by Rae Brooks
The boy had been less than well when they’d run into one another. And they had, actually, run into one another, as Kilik had not been at all aware of where he was going. Nevertheless, Calis had thought little of it. The boy worked in Dark District, and no doubt did quite a lot of intensive labor. That labor could wear on a person in the kind of heat Telandus was experiencing.
Regardless, while Calis had initially been a little concerned over the way Kilik stumbled and staggered through the market—that had been eclipsed upon seeing the vigilante again. The thought had formed in Calis’s mind before that sun that Kilik may well be the Phantom, but no ordinary person could have been staggering about one moment and then making a fool of armed noblemen the next.
No—Kilik was not the Phantom Blade. Unfortunately, in subsequent visits to Dark District, Calis had seen neither the vigilante or his former dance partner. They both seemed to be inconspicuously absent from life in Dark District. Calis could contribute the Blade’s absence to the lack of noble’s interference in the district, but he could not say the same for Kilik.
That was the source of his worry, and that worry had grown so much that it obscured nearly every thought he had. Even as his father lectured him on the importance of the court that he would be holding the following sun. “Boy, do not fantasize while I am talking to you. What has gotten into you? I understand that you may have done most of the talking in Dokak—but here, in my land, I do it. Do you understand?”
Calis was glad he wasn’t having to talk, actually, but he bowed graciously and offered a wary smile, regardless. “Apologies, Father,” he said. He didn’t bother offering an explanation, as it would no doubt have been ignored.
Lee would surely know something about Kilik if Calis asked, though Calis had been a little embarrassed about asking his advisor about a specific individual. Never before had he done that, and never before had he felt so involved in Dark District affairs. Still, a sickness as extreme as Kilik’s, accompanied with a sudden disappearance, warranted question enough.
Not that Lee questioned Calis’s motives, and the prince doubted that he would begin to do so now—but still, for some reason, being so interested in a simple commoner felt odd. Nevertheless, to deny he was interested would have been denying a very obvious fact. So, he decided as he watched his father talk—only watched, as he wasn’t sure what was being said—that he would ask Lee to find out about Kilik.
Once discussion about court had ended, with Calis only having a vague notion of what the next sun held for him, he bowed and headed back towards his room. Lee was across the hall, a luxury that had been granted to Calis after quite a bit of asking. Ordinarily, no one was allowed on the same hall as a member of the royal family.
Calis wrapped on his door quietly, hoping that Lee would be in. While they were close, Lee tended to wander off and be gone for suns at a time. To most nobles, this would have been insulting—but Calis found himself glad that Lee was able to find business of his own to attend. Another reason Calis enjoyed Lee’s company—he wasn’t mindless, and he didn’t follow Calis without reason. Nor did he follow Calis out of fear.
Fortunately, though, Lee came to the door almost instantly. A glimpse inside Lee’s room showed a very simplistic view. The stone floor was visible under the red rug in a few places, and the bed was large enough, with golden and red quilting. Lee’s desk was the most obvious feature of his room. The desk itself was mahogany, but what truly drew the eye were the countless papers and empty ink bottles littering his desk.
Calis had no idea what Lee spent so much time writing, but he certainly spent a lot of time doing so. Reading, too, as the other noticeable feature of Lee’s room were the bookcases that lined the right wall. “I want information from your sources,” Calis said directly. He entered Lee’s room without invitation, and his advisor closed the door once he did.
Lee spoke without further prompting. “Kilik, which yes, that is his name, has been ill for the past two cycles. He’s had a fever. As I said, my informant, Katt, is apprenticed to the woman he lives with—the healer. They have been tending to him, as he fell ill the sun you saw him in the district.”
So, perhaps he didn’t give Lee enough credit some of the time. Not that Calis had done a good job of disguising who he was interested in at the dance. Lee had obviously known, and Calis flushed because he expected Lee hadn’t. “Is he alright?” Calis asked warily.
The advisor seemed just a little amused at Calis’s blush. “I believe so. They don’t know what caused it, but he does seem to be recovering,” Lee answered. “I was wondering when you’d swallow enough pride to ask me.”
“You are an ass, my friend.” There was no denial from Lee, so Calis walked over to the single window in the room. Lee’s window had the same view that Calis’s did, so that he could see to the wall of Dark District from it. “Anything on the Phantom Blade?”
Lee shook his head. “That seems to be the one thing that none of my sources know anything about. He has had no need to appear recently, though, what with all the brouhaha going around in the Shining District. Are you prepared for court tomorrow?”
“Please,” Calis said, “I just spent too many shifts of the sun with my father talking about it.”
Another smirk took hold of Lee’s features as he glanced out to the wall at which Calis was staring so intently. “And you used none of those shifts to listen to him, I’d wager,” Lee said.
That was not anything Calis could deny, and so he simply laughed. Not that court was anything that required preparation. He would meet and speak with many different women, all of which bored him immensely. “I do not want to get married,” he said.
The green eyes of his advisor watched him without comment for a few moments. The statement wasn’t one that Calis had ever proclaimed aloud before, though with Lee’s keen observational skills, he had most certainly deduced it. “I don’t blame you,” Lee finally said, “just another burden, and nearly nothing gained. No marriage would change our state of affairs.” Lee was no doubt speaking about how much all the nobles hated Lavus, though speaking that directly would have been like driving a knife into his own chest.
Outside, Calis could see a few nobles walking the wide stone paths. The women hung off of the men’s arms like some sort of ornament, with foolish smiles on all of their faces. They carried umbrellas and wore lacy white dresses, entirely impractical. They were property. So, to Calis, the marriage should have been like acquiring a new steed—but he didn’t feel that way. “I just don’t understand why the rich insist on it. Why marry when none of us consider the people we marry more than a means to an end? Find another means.”
“They don’t even pretend to love one another anymore. The women are content to be shooed off into some corner to gossip while the men deal with everything. The concept is a little unsettling, but not anything you can change.” Lee’s words were direct, and they didn’t leave any room for hope. His advisor was telling him to accept that he had to get married, and Calis had been trying to do so for some time.
Glitter from the buildings made of gold and strange red tapestries reflected into his eyes and made him squint. He had a sudden longing for Dark District. “Do you know what it feels like? Being in love? Do you think the poor do?”
Lee stared at him for a moment. This seemed to catch even Calis’s advisor off guard. They had never discussed many emotions before, not like this. Love was like a fairy tale, and Calis knew that as well as he knew that Lee didn’t care for fairy tales. “I certainly don’t,” Lee said, but he left the second question unanswered.
Calis thought back to that dance. The Soul-Finder dance that had landed him staring into Kilik’s incredibly blue eyes. That kind of game was one nobles would scoff at—letting chance handle that matter would have been foolish, and emotions should stay even further away from it than chance. “You think I ought to just pick one, then?” Calis asked his advisor.
This seemed like an issue from which Lee now wanted to stray. “Why are y
ou asking about love?” he asked. “That doesn’t seem like you.”
“I was curious about it. The dance in Dark District, some of the people seemed like they might actually care about each other. Like those girls? They seemed like they weren’t just talking to impress us.”
Lee laughed. Calis wasn’t sure why, though he found he wasn’t uneasy at hearing it. Lee didn’t laugh often, and he certainly never laughed to mock another person. The laugh was genuine, but Calis didn’t understand it. “If that was what you were looking for, you should have done more in your excursions to Dark District than look around. I mean before the dance.”
Calis couldn’t have said why he had always avoided talking to the commoners, maybe because he’d felt as though they were beneath him. Now that he had spoken to them, he wondered why he’d ever thought that at all. Those girls had been no different than he was, and much more in tune with his thoughts than the nobles. And Kilik…
With the thought of Kilik came a frustration that Calis hadn’t expected. He had been a fool for ignoring how bad off Kilik had been. He should have offered to help Kilik home, and he had intended to. But the boy had cut him off before he could say anything, and he was too prideful to press it.
Surely, the gesture would have been awkward, though. Kilik didn’t want help, clearly, from the way he was shoving anyone who offered to help away from him. There had been more on his mind than how ill he felt—and Calis had no way of knowing what that was.
“Did you enjoy it?” Calis asked suddenly, remembering Lee’s presence.
The green eyes blinked, as Lee seemed to have been lost in his own thoughts as well. Then, the other man let a strange smile appear on his lips. “I’ve always preferred socializing with those from Dark District. They certainly are much less annoying than you,” Lee said.
Calis smiled at the joke, enjoying it for what it was. He was lucky in this regard, he supposed. No one else had the luxury of joking with their advisor. On the contrary, Lavus’s advisor looked as though he may be about to soil his trousers at any moment. Tareth’s simply seemed to think the younger Tsrali was an insult to humanity.
“Indeed,” Calis said. “Perhaps I could change out my advisor for a particular commoner.”
“Perhaps if you catch him while he is still delirious with fever, Kilik will agree to do so.”
The idea struck him like a brick hitting the back of his head. There was a pain in his leg from an injury from a sparring session with Lee a few suns ago. What better way to solve that than to go speak with a healer? A smile took hold of his features. “Oh, dear,” Lee said mournfully, “I’ve given you an idea.”
The time that Calis spent unwrapping his ankle and throwing dirt in it clearly pained Lee. He kept looking away and informing Calis of all the bad he was doing to his injury. When Calis was confident the injury looked bad enough to merit healing, he started towards Dark District wall. He had already changed, so he’d had to take extra precautions not to be seen. If any noble saw him in brown hunting clothes—well, he’d never hear the end of it.
Fortunately, he knew the walk to Dark District well, and he found himself on the other side of the wall without any sort of trouble. Lee accompanied him, and though he looked a little disdainful of this idea, he followed in mostly silence. “Shall I take you to the healer?”
“That would be lovely!” Calis said, once Lee had broken the silence he’d been trying to use to get Calis to give up this fool’s errand.
While he knew that he was being a little discourteous, and had already told himself that if anyone there was in need of serious healing, he would excuse himself—Calis was pleased with this idea. Surely, he would have the opportunity to see Kilik if he was sick—and lived with the healer. Calis made sure to walk with a limp, as gossip spread quickly in Dark District. “Won’t Katt recognize you?” Calis asked softly as they walked.
Lee smiled. “No. I wear a hood and mask when I correspond with anyone in Dark District.”
“Oh,” Calis said. That would make sense, as Lee wasn’t known for being foolish, and showing his face too often in Dark District would be just that. “So, for all you know, she thinks you are the Phantom Blade.”
“The mask is quite different, I assure you,” Lee said. “But I’m not entirely sure that she doesn’t think that.”
The market was bustling with people as usual, and most of them seemed to be in high spirits. The trades seemed to be going on without much fighting, and everyone seemed to be getting what they needed. There was an air of freedom within Dark District that Calis could never obtain in the Shining District. As they headed down several of the alleyways, Calis found the buildings that the dance had been held in.
During the sun, they were isolated. The buildings were falling apart and not a single soul was near them. They weren’t used for anything, it would appear, except holding the very rare festivals that they had in Dark District. The buildings were rarities, though, as nearly all of the dirty shack-like structures were in use to some merchant or commoner.
Homes were the most common, and easy to spot, as most had children playing in front of them, and lines of drying clothes hanging out in front of them.
The stores, on the other hand, had objects outside of them. The items sat in stalls, or some of them simply sat on the ground. Calis marveled at how easy stealing some of these items would have been. The nobles would never sell in such an open way.
After a few more houses, they stood in front of one of the larger ones. Like a few of the others, there were potted plants out front, as well as a young child, who was running back and forth. Clearly, he was involved in some game that Calis was sure should not be interrupted. Once they got closer to the door, the boy tossed them a casual glance and then went back to ignoring them.
The etiquette here was much different from noble customs, as the noise in Dark District often kept residents from hearing knocks. They were supposed to enter, unless a mark of berry juice was across the door. As there was no such thing on this door, Lee opened it without hesitation. Calis couldn’t help feeling a little intrusive, though.
The inside of the house was the same as the out. There was no floor, though the dirt had been padded down and there were a few straw rugs over important areas. There was a round table in the center of the room and a basin of water against one of the far walls. There were a few scattered objects, most of which Calis didn’t know the use, and on the single shelf in the room were herbs and berries that Calis didn’t recognize.
“Excuse me?” Lee asked the emptiness.
The room gave the impression of being outside, though it was certainly inside. Light from holes in the wall, passing for windows, kept the place well lit. There was another section of the house that Calis couldn’t see and another on the opposite side. Both were hidden by brown cloth—giving the illusion that there was more than one room.
After another moment, a red-haired girl appeared from one of the sections. She had a few freckles across the bridge of her nose, and her face lit into a smile when she saw them. “Oh, it’s you,” she said. Calis was a little alarmed, as Lee had said no one would recognize him.
However, Lee wasn’t bothered. “Indeed. Are you the healer?” he asked. So clearly the girl didn’t think Lee was who he actually was—but Calis was very curious as to who she thought he was.
Katt giggled and then shook her head. Her giggle was almost flirtatious. Lee didn’t react as though he noticed this, though. The advisor just kept a pleasant smile on his face for the duration. “No, I’m not. I’m her apprentice, Katt Manali.” She curtsied to complete her greeting. “Did you need healing?”
So this was Katt, and she recognized Lee, though she did not recognize him as the person with whom she traded information. When Calis met the eyes of his advisor, Lee just raised his eyebrows at the question in Calis’s eyes. “Ah, yes. My friend’s leg got caught in a rope, and he fell down a few stairs.” Calis gestured to his leg accordingly. “And he hit his head, so you might want to
check that, as well.”
Oh, if only they weren’t under the illusion that Calis had actually hurt himself—Calis would have enjoyed knocking Lee upside his head. Katt observed the wound for a moment and then nodded her head in understanding. “Very well,” she said. “I’ll go get Miss Amaral.”
“Obliged,” Lee said as Katt disappeared.
At Calis’s second curious glance, Lee spoke. “You weren’t the only one who ran into someone during the Soul-Finder dance,” he answered in a hushed voice. Calis’s eyes widened. How surprised Lee must have been when his “soul mate” was the very girl with whom he traded information. Actually, Lee probably rather enjoyed that.
A few moments later, a woman who looked more like a healer than Katt appeared. She had a calm expression and warm, hazel eyes. She was very pretty, with blond hair tied behind her head. A brown dress covered her body, and a small apron completed her look. She seemed pleased to see them, though Calis was sure she saw whining citizens all the time. “Hello, gentlemen,” she said courteously. Then, her eyes drifted down to Calis’s reopened wound. “Ah, I can patch that up for you. It won’t take long.”
She gestured for him to follow her into one of the hidden rooms. When she opened it, he realized this must be where she did her healing. The floor was fully covered in mismatched rugs and there was a table, large enough for someone to lay on. There was also a sickbed made of straw, currently vacated. If there had been herbs in the other room, the shelves in this room were covered in them. There were urns filled with liquids, and leaves of various shapes and colors sat in piles.
The woman gestured for him to take a seat on the table. After he did so, she knelt before him, rolled up his pant leg, and then pinned it with a wooden pin. Calis blinked. He had never seen any sort of contraption like this.
Her first step was to wet one of the rags within her reach. As she dipped the rag into an urn of water, Calis saw the leaf in the bottom of the urn. He found himself curious, if only because there was such a difference in the way he was usually treated. “You must see a great deal of people,” Calis said.