Countdown: 2 days, 9.5 hours, 4 deaths
A public pool house is not where Aurelia would have expected to meet Aron.
When Mikael had returned, breathless and red-cheeked, his dark hair curling with sweat over his collar, and had thrust a crisp white card into her hand, Aurelia had read it twice to make sure that the information was correct. It had been printed with the sparsest of information in silver ink: Jacaranda Pool, 9:30PM.
She had slipped the card into her pocket and thanked the Universe that Mikael had been smart enough to present it to her when neither Kaol nor Colin were nearby.
Kaol had left the bar shortly before his shift was scheduled to start, and had told her that he wouldn't be able to come by later, since he had previously made plans. The guilty look in his eyes had informed her of exactly who they were with.
Aurelia had excused herself to bed, claiming fatigue, soon after. The sidelong look that Colin had given her over the bridge of his hooked nose informed her that her acting skills were not as good as they had once been. He hadn't called her on her deception, though. Instead, he had sighed a sigh that said 'It's your funeral,' and had left the Backstage Bar with twitching hands.
Now, Aurelia stands before Jacaranda Pool- an ordinary place noteworthy only in that it was where the Amaliem girl Rena Baliem was last seen before her disappearance. And because of Aron's apparent interest in it.
Aurelia shudders, catches herself fiddling with her earlobe, forces her hand down. Now is not the time to show her nerves. Not when Aron's spies could be watching.
She squares her shoulders, lifts her chin with a bravado she tries to force herself to feel, and goes to the entrance of the building. The sign beside it shows that operating hours ended a half an hour ago, but the door opens easily when Aurelia pushes against it.
For a moment she stands there, frozen as a statue, Kaol's words running through her head. Bodies with tattoos gouged out, missing eyes and teeth and identifying marks, dismembered hands with no fingertips. Colin losing an eye at her own hand.
She takes a deep breath, steeling herself, and forges ahead.
It is quiet in the vaulted, white-washed halls, the echoes of her sandals against the concrete floor the only sound. The glow-globes paint the underwater frescoes on the arched recesses of the walls in shadow. The place is deserted.
When she emerges from the hallway and into the pool room itself, she finds it equally empty. The fact that no one is there is more disconcerting than it would have been had someone been lurking behind a pillar.
She arrived on time- so where is Aron?
Aurelia crosses the room to the pool. She hikes her dress up above her thighs, and submerges her legs into the water as she sits on the ledge and waits. She distracts herself by admiring the glass tile mosaic that covers the entirety of the pool. As she swirls her legs through the water, the ripples on the surface give the tile sea-turtles below her the illusion of movement.
There is the sound of a door creaking open, and Aurelia scrambles to her bare feet, adrenaline surging through her veins, her heart pounding painfully against her ribs. She stills the urge to pull her hairstick from her hair, not wanting to alert Aron to the weapon she hides in plain sight.
When she sees the tunic of mercenary's black and guild gold, she freezes.
She had been a fool to trust Mikael.
"Hey! It's after hours. How did you get in here?" the mercenary demands.
Aurelia glances at the exit behind her, calculating whether or not she will be able to out-run the mercenary standing on the opposite side of the pool.
He swings his flashlight so that the beam blinds her, and catches her panicked glance.
"Stay right there," he orders, and Aurelia transitions her weight to the balls of her feet, softens her knees, and readies herself to flee.
He takes a step closer, and his face changes.
"You- you're that girl. You're the girl who killed the Helborus heir," the merc exclaims. He drops the flashlight, the beam skittering over the water of the pool and across the room, as he reaches for the dagger at his belt.
Aurelia stands her ground as the large man runs at her, the wicked edge of his knife glinting dangerously in the low light of the glow globes. She sinks into a crouch as he approaches, rips her weapon from the hidden holster on her thigh, scrabbles across the ground with her own knife in her hand.
He swipes at her, catches the fleshy part of her upper right arm as she skitters past him. In retaliation, she swipes behind her with her dagger, cutting across the back of his ankle in a quick, deep, lucky strike.
The man cries out, staggers, falls heavily to the ground. He tries to push himself to his feet, but as soon as weight rests on his injured leg, he wobbles and crumples to the floor again.
The Achilles tendon.
Aurelia's smile is feral.
She could flee, now that he is immobile.
But she does not.
Her blood sings the sweet siren song that her body has learned to crave. She feared it, once. Had run from it, crying and vomiting like a child. She feels no compulsion to ignore its clarion call now.
She stalks closer to him, slowly, like a jungle cat, as he whimpers and groans and slashes in her direction with his knife. His eyes are glassy and fear-filled when he stares up at her. The expression makes Aurelia's blood thrum.
"Who told you I was here?" she asks, her voice at once saccharinely sweet and husky- the voice of a stranger to her own ears.
"I didn't know it was you," the man growls back, his dagger pointed in her direction as he pulls the dead weight of his leg away.
It is a pointless exercise and they both know it.
"What brought you here, then?" she probes.
"A woman. A woman told me that she saw someone break in after hours," he divulges, and Aurelia smiles.
"Good boy. What woman?"
He curses at her, swings his knife when she gets closer. It cuts through the fabric of her skirt, but does not cut her leg. As he does, she jumps back, picks up one of the side tables sitting around the pool. She throws it at him, and he drops the dagger when he raises his hands to protect his head.
While he is distracted, she steps on his wounded leg, grinning at his responding cry of pain. Before he can catch his breath, she has lurched forward, pilfered his dagger from its spot on the ground.
"What woman?" she demands, pointing his own dagger at him.
"I don't know. Some local woman. Average looking, Nothing stood out," he finally responds, and Aurelia cocks her head.
"Was there a child with her? A boy of around eleven or twelve?" she asks, and the man growls low in his throat.
"I told you. It was just a woman."
Aurelia looks at the dagger she holds in her hand- a hilt of black, with gold scroll-work on the blade. Kaol has one much like it. Blood drips from its edge and onto the ground.
In that moment, the adrenaline ebbs enough for Aurelia to remember that he had taken a swipe at her with it. She glances at her arm, and curses when she realizes the gash will likely leave a scar.
The mercenary takes advantage of her momentary distraction to lunge for her legs with his bare hands. He succeeds in wrapping his arms around her shins, taking her down to the ground.
In the fall, Aurelia spreads her knees, curls herself forward, and plunges the knife downwards with her descent. As her knees sting with the impact, the knife embeds itself firmly in his neck.
He makes several, choking, gasping sounds, so Aurelia digs it in deeper, and swoops it around so that it severs the jugular. Blood spurts from the wound, drenching her collarbones, her belly, the front of her dress, speckling her jaw and face.
She runs her fingers through the liquid, feels it on her hands- so fresh it is not quite sticky, yet- almost silky. Thick and viscous and smooth. She wonders what pigments Marcus' pretty, quiet wife would have mixed together to get the color right.
She licks her lips and tastes the metallic tang of copper on her tongue. She traces the man's cooling chest, reaching to her hair for an ornament she does not have. She frowns, digs her nails into his pectoralis muscle, thinks of how lovely it would be with a pretty little sweetbriar tacked against it.
It looks wrong without one.
"Well done."
The voice makes Aurelia scramble to her feet, both knives in her slippery, bloodied palms, teeth bared. Her blood is still thrumming, pumping, with fire and life. The feeling is more heady than rum, more addictive than her mother's Blaze.
She'd welcome another assailant, would revel in another rush like this one.
Her eyes find the figure of a woman across the pool, dimly lit by a nearby glow-globe - a woman with hair the color of damp sand and a skin tone to match; a palate of dark beige. The monotone tonality gives the appearance of being colorless, even in her color.
"What?" Aurelia hisses in that stranger's voice.
"He was twice your size. We weren't sure if you'd be able to handle him. You've proven yourself," the woman adds, stalking closer, seemingly unafraid, unperturbed.
The 'we' is what catches Aurelia's attention, drags some piece of logic from beyond the heady fog she floats in.
"Aron?" Aurelia asks through a cotton-dry mouth, and the woman smirks- a subtle quirk of her lip as she takes yet another step closer.
"Of course not," the woman responds. "Aron would not be foolish enough to come on the word of a child- even one with the connections of your little friend. Today, I am Aron's eyes and ears," she says.
What was it Kaol had said? She is not half as clever as she thinks she is? She cringes at the realization that he may have been more correct than she wants to admit. She glances down at the dead man on the floor and grimaces. Much more correct than she would like to admit- blood is everywhere, her own mixed in with that of her victim.
"You brought weapons to meet Aron?" the woman probes, her eyes on the daggers still clasped in Aurelia's now sticky hands.
Aurelia meets her gaze. "I've heard things. Terrible things- about Aron. I wanted to have a chance to protect myself if I needed to. It's a good thing I did," she defends herself.
The woman inclines her head in something like agreement. "Go wash off," she says, jerking her head toward the pool.
Aurelia reluctantly does as she is bid, sliding into the warm water. She watches, fascinated, as the thick blood she is coated in melts into rivulets of pink rivers, swirling from her arms into the blue of the pool. When she has gotten the blood from her limbs and hair, the woman sets a clean, linen dress at the edge of the pool.
"I've noticed you can be... messy, in your work," she says, with an entirely too knowing glint in her beige eyes. "I thought you might need it."
Aurelia blinks.
"You've been following me," she says, thinking back to all the times she felt the itch of someone's eyes on the back of her neck.
She'd assumed it was The Artist; she never would have guessed that Aron's people would have had eyes on her until this moment. The woman tilts her head to the side, but does not confirm or deny Aurelia's observation.
Aurelia lifts herself from the pool, the gash on her right arm smarting as she uses it to bear her weight up and out of the water. She quickly strips the sodden, blood-strained garment from her body and pulls on the clean dress. The woman watches on, completely unperturbed by her nudity.
"Please, sit," the woman instructs once Aurelia is dressed, gesturing to one of the lounge chairs beside the pool. Aurelia swallows and does as she is bid.
She plays the character game on the woman before her- this is a woman who could easily blend into any room, any group of people- a complete chameleon. She has subtly mimicked Aurelia's posture- something Aurelia knows from her training is meant to put others at ease, to make them more trusting.
If anything, this makes Aurelia even more guarded.
"I am Lana," the woman introduces herself as she reaches forward, wrapping a strip of linen around Aurelia's wound, and binds it as quickly and efficiently as any urgent care physician's apprentice.
"Now. Since you have proved your skills- what is it that the Sweetbriar Slayer wants from Aron?" the woman queries, once she has leaned back.
"I need to get out of Glascoast," Aurelia replies, forcing her voice to be even, level, as she glances over the quick wrap job. Lana gives no indication of her, or her employer's thoughts on the matter. Her face is passive- a blank canvas.
"I need a new identity- a Courtesan Guild ID card, forged documents, and letters of reference that will stand up to Blueridge's scrutiny. And a way onto a supply train to Blueridge."
The smirk that quirks Lana's lips has a nasty edge to it. "Are you certain you are still suited to the life of a Courtesan?" she asks, glancing down at the dead man.
Aurelia shudders, deflects. "I have a goldsilk shawl to pay for it- it should be more than enough to cover the costs."
Lana cocks her head to one side, the light catching against the dull, damp-sand color of her hair, making it look like muddied gold.
"Why would Aron need a goldsilk shawl?" she asks.
"You could sell it-" Aurelia tries, but the woman holds up a hand.
"Aron doesn't need money," the woman interrupts.
"Maybe you need the Sweetbriar Slayer?" she tries, pushing the words out of her throat. "I'm not technically affiliated with the guild yet but-"
"And you won't be. Not until you kill the rest of the Senators on the list. Or until you assassinate Pelas Larch," Lana interrupts her.
Stunned, Aurelia stares at her with wide eyes, her mouth opening and closing like a fresh-caught fish.
"Do you think there's anything that happens in Glascoast that Aron doesn't know about?" the woman asks.
Aurelia blinks, twists her earlobe between the knuckles of her index and middle finger. Of course Aron knows everything. Half of Glascoast is either on his payroll or indebted to him in one way or another.
Mikael had released her identity and the offer of payment, and it had been enough to pique Aron's interest. If he does not want her payment, there must be something else of import to him. She is more convinced than ever that it was, in fact, Aron's people who have been following her.
"What does Aron want with me?" she asks.
The woman gives her a small smile- the slightest quirk of her thin lips. Lana sits in quiet for several moments, drawing out the tension, eyeing Aurelia with a bland, albeit perceptive gaze.
"It is in all of our best interests that you fulfill the challenge the Assassin's Guild set for you. He would like to... assist you in your endeavors."
"Why?"
"What do you know about what is happening in Glascoast?" The woman asks, answering the question with one of her own. "Politically speaking," she clarifies.
Aurelia frowns. "People are angry. More so now than ever. There's the traditionalists and the progressives, but most people don't really feel represented by either. They're starting to take things into their own hands... things are getting ugly."
"Hence the People's Liberation Party," Lana says, and Aurelia stares at her.
"The terrorists?" Aurelia deadpans, and the woman offers a hard-eyed smile.
"That is what the Traditionalists and Progressives like to call them, yes."
"They're insane. They want to murder every Senator, every family of every senator, any person in Glascoast with blue eyes..." Aurelia retorts, and the woman shakes her head.
"Where did you hear that? Your Senator lover?" the woman cuts in, her tone flat. "They do not want to murder anyone. They want to remove the corrupt officials, they want to eliminate the Senatorial class system. They want to allow the Citizenry to vote, to own property, to take control of their own lives. They want the government to be run by the people, for the people, instead of by the Senators, for the Senators. The Citizenry already view them as saviors... it is only a matter of time until the Guilders do the same, and join the revolution."
"You're one of them," Aurelia observes, wide-eyed, and the woman inclines her head. "Aron is..."
"Aron has his fingers in many pots," Lana returns, easily, and suddenly Aurelia finds it hard to breathe. "You happen to be a valuable asset to this particular pot."
"Me." Aurelia says, and wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all.
The King of Glascoast's underworld is a member- if not the creator, given Aron's reputation- of a domestic terrorist organization, and he finds a drop-out-Courtesan-turned-murderer a 'valuable asset.'
"The Citizenry, and even many Guilders, are... inspired... by the Sweetbriar Slayer."
"So... what, you want me to become some sort of poster child for the PLP?" Aurelia asks, and the woman shakes her head quickly.
"Ideas are revolutionary. People are fallible. The idea of the Sweetbriar Slayer has struck a chord with the populace; has ripened the harvest, so to speak. We don't want you to be officially attached in any capacity at all, at the moment. You'd be a liability. But the mystery of it all, what the Sweetbriar Slayer is interpreted to represent... that is very much of use to us."
Aurelia frowns. "Pelas- He's one of you, isn't he?"
It doesn't make sense for members of the Assassin's Guild to want to kill their elected Councilmember. But if they had learned that he is a member of the PLP, and that he is actively working to eliminate the Senatorial class system... it would make sense why they wanted to take the risk.
Lana dips her head.
"That's how he got proof about Castus' son's paternity too, isn't it? Aron."
Lana smiles. "We take care of our own," she replies. "I do not know whether you have realized it or not, but certain members of our organization have already taken you under their wing."
"Besides Pelas?" Aurelia asks, and then recalls the mysterious bunches of flowers Camellia hid from her prying eyes.
"Cam?" she asks, and her frown deepens. It would not make sense for Camellia to be a part of the organization. While a Guilder herself, her father and brother are Senators.
Lana shrugs. "It is not my place to say. But, their protection only bought you a temporary reprieve. It is your own skill that has purchased Aron's attention. If you succeed as The Sweetbriar Slayer, it may even earn you his favor."
"So you want me to find a way to fulfill the contract so you can have four more dead Senators?"
"We want to give you a way to fulfill your contract," the woman corrects her, and Aurelia swallows.
"How?"
"The Senatorial Summit."
Aurelia stares at her, then scoffs. "You want a martyr," she returns, drily, bitterly.
"You would be valuable to us as a martyr," the woman acknowledges. "But you would be invaluable if you managed to infiltrate the Senatorial Summit and succeed. What better symbol could there be than the Senators slain in their own seat of power, while wearing their rings made of the dictator Argryus' gold?"
There is a poetic ring to it. Aurelia has no doubt it will wind up in the People's Liberation Party's rhetoric. It might even help to sway those on the fence to their side.
"The missing Baliem girls," she finds herself saying, and for once, Lana's composure is broken. Her brows shoot to her hairline, and her mouth drops open slightly in surprise. Apparently there are some things about Aurelia that Aron's people don't know after all.
"Baliems are Citizenry too. If Aron knows 'everything,' he must know what the Senators are doing to them. What is your organization doing to help?" she demands.
"We do what we can," the woman murmurs, her composure obviously shaken, and purses her lips. "When a girl runs, we take her in, give her a job she doesn't need a voice for, provide her with counseling for the trauma."
"That's all? Only when a girl runs?" Aurelia says, and the woman's face is suddenly a placid mask once more.
"The timing is not yet right to make that information public."
"The timing isn't right?" Aurelia demands, her ears burning. "Because the timing isn't right, a party that's supposed to be 'for the people' is allowing innocent girls to be tortured? Thirty-eight girls! Thirty-eight!"
"Thirty-eight reported girls, with the surname of Baliem," the Lana says softly. "The true number is far higher. They usually prey on the girls who will not be missed- Mid City prostitutes, beggars, homeless drug addicts, bullet brats, taint-lines without a family... Those thirty-eight girls had at least one person in their lives who cared."
"And you let those monsters get away with it. How do you live with yourselves?"
"Sometimes, sacrifices must be made for the greater good. We need to wait for the opportune moment to release the information- it is the only way for those girls' suffering to have any meaning. We live with ourselves the same way you do- by justifying it."
"I don't do things, or allow things to be done, to innocents."
"What about Senator Helborus' bodyguard? Clotbur, wasn't it?" the woman replies, pointedly. "Collateral damage, yes? Or that man right over there? You have more in common with us than you think."
Aurelia drops her eyes, can't meet the woman's gaze, swallows, fiddles with her earlobe.
"I don't understand what Aron wants with all this," she says, turning the conversation away from herself. "He's built up an empire blackmailing the Senators. If the PLP succeeds..."
"There will always be someone to blackmail. We're on the ground floor of constructing a new government. Imagine what some of the so-called terrorists will do to build the world they want. Imagine what others will do when they suddenly have access to more money and power than they had ever dreamed of. Aron will see it all... and they will pay, just as the Senators have paid.
"However, there are more members of our party who are good than evil. Aron will survive as Aron always has, but the world we live in will be a better place."
"Isn't that risky, though? If the PLP fails and his association with them becomes known..."
"We will not fail," the woman interrupts, voice strong and sure with the depth of her conviction- a true fanatic, then. "Besides, Aron hasn't come as far as he has by playing it safe. And even underlords have their ideals."
Aurelia is silent for a time, digesting the information. The woman in the lounge chair beside her seems completely unperturbed, unruffled, by the entirety of their conversation.
"About the summit..." Aurelia says, steering things back into clearer waters. "Polis Hall is impenetrable. How would you even get me inside?" she finally asks.
Lana's lips quirk. "For Aron- anything is possible. We have our ways."
"Anything?" Aurelia asks, and the woman glances over her with shrewd eyes.
"What else do you want?" she asks, her tone clipped, all business.
"If I fail- If I'm caught, and I die, and I become your martyr... I want immunity for Colin and Kaol for their part in all of this."
"Colin Durante?" the woman clarifies, and when her lips twist again, it is into a sinister curve that barely resembles a smile. "Do you even know who it is you are trying to protect?" she asks.
"He's been kind to me," Aurelia defends him, because for all his faults she feels she has to, and the woman scoffs.
"Did you know he was nearly de-guilded? He got so high one night he asked his thirteen year old apprentice to kill his mark for him, unassisted. The child failed, of course. Was gutted by the bodyguard sworn to protect the mark. His apprentice survived long enough to drag himself back to Colin for help, but the addict was in such a stupor that he didn't even realize what was happening until he came out of it in the morning and saw the bloody corpse. He's is not worth your protection."
Aurelia winces, her heart sinking into the pit of her gut.
"And as for your bodyguard- you know what it looks like, don't you? The pair of you conspiring to kill the Helborus heir, you absconding in the night, him covering your tracks? To all the world, it looks like a love affair," she begins.
"He's my brother," Aurelia interjects, by the subconscious instinct borne of living with Marcus.
The woman smirks. "The only person foolish enough to believe that lie is dead, now. You knew each other before your grandfather died, and were nearly pubescent when his parents took you in. There's not a living soul in Glascoast that would believe the two of you are related."
Aurelia winces.
"Regardless, with or without immunity, his career is over now. He was lucky the Helborus family hired him in the first place, given his bloodline. They probably only accepted him into their module because he was guarding a mistress- someone whose death wouldn't matter. Then, to add insult to injury, to the rest of the senators, it looks like he fell in love with his charge and murdered his employer. No one will hire him after this, even if we protect him and he survives. He will be an outcast in Glascoast, confined to the Baliem quarter, working a menial job until the day he dies. He might prefer death."
"The Artist promised him a spot in the Interior," Aurelia offers, and the woman chuckles.
"Where he'd be little more than a puppet. Like you as a Ghost. Which is why you came to us in the first place. You don't want to be controlled. You want the freedom to lead your own life. And you will- as long as you succeed at the Summit. Your loyalty is commendable, but there is little we can do for your friends."
"Regardless of what he did before, Colin's doing his best to help me now. Immunity for his part as an accessory to my murders would be enough to repay him for that. Can you at least do that much?" Aurelia asks, and the woman looks at her for a few moments, searching her face, before she finally gives a tight nod of agreement.
"And Kaol- you're right, he would rather die than be a puppet or live in the Baliem quarter. But I can't... I don't..." she pauses, swallows, struggles for the words. She cannot find them.
The woman sighs, takes pity on her. "We will accept the goldsilk as payment for your friend's safe passage to Blueridge aboard a supply train, as well as new identity documents," she offers, and Aurelia lets out an involuntary sound that is not quite a sob or a cry of relief, but something in between. She hates how much it reveals.
"You, however, will infiltrate the Senatorial Summit and complete your contract, or you will die trying. If you back out, or if you are captured alive, Colin will lose his immunity and Kaol will stand trial beside you for the murders of Marcus Helborus and the bodyguard Clotbur. Are we clear?"
Aurelia nods, furiously.
"We will contact you when the time is right," the woman says, and then rises from the lounge chair to her feet.
"Is there anything else?" she asks, courteously, as though this were a simple matter of opening a bank account and not plotting a revolution in their polis.
"I'd... I'd like to see my family, before..." she says, softly, unable to hide the emotion lurking in her voice. "If I fail... my foster parents lose two of their children- me to the tides, and Kaol to Blueridge. If I could see them... say goodbye..."
Lana dips her head in acknowledgement. "We will arrange it so that our people are the mercenaries with eyes on the Lighthouse tomorrow," she agrees.
"And The Artist?" she probes, and Lana inclines her head.
"You will be under Aron's protection until the Summit. Even The Artist wouldn't be foolish enough to move against you- and certainly none of his employers. Aron could destroy them all with very little effort, if he so wished," the woman replies.
Aurelia nods her comprehension, and not for the first time wonders at how lucky she is to have made connections in such high places.
"Now, move along. I'll take care of this," Lana says, using a sweeping gesture of her arm to indicate the blood-streaked floors, the ruined dress, the dead man sprawled on the ground.
Aurelia is not sure if she is supposed to say 'Thank you,' since she wouldn't have been placed in the position to kill the mercenary without Lana's little test.
She settles on a nod, and then follows Lana's instruction, leaving the pool house, the blood, and the terrorist within, behind her.