I was frozen on the spot, unsure of whether I should be confiding in Axe or threatening to slash his throat. Axe continued speaking, as if oblivious to my confused nature.
"I had my suspicions from the beginning," he explained. "Especially when you started to fight so hard just to earn a rank on the Alpha team. It didn't seem like you, and even after months, it still doesn't seem like you. And the way the sudden change took place after Echo's death was too coincidental. At first, I thought you were trying to honor Echo's memory by being number one like she always thought and wanted you to be. But something always felt off about that theory. It just didn't add up, but I never had any evidence that suggested otherwise. Until now."
I finally found my voice again, though it was too weak for my liking. "Why... how did you get in?"
"Yesterday, in the elevator, I stole your ID card and copied the barcode on scanning tape and placed it back in your pocket before you left."
My thoughts flashed back to the awkward exchange in the elevator and I mentally cursed myself. How could I have been so stupid? Axe always did something for a reason. He was as dangerous as Xavier because it was so easy to underestimate him, a trap I had fallen into like another fool and victim of Axe Cormac.
"Why?" I asked.
He shrugged. "You're a sentimental person no matter what you make people believe. I figured you would've kept something of value, one that would remind you of your goal--and tell me exactly what it was."
"But why bother? Why do you want to know so badly?"
Axe tilted his head and paused before saying, "I'm not sure. Maybe it just bothered me that I couldn't figure out what you were up to."
I tightened my grip on the dagger, "I swear to god if you tell anyone-"
"I won't," he responded before I could finish. "I won't tell anyone."
"Why should I believe you?"
"Because I want to help you."
I blinked. "What?"
"Do I have to repeat myself?"
"Yes."
"I want to help you," Axe said, painfully slow.
"But why?"
"Because Echo was my friend too. And if there's any way to get justice for her death, I want to see it happen."
I sheathed my daggers and started pacing the kitchen. "But you're friends with Damien."
Axe dropped Echo's letter on the table and raised an eyebrow. "And when did our friendship begin?"
My mind whirled. I answered slowly as the realization dawned. "After Echo died."
He sat on the couch and I leaned back, my heart beating in my ears. "You've been working against the Crown Assassins the entire time."
His lips twisted into something between a smirk and a mischievous smile. I looked at him as if truly seeing him for the first time. "Is that why you're so motivated to be an Alpha? So that you could get near the Crowns and figure out what happened to Echo?"
"Now, now," he said. "Let's not get ahead of ourselves. I wanted to be an Alpha member from the moment I stepped foot in this school five years ago. Getting justice for Echo is just a bonus."
"This is crazy," I sighed. "How many others have the same agenda?"
He shrugged. "Only one other that we know of for sure."
I met his eyes. "The killer."
"You have any leads?"
I narrowed my eyes. "Why should I tell you?"
"Why should you not?"
"For all I know, you could be the killer."
"Is that why you sheathed your knife?"
"We both know I could throw them straight through your chest in half a second."
"And I could have my dagger at your neck in less," he said, eyes brimming with a challenge.
Holding his gaze, I said, "Fine. I'll pretend you're not the killer. For now."
"Good," he jumped to his feet. "Let's get to the real stuff. Obviously, I've had my suspicions about the circumstances of Echo's death, even though I didn't have proof before now that she could've, somehow, induced the Crowns' wrath. So, to do some investigating, a few weeks after the funeral, I dug up her grave and-"
"You what?!"
"It wasn't that bad!" he said, hurriedly. "I left it in good conditions and no one could tell the difference. Someone had to do it and it definitely wasn't going to be you."
I hated the thought of Axe desecrating Echo's beautiful grave, of destroying the amount of thought and love her parents had put into the funeral, the flowers and presents all of her friends, including myself, had left in her memory. But, Axe was right. Assassins made their wills early on in life—the moment they stepped foot Evandor, sometimes even earlier. And in their wills, they recorded the things they would want to be buried with them in their grave, things they would rather keep for all of eternity than pass it on.
Furthermore, they may store things in certain containers to ensure that no one saw what was inside the container but simply knew to store the container and all its contents in the grave. If an assassin died, their secrets would die with them, buried deep beneath the ground for ages beside their body, trapped forever until they were forgotten. If Echo had found something about the Crowns, she may have buried the secrets with her.
I swallowed my anger and continued in the steadiest voice I could muster. "Did you find anything?"
Axe pulled something out of his pocket and placed it on the counter. "Just this."
I picked up the small object. It was a small, assassin ring, one that's passed down the generations of assassin families. Traditionally, the eldest child or the one considered the heir would get their father's family ring and the mother's would go to the next child. Any extra rings that may have found their way into the parents' possession would be given to the other children. The Fluor ring, the one my father had given to me when I was younger, was currently sitting in the back of my jewelry shelf.
The one in my hands was quite large compared to most rings, indicating high power. A small star was etched into the sparkling amethyst entwined with gold. I had never seen it before.
"Is it yours?" Axe asked.
I shook my head. "I have mine. And the Fluor ring is a grey moonstone, not amethyst."
"Your mother's?"
"No, it's at—just no."
It's at the bottom of a lake, I almost said. I decided to keep it to myself.
"I've never seen Echo wear this one," he said.
I shook my head in agreement. "Her's was a pearl."
"And it's not her mother's," Axe said. "I saw it on her finger during the funeral."
I shook my head, "I've never seen this ring before in my entire life."
"It was in Echo's grave," he said, leaning in closer. "It must've been important."
I stared at the ring in my hands. "But whose is it?"
Axe sighed and slipped the ring from my fingers and twirled it around. His fingers brushed mine as he did, but he didn't move his hand away. "I have an idea but I don't have any clear evidence and it's kind of crazy."
I tilted my head and stared, telling him to go on.
"After I found the ring, I started looking through as many pictures and documents of the Court as I could find," he reached into his pocket and took out a Tab, a small pen-like object. He clicked one side and a holographic image flickered in the air. He flipped through them.
"No matter how many pictures I searched, I could never find it on anyone's finger or listed in any documents. A star amethyst just didn't exist in the Court. And then, I found this picture," he tapped on a single picture, "Find the ring."
I looked closer at the picture of the entire main Court standing in perfect order beside their respective Crowns. I recognized it as a famous picture from the current ruling Crown's coronation. Staring at all of the Court's hands, the despair grew as I couldn't find a single ring that even minutely resembled the one in Axe's hand. Finally, I gave in.
"Where is it?" I sighed.
"Right," he zoomed in. "there."
Now, the main attention was on the Unassailable Queen standing a little bit behind her husband, the Crown Assassin. A small golden tiara was placed on her head, almost blending in with her bright blonde hair. An elaborate white dress hung down her sides. My eyes drifted down to her hand, heart beating in my ears. There, on her finger, was a purple gemmed ring. The symbol was blurry in the distance, but I could imagine it as a star.
"Impossible," I muttered.
"There's no other ring with the same exact color," Axe said. "And the symbol might not be clear, but it looks close enough to a star. Still, I wasn't sure and was kind of hoping you would have some other explanation to the ring, but..."
"This is crazy," I breathed. "Why would Echo steal the Queen's ring? How did she even manage it?"
"I don't think she stole it from the Queen," he said.
"But you just said-"
"Do you remember Daria Fortier?"
My mind whirled. Another Fortier? The story sounded familiar, but I came up blank.
"Arielle used to have a younger sister," he explained. "I think Daria was about a year younger than us. Most never saw much of her since their mother hid her away from the Court. My parents only notified me of her presence at Court meetings once, despite Arielle always being there. They said that she was very ill since birth and eventually, when we were about ten years old, she died. But, by custom, they should've given Daria her mother's ring by the time she was five."
"So Daria already had the ring when she had died," I pieced together. "And Echo stole a dead Royal's ring. But that still doesn't explain why."
Axe set down his Tab and sighed. "That's what we're going to figure out."
"You think that's what killed her? The secret behind this ring?"
He took a step closer, his breath now brushing my face as he handed me the ring. "I don't know, but it's the best bet we've got."
I looked up, meeting his eyes. The warm white light from the living room reflected against swirling brown pools. The smell of new cars and diesel wafted from him and I found it oddly comforting. He held out his hand.
"So, what do you say, Fluor," he raised an eyebrow and delivered a half-smirk. "Ready to partner up?"
I narrowed my eyes. "Depends. Would I just be partaking in another one of your suicidal ploys to get on the Alpha team?"
"Yes," he answered honestly. "When is it not?"
"This one better not make you the prime suspect of a murder."
Axe lifted a finger. "I would like to point out that in this case, you are the prime suspect."
"How?"
"You clearly have a vendetta against the Crowns. Perhaps you are using the excessive resources given to you as a member of the Alphas to kill multiple people of power."
"But no one even knows about my revenge plan!"
Axe shrugged. "Maybe. But you never know."
I sighed. He was right, of course. It was infuriating.
"So," he said, nodding to his still outstretched hand, "are we forging an alliance or shall I declare war?"
I rolled my eyes and placed my hand against his and shook. "Deal."
He smiled, the twinkle in his eyes far more brilliant than I would've expected. Our hands were clasped against each other longer than necessary, long enough for me to realize that it had been nearly a year since we held hands, the last time being at Echo's funeral when we had both been a mess. And I had been on the verge of doing something very irrational.
The memory of my uncontrolled state brought a bitter tang and I yanked my hand out of his, taking a step back. The light in his eyes dimmed for a moment, his face convoluting into a much more serious expression, and he opened his mouth to speak but was cut off by three sharp rasps against the door.
I turned to him, wide-eyed, and we paused for a brief second before springing into action. Pocketing the ring, I darted to the living room, shuffling all of the pictures and notes of Echo and I back into a messy pile and opened my shelf, trying to shove it back into the secret compartment. Axe, apparently deciding there wasn't enough time, snatched them out of my hands and flipped, diving behind the couch. I heard a soft thud and muffled cursing. He probably didn't stick the landing quite right.
So the asshole can do something wrong.
Someone knocked against the door again, impatiently, and I shoved the shelf shut and looked around once more before running for the door. Flinging it open, I found Arielle Fortier standing outside my door. My heart raced. Did she hear our conversation?
"Hi Indigo," she said smiling as if she was the world's sweetest, most perfect angel and not the cold-hearted Heir of the Crown and next ruler of the Assassins.
"Um, hi," I said. My voice sounded too timid, too unsure of itself. I cursed myself.
If Arielle noticed anything strange, she didn't say it. "I realize I haven't talked to you very much, which is why I was wondering if you would want to accompany Nydia and I outside of the school. We're going to be hanging out in a nearby town and I thought I would invite you, maybe get to know you better."
The way she phrased her words was strange, but I wrote it off as her not being used to socializing with people besides Xavier and Damien.
"Isn't it a bit late?" I replied as politely as I could. I didn't need to piss her off before I ever got close to her.
"We get the entire day off after missions," Arielle explained. "So we have time to sleep in."
"Where are we going?"
"Just to some of the local meeting spots," Arielle waved her hand. "You in?"
"Yeah, sure," I replied. This was the perfect opportunity to get closer to her, enough to covertly question her about the ring.
She clapped her hands. "Great! Meet us in the foyer at ten."
Arielle headed toward her room and I shut the door, locking it tightly and listening for when Arielle had entered her room before sighing in relief. Axe peaked his head out from behind the couch.
"She gone?"
I nodded and he climbed back out from his hiding spot, dusting spider webs off his arms.
"You should learn how to clean," he said, scowling. "I'd nearly swallowed a cockroach earlier when I checked behind your bookshelf for the notes."
I decided now was not the time to point out that a web was hanging from his hair with a spider still connected to it. Besides, he broke into my room. It's not my fault if he has a few embarrassing encounters with insects.
"Go find as much as you can on Daria Fortier. I'll try questioning Arielle discreetly," I told him.
"Don't lay it on too thick."
"I won't," I said. "And put the pictures back where they were. They better look exactly as they were when you found them."
"Yes mother," he mocked but did as ordered while I shoved off my shoes and weapons.
Finally, he straightened and I asked, "How will you get out?"
"The same way I came in. Through the door."
"There's people downstairs this time."
"Unlike certain others, I'm quite skilled at espionage."
"Unlike certain others, I don't shoot people off trees," I shot back.
Axe gave a small laugh. "You're fine now, aren't you?"
I only rolled my eyes in response. Axe walked past me with a nod. "Later, Fluor."
He slipped out the door, the spider, still hanging from his hair, flying behind him. For the first time in a while, a true smile found its way to my lips.