lustrous black gleaming with gel, and its shape is like a dyed judge's hat. Even his face, smooth as a baby's smothered in primer, appears rich with the gold tints of foundation on his cheekbones, not too prominent from his full cheeks.

'Perhaps that's where he keeps his jewellery,' Akuma thinks to himself, raising a disgusted eyebrow and his left nostril. Sao nudges him so Akuma adjusts his brow straight but his nostrils continue to twitch.

As the centre man's mouth opens wider to speak, his enormous tongue rests prominent. The usually unnoticeable scars on a person's tongue are impossible to miss on his own, like patches of clouds in the morning's sky. Rising to the roof of his mouth, it resembles a red whale's tale surfacing above the water, saliva dripping from its sides.

'Hello! my treasured visitors, how are we?' the man bellows.

No one responds, all far too uncomfortable with the man's roaring voice.

'It is an honour to have such admirable guests in our home.'

Again, no one responds.

'If you follow your assigned butler, he will take you to your residences during your stay,' he says, his eyes grinning. 'You will be checked on later for any questions you may have. We are much too busy at the moment, but we will ensure that someone will be with you by eight. Be sure to enjoy our home as if it were your own in the meantime. Adieu.'

The man then seats himself and the butler leads the group out. Rose, a little startled by it all, peaks over her shoulder. The five of them stare.