Not too confident with how the end of this chapter turned out, but it took so long to write that I really don't want to try and make it better right now. Hope you enjoy it!
The way to the Church's Hunter Workshop was, as it turned out, a short one. A brief walk through the apothecarial gardens of the Cathedral Ward brough Edward and his guide to a tower hidden in among the various steeples and chapels of the Church's domain, which loomed high against the setting sun. At its base, an arched passage gave admission to a doorway guarded by two Black-Cloak Hunters, who waved Gascoigne through, but stopped Ed until his guide invoked the name of High Minister Norbert. Even then, their expressions were recalcitrant, and they glowered at the young alchemist as he pushed past to join his host.
Then the old priest pulled a thing like a bell-pull that was affixed to the wall of the chamber beyond the arch, and the floor had quickly risen, proving that despite its apparently rustic nature, Yharnam had elevators, of a sort. The ascent terminated in another arched door, which opened out onto a wide, drafty space full of arches and pillars, beyond which lay the radiant glow of the blood-red setting sun. As he stepped out into it, Edward realized that the Hunter's Workshop was an open space, covering the entire top floor of the tower and its surrounding attachments.
"Interesting." he muttered, "Kind of a drafty place to work."
"Twas built in the time of Vicar Lawrence." Gascoine explained, "Castles were still in style back then. And they say the first Hunters o' the Church loved to look at the moon as they worked."
"Huh." Ed remarked, looking around, "Not what I was expecting bu-...oh." He fell silent as he spotted the weapons.
"Wow." the young alchemist muttered. He'd never been to a slaughterhouse, or to a gunsmith's workshop. However, he had been in automail workshops, and if he had tried to mentally combine either of those former settings with the last one, the comparison would probably not have been far off. What lay before him was something only the most crazed of minds could possibly concieve. If Edward had seen half the things he saw lying around that room in someone's basement, he would've assumed he was dealing with an eccentric serial killer...or possibly an entire cabal.
The most overt of the items of death and mayhem on display were the blades. There were straight blades, curved blades, round blades and above all, sharp blades. Almost all of them had jagged teeth on them, which added a further element of 'carpenter's backroom' to the mixed atmosphere. There were also guns, including what looked like a massive short-barreled cannon of the sort once used on the battlefields of the previous century, or perhaps earlier. It lay atop one of the stone and wood work tables like a forgotten relic from an earlier era, recalled to serve the people in the hour of their direst need. Above it, a dozen large swords dangled precariously from hooks like metal icicles, ready to impale the unwary thief.
"Tis a bit wild, I'll admit, but the sad truth is it's all necessary." Gascoigne said poignantly. Ed turned to gape at him.
"Necessary?!" he gasped, "What-"
"A Beast is no ordinary prey, m'boy." Gascoigne said wearily, stepping past him to walk past the various benches, while obviously looking around for other occupants, "They willnae stop fighting until you take the blood outta them. I've seen men put ten or twenty bullets into a full-grown Beast and be torn to shreds." After a bit more looking around, he turned his eye back to his charge. "Normal bullets won't work either. Has to be quicksilver bullets, and even they're only good for slowin' 'em down."
He grabbed a long-handled weapon that looked a great deal like a carpenter's saw, adapted to be used by two people as easily as by one, then wiped his hand down the side of the heavy, iron blade. Then, with a motion so quick that Ed found himself leaping back in shock, he whipped the tool to the side. One end of the sawblade detached from the handle, flicking out and then locking into place with its teeth facing outwards at the other end, turning the saw into an enormous and very crude sword.
"Blade's quickest." Gascoigne said morosely.
"But how do you fight them up close if they're so dangerous!?" Ed demanded, unable to keep his eyes from drifting back over and over to the blade now in his host's hand, "I mean, you'd have to train for years to use that thing without ripping your own arms off!" He pointed at the weapon, which Gascoigne held up with a look of disinterest.
"Saw cleaver?" he grunted, "Light as a feather to a Hunter. But I see yer point." He gripped the non-toothed side of the blade and forced it back into its proper shape, the sound of a catch clicking as he did echoing through the room.
"We Hunters," he explained, hanging the weapon on a convenient hook, "are cut with Blood. A special decoction reserved for the Hunters alone. It gives us long life, great strength, and the senses and will to hunt Beasts."
If Edward had not seen Gascoigne do half the things he had, he would've laughed. Because he had, he instead stared bug-eyed at the old priest in wonder and horror. Of course he had known there had to be something to explain the old man's immense strength and agility, not to mention his sense of smell (which coincidentally explained how he'd known Al was hollow. Ed was certain of it). However, he was no less amazed to hear it from Gascoigne's mouth than he would've been had he read about it in the books Iosefka had lent him.
"So the Church..." he said slowly, "gives people superhuman abilities in order to solve its problems?"
"To hunt BEASTS." Gascoigne said firmly, "Tis a rare man that can take on a contract, for it is a lifelong duty. And worse still, there is the thirst."
"Thirst?" Ed asked, a icy wind of dread beginning to blow through his already unsettled mental landscape. Gascoigne shot him a look that the young alchemist found he couldn't quite read. There was disgust there, but not directed at him, as well as shame and...something else. Something...dark. Ed found himself recalling that first night, when he'd looked into the man's eyes in the glow of the gaslamps and seen something that was not entirely human, and yet in a sense, all too familiar.
"If a man Hunts too hard for too long," Gascoigne explained somberly, "he begins to act like a Beast. A thirst for th' Blood overtakes him, and he'll quickly begin to fall apart. And when that happens, there's only one thing to be done." He looked out over the city with a grim, almost mournful expression now, staring down at the streets and deep valleys of Yharnam in a way that somehow reminded Ed of a dog looking out at rolling fields of grass. It was an uncomfortable comparison, but in making it he realized it was all too true. Indeed, this explained far too much...and yet at the same time, it just raised more questions.
Why would the Church trust anyone with such power? That they'd been here for so long, yet never used the Good Blood for conquest spoke volumes...just not in a language Ed could understand. Again, he found himself wondering what exactly the Church WAS, and what it's goals could be. His mind wanted to put everything in a neat, understandable framework that lined up with his preconceptions, namely that the Church and its members, like so many religious organizations, was out to con everyone. The fact that it seemed to have ulterior motives beyond wealth and power, as well as factions within its own power structure, just added to the mess.
And here was Gascoigne, such an obviously simple man, who wanted nothing more than to help people, caught in the middle. How could such a person, who had offered the same love and care to a pair of foreign strangers that one might expect from a near and dear friend, live every day in this web of confusion, especially when the price was the duty to kill monsters while living every day with the possibility of becoming one himself? Edward felt an uncharacteristic surge of sympathy for the old man, as well as respect, and wondered, just briefly, if he shouldn't just admit his real reasons for coming up here. But alchemists dealt in knowledge, and until he knew more of what was going on, Ed knew he couldn't risk anything...not even for this.
Desperate to distract himself, he looked around at the assorted tools of death. "On a tangent..." he asked, as casually as possible, "where is everyone? I thought this place would be busier."
Gascoigne turned back to him.
"Truth told, I was wonderin' that meself." he muttered, looking about the silent columns and workbenches, "Seems like everyone's out...which can't bode well for tonight."
"Well I need to know more about Beasts. Are there...any texts? Books? Anything?" Ed pressed, turning around and around in the midst of the arches to avoid having to look at anything for very long.
"There's the chest of Hunter's Wisdom." Gascoigne said, turning to a door in one of the walls of the mostly open chamber, "I'll gae fetch sommofit, shall I?"
As he walked past Ed he murmured quietly, causing the young alchemist to freeze in place, a look of bug-eyed shame written all over his face.
"Whatever tis yer really up here for, don't take to long, eh?"
---
At first Edward was worried he might not find what he needed, given the nature of most of the devices on display. He'd always intended to transmute himself a telescope after arrival, given that the Hunter's Workshop was, well, a workshop. However in hindsight he realized he should've been more prepared. While Gascoigne busied himself with an enormous brass-bound chest full of scrolls which Edward took to be the Chest of Hunter's Wisdom, Edward did his best to casually scan the various death-dealing tools dangling and sitting about the chamber.
Admittedly, he found it hard to stay totally focused in the face of the ingenuity of some of the devices he found, as well as the esoteric nature of others. For example, there was a spade-shape spike attached to some sort of miniaturized engine block and fitted with leather straps, obviously designed to be worn like a buckler. It looked profoundly advanced given its surroundings, but whatever it was and how it operated Edward couldn't say. There was also a large metal lute on a stand in the corner that made his head ache when he came close enough to hear the wind disturb its strings. He stayed well away from that. One of the strangest things he saw was a large rake, leaned against the wall as part of a rack of pole-arms. It looked innocent enough...until you saw that the 'fingers' were tipped by barbed hooks.
Eventually, he found what he was looking for amidst the firearms, as he has suspected he would. A rifle with an attached scope lay atop the workbench closest to the lute, and after suffering through a bit of a migraine to detach it, Ed conducted a quick transmutation to improve its quality before beginning his search. He wasted no time in directing his gaze beyond the limits of the city. He knew it was entirely possible that Byrgenwyrth might actually be IN Yharnam, where it couldn't been renamed after being swallowed up by the sprawl, but something told him that the Church wouldn't want to leave a place with such history open to the public...for ANY reason.
Thus, he directed his search towards the lake at the foot of the woods which back the Cathedral Ward. He swept his gaze to and fro, once or twice passing over a strange cloud of fog before spotting what looked like the ruins of an old castle. Excitement building inside him, he adjusted the focus of the lens and saw beyond its towers what looked like the outskirts of some sort of long-overgrown estate.
"Ah-HA."
"What?" Gascoigne asked, not looking up from his delve into the depths of the chest.
"Nothing!" Ed reported quickly, putting the makeshift telescope back as carefully as he could, while trying to map out a method of reaching what he'd seen from somewhere in Yharnam. He frowned, his efforts unfortunately quick to bring to his attention another glaring flaw in his master plan that he'd missed until now: he didn't know enough about the city and its surroundings to do that. Clenching his fist in frustration, he turned back to Gascoigne and put on his most nonchalant voice.
"Say, Gascoigne..." he asked, "you got any maps in that chest?"
He looked over his shoulder in time to see the old man raise his head from his 'search'.
"A few..." he replied, "what for?"
"I'm wondering if there might be a way to find where the Beasts are...nesting. I mean, they must be going SOMEWHERE during the day, right?" Ed said, inventing frantically to keep the obvious deception going. He knew that Gascoigne wouldn't believe any explanation he gave, but the man's earlier admonition seemed to indicate that for whatever reason, he had decided to grant Edward the benefit of the doubt regarding his true goals, heavens knew why. Whatever his reasons, the gray-haired priest nodded in agreement.
"A fair idea. If we knew, we might form a plan of attack..." he reasoned, building on Ed's lie for any potential listeners. As he dug into the chest, a thought struck the young alchemist, and took hold of it.
"On a tangent, I've been meaning to ask:" he said slowly, keeping his voice calm, "You said you didn't know much about Byrgenwyrth. But you didn't seem at all surprised by the story Anneil told us."
"Aye." admitted Gascoigne, fishing about in the vast chest, shoving scrolls aside in a cloud of dust, "An' tis true. In fact I hadnae heard the tale of Vicar Lawrence for fifteen years afore that little speech." He paused then glanced over at his young charge with a sly grin.
"Didja get any answers outta ol' Iosefka about Byrgenwyrth? Woulda figured none of that fancy storytellin' woulda surprised ye either, seein' how ye had the opportunity to ask away."
Ed, who up until then had been feeling pretty confident about his conduct, even if he was nervous about his next move, froze and winced in sudden realization.
"Damn." he growled, "No." He cursed himself, even though it would've been fair to say the blame was shared. BOTH Elrics had passed up the chance to interrogate a more compliant subject in favor of Anneil's promise of full access...and now here they were, stuck in the dark.
"She just said it was forbidden ground." Ed grumbled angrily, unable to keep the frustration out of his voice.
"Ah, well. Tis true. The Chuch has laws against treadin' in some places. No man who ain't a Tomb Prospector is allowed down in th' Chalice Dungeons fer example."
"You seem...I dunno, kind of calm about all these secrets." Ed countered, crossing his arms, "I would think someone who's lived here as long as you-"
"Lad, I toldje when we met: I'm a priest." Gascoigne replied, finally withdrawing from the depths of the chest with a long leather tube, obviously meant for a large map, "I was never much of one tae ask questions or make assumptions, because in my line of work, you're supposed to help the man in front of you and figure out the rest later." He shrugged, "Maybe that makes me stupid...or e'en a bit of a coward. But then I got a family to think about." He loped towards Edward, extending the tube so his young guest could grip the other end. "Asides, if I went around airin' my doubts and troubles, who'd believe me?"
For a moment, the two shared a gaze, and In that gaze, Ed gained a new understanding of the old priest. Because in man's gray-bearded, wrinkled face, he saw an honest man, who just wanted things to be simple and to look after his family. Echos of Lieutenant Colonel Hughes, with his smiling, cheery manner and constant fawning over his wife assaulted Edward's mind, telling him that while it was safe to trust this man, he was not someone who needed or wanted to be involved in the affairs the two Elrics were about to stir up. He nodded, gripping the map tube tightly.
"I understand." he said, then took the leather container and undid the top. Inside was a map, which going by the smell had probably been graphed out at the dawn of cartography as an actual occupation. Dust billowed up as Edward pulled the rolled parchment free, making him cough. After a moment of looking around, he found a space to spread it out on one of the workbenches. As he did, he cast another look around the place.
"Is it always this empty?" he inquired, "I would think given the scale of the problem-"
"Like I said lad, there's no many men who can be a Hunter these days." Gascoigne replied, moving among the various weapons and examining them one by one, "If I recall correct, twas different in the old days, when Vicar Lawrence was still alive. He knew the Old Hunters, the first o' them tae swear the oath, and Ludwig, who founded the Church Hunters as an order." The old priest shook his head, examining a massive stone block with a sword stuck in it. "Twas a different time. Only Eileen would remember any o' it now..."
The old man's explanation was abruptly cut short by the rattle of the Workshop's elevator as it began to descend. Edward felt the urge to panic rise, but he quickly pressed it down. There was nothing suspicious about what he was doing. He was looking at a map was all! What visitor wouldn't want to know more about Yharnam? Especially given the company they had to share, he thought morbidly.
There was a pause as the elevator reached its destination, before it abruptly started up again, signalling whoever was using it was in a hurry. As it turned out, that someone was Alfonse. The outline of the younger Elric rose up back-first, turning in place as he realized that the lift's exit door on the top floor was not the same as it was on the bottom.
"Ed!" he said, voice full of exhaustion (or feigned exhaustion at least, given he had no lungs) as he dashed into the room, "Ed! Anneil just told me they're sealing the bridge! They're closing it to everyone for the night, even Hunters!"
"What!?" barked Gascoigne, "That's absurd!!"
Caught off guard by the priest's outburst, both brothers whirled to face him.
"What, that's never happened!?" Edward demanded. Gascoigne shook his head vigorously, face a mask of outrage.
"Ne'er! Not in all my years! The bridge is supposed to remain open to all members o' the clergy and their guests at every hour, an' ESPECIALLY tae Hunters!"
"What did they say it was for?" Ed asked, looking back over his shoulder at the Cathedral Ward and the forest beyond.
"They say its for the safety of the Church and its members. There was a Beast attack in Central Yharnam." Alfonse explained, leaning forwards and panting as he rested his hands on his knees, clearly determined to do his best to give the impression that he'd run all the way here. Or maybe it was purely instinctual; Edward couldn't always tell, whatever the case, his brother's explanation only deepened his confusion.
"In Central Yharnam?!" he exclaimed, "but how-"
"The Oldtown Sewers." Gascoigne muttered grimly, striding towards the table where the map lay, jabbing his finger down at it. Leaning closer in the waning light, Ed saw that the map was indeed one of Yharnam and a fair chunk of the surrounding valley. Gascoigne's finger lay in the heart of the old city district, through which traced a myriad of dark lines that connected it with the rest of the town, though not the Cathedral Ward. Because he was wont to notice such things, even under pressure, Edward noticed that a fair chunk of the valley had been blotted out at some time in the distant past, leaving a large blank space that looked like water damage.
"They connect Central Yharnam and Old Yharnam?" Ed pressed, growing suspicious immediatley, "Why hasn't there been an attack before now then?"
"We killed a fair lot of the Beasts these past two nights..." Gascoigne mused sourly, "Mayhaps in pushin' em back, we forced 'em to seek new territory."
"Maybe..." Alfonse admitted, walking up to stand behind both men, "Or maybe not. EIther way we're stuck here."
"Tis a greater issue to me than you!" Gascoigne growled, "I'm th' one stuck here while my Viola and little girl are trapped down there near Advent Plaza!"
"This all seems...a little coincidental." Ed muttered, staring at the map. He was beginning to see now that the water damage was not limited to the far side of the valley. Large portions of the lake shore were blotted out. It was done in such a way that he was almost ready to believe that it was just the result of wear and tear, given how random it seemed to be...but then why had anyone not bothered to replace it?
"Yer tellin' me." snarled the old priest, spinning on his heel and marching past Alfonse, "I'm going tae find out who ordered this nonsense. If anythin' they should be callin' the White-Cloaks out to reinforce us, not lettin' 'em hide up here. Folks oughta be armin' themselves!"
"What about us?" Alfonse asked, "What should we do?"
"Do what ye like." snapped Gascoigne, stomping into the elevator and jerking the bell-pull. There was a rattle as he descended out of sight. And that, apparently, was that. The two Elrics looked at one another.
"Hope he stays okay." Al murmured, "He's the most helpful person we've met in this city. I'd hate for him to get into trouble..."
"Where's Anneil by the way?" Ed demanded, raising an eyebrow, "I thought we were supposed to be escorted everywhere?"
"She left right after one of the other white Hunters told her about the bridge. It was weird. He had this huge guy with him; bigger than Major Armstrong. Big hat too."
"Well nevermind that then." Ed replied dismissively, turning back to the map, "So long as she's not HERE; that's what matters." He pointed to the map along the coast of the lake. "Is it just me, or does that look deliberate?"
Alfonse bent over the map, looking over the subtle smudged areas his brother was indicating.
"Almost...but then why's that tower blotted out?" he asked, indicating one blur deep in the heart of Old Yharnam. Ed squinted, then looked up and around until he spotted a lantern. As it so happened, it was lying on another workbench and attached to a chain, which in turn was affixed to the end of a rod, making it look like some sort of flail. The fact that it had spikes on it didn't help.
"Grab me that will ya?" he asked, gesturing to it, it's getting dark. The younger Elric obeyed, quickly fetching the small metal and glass device, the rod clattering over the bricks as he brought it over. Edward quickly pried it open and was happy to find wax and wick already within. He lit it with a simple transmutation, causing a ghastly blue flame to appear within.
"Whoa." he murmured, "Did they dip the wick in something?"
"Why's it attached to this stuff?" Alfonse asked, then looked around the dimming chamber as if realizing what it held for the first time. "And who designed this stuff!?"
"I'll ask Gascoigne the next time I see him." Ed replied, holding up the lamp. He stared at the lines and numbers of the cartographer's art, struggling to put them into context with the location of the castle he'd seen, and the mansion beyond. His finger traced over the aged paper until it landed on a road running out of the Cathedral Ward.
"I'm pretty sure I saw Byrgenwyrth." he explained as he followed the path of the winding trail, which led deep into the black cross-hatching of the Forbidden Wood, which was still named as such even on the map itself. Funny how so much of the valley seemed to be forbidden ground...but then that would be just like the Church, who by now had well-established themselves in Edward's mind as 'people with something to hide'. "It was near a way-castle. Kind of like fort Rosco back in Amestris." he explained, "It looked big...but it also looked abandoned."
"You're sure?" Alfonse asked, before making a noise that seemed to indicate he realized the absurdity of that statment. Neither of them could be really sure of anything right now. Part of Ed's paranoid brain was suggesting that maybe the real reason the bridge had been closed was to keep the two of them here...but that would be absurd, and would also suggest that Anneil had power even he hadn't suspected.
"There." he said, planting his finger at the end of the road, which was labeled in flowery, flowing script as 'Hemwick Charnel Lane'. The path terminated in another large watermark, which seemed to waver in the strange light of the lamp. In the flickering shadows produced by the glass-ensconced candle, Ed swore he could make out the faintest sign that there had once been a tiny drawing of a castle at the center of the splotch. And beyond that...
"There." he repeated, thrusting his finger at a spot down and to the left of the way-castle. It was a particularly large smear, but again, the flickering light suggested that once, it had held the letters 'B', 'Y' and 'G' at least. Everything else had been obliterated.
"That's pretty far away..." Alfonse murmured, "and the books I read said the woods are considered pretty dangerous. They've got an animal problem."
"You don't mean-" Edward began, looking with shock at his brother.
"No, not that kind of animal. Not Beast with a capital 'B'." Al said quickly, "But it said there were snakes...big ones. Wild dogs too."
"Well I figure I'm quicker than your average scaly noodle." Edward grunted, stepping back and looking out across the landscape again. The sun had almost entirely sunk beyond the horizon now, and the stars were beginning to come out.
"But how would you get out there anyways?" Alfonse asked, using his own gauntleted finger to trace back to the beginning of Hemwick Charnel Lane, which ran right up against the Cathedral Ward, suggesting the only way to reach it was through a gate neither of them could locate, in a wall at least seven meters high. Ed frowned, reflecting that the geography of Yharnam was not on their side. It was like half the city was mounted on a table, which dropped steeply down to the lakeshore, making it impossible to assault from the valley floor, or escape without knowledge of the wild landscape itself.
Something about the word 'table' in that thought knocked loose a memory in Ed's brain. He chased after it before it could slip away...then grinned when he realized what it was.
"Don't worry." he said, grinning evilly at his brother, "I have a plan for that."
