Maria - The Blind Princess

Chapter 3

At first, Gerald was surprised. After thinking for a while, as Maria's supporter, he thought it could be the only way for her to become an official knight. Seeing the determination inside the eyes of the girl sitting in front of him, he thought she could do it.

"But be careful, Maria. If someone finds out you are a girl, we both will be doomed."

"I know."

Gerald helped Maria trying the academy uniform and fixed her hair by tying it.

"How do I look Gerald?"

"Oh wow... You are.. pretty cool in this costume, Maria."

Thanks to their adoptive father, they could complete the progress of study and entrance test's fee: 40 coins of gold for both Gerald and Maria. Since Tranchant knew their real identity, he agreed with their idea that they would completely be safe from the hunt of the enemies if they stayed inside the academy. Also, almost academy's students are sons of the nobles, it would be an ideal place to collect the information of Baron Beauvallet's murderer 6 years ago. That was how he was ready to spend a lot of money for them and support Maria entering the academy.

"Thank you so much for everything, daddy."

"It was just my duty, so don't mind. The life inside academy will be very tough so just eat as much as possible."

Their last dinner together was luxury meals with cheese breads, beefs and fried eggs. Maria raised her fragile hand forward to look for the bread, he helped her getting it.

After that, Tranchant changed his talking tone.

"Lady Beauvallet, whenever you're in difficulty at the academy. Don't hesitate to contact with me."

"Daddy..?" Maria got surprised. It was the first time Tranchant called her as lady Beauvallet not his daughter.

"In this town, everyone admires Baron Beauvallet thanks to his kindness and intelligence. And the fact he was murdered had angered us through 6 years. You're his daughter, so protecting you is my life duty." He then looked at Gerald "Gerald, please take care of her at the academy."

"Will do."

At that night, Maria and Gerald couldn't sleep. The day after that they had to say goodbye to Tranchant to depart to the capital to pass the entrance test.

"My dream is going to be come true..." Maria thought.

***

It took them a morning by horse cart to arrive the capital city, where Eurydia Academy located at. Unlike the peaceful atmosphere of the town, everything was so lively with many kinds of noises. As a girl who entered the city at the first time, Maria felt a little uncomfortable, but she had to endure. Luckily, Gerald's hand never left Maria's. He kept asking apology to people to let her pass through the sea of people. Maria never thought that she would be so disadvantage like this because of her blindness.

Eventually they arrived Eurydia academy. However, the entrance test would be tomorrow so they had no other choices than finding an inn.

"Oh my god so tired.. The city is bigger than I thought!"

Gerald and Maria rested beside a fountain at city's square. He kept complaining while eating the sandwich. Maria giggled, her hand holding the handkerchief kept awkwardly wiping on Gerald's face.

"Sorry Gerald, you have suffered so much because of me."

"As I told you, I'm your servant.. a support. So don't mind about..."

"No you're not my servant anymore, you're my 'big brother'." Maria smiled "Also, from now, my name isn't Maria anymore. Please call me Richard."

"Richard... Richard... Isn't it Lord Beauvallet's real name?"

"Yes, the secret only two of us know then hehe."

In order to prevent the worst case can happen, Maria already disguised herself as a boy since they entered the capital.

Suddenly from afar, Gerald and Maria heard the sound of the trumpet and noise from the people.

"The prince is coming!"

One of the guards shouted. People hearing it tried to avoid at the roadside, to let a royal horse cart passing by.

"The prince?" Gerald wondered "The prince also studies at this academy?"

"You seem to be so surprised Gerald." Maria kept eating her sandwich "Didn't daddy Tranchant tell you? All the noble's son will gather there so the prince is included."

"And I think he is a really nasty person..."

Gerald showed his disgusted face when seeing a guy with luxury costumes coming out of the cart, scolding an old woman who accidently dropped her basket of apples in the middle of the prince's road. She didn't have enough time to pick all of them up so stood on his way.

"At the academy, it's better if we don't get involved trouble with this guy." Gerald covered Maria's ears so she couldn't hear his shout from afar.

"I got it."

"Hey~ I heard what you said to our highness."

Gerald looked at the owner of the arrogant voice earlier. It was from a boy in academy's costume who was leading his other two friends. Gerald could guess they might be close with the prince. This situation was very disadvantage for both Gerald and Maria.

"Would you mind if you repeat what you just said?"

The leader boy hold Gerald's shirt and shouted at him. Maria could feel everything getting worse so she awkwardly tried to stop.

"Come on.. It's just misunderstand..."

"What?? Misunderstand?? Or you want to replace your friend to get the punishment?"

He then looked at Maria from her face to her legs. Her brave eyes and the immobilized pupils even interested him more.

"You're a boy, but why do you look like a girl?"

"Just freaking leave us alone! My friend is blind ok?"

Gerald yelled and dragged Maria to elsewhere. But they were stopped by the troublemaker's friends.

"At least let me teach you some lessons so next time, you will know yourself and be more polite to our highness."

"Richard, let's run!"

Gerald dragged Maria to run. Suddenly, in her mind, she recalled herself being same as this state 6 years ago, desperately running from the enemies. Before, she was too coward and left her father dying alone. Now she wanted to face her fear and change this fate, at least once.

Maria didn't hold Gerald's hand anymore. She turned her back, face to face against the group of troublemakers with knight's defensive posture.

"Mari... Richard? What are you going?"

"Give me a "weapon", Gerald! I will fight them!"

Geald was hesitating for few seconds. Then, he gave her back the cane for the blinds. If Maria wanted to fight back, he would support her until his end.

"Lord Beauvallet, your daughter had grown up..." Gerald thought. He prepared himself two wooden sticks as his knife's replacement, ready to support Maria giving vision.

***

The battle was happened inside a small area of alley. Luckily, it was advantage for Maria since she could feel the enemy's movement and their breathing noise clearer and nearer. If about close combat, she was really confident. But for an assassin like Gerald, being unable to move in large area was very disadvantage. The only thing he could do was standing behind Maria, to prevent the case if one of three of them attacked her from behind.

"He is blind, cannot see us so we will win for sure! Beat them!"

But too bad, despite being blind, Maria and Gerald had practiced a lot through 6 years, to improve her movement, judgement and enemy detection. Now her movement was fast that even can stop assassin's encounter like Gerald. To fight against those revealing incoming attacks like those troublemakers, it was too easy for her.

"They have a wood baton as their weapon." Gerald told Maria.

"How many of them?"

"Three."

Maria raised her cane eventually to defend when hearing the rushing noise of enemy's shoes. She maximized all her focus, predict where the next attack would be. Base on that, she can also dodge, guess the enemy's height to aim her cane's tip to their weakness: The upper abdomen, between two ribs.

Usually with the cane as her weapon, her attack couldn't kill an enemy, but can make them being immobilized on the ground for a while. Maria charged forward, her power on the cane wasn't strong but her amazing technique was enough to knock out one of them and push him back, make him losing balance and felling on the ground. She swung the cane like how she did with her usual lance, back to defensive posture.

"You..." Hearing pathetic voice, Maria could guess the one attacked her was also the leader. She didn't hear his other friends attacking her, it meant they had been taken care of by Gerald "I will report you two to the capital council. Let's see if you can be arrogant like this or not!"

"We aren't arrogant toward you. It was our explainable self-defense." Maria answered.

"And I think we also got some people witness our mess right?" Gerald intentionally threw those two outside of the alley, in front of many people with a note "Bullying a blind shall be bullied".

Suddenly, the leader of troublemaker group could sense a royal atmosphere from Maria's talking attitude.

"Gr.. Just wait.. One day I will revenge.."

Eventually they gave up causing trouble to Gerald and Maria. They both gave a relief sigh. Gerald looked at Maria and gave her a compliment.

"If Lord Beauvallet had seen you being like this, he would have been so proud of you."

"Well, it was just the very first step to surpass my fear." Maria smiled. As usual she didn't turn her eyes to him. Although Gerald knew Maria couldn't see him, it made him a little sad as well, he felt like she was talking to another invisible person.

Gerald then felt someone stalking them. But when he turned back, there was no one. He guessed his feeling was just too exaggerating and ignored it.

Eventually the day of their entrance test had begin...