Volume 2: Burglary

by R. A. Consell

  “I’d rather not,” Kuro mumbled, averting his gaze. “I don’t really like it here. Can I go?”

  “Go?” Dubois threw up his hands at the suggestion. “Do you have any idea of the trouble you’re in?”

  “Not really, no.” It was an honest answer. He didn’t think he’d done anything illegal. If not allowing someone to murder him was a crime, he felt he should just give up any hope of escaping a life in prison.

  “Fighting in the streets, destroying private property, unsanctioned trips to the Blandlands!” Dubois pointed an accusing finger at Kuro.

  “Which of those is illegal?” Kuro asked.

  “All of them!”

  That came as a shock to Kuro. Destroying property made sense, though he didn’t remember damaging anything himself. But he’d seen fights outside pubs many times without anyone getting hauled in by the Guard, and he’d been to and from the Blandlands almost daily for half of his life. He didn’t want to think about the prison sentence he’d earn if that was against the law.

  “All I did was run away,” defended Kuro. “Why am I in trouble?”

  “Oh, you are not the only one.” A knock at his door interrupted. “That will be our other troublemaker now, I expect. Come in!”

  A young Hound with a border collie at his heels opened the door and ushered Azalea inside before leaving again. Azalea strode into the office imperiously, glancing disdainfully at Dubois.

  “Has the lady recovered?” asked the Hound with a slight bow.

  “Quite” was all Azalea replied. She was no longer coughing, and her clothes had been cleaned and mended, while Kuro still sat soaked in sludge, with melon shrapnel in his hair.

  “Would the lady kindly take a seat,” Dubois continued, his posture and attitude entirely different toward Azalea than they had been moments before to Kuro. “I have some questions about the events of today.”

  Azalea did her best to maintain an air of confidence as she climbed into the second chair across the desk from the Hound, but Kuro could see it was a front. She shrunk away from the prowling wolf and had trouble meeting Dubois’s accusing eyes.

  “The first and least of my questions,” Dubois said, “is what exactly were you doing?” He leaned back in his chair and pressed his fingertips together thoughtfully, as though he’d just made a move on a chess board and was waiting for his opponent’s response.

  “I was engaged in a duel, and you had no right to interrupt,” Azalea replied.

  “On what grounds was the challenge offered?” asked Dubois as though Azalea’s claims were entirely reasonable, and he just needed to fill out a form with the details.

  “For the honour of my family,” said Azalea. “Kuro Hearn, a child of our ancestral foe, has assaulted my sister twice and demeaned her on several occasions without redress.”

  Kuro didn’t fully understand what Azalea had said, but something seemed off about it. Dubois caught it as well, though it looked like he’d expected it. He feigned a small amount of surprise. “Our records don’t show Kuro having any known parents. Does the Lady have information she would be able to share with the Royal Guard on this matter?”

  “He’s Phineas Hearn’s son.” Azalea pointed an accusing finger at Kuro. “One of Claudius Roche’s men. They killed my parents.”

  “I fear the Lady may have been misinformed,” said Dubois. “Kuro was Hearn’s servant, not his son. And an unwilling one at that.”

  Azalea looked at Kuro, face still full of anger but showing the first moment of doubt he’d ever seen in her. “He still attacked my sister.”

  “It’s news to me that Dame Lamorak is not in a condition to defend herself. Is Belladonna unwell?”

  Azalea crossed her arms and sank into her chair.

  Dubois leaned forward in his. It seemed to Kuro that he had planned this whole conversation and was manipulating it to an end of his choosing, though Kuro couldn’t yet see his goal. “To an untrained observer, one might think that you challenged a commoner to a duel under the pretence of defending the honour of someone more than able to defend it herself, when your actual cause was something more akin to a blood feud.” He looked down at Azalea as a judge about to hand down a death sentence. “Blood feuds of that kind are quite illegal. They’re the sort of thing that can strip you of your title and even get you exiled.”

  Azalea was beginning to look very tense. Her initial confident posture had entirely dissolved, and she looked like she wanted to escape the Hound’s office even more than Kuro did. She could say nothing in response.

  Dubois smiled. It was a wolfish grin, the smile of a predator that has caught its prey and knows it. “However, a more charitable witness to the events might see it differently. It would be unseemly for Belladonna to challenge someone so much younger than her to a duel of honour, would it not? It would be unbearable to a family of knights to carry the stain of those insults, but she could not possibly claim honour in challenging Kuro herself, could she? So, the duty must fall to you.”

  Azalea straightened and looked back at the Hound in confusion.

  Kuro wasn’t confused, or even surprised. Dubois had done the same thing to him the year prior. He’d known everything he’d needed to before the conversation had even started. He walked her into a trap, snapped it shut, and was now offering her a narrow avenue of escape. What Kuro didn’t know was why he was still in the room. He didn’t imagine that Dubois would have kept him present without a reason. Dubois did not keep him wondering long.

  “It would also save a lot of trouble if the chaos you caused was done in the course of a legitimate duel. Any damages would just have to be paid for by whoever caused them, rather than being criminal offences. Also, the exit to the Blandlands might be considered a clever strategy in a duel instead of a legal issue.” Dubois now shifted his attention entirely to Kuro. “You did accept the duel, didn’t you?”

  Kuro sat caught in Dubois’s accusing stare, uncertain what the Hound wanted from him. Was he meant to lie to protect both himself and Azalea, or was this a trap, and the lie would just add to his lengthy list of crimes? He was caught in Dubois’s chess game but couldn’t see the board. He looked from Dubois to Azalea and back, hoping for some sign of the correct path. Neither the truth nor a lie was a good choice, so he did neither. “I didn’t know if I was allowed to refuse” was all he said.

  The corner of Dubois’s mouth turned up, betraying a hint of pleasure at Kuro’s response.

  Azalea was less restrained in her reaction and let out an audible sigh of relief. The gasping breath that followed implied that she’d been holding it for some time.

  Dubois scribbled some notes, which he punctuated with a satisfied flourish. “I’m glad that’s resolved; much less paperwork this way.” He smiled briefly before returning to his interrogations. “My next and rather more serious question: Azalea, where did you learn that kind of magic? Or magic of any kind, for that matter. You’re not school age yet.”

  “Nowhere,” replied Azalea, her momentary relief snatched from her.

  “Really?” Dubois looked a little bit eager to hear whatever Azalea could say that might explain her remarkable abilities.

  That explanation was not forthcoming, however. She squirmed under Dubois’s gaze and tried to hide behind her own hair.

  The lengthy, uncomfortable silence gave Kuro a chance to reflect on Azalea’s magic. She had hurled lightning and fire around pretty well. She was much better than Kuro, and she hadn’t even been to school. He was annoyed at her for that. He’d spent a whole year trying and failing to master basic evocation, and she was doing it easily even while running. How could she have learned it if not taught? Bella was probably teaching her in secret. The magic was just like what Bella had taught him before those lessons had been stopped—lessons that Azalea had attended without fail.

  “It was me,” Kuro said aloud, surprising everyone, including himself.

  “Sorry, what?” said Dubois. Kuro had a moment of sa
tisfaction at derailing Dubois’s carefully constructed conversation.

  “She learned the magic from me,” Kuro tried to clarify, but Dubois interrupted with disbelief.

  “Not to insult you, Kuro, but your talent with evocations is . . . still developing. You can’t expect me to believe you trained someone to be better than you.”

  “That’s not what I mean,” Kuro interrupted the Hound right back. “She’s been at all my lessons, every day, all summer, watching me. It was kind of creepy.”

  Dubois tapped his fingers together as he inspected Azalea’s reactions. “Even if I were to believe you, it doesn’t explain how she can throw a bolt of lightning clear across Bytown market square. Did someone teach you how to do that?”

  Kuro nodded.

  Dubois’s surprise quickly transformed into an unpleasant understanding. He buried his face in his palm. “Belladonna,” he growled to nobody in particular. He recomposed himself and fixed Azalea with a deadly serious gaze. So as not to be left out of the threat, his wolf did the same to Kuro. “That is not the sort of magic that should be taught to children. By all rights, Belladonna shouldn’t even know how to do it yet. That’s combat magic meant for soldiers and knights.”

  “I am a knight,” snarled Azalea, slamming her hands down on Dubois’s desk.

  “Not yet,” he replied coldly, unfazed by the outburst of the child across from him. “Your sister, despite her best efforts, has neither died nor been stripped of her title. You are merely a squire. Regardless, nobody should be getting combat training until after they graduate, and you haven’t even started school. Have some patience.”

  That suggestion enraged Azalea. “Do you expect me to wait until I finish high school to avenge my parents?”

  Dubois’s aggressive posture softened a calculated amount, no longer threatening but still commanding. “Lady Lamorak, Azalea, the war is over. It was over a decade ago. Nearly everyone involved in the Coup d’Été is jailed or dead themselves. You’re chasing ghosts in the name of vengeance. Do you really think your parents would want you hunting down the children of their enemies?”

  “I should be ready to defend the throne!” Azalea retorted.

  “The Sun Throne is empty,” replied Dubois gently, pretending at a sympathetic tone. “The entire royal family was killed in the Coup d’Été.”

  “All but one,” argued Azalea.

  “The heir to the throne is unaccounted for, yes, but being missing doesn’t mean they’re alive. It’s been thirteen years. There’s nothing left to avenge, and nobody left to defend. The surviving Tirnanog nobility have their own knights and guards, and they like it that way. They’re looking for excuses to strip you and your sister of your titles. The old Knights of the Sun are an inconvenience to them. Don’t betray your parents’ memory by losing your title to petty squabbles.”

  Azalea slumped in defeat. Dubois had won, but his victory over the young girl was not yet complete.

  “There is one more small matter, before I let you go,” said the Hound, trying to hide the pleasure in his victory from his voice. “Who is the victor of the duel?”

  Given that Kuro hadn’t even fought back, it wasn’t really a question. He pointed at Azalea, happy that the whole business was done with.

  Dubois screwed up his face in annoyance. “It would be convenient if the two of you could agree.”

  Confused, Kuro looked to Azalea to find her finger in his face. “Why are you pointing at me?” he asked. “I didn’t win. I never even cast a spell.”

  “You still beat me,” she replied glumly. “I was incapacitated. That means you won.”

  “That wasn’t anything I did,” Kuro argued. “You can be the winner. It’s fine.”

  “Don’t insult me.” Azalea was starting to get angry. “I don’t need your charity. Take your victory.”

  Kuro didn’t care about victory; he cared about not getting into more duels. “Which one will make you not try to fight me again?”

  Azalea was getting impatient with him. “I yield to you, Kuro Hearn. The affront to my family’s honour has been settled.”

  She was so forceful that Kuro couldn’t bring himself to argue. He cowered in his chair and just said, “Okay.”

  Dubois appeared quite pleased with the end of the whole affair. Garmr’s tail was even wagging. “I’m glad that’s settled.” He made some notes and then added, more to himself than to the children, “He’s not a Hearn, though. We should probably get him a real last name soon. Hate to have this sort of thing happening again.”

  Dubois returned Kuro and Azalea to the market himself, which earned a lot of attention from the market goers. Talen Dubois, knight commander of the Hounds, was famous, and the recent duel was clearly the talk of the town. People were pointing and whispering as they passed. In a place where Kuro had spent years trying his hardest to be invisible, it was deeply uncomfortable having the eyes of the whole market on him. If it weren’t for Garmr loping at his side, he probably would have bolted.

  Trapped as he was, however, the unpleasant situation presented an opportunity. Kuro gathered the courage to ask a question that had been eating away at him all summer, which he had no way to answer without the Hound’s help. “How is Ms. Crawley?” he asked.

  His favourite teacher had fought to rescue Kuro from Phineas Hearn, and in doing so, she had exposed her former association with the man. That had gotten her arrested, and Kuro couldn’t help but feel responsible for that.

  “Bored,” replied Dubois. “Otherwise, fine. She’s still under house arrest awaiting a formal trial. She’d probably enjoy letters from you if you sent them. I could give you the address.”

  Kuro was suspicious of how openly helpful the Hound was being. “Are you reading her mail?” he asked.

  Dubois shrugged. “Would you write anything that shouldn’t be seen by the Guard?” he replied.

  They were a few minutes early to the meeting spot under the clock, but that didn’t prevent Miss Brigid from being angry beyond words. Her face flushed, and she puffed her cheeks as she tried to contain her fury while Dubois assured her that “everything was taken care of” and “there would be no further trouble.” If anything, that made her angrier. His pleasantries and platitudes took the teeth out of the fiery tirade she had prepared.

  Kuro didn’t know what Dubois was trying to do by placating the matron. He had a hard time believing that Dubois would do it all just to avoid the paperwork of arresting them. The Hound had a lot of faults, but laziness wasn’t one of them. He wondered if it was related to Azalea. Maybe he was protecting her for some reason. Perhaps because she was from an old noble family, or maybe to trap her in the same way he had trapped Kuro. Dubois had an encyclopedia of Kuro’s crimes and could jail him at any time if he wished. Now he had similar leverage over Azalea and probably Bella as well. Dubois was building a collection of people who couldn’t say no to him.

  Four

  Trials Beyond Measure

  The final week before school was thankfully very busy. Kuro’s chores at the orphanage had been doubled, and new ones had been invented as punishment for the duel. It was a gross injustice that he was disciplined for being attacked, but Kuro was getting used to it. Besides, the extra work helped him keep his mind off his lack of mail and his upcoming ordeals.

  Kuro had to endure two more trials before he would be free of the walls of the orphanage: his evocations test and a haircut.

  He wasn’t certain which he dreaded more. The test would be excruciating: hours of written exams followed by practical demonstration of his abilities. The outcome of that was all but certain. He wasn’t consistent with any of the skills and hadn’t once successfully moved anything via telekinesis. He couldn’t imagine them passing him into the next grade without his being able to do one of the first things students learned. It would be an afternoon of desperate struggle toward an inevitable failure.

  The haircut was a whole different kind of anxiety. He’d never ha
d anyone else cut his hair. The idea of sitting entirely still while someone played with blades around his head and neck was terrifying. Given the choice, he’d rather duel Azalea again.

  When the fateful day came, Kuro was as mentally prepared as he could be. That is, he had barely slept or eaten. What sleep he did get was full of nightmares, and the food he had managed to get down wasn’t keen to stay there.

  The hairdresser came to the orphanage bright and early, and Kuro had been nominated to go first, since he “had such a big day ahead with his tests.”

  The hairdresser was tall and lean, dressed all in tightly tailored black clothes. His hair was fiery orange on one side and blue on the other. The effect was that of an explosion colliding with a waterfall. It was clearly intentional, though Kuro couldn’t imagine why anyone would do such a thing on purpose, particularly if they were to be trusted with the hair of other people. Perhaps it was meant to distract from the arsenal of polished steel loaded into his apron.

  He set up a chair under a fruit tree in the yard to do his work, maybe to offer a serene setting for the ordeal, maybe to make it easier to clean up the hair, maybe to make it easier to clean up the blood.

  At the urging of the orphans, Kuro mounted the chair. He was instantly enveloped in a sheet, which tied itself roughly around his neck, binding him to the chair. The hairdresser then started running his fingers through Kuro’s hair. He made sounds of disapproval as he shifted the uneven mop from side to side. “The tousled look is fine, I suppose, but if I didn’t know better, I would think your last haircut was done with a dull knife.”

  Clearly, he did not know better as that is exactly how Kuro had previously cut his hair.

  With a single gesture and no warning, the hairdresser sent an orb of hot soapy water to engulf Kuro’s head. It vigorously scrubbed as the hairdresser pressed him with questions for which he had no answer. “Do you like the length as it is? How do you feel about bangs? Where do you like the part? Shall we keep it bohemian or go for something more subdued, or more daring?”