Royal Blood : Chapter 18 (Patreon)

Chapter 18: Royal Revelations

I didn’t know why my target was looking at me, but it couldn’t be a good thing. Maybe his observation skill had broken through my Conceal. Usually I could feel when that happened, but hell if I knew what other strange skills his classes would have.

I decided that discretion was the better part of Valor here. I’d gotten a look at my target, and knew that he busted a smuggler. Best to cut my losses here.

As I jogged farther away from the port at random, I flicked the note open since he hadn’t bothered to seal it. It just confirmed what I already knew: he wanted a few more guardsmen to come down to the port to seize the cargo, and apparently the woman’s benefactor would also be involved.

It meant that he’d be busy with this case for a while, then. I could work with that.

I looked up, catching eyes of another boy about my height. “Oi!” I waved him down. “You a runner?”

He looked at me warily. “Could be.”

I held out a message. “To th’ port office. Got too many so I’ll gib ya a slug fer it.” If Nezza did nothing else, she really helped me brush up on my vernacular.

He crossed his arms. “A silver.”

“Deal.” I pushed the message into his hands and flipped him the coin a second after. The slug I kept in my pocket.

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is called capitalism.

I made like I was running off on another errand, before doubling back under my sneak. It helped me blend into the crowds as I shadowed the other boy. Not to see if he’d deliver the missive—there was a bit of an unspoken code of honor among runners, based on the obvious fact that if no one delivered messages, no one would pay to send them—but to see what happened when he did.

It was a few minutes jogging to make it to the Port Offices farther south in the docks. I easily kept pace with my Endurance, falling a bit farther back as the kid rounded the last corner before the port office.

The building itself was built in the neo conservative style, with pillars and flared eves painted bright colors. I watched from the corner as the runner jogged up to guards at the gate, holding out his message. The two shared a look, asking a question.

One of them gestured for the boy to come inside.

I guess the magistrate had sent a word. Maybe he even sent his bodyguard. Shit, that would have been the perfect chance to nail my target and get out of town before things could go even more sideways.

The kid was street savvy, so he didn’t follow the big men inside the government building, not even when they offered him money.

Of course, that’s when the guard, and all guardsmen were at least level thirty before they were allowed important posts like this, snagged the boy by his shoulder and dragged him inside.

Well, shit.

I ducked back around the corner. I didn’t hold any illusions that he’d get out of this unscathed. If nothing else, they’d probably interrogate him about where he got the message.

For some reason, I felt worse about that than the murder I was about to commit.

Well, maybe I felt a little bit better about the oncoming murder.

First though, I had to get away from anywhere people would be looking for me. So I decided to get started with that.

I turned on a heel, stripping off my ratty old cloak and dumping it in a nearby alleyway. My clothes beneath were non-distinct, which was perfect. I dipped into an alleyway and shifted my two holdout daggers to my boots, shifting the sheaths to look like I was just wearing a somewhat fancy belt. Something like that still stood out, but less so than a kid carrying weapons.

I took a winding route back north to where I’d parted with Nezza, mind going a mile a minute. I had no idea why the Magistrate wanted me in custody. I had to assume he’d seen my class, but there wasn’t anything I could do about that.

As I came out on one of the main roads, I nabbed a brown cap from a passerby, ducking under a cart before his shout of outrage split the air.

It was a bit big for me, but that just meant I could tuck it low over my eyes. Hopefully that would make me harder to identify if Magistrate Scionus got my picture drawn up by some scribes; I knew most administrative classes had skills that helped with things like that. Meanwhile, I pondered my own next move.

I was still thinking when I wound my way back to that smithy I’d dropped Nezza at. She was loitering out front, perking up as she saw me.

“Aly!” She jogged over, big grin on her face. “Got th’ stuff ya wanted.” The she paused, blinking. “What happened to yer cloak? An’ that hat.”

I rolled my eyes. “Let’s walk and talk. You keep all the knives for now.” I waved to my simple dusty jerkin. “I don’t have anywhere to put them.”

She frowned at me, before nodding. Nezz could be a kid, but she also knew how to handle herself on a job. She pulled up her own hood, following me down the street as we meandered our way up to Queens Row.

“So?” she asked.

I shrugged, rolling my head back as if I was looking at the sky. Boss had taught me a thing or two about checking for tails, and we took a few more random turns until I was relatively sure we were clean.

There was always the chance someone with a high level was right behind me and I’d never notice. Hah.

“Magistrate saw me. Not sure what happened, but he sent someone after me.” I frowned. “I managed to dodge it, but some other runner got picked up in my place.”

Her eyes narrowed. “What did’ya do?”

I held up my hands. “Hey, what makes you think I did anything?”

“Alex.”

I huffed. “I…maybe traded placed with another runner.” I ducked her fist. “Oi!”

“Alex!” She glared at me. “Ya jus’ had to know.”

“I did!” I glared back just as fierce. “I didn’t know why the Magistrate was looking at me. Maybe he just didn’t like how dirty my face was. But no, it wasn’t just that.”

Her glare persisted a moment more, before her eyes furrowed. “What did’ya learn?”

I huffed. “They didn’t just haul him off the street. I don’t know why the guard would do something like that unless…” I stopped as the pieces finally clicked into place. “Fuck.” I shook my head. “Fuck!”

“Huh?” Nezz looked at me like a grew another head. “What?”

“I—” I stopped talking so fast I almost bit my tongue. Then I looked around. We were in the middle of an ever flowing crowd of people, and no one looked like they were paying attention to us, but this wasn’t the type of thing I could just talk about.

I couldn’t keep leaving Nezza in the dark though. Forget that played-out romcom nonsense.

“Come with me,” I said.

Nezza raised an eyebrow, but she must have seen something in my expression, because she followed along without another word. I lead us farther north, towards the boundary between the Docks and the Imperial Quarter.

Slowly, the crowd thinned out as we drew closer to the more affluent part of the city. Still, then we’d stick out for different reasons.

Eventually, I pulled Nezza down yet another alleyway, climbing up a brick wall to hop up on the roof of an empty warehouse. Nezz clambered up after me, and I held out my hand.

We’d been together for long enough that she knew what I wanted. Reaching out, she slapped her palm into my own and slipped into dagger form.

I sighed, sitting down on the roof. The sky above was cloudless blue, and the burble of the city rose up around me. It was almost peaceful.

If not for that the Magistrate knew I was Prince Alexander Nevarius.

Still, no reason to put it off any longer. “You know how you always say I know a bunch about the Empire?” I started idly spinning Nezza’s Bite in my grip, the familiar handle whispering over my fingers with practiced ease. “Well, there’s a reason for that.”

And then I told her.

I told her that I was a Prince, and that I’d been kidnapped.

I told her that I couldn’t just go back, because there was some contract hanging over my head, that may or may not involve an actual goddess.

I told her that even if I could, I wouldn’t go back anyway, because someone in the Palace had it out for my sister, and maybe even the sister I actually cared about.

And then I wrapped it all up with the fact that Magistrate Scionus probably knew all of this as well.

“That’s…a lot.”

One good thing about thought communication is that I didn’t have to worry about anything getting lost in translation. I could give Nezz a clear sense of what I meant.

“Yeah,” I replied. “Sorry for dumping all of this on you out of the blue. I figured that it would only get worse if I waited any longer.”

There was a long pause. And I got the kind of sense that Nezza was chewing over her thoughts. Then, “When would you have told me?”

I hummed, looking down at the dagger in my grip. It was amazing how natural it felt in my hand. “When it mattered, just like I did right now.” That much, at least, was honest.

“And if it didn’t matter, and you just…got to go back to being a prince?”

I rolled my eyes. “Well, I’d make sure you didn’t go hungry ever again. And probably give you all the gold and shiny things you could ask for, if you wanted to leave.”

“Oh hell no! You’re not getting rid of me that easy!”

I laughed. “Then I’d keep you with me. Hell, I could probably get you a nice title too. Like Marquessa. How’d you like that?”

This time, I sensed surprise when she paused. “Just like that?”

“Even for the Imperial Family, Soul Weapons don’t just grow on trees. And if I do return in triumph, something like that will be almost trivial.” I shrugged. “Really, I should have been selecting people for my future household at like, eight. Just no one cared about me then.”

“Because of your blessing?”

I nodded. I could tell she got the picture.

“Okay.”

I blinked. Looking down. “Okay what?”

“I’ll stick with you, no matter what.” I could hear the grin in her thoughts. “Aaaaand when we make it back to the palace and you get to be a fancy prince again, you’ll make me a Shiny Marcheesy.”

I couldn’t help it, I laughed. “Deal. And it’s Marchessa.”

“Who cares. Deal!” She paused. “I got a new racial quest!”

“What, really? Just from that?”

“It says…‘Fulfill my first worthwhile bargain’, or something.”

“Put a kidnapped prince back on his throne?” I looked up at the sky. “That does sound like a pretty worthwhile quest, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah! Course, we have to deal with your job first.”

I nodded. “Good thing I have an idea about that. It came to me while we were talking.”

“Ooh! What is it, Aly? Or should it be Prince Aly?”

I rolled my eyes. “Call me whatever you want.” Then I grinned. “And as for my plan, well. If the Magistrate knows I’m the prince, and knows I ran away from him, where’s the last place he’d expect me to show up?”

The perfect place to set a trap.