Thunder closed in overhead as Felix and Cinere left the forest behind. Mae mewled impatient at the sky, sometimes throwing a hiss in there to further express his frustration. For once, Felix found himself agreeing with the cat. His clothes were soaked through to his skin, clinging to his body with the uncomfortable weight of the water. The rain got in his eyes, though it was already hard enough to see through the curtain of heavy downpour. Much like Mae, Felix found himself wanting to yell at the sky.
He refrained. He was better than the cat.
Cinere had fallen uncharacteristically silent since they began to leave the forest behind. She jogged at his side, holding Mae tightly in her arms. Her lips were pressed together in a thoughtful frown, and her gaze was trained on the ground. She only glanced up when the thunder rumbled through the sky and lightning flashed in the distance.
It felt like an eternity before the gates of Crocea came in sight. The guards called out as soon as they spotted them. One ran to meet them, speaking in the elegant lull of the Nivean tongue. Cinere answered in the same language, waving him away. The guard paused for a moment before he took off his cloak and draped it over her shoulders. He glanced once at Felix before he returned to his post.
Cinere sighed, pulling the cloak tighter around her shoulders. Mae ducked under it, vanishing beneath the folds. A contented purr rumbled from within, the only thing that let Felix know the cat was still there.
"If you want to see The Core, that can be arranged," she said, softly but still loud enough to be heard over the constant stream of rain. "It will take me some time to put all the pieces together though."
"The pieces?" he asked.
"The Core is in the palace." She met his gaze and held it. Soaked through, shadowed by the overcast sky, she still looked pitiful and small, as if she was no one special at all. "It's technically forbidden for anyone but the priests and the royal family to go down there, so I have to find a time to smuggle you in."
Felix rubbed the back of his neck. Cinere's dedication to roping him into The Core and Aiko's curse was quite persistent—so much so that she would trust him enough to take him down to a place that was so sacred. Faintly, it tugged at his heartstrings with guilt.
"You... care a lot about Aiko, don't you?" he murmured.
Cinere smiled bitterly, chuckling to herself as she pulled the hood of the cloak over her head. "I suppose you could say that."
Some part of him wanted to protest that it was all part of her blank, and yet, looking at her, he could read her. He could read weariness, exhaustion, and some hint of sadness. It wasn't her confident, innocent, and angelic blank. It was as if there was a shift in her in the mere span of an hour—if even that. Perhaps it was that the soul world took a toll on her, or maybe it was simply that the rain put a damper on her. A childish part of him claimed it was that the rain had put out the strong flame of her soul, leaving her as empty as a shell.
He shoved that aside. The flame wasn't literal, and water could have no effect on it.
If he was going to use Cinere to get to Aiko, he would have to look past her pitiful appearance—blank or no blank. She was nothing but a pawn, and he didn't care what happened to her. He was an assassin, his only duty was to kill. A weapon is a tool, and a tool is made to be used, not loved.
There was no place for the turbulence of emotions in his heart if he truly craved release. She was no more special than any other weapon, and he would simply toss her aside when he was done.
With that in mind, he drew back from his heart and stamped out whatever sympathy reached out to her.
"Well," Cinere said, straightening her spine. She dipped her head to him. "Goodbye, then. I'll come find you—or send Mae—when I'm ready. Please don't wait around, though. It could be a while."
"You act as if I came here just to be entertained by you," he found himself teasing her once more, though his tone fell a little flatter this time.
If she noticed, she gave nothing away. Only a smile graced the corners of her lips. The other half of her face was hidden by the shadow of her hood, but he could picture it quite well—that flickering light in her eyes that shone brighter when she was answering his jabs.
"If that were true, you wouldn't let yourself be pulled away by my fanciful dreams," she said.
With that, she began to walk away from him, taking slow, deliberate steps. However, she didn't make it more than a few steps before she turned to him again. Mae's head poked out around the rim of her hood as he crawled to his perch on her shoulder. The cat's eyes glowed brightly in the dark, a brilliant azure blue as boundless as the sky and as treacherous as the sea. When he was swallowed by this glow, he truly did seem otherworldly and magical. In his shadow, there was Cinere.
"I don't know what you really came for," she admitted. This time, her words were almost swallowed by the rain. He found himself leaning in to catch them. "I don't know if what I saw in you was true or not. Whoever you are, whatever you came here to do, I want you to know that Ai—no, that I appreciate what you've agreed to do."
Felix hesitated for a moment. She did too, patiently awaiting his answer. Inhaling deeply and exhaling slowly, he curled his fingers against his palms until he could feel his nails digging into his skin.
"I can't stand to see someone trapped in a cage," he said. "I guess you could say... I want to do what's right and set that person free."
Satisfied with that, she left him standing alone in the rain.
⇠⭑⭒⭑⇢
A handful of new tally marks appeared on Felix's sheet as the days went by. The first of the two weeks ended, bleeding into the second week without another sign of Cinere or her ethereal cat. Usually, Felix spent whatever time he had before a job in preparation: surveying the target or the area surrounding them to get a feel for where he could stick them when the time came. Instead of doing that, he found himself wandering Crocea aimlessly while he waited for Cinere. As annoying as it was, he couldn't think about anything else. Aiko suddenly became meaningless, and Cinere was at the forefront of his thoughts.
It didn't matter what he was doing, he couldn't escape his nagging thoughts. Why did Cinere care whether or not Aiko was cursed? Why was she so devoted to the idea of Aiko being freed that she would hound a stranger for help? What did she truly see in him?
He raked his fingers through his hair as he paced back and forth in his room. It was as if the truth dangled right in front of his nose, and yet he couldn't grasp it. He was reaching blindly through the dark, simply hoping that his fingers would brush the surface of it, but to no avail.
Ultimately, it was pointless. She was nothing. She was a pawn.
And yet, he couldn't shake the feeling that he was going about it all wrong. The image of her ring flashed through his mind. Its smooth surface, engraved with the kingdom's emblem of the sun, was so similar to the ring the king of Furvus had been wearing the night Felix killed him. Had Dinah been wearing that same ring?
If it was stamped with the royal seal, why was a lady-in-waiting wearing it around?
Heaving in a deep breath, Felix pressed his palms to his eyes and sank down against his bed. "I'm beginning to really hate blanks," he muttered.
He removed his hands and glared up at the ceiling, narrowing his eyes until his vision became blurry and darkened as he was peering through his lashes. The wood boards held no answer, yet he searched the paneling for one as if he might find it.
Could it be possible that...?
With the shake of his head, he quickly shoved that thought aside. Without the full story, drawing conclusions could lead to a mistake he wouldn't be able to return from. My best bet now is to play it safe, he told himself. Stick with Cinere, follow her plan. She'll lead you right to Aiko.
He lay there for a moment longer before he pushed himself upright again. Afternoon sunlight graced his room with a warm glow, drawing his gaze down to the crowded streets outside. As the coronation date crept closer, the streets grew more crowded. Decorations and festivities were strung up everywhere he looked, all boasting the kingdom's vibrant reds and golds. Yet there was never a single word about Aiko herself, or an image of her face. It was as though it was a celebration for Niveus and was completely detached from her.
In some ways, it made sense. It was a celebration for the kingdom to gain a ruler after so many years under the charge of a regent. However, Felix could still recall the coronation of Dinah after the passing of her husband, passing official authority on to her. It was a celebration in her honor, not Furvus's.
He had no other experience with coronations beyond the stories his master would tell him when he was a kid as he drifted off to sleep. On those nights, he would dream of faraway places and celebrations that dragged on into the deepest hours of the night—sometimes long into the morning as well. When he was a kid, he dreamed of being there on a mission, and how the crowded halls filled with drunk guests and distracted party-goers would make his task so much easier.
Perhaps it was always his dream to receive a mission like the one that now rested in his hands. Yet, holding onto it now, his stomach twisted with anxiety.
There was too much he didn't know, and he only had himself to blame.
Turning away from the window, he rose from the bed and snatched his cloak off the back of the chair at the desk. He slung it over one arm and made his way toward the door. There was no use sitting around and drowning in his thoughts. If he had counted correctly, there were three days left before the coronation.
Using the coronation and the natural chaos of a crowd would be his best option. The only thing left to do was uncover the curse and determine whether or not it was a threat to him. If it was a threat, then he would have to determine the next step.
The door swung open easily as he pulled on the knob, letting the muffled chatter from the tavern below drift into the room. As they did every day, the wooden floorboards creaked beneath him as he walked down the hall. It was the same boards every day—one, in particular, creaked the loudest, placed near the middle of the hall. He had begun to avoid it, but today, he stepped right on it. The squeak of the wood barely registered. It wasn't long before he found himself at the foot of the stairs, standing in the entrance to the tavern.
Today, it was filled with boisterous laughter. It was the middle of the afternoon, yet the air was rank with the stench of ale. Part of Felix cringed and shrank back from the noise and the crowded space. He suddenly longed for the emptiness of his room. Perhaps he could do with a nap instead—just standing in the room was sapping his energy.
Fastening his cloak around his shoulders, he strode toward the door with his head high and his hands tucked beneath the folds of his midnight blue cloak. He kept his steps brisk, weaving around the waitresses and patrons waving their mugs. Never before had the tavern seen so much activity in the middle of the day. Perhaps this was how the lower class celebrated the upcoming coronation.
He caught murmurs of Aiko's name among the chatter, but it was never anything new. Only that she was a beauty they all wished to behold, and that it was both a blessing and a curse that she remained unmarried even at the age of eighteen. The ramblings of drunk men could go on forever, and thus they did. When they took a sharp turn, Felix snapped his attention elsewhere.
To the people, Aiko was more like some sort of goddess than a princess. They revered her, worshipped her, prided themselves upon her, and yet knew nothing about her.
He began to wonder if she had any plans of changing that, though the thought turned bitter as he once again reminded himself of why he was there. He didn't come to listen to Niveus's gossip.
He came to kill Aiko, and it was time he remembered that.
The tavern door swung open with a sharp yank just as he reached for it. Sunlight flooded into the room, along with the bustle of people milling around outside. It all quickly became meaningless as his gaze landed on the figure in front of him.
As if summoned by his thoughts of Aiko, there stood Cinere in the doorway, staring up at him with wide eyes. Her lips parted as if to speak, but no words came out. Her hand lingered in the air as if to still grasp the door which had already opened.
Clearing her throat, she stepped back and the moment vanished. Today, her blank was replaced in full, and her smile was back to being as intoxicatingly alluring as always, though the flame in her eyes burned strong. She left no hint of the weary, fragile Cinere he had seen drenched in the rain before. Instead, she had returned to her radiant self—as bright and inviting as the warm sunlight that enveloped her.
"There you are," she greeted him, dipping her head slightly. "I was just about to burst in here and start shouting for you. Do you think the drunks would throw stuff at me if I did that? Might be fun."
"Please don't," he muttered as he ushered her outside and shut the door. "I wouldn't answer anyway. You would only make a fool of yourself."
"Oh, I do so love making a fool of myself."
"I can tell."
Her gentle smile turned into a proud grin. "Well, you're in luck, my good sir. Your request to visit the palace has been approved!" she said. With a flurry of her cloak, she pulled out a dark red book, embellished with gold and the faint imprint of the sun in the fabric of the cover. She shoved it at his chest. "You're a literary scholar and you're coming to examine the books in the palace library. This one, in particular, has caught your eye, so you're going to be looking down at it a lot."
He fumbled to catch the book as her hand withdrew. "I am?"
"You are!" She beamed up at him before fiddling with one of the cuffs on her wrist. Her fingers slipped over the clasp and she muttered a curse. As soon as the word left her lips, however, she paused for a moment, her gaze sliding back to him. When he said nothing, she returned to the cuff.
Deciding to let her strangeness slide, Felix furrowed his brow and glared down at the book. "But I don't really know anything about literature."
"You can read, can't you?"
"Well, yes, but—"
"That's all there is to it." Cinere finally unclasped one of the cuffs with a click, pulling her wrist free. A sigh slipped through her lips as she twisted her wrist. She held out the cuff to him, a spark lighting in her eyes. "Put that on and follow me."
I was happily writing (more like struggling through) this chapter when I reached the end and realized... it had hit 5k words. I never intended for this chapter to be this long, but Felix kept monologuing.
Anyways. I split it because 5k feels like a lot for Wattpad (though we'll ignore that chapter seven is about 4k... shh). It works in my favor though because I'm working through midterms as I write this so I'm most likely going to be taking a break for a bit. But I'm four--now five since I split this--chapters ahead of everyone so hehe >:)
The climax of Act I is swiftly approaching. I'm both ready and not ready for what's to come, so take that as you will.
See you in the next update! :D