I was eighteen when I met Rafe.
It had only been a year since I was made Ravaryn's assassin, and the city was still foreign to me. I was trying to learn the streets and the names of all the businessmen and merchants. Most slipped my mind, some I'd remember for a few hours, but only a handful would I remember for days. I had even gone to the extreme measure of writing the important ones down on a crumpled piece of paper, one I found abandoned at the bar, a half-written note on the backside. I could barely afford food, much less paper.
For three months now I've been living outside the castle. I couldn't stay there anymore. The air was too suffocating, every room full of painful memories... memories I was too cowardly to face. I was dying there slowly, drowning even slower. At least here, there was a glimmer of color underneath the dirt and grime. At least here, I could breathe.
In the castle, I could do nothing but wander -wander and wait for whatever crude task the king wanted next. I've never met a man with a kill list as big as him. Every day it seemed I was tasked to kill a new person or steal a new gem. Every day, I had no choice but to listen and shove down my conscience to complete it. The other option... I couldn't, wouldn't take it.
After a year though, I've grown accustomed to it. I've learned to shove down my protruding guilt, to not think about the lives I'm ruining with every swipe of my blade. It was the only way to survive here... though sometimes I wondered why I didn't just let myself drown.
Walking on Beran street- wait, no, Helen road- I was continuing my daily walk through town when sounds of grunting and punches landing broke me from my thoughts.
I halted.
The fight was in an alleyway to my left. From the looks of it, it seemed to be between a young boy -maybe only a few years younger than me- and two other men. The older men had their backs to me, but I could tell they were drunks just from the way they looked.
My attention turned suddenly to the boy. He was tall for the age I predicted -around 16- and the muscles on his exposed arms made me think he worked somewhere that required lifting or carrying heavy things around. With black hair that was stuck to his forehead and pale skin, the boy staggered back, having just taken a punch from one of the men.
His other features were blocked by the blood dripping from the corner of his mouth, his nose, and from a cut just above his brow. He clutched at his chest, breathing deeply, but still looking pissed, pissed enough the lunge forward toward the man on his right.
It was a noble effort, but so clumsy and stupid, that the drunken fool was able to slip behind him and grab his arms, restraining him against his chest. The drunk was smiling disgustingly, his equally revolting teeth, baring. The other, a blonde-haired man, walked in front of the two.
"This'll teach ya to disrespect me, ya little shit," he said, pulling a fist back and striking the boy in his stomach. The black-haired boy groaned and his head fell forward.
Seeing enough, I turned ahead again. Brawls weren't uncommon. The Core Defense will step in if they see it necessary (which unless you hold a fancy title, they don't) but they go otherwise unnoticed.
I had taken one step before I caught myself. I knew what it felt like... I realized. To have everyone watch you suffer, know you're dying, and do nothing. The blonde-haired man punched the boy again. His groans of pain and coughs made me hesitate. It wasn't right -leaving him.
I glanced down the alleyway again, and I don't know why I did it, or what my body was thinking, but I took two steps into the alley and said,
"Two to one? That hardly seems fair." The two men -both the blonde and the darker, brown-haired man- looked at me. Slowly, the black-haired boy picked his head up, one of his eyes beginning to swell shut. The blonde scoffed and waved me off.
"Go home and clean somethin', sweetheart," he mumbled.
I smiled sweetly. "I'd rather not."
"Then move and stay out of our damn business," the blonde spat over his shoulder.
Not listening, not even hesitating, I took a step forward, letting my body seem relaxed. Then I lied nonchalantly, "I was actually trying to pass through this street and you two brutes were in my way, so if you don't mind taking your business elsewhere-."
"Go another way," the blonde snapped. Behind him, the brown-haired man snickered.
I barely gave him a glance. "But this way is so much faster."
"Honey, does it look like I give two shits?" He unsheathed a knife and spun it around his finger, his crooked teeth showing through his lopsided smile. "This is my last warning."
To his surprise, I laughed. "You're cute. You think that tiny little thing is going to get you anywhere? I mean lucky for me," Pulling back the sides of my coats, I revealed the many knives on the inside, along with a belt on my waist and in sheaths on my thigh, "I have a few of my own little treasures. But I wouldn't want to overshine your little... toy." Both men glanced at each other, their eyes widening slightly.
"What the hell are ya?" the brown-haired man, holding the boy, blurted out.
"Beautiful, cunning, fashionable, talented, an assassin... I am many things," I said.
The brown-haired man laughed to his companion. "Hear that, Caden? The little girl is an assassin." The blonde chuckled back and glanced at me.
"Look, I don't know what sicko with a knife kink gave ya that costume to fuck ya in, but I'm not buying that shit. Now be a good girl and let us clean up our own trash," he finished, motioning a hand to the boy.
I shrugged. "Fine, but it's your funeral." That's when I released the blade in my hand. "Literally."
The metal plunged into the blonde's arm with an abhorrent sound of squelching flesh.
With a small yelp, he fell to the ground, but by the time I'd ran to him, he'd taken the knife out of his shoulder and scrambled up. The brown-haired man threw down the boy, making him crash into the stone wall, and joined his partner by his side.
"You bitch," the blonde spat at me as I stopped in front of the two, another blade in my hand.
"Ah, but a very fashionable bitch, no?"
As anticipated, the blonde (Caden as his friend called him) darted for me first. With my free hand, I ducked to the side and knocked his arm away, my own knife plunging into his lower abdomen as his momentum kept him going forward. Then, for extra measure, I stuck a leg out and tripped him up, resulting in him rolling forward. Immediately, I spotted the brown-haired man attempting to entrap me in his two large arms.
Staying low, I put my hands together and shoved my elbow deep into his diaphragm, then threw my arm up to his nose, and while he staggered back, I turned and kneed his dick. He groaned and fell to his knees. I held a knife not two inches from his face.
"P-please don't kill me," he panted, still covering the space between his thighs.
"Leave," I told him, breaths even. "Take your friend with you, and be grateful I'm in a good mood today." Cautiously, yet quickly, the man got up and helped his groaning partner up. Together, they limped away, throwing soft insults at me.
When I was certain they were gone, I walked to the boy and knelt down next to him. Eyes wide -or as wide as they could go being swollen- he scrambled away from my touch.
"G-get away from me," he stuttered. From the way he was favoring his left wrist, I guessed it was broken or at least sprained, and the way his right arm covered his lower chest, made me think he had a few bruised ribs.
"You know, a 'thank you' would be nice." The boy blinked. He let out a few shallow breaths before wetting his chapped lips.
"Thank you," he rasped.
I nodded. "You're welcome." Grabbing his arm, ignoring how he again attempted to cringe away from my touch, I examined his wrist. "How did you find asshole one and two?" Broken. His wrist was broken. Along with possibly his nose.
"I-I was running a delivery down to Judah's Twilight Tavern and they tried starting a fight." His nostrils flared as he remembered. "I was just standing up for myself."
I stared at him lamely and raised a brow. "So... you have anger issues, no fighting experience, and picked a fight with those two? That sounds reasonable." The boy glared at me.
"I can do whatever the hell I want," he snapped. I was slightly affronted by this, his quick demeanor change. Glancing up, I cocked a brow.
"Right," I mumbled, standing and brushing off my coat. "Do you have a name, boy?" He hesitated, looking at me with creased brows.
"Rafael," he said cautiously. "Rafael Bennet."
"Vera Drystan," I responded, "Ravaryn's official assassin, at your service." I did a slight bow for dramatics. "How old are you, Rafael?"
"Nearly 15."
"Where do you live?"
His expression hardened. "The Vadon orphanage."
I paused, surprised. "What is an orphan doing, running around Vadon?"
"I'm one of the orphanage's errand boys. We all have jobs we're funneled into on our eighth birthdays. I mostly transfer illegal boozes and shit to bars around the city. In return, they feed me. We have to earn our keep." My brows furrowed. I knew first-hand how brutal children in orphanages were treated, but I hadn't known about this, that they used children for such things.
Glancing down, I noticed the boy's feet. They were bare, his skin cut and bruised. His clothes weren't much better. Baggy and torn, they clung to his skin only by the sweat on his body.
"What are the other jobs?" I asked, unsure why. I knew I shouldn't care, knew I should continue my rounds. This boy wasn't my problem nor was I his savior.
Rafael swallowed and hesitated again, glancing to his right briefly. "Maids, cooks, stable workers. Stuff like that." When we fell silent, me deep in thought, Rafael's jaw tightened. Then he said, his voice a hoarse whisper, "They are cruel with us. We are whipped when we do something wrong, and when we are late..." he visibly shuddered.
I felt my gut cinch. "I'm sorry," was all I could come up with.
Rafael shook his head. "I don't ever want to go back."
I understood him, and as much as I told myself not to, I pitied him. I pitied him because I knew what he was feeling, had felt it before- the fear that roots in you every time you have to go back. It was a feeling that sat with you, slept with you, ate with you. It never left. It became part of you, but you never get used to it.
Only one other person knows -knew- what I meant when I said that.
If only there was a place we all could go, a safe place -somewhere where we weren't hungry, where money wasn't a luxury, where I could finally shut the king out. A place where the Core Defense doesn't bother us, doesn't even know we exist. A place with adventure, a place to breathe, a place that is completely and utterly mine. Mine to watch over, mine to fight for.
That's when the completely, utterly insane idea hit me.
"Maybe you don't have to," I said to Rafael slowly. Yes. Yes. Yes. This was it.
"What?" He asked. "What do you mean?"
I held a hand out for him. "From now on, you're Rafe, my second in command."
Cautiously, so cautiously, Rafe took my hand. "Second in command for what exactly?"
I smiled and pulled him up. "If you'll follow me, if you'll stand by my side, I'll make sure you never have to go back. You won't ever have to set foot in that horrid place again. What do you say?" Rafe's jaw dropped slightly. He looked stunned, but only for a second.
Then his expression hardened. "Isn't it unwise to make a deal with an assassin?"
My eyes gleamed for the first time in a long time. "Definitely."
Slowly, he smirked. "I'm in."
"Perfect. Follow me." I began walking away. Rafe limped after me.
"But, um, if you don't mind me asking again, what am I a second in command for?"
I looked at him over my shoulder.
"For our gang."