Pendragon

Chapter 3: The fall of house perde.

The dining hall of House Perde was a testament to generations of wealth and prestige. A long table of polished oak stretched through the center of the room, its gleaming surface illuminated by crystal chandeliers hanging overhead.

Tall windows lined the walls, allowing the warm glow of the evening sun to spill across marble floors and richly woven carpets imported from distant kingdoms.

Portraits of past members of House Perde watched silently from gilded frames, while silver cutlery, crystal glasses, and fine porcelain plates had been arranged with almost military precision before each seat. The aroma of roasted meats, fresh bread, and exotic spices filled the air, enough to distract even the most disciplined knight.

Around the table were six seats, but only four of them were filled.

Regald Perde sat at the head of the table, watching his children talk and laugh with a proud smile.

On one side was Justin, chatting away happily to his brother and sister. His brother sat in the seat next to him, with the same long ponytail as his father and himself, round spectacles resting on the bridge of his nose, and his eyes occasionally darting to his book while he watched his older brother talk.

He was never much of a talker, unlike his sister, Kate.

Kate sat on the opposite side of the table, directly opposite Justin and close to her father. She watched her brother speak with excitement, occasionally hijacking the conversation from him. Her blonde hair flowed down her shoulders, reaching the small of her back.

The other two seats, the one beside her and the one at the other end of the table, were empty.

“...and that's how Abe and I almost had to fight 26 goblins by ourselves on my last expedition.” Justin wrapped up his story with a satisfied grin.

“Wow!” Kate jumped on her seat, excitedly gasping at the story. “You're so cool, big brother!”

“Hehe,” Justin said, rubbing his nose with pride. He loved sharing his stories with his younger siblings.

“Yeah, especially since there were so many.” Brutus looked up from his book with a doubting expression. “Honestly, for a knight of your skill level and a doofus like Abe, it's almost unbelievable that you could take down so many—”

Justin slapped him in the back of his head, still keeping a smile on his face.

“Ow...” Brutus mumbled before going back to his book.

“Only you can make a fighting story sound boring, Brutus,” Kate said, sticking her tongue out at her older brother.

Brutus didn't reply to her, though. He just mumbled about how she was supposed to call him older brother, not by his name.

“By the way, where's Mother? I haven't seen her since I arrived.”

“Kitchen,” Brutus replied simply before anyone else could answer.

“Yeah,” his father continued, giving Brutus a worried look. “He has been nose-deep in that book for a good while. You know her. She said she's the only one who will cook for her family. It took all of us begging to make her even let the servants help.”

“Yeah, she wanted to make me join too, but I ran away.” Kate complained and slumped on her chair. “She chased me with a pan for eleven minutes.”

Justin laughed at those words. Then the door behind them opened, and a beautiful woman dressed in an elegant blue dress came out. She had a large smile on her face and hazel-brown hair.

Immediately, when Justin saw her, he stood up from his seat to greet her. She took off her apron with practiced ease and threw it to Kate before rushing to give him a big hug.

“Oh, baby boy.” She squeezed him gently. “It's been so long.”

“Mother, it's only been a month.” Justin chuckled, but hugged her back lovingly.

“A month is a long time, Justin.” She pinched his cheek. She smelled of spices and rosemary. “You promised that you'd visit more often than that.”

“Okay, okay. I'm sorry.” He escaped her grasp before his cheeks were pinched off. “You all look like you're doing great. But I haven't seen—”

“Mama!!” A voice travelled across the whole house.

“...Alex.” Justin sighed.

“Mama!” The voice rang again, and this time, the doors were slammed open and a young boy with a towel around his waist stormed in.

“Mama, can we fire the maids! They kept touching my butt when they were drying me—oh, Golden Boy's here?” He stopped when he noticed Justin's presence. But unlike the other siblings, he frowned.

“What's the point of moving out if you're always here?” He rolled his eyes.

Justin walked over to him with an annoyed smile and put him in a headlock. “Who's 'Golden Boy'? It's older brother to you!”

“Ack—Mama! Papa! Justin is killing me!” Alex cried out in a fake cry.

“Older brother!” Justin shouted back at him and ruffled his wet hair. Unlike the other men in the family, Alex's hair was short, barely reaching the back of his neck.

“Okay, okay. Alex.” She turned to the teen. “I told you to go prepare hours ago. We're not firing the maids. They were just doing their job.”

“Yeah. And besides, why would they want to touch a brat like you?” Kate added with a smirk.

“Shut up, Kate. Mama! Kate is being mean to me!” Alex complained again.

“Not my fault the bathwater washed away your brain.” Kate stuck out her tongue at him.

“Both of you stop,” their mother chided them gently. “Alex, go back and get ready. Kate, stop being mean to your younger brother.”

Alex mumbled all the way back with his hand clutching the towel for dear life.

“Honestly, why do you fight so much?” Marie, their mother, sighed.

“Well, it's been proven that siblings with a small age gap often fight a lot. Justin and I have a five-year age gap; Kate and I have a three-year age gap. But for her and Alex, it's just a year. It's expected.” Brutus said as he pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. Everybody else at the table stared at him in silence.

But Marie rubbed his head as she walked past. She loved it when he flaunted his smarts.

“Speaking of age, when is Alex going to start his knight training? He's already fifteen, that's the same age when Brutus and I started ours.” Justin turned to his father.

“I've brought it up,” Regald sighed. “But you know your brother. He said he doesn't want to be a knight. He said he doesn't want to die in battle like some commoner.”

“At this rate, he'll never grow his hair out,” Justin sighed as well.

In the Perde house, for as long as they could remember, the men of the house grew their hair out as a sign of achieving manhood by doing something worthy of being called a man.

“In other news,” Marie changed the subject, “the food is ready. The maids are getting ready to bring it out.”

“Great. But we'll have to wait for Alex,” Kate groaned. “You always do.”

“That's a lot of attitude for someone who didn't help cook the food,” her mother said, squinting at her and causing Kate to visibly shrink in her chair.

Back upstairs in Alex's room, the whole place was a hot mess. Pillows littered everywhere, clothes and shoes were scattered all over the place, and a damp towel lay somewhere near the door.

He had thrown a tantrum and chased away all the help, stating that he could get ready himself.

“Stupid maids,” he said as he combed his hair. “Always overstepping, like we don't do enough by just paying them for their mediocre services.”

He placed the comb down and took a few steps back, looking at himself in the mirror with a smile. He had a mismatched shirt and shorts on, with two different socks and a pair of casual slippers.

He nodded to himself, thinking his attire was sharp.

He quickly made his way downstairs, ignoring the mess that he had made. After all, the servants always cleaned it up.

He dashed downstairs and went to the dining room. He stood at the door for a moment. It was quiet.

That was odd. The Perdes always chatted away while they waited for their last-born.

‘Maybe Golden Boy ran out of stories.’ He shrugged it off and opened the door.

The first thing that hit him was a smell. Instead of the usual smell of delicious food set at the table, he was greeted by a disgusting metallic smell. He covered his nose and winced.

“What’s this disgusting—” He looked up to complain as usual, but the sight he saw made his throat close shut.

“W-what?” He took a step back, his eyes wide with shock and fear. Blood trailed from the table, stretching slowly across the expensive tiling.

Everybody at the dinner table was dead.

“Mama... Papa?” His voice quivered heavily as he finally started to move forward.

Their bodies were littered everywhere, laid like common sacks of potatoes, with their faces twisted in pure horror.

“K-Kate? Brutus?” He walked past the bodies of the servants who were closer to the door. They weren't important, they didn't matter. What mattered to him was his family.

He finally reached the table, and the first person he reached was Justin.

“Big brother?” His eyes watered, his vision blurred as he took his brother's body in his arms. “Big brother, it's me...wake up. Mama! Papa!”

He ran frantically, holding both their bodies as he fell to the ground and rocked them back and forth.

“MAMA! PAPA!” He cried desperately, hoping and praying that they would heed his call. But they never replied.

“BRUTUS, KATE! MAMA AND PAPA AREN'T BREATHING!” He cried and turned to his older siblings. “JUSTIN! KATE! BRUTUS! MAMA AND PAPA AREN'T—” He paused as it dawned on him... They were dead too... the people who were always there for him... were gone.

He broke down, kneeling on the floor with blood all over his clothes, tears flowing endlessly down his cheeks, and throaty wails escaping his mouth.

He sat there rocking all their bodies, crying his heart out, begging and screaming for help. But no one answered. No one replied. No one came. He would never hear his father's laugh or feel his mother's warm hugs again.

He would never hear Brutus' facts or Kate's insults again.

He would never get a chance to play-fight with Justin again.

They weren't just gone; they were all dead.