Gosick Episode 07

Synopsis
As the gates close behind them, Victorique, Kazuya and their companions are given a short tour around the town. According to the elderly man who welcomed them, the village has deliberately closed off itself from the outside world for 400 years, and has learned to sustain themselves to survive. He also tells them of the Summer Solstice Festival to be held at the town, where they will allegedly receive the blessings of their ancestors.

Alan, Raoul and Derek appear to act like tourists enjoying the view outside, deeming them suspicious looks from the inhabitants, and this incited the elderly leader of the village to fire shots in the air. The three men are startled by the gunshots, and they demand an explanation, although they did not accept "wolves live on the nearby mountains" as a viable reason. In fact, one of the three men points out that its the people themselves who are the wolves, which alarmed the village leader; he mutters that they are humans, although they are much higher than the humans at the foot of the mountains.

Victorique's appearance continues to shock the inhabitants of the Village of the Gray Wolves. As they head over to the elder's estate to stay, one of the attendants, named Harminia, expresses her anguish at the sight of Victorique's face, who reminded her too much of Cordelia, before being ordered to leave.

Soon, they are invited for lunch, where the village leader explains what happened.

A certain Elder Theodore's study becomes the setting of the incident. At midnight, the maid (probably Harminia) was inside the study, where she customarily replaces the water in the jug located in the room. Meanwhile, at precisely 12 at midnight, a 15-year-old Cordelia entered the room; she was seen by several people, including the village leader.

Then, Cordelia is then seen screaming and running out of the room.

The village leader is alarmed by Cordelia's actions and panicked to get inside the study, only to see Elder Theodore stabbed with a dagger through the chest. According to the village leader, there were several gold pieces lying around Elder Theodore's corpse; the current elder knows that he collects gold coins because they are unusable in their town.

For the next few days, Cordelia was bedridden with high fever, and after her recovery, the current elder succeeded and ordered Cordelia was banished from the village, given only one gold coin and one trunk.

Despite Cordelia's incapability to live outside the gates of the village, she is befallen said punishment, which the elder deemed appropriate to avoid suffering from misfortunes.

Victorique leaves the mansion "to take a walk", and Kazuya follows. They are soon accompanied by Ambrose, the elder's assistant. He is certainly fond of Kazuya, who possesses a different eye and hair color, and is willing to follow Victorique as long as he is able to sate his curiosity for someone like Kazuya.

However, Victorique demands him to take her to her mother's house, much to Ambrose's shock. Nonetheless, he shows the way, but flees right after.

They head inside the shambled house to look around, and Victorique finds out a plank of wood that stands out; she and Kazuya help to pry the plank out, and beneath the floor, they discover a box with a photograph inside.

It is the picture of an infant Victorique and her mother Cordelia.

Victorique knows that such a picture does not fit, since Cordelia is banished a long time before Victorique was born; she assumes that someone replaced the contents of the box with the photograph.

For the first time, Victorique feels baffled on a mystery.

Kazuya and Victorique soon visit the cemetery, where they look for Elder Theodore's tombstone. Victorique soon digs upon the ground where the tombstone lies, much to Kazuya's shock, and they soon notice a message chiseled out from the stone: "Je ne suis pas coupable... C"

Victorique falls into tears when she realizes that it was her mother Cordelia who wrote the message. Meanwhile, Kazuya notices the fog stir up around him, along with the sounds of giggling and laughing. Kazuya feels uneasy with the atmosphere, so he takes Victorique with him. In fact, the eyes that were pursuing him as he and Victorique run to safety possess the same color as Victorique's eyes...

The two manage to escape into the elder's quarters, where they stumble upon the three men from earlier. A surprising sight is Mildred out of her nun's habit and into a yellow dress. The men speak about a telephone, causing Victorique to realize that there is electricity in the area. Mildred soon explains that the electricity is funded by a certain Brian Roscoe, who is a son of someone who left the village ten years ago.

That night, as Kazuya tries to organize Victorique's wardrobe, Victorique wonders about Brian Roscoe's involvement with the village. She knows that the Great War began at that year, and she thinks that there are more important things than setting up electricity deep in the mountains. Also, she judges that the picture they discover at her mother's old home coincides with that period.

Her thoughts are then interrupted by Herminia, who arrives to deliver hot water to use for the bath.

As Victorique sings her lungs out to the joy of having a bath, Kazuya stands guard outside. He feels relieved to see Victorique back to her old self, and decides to take a breather. As he goes to drink from a glass, he sees something peculiar floating on the water, followed by lights turning off.

Kazuya feels nervous for Victorique's safety and calls for her name; Victorique is safe, now dressed into her bedtime attire. She saw the peculiar object floating on Kazuya's glass - an eyeball - and concludes that someone is out to scare them into leaving the village. Kazuya suggests leaving the village nonetheless, but Victorique rejects the idea, pointing out her trust in Kazuya.

The next day, the day-long Summer Solstice Festival begins with a parade. Kazuya and Victorique are accompanied by Ambrose, who explain that there will be a re-enactment of a dramatic battle to happen later. Soon, a commotion emerges from the crowd, where Herminia argues against Kazuya and Victorique's companions; fortunately, Derek and Raoul manage to clear out the mess before it worsens. Soon, Mildred appears and tells the two that they have been causing mess last night as well, desecrating a church while intoxicated.

With the commotion averted, the festival continues, with a few ladies throwing hard nuts in the air. Kazuya covers Victorique, who has just received festival sweets from him, and receives showers of nuts. They also saw Alan running away from the incoming showers of nuts.

Later on, the ceremonial battle between the forces of Summer and Winter begins. Ambrose is also part of the act, which consisted of dances and a symbolic burning of the Winter Man, representing the end of Winter. As three fully-decorated carts with a paper-mache man each is burned at the end of the presentation, Ambrose notices something: one of the paper-mache figures appears to be moving in the middle of the blaze. Ambrose goes to rescue whoever is inside the figure, but it is too late.

As they check up on the corpse, they find out that it is Alan burnt in the place of one of the figures.

Despite what happened, Sergius remains adamant. He simply does not have the time to grieve over someone dying in the middle of the accident. As Derek and Raoul weep over their charred companion, the festival continues.

Kazuya and Victorique watch the festival unfold on the town square; however, Kazuya cannot help but feel bad to the villagers for disregarding someone's death over a festival.

Then, all of a sudden, he finds himself without Victorique beside him.

With Victorique's remark of trust to him the night before on his mind, he looks for Victorique until the afternoon, where he stumbles upon the local church. Upon entering, he sees Ambrose and he is asked to join the fortune-telling by Elder Sergius himself, which is part of the festival. Before he could respond, Ambrose takes him to Sergius.

Upon entering, Sergius answers Kazuya's questions. The elder assures him that Victorique is safe. Then, as the elder enters a trance-like state, he speaks of the future for him and Victorique. According to Sergius, "A gale that will shake the world will force them apart; they will not die together, but their hearts will never part."

Outside the church, Victorique emerges from the entrance, much to Kazuya's shock. She tries out the fortune-telling, and finds out that she will not be able to get taller; this disappoints Kazuya, who has been worried about her since she suddenly left. Soon, she tells Kazuya where she has been all afternoon: Elder Theodore's study.

On Victorique's visit to the study, Herminia recollects on how she witnessed Theodore's death. According to her, Theodore is stabbed from the back using a dagger whose design was remembered in detail by Herminia herself. She also pointed out that the difference of heights of Cordelia and Theodore are too noticeable. This causes Victorique to believe that Cordelia could not have committed the crime, since the height difference would make it impossible for her to stab Theodore at the same spot. Soon, Herminia flees the study, and as black crows fly outside, the clock strikes 3 in the afternoon.

At that moment, Victorique has just reconstructed the fragments of chaos. However, she wants to make sure that her conclusion is proven.

Soon, howls of wolves disturb the celebration. Ambrose and Sergius leave the church when they hear the wolves cry and, with Sergius armed with a shotgun, they prepare to face off with the wolves. Victorique, on the other hand, decides to follow the two with Kazuya.

At the outskirts of town, Sergius readies his gun as Ambrose looks around. Meanwhile, Kazuya notices that he can no longer hear the sound of the howling wolves. Sergius then spots something within the bushes and opens fire, with Victorique's advise to not shoot coming too late. Victorique mutters that it was another human killed, and this time, as they check up on the corpse, it is Derek, lying on the ground with several wounds on his body.

Characters
(In order of appearance)
 * Kazuya Kujō
 * Victorique de Blois
 * Alan
 * Derek Banks
 * Raoul
 * Mildred Arbogast

New Characters

 * Elder Sergius
 * Ambrose
 * Harminia
 * Elder Theodore

Quotes

 * (by Victorique) "Where is this Chaos heading?"
 * (by Kazuya) "My mind boggles at how many strings and frills are on this thing." - commenting on Victorique's outfits
 * (by Victorique) "You'll protect me, won't you?"
 * (by Mildred) "The logic of drunkards escapes me."