The Fix [Original Dark Fantasy, Mystery, Thriller]

[Fuzed]

Tenzin hated the rain because it weakened the freshly applied glue beneath his disguise. Wet leaves rustled underfoot as he rushed for cover to check whether he still looked the way he wanted to—the way they expected him to. Sheltered beneath the overhang of a closed storefront, he inspected his reflection in the darkened window. It was a rush job, he knew, but the unexpected contract had demanded haste. It would have to do. The rain showed no sign of easing. Tenzin pulled the flap of his coat over his head and ran towards his destination.

The building blended in with the opulence of the surrounding neighbourhood. Even so, Tenzin hadn't expected the Family to summon him to this part of the city. The Hexman who delivered the message had given him the gist of the situation, but seeing his destination raised more questions than it answered. He would need to exercise greater caution than usual. The three Rings on his left index, middle and pinky fingers, concealed beneath a black leather glove, provided some reassurance. He twisted the crimson marble Ring on his index finger three times through the leather — a ritual of sorts — and stepped out of the darkness.

Immediately, a nervous bulk of a man raised an even bulkier hand to stop him. Tenzin dropped a single coin of white marble onto the floor without breaking stride, and the tension left the guard almost miraculously. The guard knew the sign, the Merciful Crowns be thanked! If Tenzin had to deal with yet another confused zealot of the Families, he might just consider packing up for good.

No, he could never do that. He needed this as much as they needed him.

"You him?" the bulk said, his tenor voice belying his stature.

"Where?" Tenzin asked, keeping his speech clipped around the Uninitiated. The inner circle of the Families lived by a code that afforded him certain liberties in how he behaved and what he said. Those who weren't born into the Family but hired into it — the Uninitiated, as they had been called for decades — wouldn't necessarily be so tight-lipped with information that might earn them some extra marble. Of course, most would fear incurring the Patriarch's anger. Especially if the patriarch in question was Itzel Kukulkan. But in Tenzin's line of work, a man did not live as long as he had by trusting in the selflessness or common sense of strangers.

"Inside." The man pulled open the large wooden doors and gestured Tenzin through. The hinges creaked, an eerie accompaniment to his entrance. Barely any light reached the long hallway, but Tenzin could make out a large wooden armoire beneath the staircase and a much smaller table against the opposite wall. The space between them was unusually narrow for an entry hall. At the far end, a flicker of light betrayed a fire burning somewhere beyond. Unintelligible voices drifted towards him, only to fall silent at the sound of a much older voice. A steady rhythm of metallic clicking followed.

Still using that damned cane, I see, Tenzin thought as a hunched figure in a suit appeared at the end of the hall.

"You're late, g'damn you." The old man turned and waved for Tenzin to follow.

Tenzin hadn't expected the room with the fireplace to be so spacious or so crowded. He immediately recognised Itzel Kukulkan, patriarch of the Kukulkan Family. The man was difficult to miss, even in the dim light, with his hunched back, snarling face and, most importantly, the metal-tipped cane. Even without considering his enterprise, Itzel was a notorious figure in Belshazzar society. Tenzin also recognised his eldest son, Xanat. It was a running joke amongst those brave enough to repeat it that Xanat was the result of Itzel's wife stepping outside their marriage. Compared to his father, he stood at least three heads taller and half a torso wider. Age had only widened the contrast.

Xanat's wife was also in attendance, which was odd. She kept herself clear of Family business and pretended her husband was a respectable agricultural magnate, rather than a scummy leebark farmer and the largest drug distributor in the country. What truly sent a chill down Tenzin's spine, however, was the youngest Kukulkan present, whom he recognised only because of her striking resemblance to her mother. Ixchel, the Patriarch's granddaughter and Xanat's eldest daughter, was only seventeen and was kept as far from Family business as the constraints of reality allowed.

A single line of thought broke through the void Tenzin cultivated around his mind whenever he worked: This is bad. This is personal.

Tenzin waited. He had been summoned and wouldn't beg for an explanation. From the way Ixchel cried against her mother's shoulder, however, he could safely assume the job had something to do with her.

"We need discretion. Even more than usual, Fix," Itzel said. In his raspy old voice, the name Tenzin used for this particular persona sounded almost like a slur. "This is a… private matter." He shot a quick, spiteful glance at his granddaughter.

Before Tenzin could reply, Itzel lowered his cane towards a tarp covering something suspiciously human-shaped. A marble snowtiger formed the head of the cane — the crest of the Kukulkan Family. Its protruding teeth caught the edge of the tarp and, with a sharp tug, Itzel pulled it aside to reveal what Tenzin had expected. A pair of ashen, pedicured feet appeared beneath the undignified cover.

Tenzin scanned the room again, and a picture began to form. A body on the floor, presumably naked beneath the tarp. A teary-eyed seventeen-year-old girl clutching her mother for support. And, most importantly, a fuming father. Tenzin hadn't noticed it before, but Xanat looked furious. There was a particular kind of anger a father felt when somebody so much as thought of wronging his child. Tenzin had seen it several times before, and almost always it was the eyes that betrayed it.

He looked back at the girl, studying her face and clothes without drawing her father's attention. If his suspicions were correct, staring at her too openly might be dangerous. The torn fabric of her shirt corroborated the story forming in his mind.

Something was wrong, however. The mosaic Tenzin was piecing together had a gaping hole at its centre, one he couldn't seem to fill.

He was a Fixer. The Solutionmaker, some called him. People came to him when they needed a complex problem broken down into something smaller, something manageable. With enough marble thrown his way, Tenzin could make the problem disappear entirely. All on his own.

But this… this was already simple. It was a body.

Whether the girl had killed the man when he tried to force himself on her, or had merely witnessed the brutality of her Family firsthand, wasn't important yet. Either way, the Kukulkan Family was more than capable of making a body vanish, by magical means or otherwise.

So why was Tenzin here?

"We need him disappeared," the old man said, letting the tarp fall back over the remains of the recent tragedy. "Quietly."

"Do not insult me by stating the obvious, Itzel," Tenzin said coldly as he moved towards the body. He bent down to pull the tarp away completely, but a gentle tap of cold marble against his shoulder stopped him.

"Do not be misled, Fix," the old man said. "Once you pull back the rest of the tarp, you'll understand the gravity of the situation. Go ahead."

Tenzin looked at the small snowtiger staring back at him. Itzel slowly lifted the cane from his shoulder, a not-so-subtle reminder of the current balance of power.

He's nervous, Tenzin realised.

It was a terrible omen: an oppressor becoming cordial.

The tarp was much lighter than it looked and surprisingly soft to the touch. In desperate enough circumstances, it could almost have passed for a blanket. Tenzin thought back to the war years and what he would have given for something like it then.

Yet even in those days, when viscera and death had been part of his daily existence, he had never felt the kind of dread that seized him as he lifted the upper half of the tarp and revealed those unmistakable rust-coloured locks.

The eyes staring back at him seemed innocent. Scared, even.

And yet they terrified Tenzin more than almost anything else could have.

Beneath the tarp lay the still-warm body of Tika Bat-Erdene, young heir to the Bat-Erdene Family.

Munay Bat-Erdene had been robbed of his only male son.

Tenzin could only imagine the wrath the Bat-Erdene Family would unleash upon the city if the truth ever came out. And it was his task to make sure it never did.

The foundations of destiny seemed to shift beneath him as he stared at the dead young man whose murder might finally tip the scales towards the inevitable war.

 

[Fuzed]

Whenever Tenzin was in the mood for a joke, he would tell himself that he might have been a dancer in a previous life. How else could he explain having danced along a knife's edge for so long without losing his footing and slicing his neck open against the blade as he fell? As he watched his own expression reflected in those glassy eyes, only two thoughts ran through his mind: one was of his family; the other, of a dancer stumbling and falling, his disembodied head leaving a smear of blood along the knife. A recurring nightmare had finally come to life.

Maybe not all was lost, Tenzin thought. He needed details before he could formulate a plan. "What happened?"

To his surprise, it wasn't the patriarch who spoke, but the girl. "He's my boyfriend," she said in a shaky voice. Tenzin had never heard her speak before, and he was struck by how similar her voice was to the patriarch's, though hers lacked the rasp that came with age. "But I didn't want him to… He tried to force himself onto me, and I…"

Her father came to her rescue, his voice thick with a father's fury. "That swirling swine tried to rape my daughter! She did well to defend herself, and he got what he deserved! What every Bat-Erdene in this city deserves!"

"SILENCE!" the patriarch shouted, then dissolved into a nasty coughing fit. He steadied himself against the chair beside him. "You do yourself no favours by speaking in such a manner in front of an outsider, my dear son."

"My apologies, Patriarch," Xanat said, chastened into meekness. "It's only that—"

"It's only that I raised you to be a mild-mannered man, yet you dishonour not only yourself and this Family but, most importantly, me. Keep your mouth shut if you can't control what comes out of it!" He punctuated the rebuke with a sharp rap of his cane against the marble floor. Tenzin noted the irony of the outburst.

Tenzin pretended to study the body while covertly watching the people around him. Xanat's cold eyes caught his attention. The anger Tenzin had identified earlier was still there, but something else pierced its thick veil: disdain. Xanat wasn't looking at the lifeless body sprawled across the marble. He was looking at the hunched patriarch, who had turned his full attention back to the matter at hand.

"I believe you can work out what happened for yourself. As for what I need you to do, I won't insult you by explaining that, either."

Tenzin stood and surveyed the walls, bare of paintings. There were no marble busts or personal memorabilia anywhere. Despite the warm light flickering across the room, the place felt cold. "What is this house?"

"That is of no import at this moment," Itzel said.

"It is when I say it is," Tenzin said, locking eyes with the stubborn old patriarch.

Tenzin watched as Itzel worked his gums in thought, then clicked his tongue and sighed in defeat. "One of our safe houses. Useless now that you've seen it, naturally."

"How 'safe' is this house, exactly?" Tenzin asked, glancing at the dead scion of a rival Family.

Itzel didn't reply at first. He glanced at his granddaughter, one corner of his mouth twitching upward involuntarily. "I suppose you had better make haste," he said, turning back to Tenzin.

Once again, Tenzin crouched and looked beneath the tarp. The blood surrounding a massive gash just to the left of the boy's sternum had begun to dry. Judging by the wound's width and the blood coating his naked torso, the blade must have severed a major artery near the heart. He must have died within minutes. A pattern of contusions surrounded the wound, barely visible beneath the drying blood. The imprint left by the hilt seemed distinctive, but Tenzin didn't recognise it.

Luckily, the floor was marble rather than wood, and the grout joints showed expert craftsmanship. The cleanup itself would be easy. The situation would prove more difficult.

"Who knew about you two?" Tenzin asked the young girl, who was still clinging tightly to her mother.

"Nobody," she replied. "I mean…" She hesitated, glancing around the room. "Nobody except us here." Her gaze fell to the body, and she shuddered.

He knew, too, Tenzin thought. Before you killed him.

"The Bat-Erdene Family?" Tenzin turned to the patriarch. "Any chance this was a ploy? An attempt to plant a mole in your operation?"

The old man scoffed. "Munay's precious son? Sent into the trenches? Don't be ridiculous."

"Merely confirming the facts," Tenzin said, circling the body. He examined the spread of the blood and concluded that it had mercifully remained confined to the immediate crime scene. The boy lay beside a large L-shaped settee, its beige cushions also smeared with blood. "Where did you put the knife?"

The patriarch winced at the question, working his gums as though struggling with the answer. "She… panicked," was all he said, but the glance he cast towards the window at the far end of the room explained the rest. Tenzin moved closer despite the panic creeping into his mind. He knew what lay below. The rush of water was audible even through the closed window. Darkness obscured the view, but he estimated that the river lay fifty metres below, its nearest bank at least ten metres from the base of the cliff. This entire part of the city stood atop a broad clifftop overlooking the Kallaru.

"Did you at least get it into the river?" Tenzin kept his growing annoyance with the girl out of his voice.

"I-I heard a splash," the girl stammered. The constant rush of water from below seemed to mock her answer.

"I see," Tenzin replied, making a mental note to inspect the area below the window from outside. "Anything else I should know?" His gaze moved from the patriarch to the young girl, who was crying again and murmuring apologies into her mother's shoulder. "From any of you?"

"That you should watch your tone when speaking to my family," Itzel said, inching closer. The snowtiger head of his cane jabbed Tenzin lightly in the shoulder. "If you mess this one up…" He left the threat unfinished, but it was no less sincere than any he had voiced aloud.

Tenzin smiled—not nervously, but with genuine enjoyment. Powerful people made threats when they were afraid, not when they were in control. He could push his luck and—

The creak of hinges echoed through the room, and everyone immediately tensed, turning towards the entrance. The bulky man guarding the door dashed inside and spoke without preamble: "The Constabulary is coming. Lots of them!"

It was Tenzin's turn to place a hand on Itzel's shoulder. The old man was trembling now, far more than age alone could explain. "Some safe house you have here, Patriarch. My rates have just doubled."

 

[Fuzed]

Xanat sprinted past his wife and daughter to peer out the window at the far end of the room. Tenzin knew him well enough to read his body language, which was why it came as a surprise that the tension in his shoulders vanished.

"They're hiding around the corner," he said after a while. "And I think I see Vikram Dhar in the mix. He's in charge. Isn't he in Munay's pocket? In any case, they are waiting for something."

Itzel clicked his tongue. "Well, Fixer. Do your job and be quick about it. I don't care a rat's arse about your rates, just make sure we're safe."

Xanat let the drapes drop and turned to face the room. "They need probable cause or a warrant to search us. I suspect they have the latter for an operation of this size, but I have the right to demand and see it. I will question everything, starting with the judge that greenlit this and ending with the way they are conducting the operation." He looked at Tenzin. "Use the time. I won't hold them for long."

Oftentimes, Tenzin forgot that Xanat was a rather capable lawyer. When not beneath his father's forceful gaze, he was a force to be reckoned with in his own right.

But one question bothered Tenzin. Why would Vikram be here? He knew Vikram was an asset of the Bat-Erdenes, which was why he kept a close eye on him. But why had Munay sent him here now? Did he know about Tika's fling? Was there a ploy of some sort that involved Tika as bait? Unlikely…

Tika Bat-Erdene was a ruthless child. Everyone knew that, and his mother struggled on many occasions to keep him in check. In fact, it was Tenzin himself who had cleaned several messes the boy had made over the years, especially when he had discovered his nether regions weren't only for pissing. But Munay would never sacrifice him for the Family's advantage. His only son was a valued possession. In a way, Tika had been an echo of his father, only a couple of decades younger. What would have to happen for him to sacrifice the boy in this manner?

His personal motivations aside, how could he have even predicted all of this? It seemed too great a risk. Betting on this scenario seemed unwise, even in the kindest of terms. Munay Bat-Erdene was a sly old fox. He wouldn't risk running such an operation — which, if it truly had been Munay's, would cost him tons of money and accrued favours — with a cosmically minimal chance of a favourable outcome. Then it clicked. What if it wasn't a sacrifice at all?

"Where are his clothes?" Tenzin asked, pulling attention back towards him. "His trousers or coat. Anything with pockets."

"We burnt them," Itzel said.

Tenzin groaned, rushing towards the fireplace. "Which part of 'Don't touch anything' isn't clear to you, Itzel?"

"Watch your tone, Fixer. They were just clothes! You would have burnt them anyhow. I've seen you work on several occasions."

The fireplace was fully ablaze, but the last vestiges of what surely used to be form-fitted and tailored garb were still visible, covered in ash. Tenzin searched through the assortment of tools in the metal stand next to the fireplace and picked up a poker with a hook. He reached into the fireplace and took out the mostly burnt coat before searching for a little longer. The trousers were also there, luckily preserved thanks to a small gap between the logs. They weren't as badly burnt as he would have imagined.

Tenzin threw both garments onto the cold marble floor and left them to cool. The occupants of the room watched in surprise and confusion. Xanat stepped closer to his father. "You understand what's happening, father?" Itzel didn't even look at him, his eyes piercing the Fixer. Tenzin was focused on the possibilities, evaluating whether his theory could be right.

"Xanat," Tenzin said, calling the lawyer's attention. He was already adjusting his coat in preparation for stepping out into the cold. He would have to argue like his life depended on it. In a way, it actually did. "Be a dear, before you go out, take another look. Can you see Cyrus Kaveh out there?"

Itzel was now beside Tenzin, standing over the cooling clothes with him. "Why would Kaveh be here? He's in charge of white-collar crime. And besides, his hands are busy with that jewellery heist of the century that…" He trailed off. "He's there," Xanat said, slowly backing away from the window. "Why would he be here? How did you know? Father?"

The cane clattered to the ground, the sound echoing through the silent room. Itzel Kukulkan, patriarch of the Kukulkan clan, arguably one of the most powerful men in the city—royalty notwithstanding—fell to his knees and started searching through the burnt pants. His bony hands slid into one pocket, then the next, returning empty. Then, he crawled over to the cloak, which had two pockets on the outside, wholly burnt off by now, but he checked them nonetheless. His hand slid through, and only the tips of his fingers peered out from behind the fabric. Then, he ran his hand across the cloak, stopping roughly in the middle. Right around where Tenzin expected the inner pocket to have been.

Six days ago, on a dark and gloomy night, much like this one, the Serpentine Archives — home to the priceless artefacts of past kings, clergy and spoils of war — were robbed. An unidentified number of men had entered the building by means unknown, though one Constable had been found dead by the rear service entrance, providing at least some idea as to how it had all happened. From what Tenzin had heard from his sources, the Constabulary thought the whole ordeal was over in less than thirteen minutes. The culprits escaped with some of the most valuable jewellery that had once belonged to the late queen. The largest collection of Red Marble not used for magical purposes had been stolen from one of the most well-guarded bastions on the continent.

Tenzin had attempted to piece information together from the many thieves he employed as his eyes-and-ears. But nobody knew anything. They were a tight community, but they were thieves. Not even honour appealed to them more than money. This situation was unique, however, because despite his very spirited and motivational inquiries, everyone truly seemed to be clueless. The Constabulary was spearheading the cluelessness movement, which made them a laughingstock among the people and especially among the thieves, who felt emboldened by the seeming incompetence. In a way, it was a gift in disguise, for the Constabulary had never made so many arrests of notorious criminals in a single week.

Everyone knew of the robbery. Everyone knew what was stolen. Which was why the tremor that shook the patriarch's hand, as it receded from the dark crevice of the cloak, was so violent. Resting in the tender grasp of his bony fingers was a single necklace, made of red marble and silver. A great deal of red marble for a necklace. Tenzin would wager that even Itzel, with his crime syndicate that spanned the country, hadn't ever seen that much wealth in one place, let alone held it in his hand. The cultural significance aside, the hefty piece had to be at least four kilos of dense, red marble.

"Please tell me that isn't what I think it is," Xanat said. "Please, for the love of the merciful pantheon."

The final piece of the puzzle — the necklace. It was so simple, really. Tika was a good-looking young man. Charming, from what Tenzin had heard. He would get in Ixchel's good graces and enact a story as old as time itself. Forbidden lovers, sneaking behind their oppressive parents' backs. Only, the young prince had a wholly different motive, planted in the boy's head by his own father, no doubt. Whether the jewellery heist had always been part of the plan or a fortunate opportunity well utilised was of no consequence now. What mattered was that the plan went awry when Tika couldn't rein in his carnal urges and ended up bleeding out on the cold marble floor, stabbed by his own victim. In a way, that was a blessing in disguise. What seemed like the end of the world had been exactly what allowed Tenzin to be here in time for the situation to be remedied.

"We need to get rid of it," Tenzin said. "We're out of time."

The patriarch clutched the necklace in a death grip. He was hesitating. Hesitation killed. Tenzin grabbed the necklace, and his Black marble Ring glowed beneath the glove. Nobody except him knew the Ring was there, but they all saw the invaluable piece of jewellery get swallowed by the void and vanish. Tenzin's dimensional storage was now host not only to countless cleaning tools, which he would have to withdraw shortly, but also the most valuable possession of a once-beloved queen. Suddenly, the Ring on his finger felt heavy and oppressive.

"You can have it back after we're done here, for all I care," Tenzin said. That was true. As valuable as it was, it was also useless. Nobody would ever buy it for anything significant; it was a death warrant in the form of a necklace. And breaking it down into pieces wasn't possible. The magic applied during its forging was so sophisticated, nobody had ever found a way to reverse it without destroying the materials it had been applied to. For all practical purposes, it was worthless junk. That was the rationale Tenzin tried to apply to keep his voice from shaking.

"Cyrus Kaveh was released by Bat-Erdene like a hound going for your neck." Tenzin glanced around the room at the occupants. "All of your necks. As destiny might have it, it is the shittiest of situations that end up moving us forward the most. Today, you were saved by your granddaughter's bravery, Itzel. Don't fuck it up now, and let me do my job." He accentuated the last words with a clipped rhythm.

Silence, broken only by the crackling of firewood, ruled the room for a couple of seconds. Then, Itzel nodded. "What do you need, Fix?" The condescension and fear were both gone, replaced by a grim resolve to save his family and himself.

"You're quite the wine lover, Itzel," Tenzin said, moving towards the body. "Does this place have a wine cellar?"

"Of course it has a wine cellar!" Itzel replied, indignant at the seemingly unnecessary question. "What do you take me for? I would never buy a place without a wine cellar."

Tenzin moved aside the tarp and revealed the full body. A whimper echoed from somewhere behind him, and the sobbing returned, louder than before. "Any large barrels of red wine?"

"Some," Itzel said. Then, the realisation dawned on him, and he hobbled over to Tenzin. He still hadn't retrieved his cane. "You are not dropping that dead body in my red wine!"

"Great. White, then, if you must. But the stench will be much worse and noticeable much sooner."

"You are not dropping a body into my wine, Fixer! Do you know how expensive those barrels are? I could pay your exorbitant fee with half a barrel."

Tenzin started manipulating the body. It was still lukewarm. That terrible plateau between life and death, where there was still some vestige of life in the flesh, but the person was long gone. He lifted it up to check if the knife had pierced all the way through to the back. No, it hadn't. The front was already dried, but if he moved the body around too much, the wound would begin bleeding again.

His Black Ring thrummed and glowed beneath the glove, and a large ball of white linen appeared in his hand. He stuffed it into the gash, resulting in an uncomfortable squishing sound as the wound reopened, but it would soak up the blood on the way to the cellar, preventing any droplets from falling onto the marble tiles and leaving a trail of breadcrumbs towards damnation.

"Xanat, you should go and do your thing," Tenzin commanded. "And send in the thick neck standing outside. I'll need someone who can drag a body around." Tenzin looked at Itzel, smirking at the irony, as the old man barely held himself upright before leaning against his cane. Xanat left, and soon thereafter his substitute came in. Tenzin instructed him. "Under the shoulders. We don't want to drag him across the ground. The less shaking and dragging we do, the lower the risk of blood being left behind somewhere. Itzel, lead the way to your least fine red wine. Or white, if you truly must. Make haste."

The old man wasn't completely on board with the idea. In fact, he was very much off board, as the frequent grumbling suggested. But he understood the importance of listening to Tenzin when it came to these matters. He didn't pay him the unseemly amounts of money for his charming repartee.

Tenzin rushed the two men forward. With the Marble Guard lining up outside, he would need every second, and he wasn't sure how long Xanat would hold them off. Munay most likely had given Vikram Dhar a fixed time.

Luckily, the way down was short and simple. Itzel went down the row of barrels, inspecting each label for far too long for Tenzin's liking. He was about to produce a snide remark, but then the old man rested his cane against one of the barrels and opened it. He looked inside, took a noseful of the aroma and groaned. "Gods be damned, Fixer. In with that little fucker. As if he hadn't fucked my evening enough, even dead, he manages to sour my mood."

"And your wine," Tenzin added, unable to help himself. They heaved the body into the wine with as much finesse as its bulk allowed. Luckily, the barrel was only half-full, so there was no spillage to complicate the situation any further. Without a word, Tenzin turned and rushed upstairs. He didn't need the two of them for this final part.

The cleanup was tedious, but with experience, Tenzin had learnt what worked best for blood. Blood on marble made the situation all the easier. The cushions would prove more problematic, but he had used a certain trick for that once or twice. When he got upstairs, Ixchel and her mother were no longer there. He didn't much care for their whereabouts, except insofar as their absence introduced an unknown that could end up blowing up his plans.

His Black Ring glowed again, and the Form of Space allowed him to withdraw his cleaning paraphernalia. The rush of the job forced an involuntary smile on his lips, which would certainly seem odd — outright diabolical — to anybody who saw a man kneeling in front of a drying pool of blood. But it was the sense of progress that provided that rush. The feeling that, after a few minutes, what was once dirty would be clean. It grounded Tenzin. It was a method he had used in the army all those years back, even during the war.

Progress breeds contentment, his superior officer used to say. Of course, he meant it more in the sense that gaining a dozen metres of ground in exchange for two thousand dead men still counted as progress, but still. The sentiment accompanied Tenzin for most of his life.

When the floor showed no more signs of crimson, Tenzin dismissed his cleaning tools back into the Ring. Itzel returned just then. His bodyguard was nowhere to be found.

"Where is your granddaughter?"

"Upstairs. Resting."

"Good," Tenzin said, once again helping himself to an iron poker. This time, he let it rest in the embers as he spoke. "Keep her up there. Don't let her speak to the constables. Say she's sick. Throw around your weight, threaten to contact their superiors, or call in favours. No matter what, she cannot speak to them. She's weak. She'll break fast."

"Her mother's genes," Itzel muttered, barely loud enough for Tenzin to hear.

"Afterwards, let them search the house. They are after the pendant. Most likely, there was a prearranged hiding spot somewhere here in this room. They will search it carefully. Don't alert them to the wine cellar, but if they ask about it, be truthful. If they attempt to open a wine barrel, throw a fit. Curse them out and complain. They will want to open one or two, most likely for the sake of proper procedure. But if they don't find the necklace in the expected hiding spot, Vikram will quickly wrap it up. Regardless, we need to push the wine barrel with Tika's body to the back. Let's not make it worth their effort to move several rows of barrels."

The iron poker was now orange, and Tenzin took it out of the fire. He walked over to the settee and placed it against the bloody portions of the cushioning. A searing hiss and a brief lick of flame accompanied the black smoke rising from the settee. After a few more seconds, there were no more blood specks anywhere. Tenzin returned the poker to its original place in the stand and rushed to open the back window. The smoke in the room was visible now, and hopefully, it would clear a bit before the constables rushed in. The rest would be attributed to an old chimney system.

"And how am I supposed to explain that?" Itzel asked, more dejected than angry at the sight of his undoubtedly expensive settee, now a patchwork of burn marks.

"Tell them you and your granddaughter had a disagreement of sorts. In her anger, she decided to destroy your favourite piece of furniture. Long ago, naturally." Tenzin walked over to Itzel and rested his hand on the old man's shoulder. "I'm sure you'll be more than able to sell that story to them."

Tenzin went downstairs, and together with Itzel and the bodyguard, moved the heavy barrels around. Looking at the ground, he noticed a clear layer of dust across most of the floor, except where he had cleaned the blood and moved the barrels. So, Tenzin bent down and started wiping the dust clean. He sent the two men upstairs to make sure nobody was moving in. He would be screwed if they moved in now while he was in the cellar with no escape. Once Tenzin was finished, he checked the room for any other signs of blood. He could see none, so he went upstairs, where the two men were waiting. After a thorough scan, no more signs of the struggle showed themselves.

Then the shouts outside intensified, and Tenzin realised it was time. By the time Itzel looked back at the Fixer, Tenzin was already dashing out through the window onto the narrow cliff-edge behind the house. He pointed at his cloak pocket, signalling that Itzel should look there later, where he would find a note with a simple message:

Payment as usual. Only double.

For the first time in a long while, Tenzin felt like he had truly deserved the egregious amounts he was charging for his services. It was a task well done. Now only one piece was left. Clambering over the rough terrain of the cliff was dangerous, but it was nothing Tenzin hadn't traversed before. Even that failed to distract him from the fact that a priceless artefact was now in his possession and could just as easily vanish, never to be found by the world again.

 

[Fuzed]

The precipice on which Tenzin stood didn't afford him much freedom of movement. Regardless, he carefully scanned the ground for any glint of metal. He found no knife in the immediate vicinity. A perfunctory scan of the slope below revealed nothing either. He was fairly certain that if he couldn't find the knife while purposefully looking for it, the constables weren't likely to stumble across it by pure happenstance. Satisfied, he moved on, slowly trudging through the tall foliage along the narrow natural ledge.

After Tenzin successfully clambered out of the thinnest section of the cliff, which stretched for over a hundred metres, the ground gradually widened into a proper path. Eventually, he came upon a low fence and climbed over it into a private garden.

Tenzin gingerly stepped into the dark backyard, making sure nobody was watching him from the windows. Everything remained dark, so he decided to move a little faster, sacrificing stealth for a quicker escape. Once he reached the front gate, he looked to the left and saw constables standing outside the safehouse, their carriages blocking off that section of the street. A crowd had already gathered in front of them, so nobody was likely to notice a lone dark figure climbing a garden fence and walking away.

Soon, the clatter of hooves sounded against the cobbles behind him, and Tenzin turned to face the approaching cart. Judging by his clothes, the man was some poorly paid delivery driver or another. He had probably been turned around by the blockade. His incessant grumbling, occasionally punctuated by pejoratives directed at the Constabulary, made that a reasonably safe assumption.

Whether seeing a stranger wave him down in the middle of the street increased his irritation wasn't immediately apparent, mostly because the man already looked about as angry as a person could. Tenzin risked it regardless. He was confident a little marble would go some way towards calming the man's nerves. The driver slowed as he reached Tenzin, but didn't stop.

"What'dya want?"

"Mind taking a lad a little way south? Seems to be your direction anyhow." Tenzin flashed a single black coin for the man as incentive.

"Sure," the driver said, sounding about as enthusiastic as a man cursing the Constabulary moments earlier could be. They picked up pace as soon as the coin vanished into the man's pocket.

Tenzin seated himself next to him, making enough idle conversation to blend into the monotony of the night and become yet another face in the crowd. The driver asked about the blockade behind them, and Tenzin merely replied that he had no idea what it was about either. The man didn't seem to make any connection between the mysterious passenger and the ruckus behind them. The topic didn't come up again. After fifteen minutes, Tenzin asked the man to stop and drop him off. He was still a couple of blocks away from his destination, but being dropped off here on the main street would arouse less suspicion. By the time the carriage turned the corner, Tenzin was already heading in the opposite direction towards the industrial complex.

Many years ago, Tenzin's father had taken him to see his new factory. It wasn't terribly large, nor was it a piece of art. But it was honest brickwork, and it would have earned their family enough money to live comfortably. And then came the Velesian War. Non-essential production was halted, its infrastructure converted to weapons manufacture. His father's wooden toy shop was about as far from 'necessary' as possible, so it was one of the first to be seized and repurposed without recompense. Tenzin remembered seeing it only once as a child. He also vividly recalled lying in bed some years later, thinking he would never again set foot in the factory which had given his father so much hope and heartbreak in the span of a month. But destiny had twisted his path in a manner that the boy he had been could not possibly have imagined, even had he tried.

The whole complex — his father's factory included — was now abandoned. Two more wars had been waged since the Velesian War, and only in the first of those had the complex seen active use. Afterwards, it had become obsolete, and the falling cost of importing modern machinery had greatly diminished the district's appeal. New facilities were built on the outskirts of the city instead, and this relic had been forgotten.

It had been a quiet evening ten years earlier when a letter addressed to him as his father's sole heir arrived. Without any grandeur or apology, ownership of the now-decrepit factory was restored to him, and the public books were updated to show him as the rightful owner by inheritance. He had thought little of it at the time, until one day, while searching for somewhere to establish a base of operations, he remembered the factory.

Many others had received similar letters. As luck would have it, roughly eight years ago, a wave of foreign companies began investing in the district, buying up most of the land within six months at marginal prices. The owners were glad for whatever money they could get in the miserable economy, and nobody bothered to investigate who they had actually sold their land to. Even though the entire district was now owned by a plethora of foreign companies, there was almost no activity there. If anybody had bothered to truly investigate them, they would have discovered that every trail eventually led back to the same man — the one now walking through the gated entrance of the brick factory that had once shattered his father's dreams.

After buying up the surrounding land, he put the factory itself through a series of transactions as well. Ultimately, ownership ended up in the hands of yet another foreign company, which ostensibly used the building to store rarely used assets. On paper, a basic security system had been installed, accounting for the monthly electricity expenditure. The windows had all been tinted black, so no light would shine through. From the street, the brick behemoth looked as good as abandoned.

Tenzin took off his wig immediately after entering the building. He knew the layout by heart now, weaving between the massive weapons-manufacturing machines left behind decades earlier. They weren't even worth their weight as scrap metal. The back portion of the factory was sectioned off and secured with a surprisingly complex security system. Tenzin inserted a special key into the irregular keyhole and moved it through a specific pattern until the mechanism clicked open. His operations room used to be the Overseer's box — the elevated room from which the factory floor had once been supervised — and therefore sat near the centre of the building. He had installed new wiring throughout the secured section, providing reliable electrical lighting and powering the security system. Rows of paraphernalia, neatly ordered on low tables, and equipment hanging from the walls emerged from the darkness at the click of a light switch.

In the far corner stood a wooden table with a large mirror mounted above it. It was Tenzin's first stop. He dropped the wig on the table, thinking he would have to dry it before it was usable again. Assuming it was salvageable at all. The moustache and sideburns were next, revealing a man wholly foreign to the one who had entered the building. The bald, smooth top of his head glistened with the glue he used to hold the wig firmly in place. Cleaning it was a pain, but he couldn't risk revealing his true face to anybody. At last, he removed the dark leather gloves.

After he had cleaned himself up, he changed into clothes that better complemented his public persona: simple pants and a wool sweater with black buttons. The final touch was a pair of glasses that weren't strictly necessary for his vision but helped sell the persona he projected as Tenzin Tashi, the timid security consultant.

The whole process took him about thirty minutes. It was a routine that grounded him whenever he returned from an adrenaline-filled night. Afterwards, he extracted the cleaning instruments from his Ring and threw away anything disposable. The rest he added to a pile of equipment that would need cleaning when he had the time.

When would that be? Tenzin wondered.

Tenzin retrieved one more item from his storage Ring and laid it gingerly on the table before him.

The Ring could hold a remarkable amount, provided whatever he put inside remained below its strict dimensional limits. Anything too large simply refused to cross the threshold.

The necklace shone brightly beneath the electric lights. It was a marvel to look at. Jewellery had never been of particular interest to Tenzin, but he could appreciate its beauty. The craftsmanship — magical or otherwise — employed to produce such a masterwork was extraordinary. All of that was now in his possession. But he had no intention of keeping it. Priceless artefacts like this were worth far more in trouble than they were in money. He quickly returned it to the storage space, where nobody could take it from him, then took off his three Rings.

Above the table was a shelf holding a small wooden box. Tenzin opened it and placed his three Rings in the form-fitted recesses before snapping the box shut and returning it to its place. The box itself was locked whenever he left the factory. Few things in his possession were more dangerous if they fell into another person's hands.

Once done, a man completely unlike the one who had entered the building walked back out in his stead. The walk home would take Tenzin roughly twenty minutes at his brisk pace. The sun was rising, and his wife and children would undoubtedly be thrilled to have him back for breakfast.

 

[Fuzed]

The Tashis resided in an old, renovated building surrounded by a pleasant and safe community. Tenzin and his wife Sonam had bought the house roughly three years ago, much to the elation of their two kids. Sonam had always dreamt of a large garden she could tend to during long evenings, and Tenzin enjoyed making his wife happy.

Beyond the small metal gate — Tenzin had been promising to grease the hinges for over a year now and still hadn't got around to doing so — was a short, winding stone path which led to the front entrance. After rummaging through his pockets in search of the key, Tenzin finally found it, slotted it in and entered his home.

The pleasant smell of oatmeal and blueberries greeted him. A Saturday morning tradition inside the Tashi household. It had been the only meal Sonam's father could cook, and after his passing, she had carried the tradition into her own household. Tenzin was only glad the old man's sole recipe didn't include tomatoes, for he couldn't stand them and would most likely not have been quite so happy to come home to that every Saturday morning.

The house was narrow and surrounded by neighbours on both sides. The ground floor was where his wife was undoubtedly humming her favourite tune while stirring the pot of oatmeal. Right next to the kitchen was a common room, where they would host friends and neighbours for late tea. The bedrooms and Sonam's study were upstairs. Both kids had their own bedrooms, which earned them equal parts respect and envy from their contemporaries around the block, who mostly had to share theirs with at least one, occasionally two, siblings. Tenzin took pride in how much he could provide for his family, and even though he would never admit it, it made him happy when his children bragged about how well-heeled they truly were. Even if they didn't know the full extent of it. Nobody did. Not even Sonam. Such was the nature of his line of work.

Sneaking up on his wife was no easy feat, but Tenzin still attempted it any chance he got. She was a woman with a strong build and wide shoulders, on account of her line of work. Nonetheless, when Tenzin was but a breath away from her, she twisted around with a speed that belied her stature and pressed the wooden ladle against his neck. It was clean of oatmeal. She had wiped it.

"So you knew?"

She snorted a laugh. "You haven't fixed that gate in over a year, and you still act surprised when I hear you coming home." She kissed him on the cheek. "Welcome home, dear. How goes the surprise inspection?"

"They passed," Tenzin said, picking a blueberry from the tray and earning himself a slap with the ladle. "There were some minor complications, but they at least earned me double my usual rate. In fact, I quite enjoyed myself tonight."

"Happy to hear that," Sonam said, flashing the bright smile he had fallen in love with all those years ago. "Now go wake the kids."

"Ohhh, no, no! I won't be the bad guy for the sixth time in a row! I can finish breakfast while you go wake them up." He reached for the ladle, but she pulled it away.

"No way, my dear husband. You're waking them up." She leaned in conspiratorially. "I'm scared of her."

He leaned in closer. "So am I. Two nights ago, she threw that wooden toy I gave her for Godsgiving at me."

"We should really teach that child some manners, or we'll never wed her."

"I pity that girl's future husband," Tenzin said, shaking his head in mock sympathy.

His wife planted a kiss on his cheek and turned back to the oatmeal, taking the pot off the ceramic stove. "And I pity mine, for he has to wake her up until she finds someone else to do it instead. Now off you go. I won't have you eating cold oatmeal. Papa would rise out of his grave and bite my ankle if he saw it!"

Tenzin walked upstairs and entered his son's room first. A brilliant idea suddenly struck him, and he wasn't sure why he hadn't thought of it sooner. The room was spacious, filled with books and the smell of a teenage boy's sweat. He sat down on the edge of the bed and stroked Lachlan's hair until the boy opened his eyes groggily. Lachlan jerked away and rolled over to face the wall.

"Dad," was all he said, in that annoyed tone only a teenager can muster when confronted with the disgrace that is their own parent. Then he closed his eyes again and pretended to sleep.

Tenzin patted him on the shoulder and whispered, "You're a big man now, Lachlan. A man. And a man needs a man's task to truly prove he's a man. From now on, you're waking up your sister. I'm proud of you!"

Suddenly, he was fully awake, sitting upright. "No, I'm not!" he blurted out. "She's a monster!"

"Hey! Watch your tongue! She's your sister! Now go and wake her up so that you can apologise." Tenzin stood up and walked out of the room. Before closing the door, he leaned back in to add, "Oh, and breakfast is ready, son. Love you!"

Considering it a job well done, Tenzin started downstairs when he heard the familiar creaking of metal, followed by three loud knocks on the door. He sighed, preparing the best smile he could possibly muster. Most days, he was lucky enough to miss his mother-in-law. On others, their paths inevitably crossed, and they kept their conversations balanced on the precipice of cordiality. There were some days, such as today, when Tenzin sincerely hoped he would avoid the dreaded interaction altogether.

From down below, Sonam's voice echoed. "Dear, open the door for my mama, please." Whether it was blissful ignorance — Tenzin had long concluded it wasn't — or Sonam simply chose to ignore the elephant in the room that was the relationship between two very important people in her life, they had never addressed the tension. It was a simmering pot that would one day inevitably boil over. Tenzin only hoped it would be his mother-in-law who pulled the trigger first.

After steeling himself once more, Tenzin pulled open the door with a forced smile, only for it to drop instantly. The constable stood at attention, smiling amicably. Vikram Dhar, Commissioner of Organised Crime, stood face-to-face with Tenzin "the Fix" Tashi.

"Good morning, Tenzin," he said. "I'm sorry to disturb you. I hope I didn't wake you."

"Morning to you too, Vikram," Tenzin said, inviting the man in. "No, we were just waking the kids. Would you like some oatmeal? Sonam is making it." He added the last sentence as a warning. His lack of culinary skills was a frequent talking point for his wife.

The man stepped inside, lowering his hat to his side. "That would be lovely."

Sonam came into the hall, drying her hands on a cloth. "Vik, is everything alright?"

"Not quite," he said, his mood souring all of a sudden. "The sting was a bust. Kukulkan practically laughed us out of the safe house."

Tenzin had long learnt that neither Sonam nor her colleagues viewed him as a threat. They freely discussed their Constabulary business in front of him, as if he were a fly on the wall. Tenzin, for his part, encouraged that behaviour because it was free intel he might otherwise have to pay his eyes-and-ears for.

Tenzin liked to portray himself as a curious, albeit sensitive, person. He enjoyed the gruesome details when abstract, but as soon as they became too real, he pretended to flee from the conversation. It was what everybody had grown to expect from him. There was a limit to how much a 'security consultant' should be privy to, so he made a cautious exit. He would have to listen to the remainder of the conversation from a distance. "And that's my cue to leave. You know my stomach isn't made for whatever this is." He waved his hand theatrically. "Once you finish talking shop, the kids and I will be waiting with oatmeal." Just as he finished the sentence and Sonam ushered her superior officer outside for some privacy, the kids descended the stairs.

Looks like I won't be saving money on intel after all, Tenzin thought.

His little angel of a daughter came down first. She stomped past her father with all the indignation her four years of age could muster. Then Lachlan followed, massaging his shoulder and glowering at his father. Did he perhaps have a child somewhere in the world who didn't hate him in the morning?

"This was the first and final time, Dad," Lachlan said.

"Ahh, savouring the benefits of growing up." Lachlan only glared at him before continuing to the dining table.

Tenzin looked at his daughter, seated at the same table with her arms crossed. In a way, she was adorable. When she wasn't scowling at you.

I wonder whom she takes after…

Then the front door flew open, announcing his mother-in-law, and suddenly he felt like he had a pretty solid idea of the answer.

* * *​

Sonam watched her mother go inside before continuing the conversation. "Are you positive one was present?"

"Sonnie, the intel was solid. I'm telling you, one of the Fixers had to have been there. There's no other way. But that's not exactly why I'm here. We have a much bigger issue."

Sonam could feel desperation and anger fighting inside her. "Bigger than us not disclosing that the Kukulkans were planning to rob the Archives, Vik? Bigger than that? You told me nobody would get hurt and I trusted you. You said we'd finally catch the fuckers responsible for so many deaths and what did we achieve instead? Just another death, but this time, it's on us! And now the jewellery is gone, Marion will have both our badges for this and we'll be lucky if we don't end up being prosecuted for the Constable's death we caused."

"Yes, Sonam. Worse than all that," Vikram said gravely, which made Sonam shudder. She couldn't imagine anything worse than what she had just summed up. "I… I didn't want to tell you this. But I'm afraid this might be the end of the road for me…" And just like that, Vikram showed Sonam that she could imagine something worse.

"What are you talking about?" Sonam asked.

"The source that gave me that intel," Vikram began, hesitating for a moment. "It was—"

A flash of red light appeared and vanished in an instant. Instinctively, Sonam traced it to a tiny crack in the wood of her front door. When she turned back to Vikram, she saw a matching wound in his neck. His eyes were wide open. He tried to speak, but only a wet gurgle escaped as blood poured from the wound and his mouth.

He was gone in seconds, before Sonam could even dive for cover or try to help him. For a brief moment, everything that had happened registered, and she made peace with the fact that she was next. When nothing followed and an eerie silence settled over the early morning street, Sonam's instincts kicked in and she ran inside for cover. Tears streamed down her face. When her husband rushed out to see why she had slammed the door so hard, he froze in shock.

What had just happened?

 

[Fuzed]

Tenzin had to suppress his immediate reaction. I am a security contractor, he told himself. Droplets of blood on his wife's face should freeze him in place. So he counted the seconds.

One. Two. Three, four, five. He couldn't wait any longer and rushed to his wife's aid.

"Are you okay?" he asked. She was quiet. "Sonam, talk to me. Are you hurt?" He inspected her neck and torso, looking for any source of the blood. She seemed physically unharmed, though he knew the haunted look in her eyes intimately. He could still remember the first death he had witnessed — not the first dead body he had seen, but the first time he had watched a man's spark be extinguished before his eyes.

Sonam's mother rushed from the kitchen, apparently having heard Tenzin's panicked tone. "Is everything alright?" When she saw her daughter covered in specks of blood, she shrieked.

"She's okay. Don't let the kids come here!" Tenzin commanded, his sudden shift in tone shocking the old lady into action. She turned and rushed to distract the kids before they could realise something was wrong.

"He's dead," Sonam whispered. "They killed him."

Tenzin reached for the door handle, but his wife put a hand on his arm and shook her head in panic. "Okay, let's call somebody," Tenzin said instead, using a tone he hoped would calm her. He rushed up the stairs, taking the steps three at a time and nearly tripping over himself. Sonam's study was to the left. Inside, behind a table in the corner, sat the human-like Hexman. Mnareth, like all Hexmen, had a lanky frame that towered over regular humans. Apart from their height, it was the hexagonal beehive of tattoos covering their bodies and faces that marked them as a separate race.

Mnareth looked up from his book and set it down. "Master Tashi?"

"Contact the Constabulary. Tell them there was a murder."

The Hexman pierced Tenzin with that unnervingly cold look, neither malicious nor dangerous, simply listless. "Anyone specifically?"

In the past, the default answer had been Vikram Dhar. Seeing as his body was most likely already dyeing the stones in front of Tenzin's house crimson, he had to think of somebody else. "Call Chief Constable Martinelli. If you don't reach her, just tell them Vikram Dhar has been murdered."

The Hexman merely nodded and let his eyes be swallowed by a wave of fog. A couple of seconds passed before the melodic voice of Chief Constable Martinelli drifted from the Hexman's mouth, creating the kind of dissonance one could only witness in a Hexman's borrowed voice or while watching a ventriloquist perform.

"Mr Tashi, why are you calling me? Where is your wife?" She sounded panicked. Her first thought must have been that something had happened to Sonam.

Tenzin cleared his throat, playing the role of a nervous husband with years of experience. "Downstairs. She's in shock. Something happened. I don't know the details. But as far as I was able to piece things together, Vikram Dhar is dead. Murdered in front of our house. With our children inside!" He let genuine anger taint his voice at that last part, realising only too late whom he was speaking to.

Silence stretched through the room. Then, bereft of any intonation that might betray the chief constable's emotions, she uttered a single phrase: "I'm on my way."

Tenzin turned to walk back downstairs, letting the Hexman return to his reading. Just to be sure, he checked whether the supply of books was still sufficient, not wanting another issue to pile upon the already overwhelming mound of trouble. Enough reading material for a day, he concluded after inspecting the stack of seven books.

His wife was still frozen in shock at the front door. Tenzin ran to the kitchen to check on his kids. Granny kept them entertained with stories of Grandpa they had already heard several times. Lachlan understood something was wrong, especially after seeing his father rush in with that horrified look on his face. But he was a smart enough kid to know when to push and when to trust that the adults were protecting him from something he didn't want to see. Tenzin's daughter — bless her heart! — was ensnared by her granny's retelling of how Grandpa used to run around with his friends and cause havoc.

From a basket in the cupboard below the stove, Tenzin took a clean cloth and headed back to the hall, where he wiped his wife's face before leading her to the bathroom. She followed sheepishly, albeit with more life in her face than she had shown a minute earlier. By the time Tenzin had wrapped her in a warm blanket, the initial paralysis had begun to wear off. With that came the tears.

She started sobbing, covering her mouth with one hand and pressing herself tightly against her husband's chest, allowing the warmth of his body to comfort her. Tenzin pulled her in even tighter — partly to support her, partly to keep her cries from reaching the kitchen and the kids.

They remained in that position for a while, the only movement the intermittent heaving of Sonam's shoulders beneath Tenzin's hand as he gently stroked her head. Some time later, the door knocker struck against the wooden frame, the sound resounding through the house. Tenzin couldn't begin to guess how long it had been. It felt like an eternity compressed into seconds.

Somehow, Sonam pushed her grief aside the instant she heard the sound. She straightened, wiped her tears and squeezed her husband's hand three times. I love you. One squeeze for each word. Tenzin had created the system when he realised his wife found public affection difficult. This way, their love became their own private thing.

After the knocker sounded once more, this time with even greater urgency, Sonam rushed to open the door. Immediately, she assumed her professional persona, saluting the highest-ranking officer of the Constabulary, who had never once paid the Tashi household a visit until now. Tenzin knew how much his wife sought her approval. It pained him to think she might not be receiving much of it any time soon.

Outside, the body lay motionless on the ground. Tenzin could only see it in fragments through the maze of scurrying officers, their bodies forming a shifting wall around it. The conversations outside blended into a constant buzz, no word distinguishable from another. Sonam turned her head and saw what Tenzin was looking at. The look on his face moved her to close the door on him, shutting him away from the horror outside.

She misunderstood. He wasn't horrified. He was already thinking about how he would have fixed the situation. What she read as horror was the look of a professional assessing a problem he knew how to solve. But his wife could never know that. To her, he was a dear husband. The timid, shy man with a heart.

Not the monster.

To Sonam, the look she had seen prompted her to shield him from the horrors of her job. But to Tenzin, it was a reminder. A reminder of how duplicitous his life was, and how even in this treacherous situation he could no more help the woman he loved wholeheartedly than any useless vagrant on the street. Right now, in her eyes, he was the one who needed protecting. She would push back her feelings, Tenzin knew. He was sure of it. Because that was what they did: protected each other. Only Tenzin couldn't really protect her with all his might. He could only pretend.

 

[Fuzed]

Vikram Dhar, Commissioner of Organised Crime, born in the year 754, during the seventh month, was murdered during a private visit to his colleague, Deputy Commissioner Sonam Tashi. The motive behind his murder has yet to be determined. The means have been identified as a concentrated beam of light emitted by a Ring wielded by a person of unknown affiliation.

The perpetrator has yet to be identified or apprehended. The investigation will be led by the Chief Constable herself, in accordance with Constabulary guidelines.

Deputy Commissioner Sonam Tashi has been placed on administrative leave pending a preliminary review. Her involvement remains under review, though there has been no indication that she played any part in the crime.

Tenzin returned the letter to the bedside table where he had found it. The edges of the paper were warped by the sweat of Sonam's hands. She must have read the brief message at least a hundred times in the hour she had held it, before finally collapsing from sheer exhaustion. Hopefully, in her dreams, she remained blissfully unaware of her waking struggles. He doubted it, judging by the intermittent twitching of her body. He kissed her forehead and departed to check on his children. Both were asleep, and the night was quiet. Sonam's mother slept in the sitting room downstairs, refusing to leave in her daughter's time of need.

Putting on his coat and gloves — for the nights had suddenly grown even colder than usual for this time of year — Tenzin departed on his own mission. It had been a full day since the murder. His wife wasn't handling it well. Despite all the atrocities she had seen on the job, there was a visceral terror that accompanied seeing a long-time friend murdered before her eyes. In front of her home, no less. Near her children; her husband. It was all too much for her. The defeated slump of her shoulders weighed on Tenzin's mind. It made it easier for him to mask how little the sight of blood had disturbed him; he had simply replaced that source of disturbance with another.

The walk down to his Factory worked wonders for clearing his head before the job. Doing what he did demanded peak concentration and an unencumbered mind. Somehow, however, he was finding it difficult to achieve that tonight. An uncharacteristic weight had settled on his mind, which he couldn't seem to shake, no matter how hard he tried. He would simply have to work around it, keep it in the background and not let it affect his actions.

On his way, Tenzin stopped at one of the many bookstores. Bookstores were among the few establishments that operated around the clock. If one needed a late-night refill of literature for a Hexman, waiting wasn't an option. The owner behind the counter had his eyes closed and his arms crossed over his chest. Rolfenzo was a moustachioed man with a stout build and a red nose. He had inherited the bookstore from his father, Rolfenzo Senior, who had died in a tragic accident almost twenty years ago. Back then, Tenzin had not yet entered his line of work, but he supposed that, had he done so already, one of his first customers might have been this man, attempting to rid himself of his father's body. Some peculiar circumstances surrounded the old man's passing, and most people in the neighbourhood operated on the premise that Rolfenzo had decided to take matters into his own hands. For his part, Rolfenzo was unbothered by the whispers.

The tiny bell above the doorway announced a visitor, and Rolfenzo shook himself awake. He smiled reflexively, but dropped his forced friendliness when he saw who had entered his store.

"If it isn't my least favourite customer," he said, standing up and drying the sweat off his palms on his white linen shirt.

"May your night be blessed too, Rolfenzo," Tenzin said, walking up to the man.

"So, still no reader's card?" the man asked, the annoyance in his voice palpable. He was referring to a card issued with every Hexman. In a way, it was the Hexman's registration card. With a special apparatus designed for the purpose, a bookstore could read the card and check which books had been borrowed and when, so that no duplicates were lent to the Hexman. Tenzin despised the system. The apparatus not only read the cards but also transmitted the information to a central registry, allowing the Ministry of Information to track the reading habits of Hexmen.

The surveillance risk aside, Tenzin had a more practical reason for refusing the card: he borrowed books for two Hexmen, not the one shown in his official records. Mnareth was at home, while Shatarma occupied a tiny corner office in Tenzin's Factory. Shatarma was also his point of contact with the criminal underworld and the means through which he received all his contracts. To keep the trail as muddled and scant as possible, Tenzin memorised every title he borrowed. He never entered a bookstore without knowing exactly which books he would borrow next. The amount each Hexman read varied greatly. Some consumed only a few books a month, while voracious readers could finish as many as fifteen in a week. Those who read more were generally cheaper to maintain. With such variation, the number of books Tenzin borrowed was hardly remarkable.

Rolfenzo despised this practice of Tenzin's. Not because it diverged from his usual routine, but solely because each time the scanning apparatus was employed, his bookstore received a premium. A sort of bribe from the Ministry of Information for feeding its mechanism of control over the citizens. Alas, with the number of books Tenzin borrowed, Rolfenzo was losing a sizeable amount of income. At first, he had attempted to maintain his friendly persona and persuade Tenzin of the benefits of using a reader's card. Gradually, his arguments had morphed into pleading and eventually dejected defeat. Now, Rolfenzo merely jabbed at Tenzin any chance he got.

The four titles Tenzin picked were all focused on history. Even though Hexmen didn't reflect human behaviour — they didn't feel sad or happy; even when locked in a small room, they were never lonely or depressed — they had preferences. Mnareth had a taste for magic, and most of his books focused on the technicalities of Ringers, why marble worked so well as a magical conductor and medium, and, most importantly, contemporary research papers into magic. Shatarma, on the other hand, had absolutely no interest in magic — Tenzin's first attempt at reusing the same books twice had been a recipe for disaster. Instead, his work Hexman preferred summaries of times long gone. Most of his time was spent reading about how what existed now had come to be.

After Rolfenzo had packed the four books into a small cloth bag and Tenzin had deposited several marble coins on the counter, he left the store. The night air was cold and the streets were empty. Only the streetlights — electrical in this part of the city — made it seem less despondent. A single crow landed on the small bench beside the bookstore and stared at Tenzin. It opened its mouth but made no sound. After a second, it seemingly changed its mind and departed the same way it had come.

Tenzin shivered. It was a terrible augury.

* * *​

In the winter, Tenzin couldn't heat his Factory properly. Even though some basic electricity consumption was documented, a sudden spike during the winter might alert people to his presence there. Instead, he had built a tiny ceramic stove in the corner of his operations room. A large stockpile of wood was always ready to be burnt, and the flames provided a pleasant auditory accompaniment to his thinking, as well as welcome heat.

Tenzin lit the fire and watched the tiny flame dance for a while before it grew large enough to engulf the carefully arranged woodpile. He closed the lid and walked some thirty metres beyond the operations room to the former break room at the far side of the Factory, where Shatarma lived. The Hexman, clad in simple white clothes and covered with hexagonal tattoos, was reading a book. He looked up when Tenzin entered and slowly closed it.

"Two messages, Master Fix," he said. "Would you like me to play them?"

"Be so kind," Tenzin said. While the first message played, he unpacked the four books and stacked them on the right side of Shatarma's table. The stack of six books on the left was already finished, so he packed those up and planned to return them soon.

The first message was from Itzel Kukulkan, his grating voice immediately recognisable. He demanded that the Fix come immediately and rid him of the body in his basement. The second message was also from him, delivered in a much calmer and meeker tone, asking whether the usual method of payment would be used.

Once both messages had concluded, Tenzin prompted the Hexman to record him. "The method of payment remains the same. I am on my way to conclude our affairs presently. Please have somebody there to provide access."

Tenzin ended the recording by snapping his fingers twice and asked the Hexman to send it to Itzel Kukulkan's Hexman. Sending a message wasn't as simple as saying a name and wishing your Hexman could somehow make a mental connection. Each Hexman had a unique code, which another Hexman needed to know in order to transmit messages. Most codes were publicly available in the so-called HexBook; others — including Shatarma's and the recipient's — were shared strictly on a need-to-know basis.

Back in Tenzin's operations room, the warmth was spreading nicely, allowing him to drop his coat without feeling the shivers in his bones. He began working on his disguise, carefully applying the special glue to his bald head and putting on his wig. The whole transformation took roughly twenty minutes, after which the room was warm enough for him to undress and put on the dark clothes of the Fix. In less than thirty seconds, the man known as Tenzin Tashi fell into deep slumber, and the Fix reawakened.

Tenzin gathered all the tools he might need. He gingerly took the wooden box containing his Rings, opened it and placed them on his fingers one by one. The Black Ring glowed, and the prepared paraphernalia vanished inside, ready to be withdrawn with a simple mental command. He pulled the opaque gloves over his hands, concealing the Rings from sight.

Before departing, Tenzin returned to Shatarma's quarters and asked him to contact Herrman Reiter and Lee Roy Cinder. He would need the assistance of both of them tonight.

 

[Fuzed]

The horse-drawn cart pulled up beside Tenzin. He had ordered Herrman to meet him at one of their usual meeting spots, several blocks from the industrial zone. Herrman greeted him with a wide smile from the driver's seat.

"A mood as bright as ever, I see," Tenzin said, climbing up beside Herrman. The cart was a tight fit, and the two men sat shoulder to shoulder.

"Whenever I get a call from my most valued customer, it's a reason to be happy," Herrman said, flicking the reins to urge the horses forward. "Besides, I earn a pretty penny working for you, my friend."

"I still remember those days fondly."

Herrman glanced at Tenzin. "Those days?"

"When you were still in my debt, old friend." Tenzin grinned. "Life was simple when I didn't have to pay you, Herrman."

"Ah, well. Those days are long gone, aren't they?"

Indeed they were. Almost eight years ago, a middle-aged upstart freighter had contacted the Fix, asking for his help. A mutual friend whom Tenzin trusted had put them in touch, and despite Herrman's inability to pay in coin, Tenzin had offered to accept payment in services rendered instead. Tenzin had helped Herrman avert a personal crisis, earning himself a lifelong friend and leaving Herrman with a debt that took nearly four years to repay.

In the eight years since they had first met, Herrman had built a company with over forty carriages and boats carrying cargo throughout the country and occasionally across the border. He also used this legitimate business to conceal his true source of income and wealth: smuggling. There wasn't a gram of Leebark in the city that hadn't passed through his hands. That also made him an excellent source of information.

"Any movement from the Bat-Erdenes?"

Herrman shook his head, his expression turning serious. "Nothing on my radar. I heard, though, that Vikram Dhar was killed. He was visiting his deputy commissioner—at her house, no less—when they got him. Apparently, she saw it all, and her husband found her covered in blood. Poor bloke. Both of their kids were home too."

Tenzin wasn't sure whether 'poor bloke' referred to him or Vikram. Either way, it was terrifying how much information had leaked in such a short time—information that was never supposed to be public.

"Any whispers of who did it?"

"None at all, which scares me. Usually these things create a ripple effect, but there are no ripples tonight."

"Reminiscent of the robbery, isn't it?"

Herrman chewed on that for a minute before turning a sceptical eye at his friend. "You think there's a connection?"

Tenzin shrugged. "Only saying it's peculiar that two events of such import should occur in close succession, yet neither leaves even a trail of breadcrumbs to follow. Coincidence only goes so far."

"I suppose you do have a point."

Silence reigned for a couple of streets while Herrman guided the horses to their destination. Tenzin had informed him through Shatarma where they would be going. It was a quirk of Herrman's: he had to know where he was going before he even departed. He always said he picked the horse for the occasion and terrain; distance and company all made a difference. He picked only the best horses when driving the Fix, which made his incessant questions about the destination and journey easier to tolerate.

"What are we even transporting?" Herrman asked, glancing over his shoulder at the cart. "You were oddly specific about its dimensions."

"A wine barrel." At Herrman's raised eyebrow, Tenzin added, "With a body in it."

Herrman nodded as if that explained everything. "Anything I should know?"

"It's the Kukulkans. A Family matter, so don't poke around too much. And no, I won't tell you anything."

"Of course," Herrman replied. "That's why you're so good at what you do."

The rest of the journey passed in idle conversation. Herrman was more than happy to talk about his family, trusting Tenzin never to use the information against him. Tenzin's tight-lipped nature could be frustrating to a man as curious as Herrman, but that same discretion allowed him to discuss his personal matters freely and without fear. Despite knowing so much about Herrman's family, Tenzin had never actually met them. Just as Tenzin's family knew nothing of his true vocation, Herrman's family knew him only as a simple freighter.

On several occasions, Herrman had attempted to pry information out of Tenzin through innocuous, albeit transparent, questions. After receiving several noncommittal answers, Herrman had relented and accepted that he would never truly know his mysterious friend beyond their work together. Nonetheless, that hadn't stopped him from sharing details of his own life.

They arrived at their destination fifteen minutes later. The rich neighbourhood was quiet at this time of night, most of its inhabitants still enjoying the luxury of sleep. Tenzin hopped down from the cart. A curtain shifted in a street-facing window, then fell still. Tenzin wondered who would meet them inside. He hoped for a more modest reception than last time.

The door swung open before Tenzin could even knock, and Xanat Kukulkan hurried both men inside.

"Who's he?" Xanat asked, nodding at Herrman.

"He's here for the transport," Tenzin said. Herrman gave Xanat a nod of greeting. "Beyond that, who he is doesn't concern you."

Xanat wasn't used to being spoken to in this manner, but he was subdued tonight. The whole ordeal had unnerved him. "Well, do you need my help?"

"No," Tenzin said, then headed for the basement. Herrman followed.

Downstairs, an unpleasant odour permeated the basement, one that hadn't been there a few days earlier. Herrman's nose wrinkled, his expression souring. Only then did Tenzin realise how immune he had become to such smells over the years of his work. Or had it been during the war? He couldn't quite remember when it had happened, only that it had been so long ago that it felt natural.

"Godsbedamned, Fix," Herrman said. "How long has it been there?"

"A couple of days, I'm afraid," Tenzin said, offering no further explanation. "Let's load it up and move with haste. We don't want to be stopped by the constables. The smell might make it difficult to sell the story that we're transporting wine."

"You wouldn't be able to sell that story to a skunk, let alone a constable."

"Oh, please, let's be done with this."

"Excuse me for having an overdeveloped sense of smell," Herrman said. He followed Tenzin to the barrel containing Tika Bat-Erdene's decaying body. Tenzin recognised it from memory, although the smell alone made it obvious which barrel they needed to transport.

Herrman planted his palm on top of the barrel, and the Black marble Ring on his finger glowed. After a couple of seconds, he nodded, and Tenzin took hold of the barrel, lifting it easily on his own. It was difficult to manoeuvre because of its size, but Herrman's magic had reduced its weight to slightly less than an average bag of potatoes.

Herrman went ahead, guiding Tenzin through the narrow corridors and doorways as he manoeuvred the barrel. Once outside, he helped Tenzin load it onto the cart. Herrman secured the barrel with a series of straps while Tenzin returned inside to speak to Xanat.

Xanat sat before the fire, lost in thought, a splash of brownish liquor sloshing gently in the crystal tumbler he rocked in his hand. Tenzin waited for a couple of seconds, hoping Xanat would notice him, before speaking. "You should be more cognisant of your surroundings, Xanat. It has always been a shortcoming of yours."

"What do you know?" Xanat replied, downing the remainder of his drink. He stood up and straightened his clothes, his expression settling back into the familiar stoic mask Tenzin knew. He moved over to the large armoire against the wall and retrieved a wooden box from a secret compartment in its lower half. Inside, stacks of coins lay neatly arranged in fitted satin lining. Tenzin didn't bother counting them, at least not in front of Xanat. He would make sure he hadn't been shorted once he returned to the factory, but accepting the payment without counting it was, for now, a display of good faith. The box's lock clicked as Tenzin closed it. The Black Ring underneath his glove glowed, and the box vanished.

"Thank your father for me," Tenzin said, turning to leave.

He was stopped by a question spoken in such a solemn tone that Tenzin nearly doubted it had come from Xanat: "What will you do with him? The Bat-Erdene kid."

Tenzin turned. There was a glint of sorrow in Xanat's eyes, at odds with his usual hatred of the Bat-Erdene Family. Then he understood. Tika was Xanat's daughter's age. Confronted with the fragility of his loved ones, even a monster could find it in himself to have compassion.

"That does not concern you," Tenzin said. He wanted to assure Xanat that the boy would receive a proper cremation, but taking such a risk merely to console a man for whom Tenzin felt no personal affection was unnecessary. He left, closing the door behind him. Herrman waited beside the cart, ready to depart for their next destination.

 

[Fuzed]

Tenzin and Hermann chatted idly and laughed amicably as they passed the pair of constables on their early-morning route. It was a reflex for both of them. Two brooding, silent individuals transporting a barrel of wine would have stood out like an exclamation mark. Two friends chatting about their lives while doing something that undoubtedly needed to be done, and most likely should have been done weeks ago, were a different story. The constables paid them no more mind than the cobbles beneath their feet. They, too, were only human and had little interest in pursuing their duties with zeal this early in the morning.

Once they were out of earshot, Tenzin's tone grew serious. "That's the fifth patrol we've met. Is it because of the robbery?"

Hermann nodded tersely. "It's a mess. Their reputation has fallen into the smouldering coals of hell, and they're trying to make up for it with a show of force." He muttered something derisive under his breath. "At the institutional level, that's a noble endeavour. Individually, those chaps couldn't care less about their arrest tally." He jerked his thumb towards the pair of constables they had passed.

"How is… business?" Tenzin asked, sensing the frustration beneath Hermann's words.

Hermann waved his hand dismissively. "Don't even get me started. I'm bleeding money through all my crevices with all the bribes I've been dishing out since the robbery. Every bastard and their uncle has suddenly found a spine and decided they 'can't stand by any longer'. Until I buy their newfound vertebrae from them for a pretty coin of marble. Then, all of a sudden, they turn into morally grey slop."

"Perhaps you could take it easy for a while?"

"And do what? Watch my competition steal my clientele? No, I just have to be extra careful. And perhaps make some extra money on the side if the opportunity presents itself." He shot Tenzin a glance.

"I'll make sure to pay you extra," Tenzin said. "Your night rate, if you insist. Just make sure you don't end up spending that money on my services."

They shared a smile.

"Just be careful, Hermann. These are no times for carelessness."

Hermann nodded contentedly and urged the horses on even faster.

By the time they arrived at the large, looming brick building, they had passed three more pairs of constables. Amongst them were several high-ranking officers, their distinctive coats conspicuously on display. Luckily, none of them paid the odd pair on the cart any mind; their sights were set much higher than that.

Tenzin dropped down from the cart and headed for the back entrance, where he rapped out a quick sequence on the metal door. He heard a brief commotion inside before the door opened an inch, revealing a bloodshot eye peering through the gap.

"Good, it's you," Lee Roy said.

"Of course it's me," Tenzin said, unable to hide the frustration Lee Roy always managed to stir in him. "Do you take many visitors through the back entrance?"

The door swung fully open, and Lee Roy's eyes glinted with mischief. "As a matter of fact—"

"Actually, never mind," Tenzin interrupted. He reconsidered his last question in light of what he knew about Lee Roy's sexual proclivities. He had a fairly good idea where the answer was headed, and he didn't want to hear any of it. "Just open the bloody gate, Lee Roy."

"Sure thing, boss," Lee Roy said, heading back inside. Tenzin caught a remark containing the words 'backside' and 'entrance' in close succession and decided he was better off not hearing the rest.

When Tenzin returned to Hermann, the man was already lifting the barrel. "How's the little prick?"

"Still a prick," Tenzin said. "Somehow worse than the last time, it would seem."

"Must be all the heat. And the garbage. The fumes are fucking up what little brains he has."

They returned to the building, Tenzin guiding the barrel through the open gate. Lee Roy shut it behind them and turned to inspect the cargo. "This isn't some kind of sex thing, right?" he asked, eyeing the barrel as he listened to the liquid sloshing inside. "Because if so, I'm out. I'm not into that kind of stuff." He paused. "Well, okay, I am. But not when I'm on the clock. Then I am—"

"Annoying, for the most part," Tenzin interrupted. "Let's get this over with, and you'll be one step closer to being rid of your debt."

That usually got him to shut up and move along. It worked this time as well. The tiny man, dressed in a motley travesty that he called an 'outfit', led his two visitors to the burning furnace he had picked for them that morning. On their way there, Tenzin took the barrel from Hermann to give his back a rest. It wasn't heavy per se, but it was still cumbersome to carry, and Tenzin would have considered it an insult to let Hermann carry it the whole way.

They passed a small open office, marked off from the rest of the building by a red line painted on the floor and a single bright light hanging lower than the others from the high ceiling. Another man lay sprawled across a table inside the square. Hermann noticed him too, and luckily his exasperation matched Tenzin's, so he immediately spoke in a low, harsh voice.

"Lee Roy Cinder, you little prick, I will break off your arms and shove them up your ass. What's that?" He pointed at the sleeping man.

"What?" Lee Roy turned, seemingly unbothered by the threat. He followed Hermann's pointing finger towards the office and laughed. "Oh, that." The colourfully dressed man walked up to the sleeping figure and slapped him on the back of the head so hard that the wooden table beneath him shifted. Tenzin nearly dropped the barrel.

"Don't worry 'bout him," Lee Roy said. "He's had so much leebark he might as well be brain-dead for the next four hours."

The tension slowly vanished from Tenzin's shoulders. He had yet to meet Lee Roy without leaving the encounter imagining some new, cruel way to send him back to his maker. But his vocation made him a useful asset, so Tenzin tolerated his existence.

Finally, they reached the open furnace. Tenzin could feel the heat beginning to soften the glue holding his disguise in place. They needed to move quickly unless he wanted his hair sitting lopsided on his head. That might be difficult to explain.

Without fanfare, Tenzin prepared to throw the barrel into the furnace when a sudden burning sensation flared around his finger. It was deep and intense, nothing like the gentle thrumming of the Black Ring. His heart pounded as the familiar sensation dragged his buried trauma to the surface.

It had glowed just as I was about to throw in the barrel, Tenzin thought. He kept his eyes on his hand. I need to confirm it.

He heaved up the barrel again — it was slightly heavier now as the effect of Hermann's Ring faded — and aimed it towards the furnace. The Red Ring flared again. He gingerly lowered the barrel, the wine — and the cadaver — dancing around inside it.

The Red Ring was Tenzin's most prized possession. He thought of the priceless piece of jewellery in his dimensional space and promptly reconsidered that statement. It was the second most valuable item in his possession. He would have to deal with that once Itzel made up his mind about its fate. The Ring, however, had been a constant in his life for many years. From the moment he had acquired it, he knew he could never let anybody know about it. He wore it on his finger whenever he assumed his Fixer persona, and had worn it on missions even before that, during his time in the Military. In all those years, it had only glowed twice. The second time, it had saved his life. The first… was a memory he could not forget, no matter how hard he tried.

The Red Ring wielded the Form of Destiny. It somehow read the woven threads of Destiny and warned its bearer through an intense burning sensation and a red glow. For whatever reason, the Ring didn't want him to burn the body that morning. Tenzin knew better than to ignore it.

"We're taking the barrel back," Tenzin said, eliciting surprised looks from both men. "Lee Roy, thank you for your service. Consider the job done. I'll deduct your usual fee from your debt. Hermann, if you could refresh the lightening effect, I'll take the barrel back to the cart."

Nobody protested. Hermann placed his hand on the barrel, waited a moment, then nodded. Tenzin lifted it and retraced his steps to the main gate. Lee Roy opened it without another snarky remark and bade them both goodbye before returning to his desk, where he would normally spend the rest of his shift throwing crumpled balls of paper at his colleague. Perhaps not this time. The interaction had left him shaken. He had never seen the Fixer this tense.

The ride back was solemn. Tenzin was lost in thought, and Hermann was reluctant to broach what had happened. His restraint lasted only a few minutes, however, before curiosity overcame his respect for privacy.

"Want to talk about it?" he asked. "Why are we returning with the barrel? And where exactly are we going?"

"Take me back to where you picked me up last night. I'll need the cart for the day. I'm sure you can arrange for someone to take you the rest of the way home. I'll have the cart back by sunrise tomorrow."

"Fine," Hermann said, his newfound curiosity evaporating. He might not know who his friend truly was, or whether he had any family or a life beyond his work, but he knew him well enough to understand when to pry and when to leave things alone. This wasn't the moment for the former.

They reached the agreed pick-up spot. The sun had risen, and the streets were filling with people. Hermann handed Tenzin the reins without a word and climbed down from the cart. For a moment, he looked as though he might ask another question. Or perhaps offer some words of support. But he thought better of it and instead nodded a curt goodbye.

"I will have your payment ready together with the cart," Tenzin said. "And Hermann, thank you! I'll make sure to return the cart and horses with haste."

Hermann waved his hand. "Don't sweat it. It's a spare, and these girlies"—he patted the horses—"will love the breather. Just feed them something good."

With that, he walked away, raising a hand to hail a passing carriage.

Tenzin urged the horses into a trot and headed for the Factory.

 

[Fuzed]

The barrel stood a couple of metres from the central office where Tenzin spent most of his time. Hermann had renewed the lightening spell at the furnace, but its effect had begun to fade by the time Tenzin arrived at the Factory. He had eased the barrel off the cart, careful not to damage it, and rolled it towards a dark recess. He stopped—not because it was too heavy, but because he couldn't bear to have it any closer. He would have to move it somewhere it wouldn't be in the way.

The burn of the Red Ring still lingered as a phantom sensation on his finger. His gaze kept returning to the barrel as he drifted between memories of the past and a growing dread of what this latest warning might mean.

His thoughts returned to the first time the Ring had warned him of an unpleasant future by reading the threads of Destiny. Back then, he had known what the warning meant. He hadn't truly understood it, however. It had taken his best friend's head rolling through the mud of the trenches to his feet for him to grasp what the crimson light signified. Since then, it had flashed only once more, saving his life. Now it had flashed for the third time in as many decades, and the implications shook him like a storm stripping leaves from an autumn tree.

He shook his head—probably for the sixth or seventh time since last night—and pulled himself out of the dastardly memory. He needed to act. An early warning was only useful if the person receiving it took steps to avoid the catastrophe. The warning's vagueness stalled any search for a solution, and the nebulous problem only deepened his frustration.

He had to straighten the facts first.

He was now the terrified owner of two things: the body of a prominent Family scion and a national treasure of immeasurable value. Not a good start. On top of that, he knew there had been some sort of relationship between the dead Bat-Erdene boy and Xanat Kukulkan's daughter. Whether it had been love, lust, or neither was inconsequential, Tenzin concluded. His gut had carried him through decades of navigating human relationships, and he had come out on top—and alive—often enough to trust it. Straying from that instinct now would be unwise.

The Bat-Erdene Family knew about the relationship with Ixchel. The question remained whether it had been a premeditated farce from the beginning or an opportunistic move by the ruthless Munay Bat-Erdene, who wouldn't hesitate to exploit his son's love for the benefit of the Family. Judging by the fact that Tika had disregarded his mission and was willing to force himself on the girl, he likely hadn't felt much for her beyond the carnal urges of an animal.

Tenzin stopped himself. He had no way of knowing whether the boy had actually attempted anything untoward with Ixchel. Only Itzel's and Xanat's accounts supported that version of events. It could very well be a lie. Perhaps Ixchel herself had discovered the dishonesty of Tika's feelings and killed the boy, inventing the story of an attempted assault to exonerate herself in the eyes of her mother and grandfather. Tenzin knew too little of the girl to judge whether she was capable of it. Her distress that night had seemed genuine, however.

In his mind, he circled back to the necklace. It had been stolen only a week before the murder and planted in the safe house. The whole heist was a national curiosity. Tenzin had suspected he would somehow become involved with the necklace sooner or later—one of the Families would buy the stolen goods and look for a way to profit from them; or perhaps one of the Families had actually stolen it and would need the mess cleaned up. What he hadn't foreseen was how convoluted the whole affair would become. Well, that wasn't completely true. Tenzin's job was always a convoluted mess. But there was something especially disconcerting about this one, something he couldn't quite understand. Something even the Form of Destiny was warning him against.

For a moment, Tenzin entertained another possibility: perhaps there had been no heist at all. What if the Constabulary had orchestrated the whole thing as a ruse to crack down on the Kukulkan Family? The Kukulkans had been on the back foot for a while now. Everyone with even a single toe in the nasty underworld of Belshazzar knew as much. But would the Constabulary really risk losing a national treasure for the meagre chance of dismantling one of the Families?

Yes, they would. Vikram Dhar certainly would have. The dots suddenly started connecting in Tenzin's mind, and a terrible foreboding drove him to his feet. He began pacing the length of his cubicle.

If it were an orchestrated sting, the Constabulary would have had to collaborate with the Bat-Erdene Family in some capacity. But that notion was absurd. Tenzin chuckled at himself for even entertaining it. Neither party would ever accept such an alliance, even if it meant ridding themselves of a competitor and a persistent thorn in their side, respectively.

The conclusion calmed Tenzin. Which, in turn, unnerved him. If this isn't the case, I am missing something else!

Why, then, had Vikram been killed? If he had gotten in bed with the Bat-Erdenes and his scheme had inadvertently led to Munay's treasured son's death, that would explain the murder. The fact that Vikram's role in the whole ordeal had been inconsequential, and that Tika himself had been responsible for his own death, would mean nothing to Munay. In Munay's mind, calm reason would have given way to boiling anger.

Tenzin needed more information. A crucial section of the mosaic was missing, and the only piece he could see fitting would turn the whole picture into an absurdity. It had to be some unlucky marriage of Destiny and happenstance, but he couldn't see how.

More troubling was the Ring. Why had it flared when he'd tried to sever his connection to the whole affair? How could burning Tika Bat-Erdene's body endanger him?

He had learnt the hard way that the Ring warned him only of threats to himself, whether physical or mental. It wasn't a harbinger of global doom, but rather of personal misery. Whatever awaited him if he burnt the body would exact a price from him—or his family. The only viable conclusion was that he needed the body for something.

But to what end? In a couple of days, the body would become unrecognisable. Its flesh was already rotting, and the stench would only worsen. He could attempt to dispose of it another way, but his gut told him it wasn't the method of disposal that had triggered the Ring. It was the act itself.

When his deductions hit an impassable mental wall, he set them aside for a moment. He lay down on the cement floor, letting the cold seep into his body until it began to ache. Cold. There used to be a time when he hadn't known anything else. The trenches were cold, often damp, and more often than not dark. In his own twisted way, Tenzin liked to return to those times. Not because he wished to be back, but because remembering them made him cherish what he had now. He couldn't linger in those memories for too long, however, lest he awaken others he had long since buried. After ten or so minutes, he got up and walked to Shatarma's quarters to check for incoming messages.

To his surprise, there were several. Some he had anticipated:

Itzel Kukulkan thanked him for a job well done and confirmed that his payment would pass through the shell company he had specified. That was as much as the Kukulkans would ever know of its destination. Tenzin would route the money through several more companies soon thereafter a lucrative contract appeared on the books of his Security Consultation firm. A contract that would require his personal attention, demand immediate execution, and pay quadruple the usual rates. Other times, he accepted payment in cash and created the paperwork himself. Varying the method kept the Families from spotting a pattern. His accountant took a small cut from each of these special contracts to keep his suspension of disbelief alive. Apart from the old bookkeeper, nobody else knew how those contracts came about.

Beyond that, there was a message from Hermann, asking when and where he could pick up the cart and horses. He also expressed concern for Tenzin's well-being and offered his help if it was ever needed. Tenzin sent back a thankful reply, explaining that returning the cart would take longer than he'd originally promised. He would drop it off sometime in the coming week. He deliberately left the window vague in case he needed the cart to move the barrel again. Hopefully, by the week's end, this whole ordeal would be long dealt with.

The last message sent gooseflesh prickling along Tenzin's neck. It couldn't be a coincidence. Shatarma repeated the name: "Munay Bat-Erdene."

As always, Munay's message was written rather than spoken. Unlike Itzel, he kept his distance from the Fix. In a way, that was a blessing, for he didn't delve too deeply into who or what the Fix really was. Naturally, he had made inquiries, but Tenzin had a way of distributing information that suited the image he wanted to project. As far as the two Family heads were concerned, they employed entirely different men. Tenzin even maintained a distinct visage for each of them, ensuring that a spy observing him in one Family's employ wouldn't recognise him working for the other. Tenzin didn't have a monopoly on this business. He was the best, however.

Once he had overcome the initial shock of the sender's name, Tenzin asked Shatarma to transcribe the message. Words began to flow across a blank sheet of paper in the jagged script Tenzin had come to recognise as Munay Bat-Erdene's own handwriting.

"I require your services. URGENT MATTER! I will pay you whatever you ask within reason. Contact me immediately."

It was the third sentence that chilled Tenzin. Munay was a parsimonious bastard. Unlike the Kukulkans, he spent no extra marble on comfort, preferring an austere lifestyle. He had tried to instil the same frugality into his Family, though the younger generation wasn't quite as beholden to it as he would have liked. His own father, the old patriarch, wasn't making it easy for him either. Ever since Munay had orchestrated the coup to seize leadership of the Family, the old patriarch's frugality seemed to have vanished into oblivion. Now, he enjoyed the company of expensive women amidst high society. All the while, he remained on the periphery of Family affairs, maintaining a loyal retinue of followers who adhered to the 'old code'. There was no old code. But the old patriarch liked to pretend he was beholden to some higher moral standard that made him superior to his son. And with tensions rising, a growing faction within the Family had begun to believe it.

But if Munay was offering to pay whatever Tenzin asked for, it meant this was personal. It couldn't be a coincidence. Suddenly, the barrel sitting in the shadows behind Tenzin took on a newfound purpose. The only question was what story he would sell to Munay—and how.

Before he could despair, however, he saw the situation for what it was. An opportunity. If he played his cards right, he could profit from this. He wielded the most important weapon in any battle: information. He had insight into all three parties involved in the affair, and he hoped to leverage it to his advantage. He had to preserve the peace and convince the Families to bury the hatchet. Not only because it was good for business, but because he wasn't sure Belshazzar could survive a full-scale Family conflict. They had all grown too large for Tenzin to allow that.

Suddenly, the burden felt almost too heavy to bear.

Tenzin took out a sheet of paper and, in his neat, flowing script, wrote three words: "When and where?"

 

[Fuzed]

Upon returning home, Tenzin realised he knew his wife all too well. It was barely past the eighth hour, and she was already gone, just as he had expected. Not to work, exactly: she had been summoned for a mandatory interview and a preliminary review hearing. She had yet to be reinstated, though Tenzin had never seriously considered the possibility that she wouldn't be. And it had better happen soon. She would go mad if she had to stay home for much longer after what had happened. What she needed wasn't peace and solitude. She needed closure — ideally with the bastard who had killed her superior officer and friend chained to a wall somewhere in a Constabulary dungeon.

Tenzin had tried to make it home in time to kiss her goodbye. He had originally hoped for something more than a kiss. It had been too long, and they could both use the distraction. The red flare of his Ring had derailed those plans completely. He had forgotten all about his desire, and now, in fairness, Sonam probably wouldn't have been interested anyway. They shared the ability to become hyper-focused on a single task. Once that flame of determination caught, everything else became a distraction. It was also why they needed Talartha.

She lived two houses up the road from the Tashis, and her husband was a member of the Pankrati Council, the largest legislative body in Erashkalla. Not a particularly prominent one, but he had been born and raised for politics by his mother, and the career left him little time for his wife. Talartha, in turn, spent much of her time socialising with the neighbours, which was how she had ended up as the Tashis' nanny. Whenever neither parent was home, she looked after the kids. On weekdays, she escorted them to the Educatory and, unless instructed otherwise, picked them up and brought them home safely. She cooked for them and even helped with their homework.

Tenzin opened the door and found a small note folded over the staircase banister. He unfolded it and smiled at its contents. It was a tradition they had started many years ago, before they even had kids. Whenever one of them left home without a proper goodbye, they would write one instead and leave it somewhere the other wouldn't miss it. They tried to keep both the notes and their hiding places interesting. Tenzin had to admit he hadn't expected they would still be leaving them for each other this often.

Life gets busy, he thought as a sudden melancholy washed over him.

Sounds drifted from the kitchen, and Tenzin knew it had to be Talartha. He called out to her, and she peeked around the corner, her full cheeks bunching around a tight-lipped smile. "Mr Tashi," she said. "You're home. Good. Will you be taking the kids, or should I?"

"Thank you, Talartha. I'll take care of it today. You may go home. And there's no need to come back this afternoon. I'm on dad duty."

"Glad to hear that," she replied, her smile becoming slightly more genuine. "The kids sure do miss their dad."

Tenzin swore he could hear a whispered addendum as she turned, something along the lines of "And their mother too," but he assumed it was only his imagination playing tricks on him. Talartha was a good woman. Opinionated, for sure. But good. Useful.

He woke the kids gently, earning himself a grunt from his son and — surprisingly — a massive hug from his daughter. Pelzom was her mother's child, no doubt about it. She hated being woken up but loved being up early. Tenzin had long given up on making sense of it, just as he had given up on trying to do the same with her mother.

"Are you taking us to school, Daddy?" the little girl asked, beaming at him, her wide smile standing in sharp contrast to her dark eyes.

"Yes, Pelzie. And I'll be making your breakfast and lunch too!"

The little girl jumped up and down on her bed, cheering and chanting: "Daddy's lunch!"

Tenzin knew his culinary prowess for what it was — average at best. He was nowhere near the cook his wife or mother-in-law were, as reluctant as he was to admit the latter. So he appreciated his daughter's reaction all the more. He gathered her up into a tight hug and hoisted her up over his shoulder, much to her surprise. She giggled as he took her downstairs, calling for Lachlan to get out of bed too.

Talartha was just leaving as they came down the stairs and Tenzin could see a bittersweet smile on her lips as she watched the happy family moment. Though it was merely a suspicion, Tenzin had always assumed she was jealous of their family. She was nearly thirty-three years old now and had been with her husband for over a decade, yet still remained without a child. From the yearning looks she often gave Lachlan and Pelzom, not for any lack of trying. He pitied her at times, which was why he had chosen to ignore her occasional snide remark.

The food Tenzin cooked for his children was simple — eggs over some semi-fresh bacon with bread and cheese sprinkled on top. While they ate, he wondered idly if his kids even realised the privilege they enjoyed by way of having rich parents. Did they understand that having cheese more often than once a week was a luxury that not many kids could enjoy? He doubted it. Perhaps Lachlan, but he too wasn't privy to the circumstances in which most kids his age found themselves.

This is what I do it for, he told himself. This is what I do it for, he repeated, trying to convince himself of the fact. A sudden shiver went up his spine, causing him to close his eyes. The flashing red Ring appeared behind his eyelids, vanishing just as he forced them back open. He had to figure it out.

After breakfast, the kids got themselves ready surprisingly quickly. The little one still needed Tenzin's help, but by the standards of most mornings, it was smooth sailing. He dropped them off at school, exchanging pleasantries with some of the other parents.

He was just about to leave when a vaguely familiar man approached him. Tenzin couldn't quite place the man's face, and the man didn't introduce himself, as though Tenzin should already know who he was. Maybe he was a parent?

I should really get some rest, Tenzin thought. Such a lapse of memory was uncharacteristic of him.

According to the man, one of Pelzom's classmates had heard Tenzin's daughter beam with pride about how "Daddy protects people from other bad people"—the simplified explanation of security work that he and Sonam had crafted for their daughter's benefit. She was very curious about where Daddy and Mommy left each morning. The classmate had apparently repeated the statement at home, which was what had led the man to approach Tenzin.

The man seemed haggard, as though he hadn't slept in a month. He was dressed primly and lavishly — clearly a man of wealth — but no fine coat or hat could conceal the worry and fatigue etched into his face. Tenzin had no desire to entertain him for long, so he handed the man his business card and offered his professional services at the address printed there. He would be at his office that afternoon. The man merely nodded and accepted the card.

The walk back home was unpleasant. No longer occupied by his daughter's endless chatter and her brother's intermittent provocations, Tenzin was left alone with his thoughts. Munay still hadn't replied by the time he left the Factory. Tenzin had waited roughly thirty minutes, assuming the man would be expecting a response. Apparently, the issue wasn't as pressing as the initial contact had led him to believe.

Or it was so bad he didn't even have the luxury of replying.

Tenzin chastised himself for the thought. No good ever came from making assumptions with so little evidence.

For the rest of the morning, Tenzin caught up on some neglected chores. He picked up new books for Mnareth, returning the old ones while he was there. He cleaned the house a little and made the rounds through the bakery, the butcher's and a tiny general store run by an old woman who had probably come with the building and never left.

Once everything was done and Tenzin had some time to kill, he hailed a carriage and let himself be driven to work. The small, two-storey building had once served as the administrative centre of the self-contained municipality where the Tashi family lived. Even before Tenzin was born, however, the municipality had been absorbed into the rest of the city, leaving the building without a purpose. Tenzin had bought it after lengthy discussions with his wife over whether a decades-old, decrepit building was really a worthwhile investment — and whether perhaps he ought to start smaller.

Many discussions later, Tenzin signed the contract and set about restoring the building to its former grandeur. Its architecture was a marvel. A broad walkway surrounded the central building on all sides, sheltered beneath a stone overhang supported by thick pillars of whitewashed stone. Even Tenzin wasn't crazy enough to clad the exterior in actual marble, though he quite fancied the illusion of it. After a couple of years — and considerably more money than he had originally intended to spend — Tenzin reopened the building. Now, only a small section served as the headquarters of his security firm. The rest was rented to other companies.

Tenzin walked through the pleasant garden surrounding the building. On his lunch breaks, he liked to sit in the tiny pagoda in the far eastern corner of the grounds, enjoying a moment of solitude and silence. The high stone wall separated the garden from the noise of the city. It was a refuge where he could be alone, forget his work and his life for a while, and simply… be.

But lunch was still a while away, and Tenzin entered the building, privately looking forward to a little normalcy. He greeted the few people he met along the way, exchanging pleasantries with the more familiar faces before finally reaching his office on the second floor. His keys jingled as he slid one into the lock and stepped inside.

His mood soured immediately. Seated in the waiting area beneath an obnoxiously abstract painting by a famous Belshazzarian artist was the parent from the Educatory who had approached him that morning. Once again, Tenzin was struck by the nagging sense that he ought to know the man, but his mind remained frustratingly foggy.

You sure work fast, Tenzin thought. Or you're desperate. He schooled his face into a pleasant, if dishonest, smile. "Ah, what a treat to see you here. If you wouldn't mind waiting a couple more minutes, allow me to get settled."

Tenzin shook the man's hand, fully set on finding an excuse not to see him himself. Perhaps there was a scheduling conflict he could fabricate as an excuse. Or perhaps he could let his secretary handle him, at least for today. No, the man seemed determined to speak with Tenzin personally. Tenzin sighed after closing the door to his private study. At the far left of the room, double doors opened into a separate section where his secretary and two employees worked. After a minute's respite, Tenzin called for the former, beckoning the boy inside. Karmichael popped his head in, revealing a mop of long blond hair.

"Ah, Mr Tashi," the young lad said, stopping with only his head peeking through the double doorway. He only walked in once he realised he hadn't imagined the summons. Karmichael had only recently reached the minimum age for such a job, but he came highly recommended by a colleague of Sonam's. His nephew, apparently. He had been in Tenzin's employ for over a year now, and Tenzin had to admit he was thoroughly impressed. He had even developed a paternal affection for the boy, deciding that, with a little guidance, Karmichael might do well for himself.

"Your calendar for today is open. I moved tomorrow's meeting to another day since you wanted the day free, if I remember correctly? Also, Mrs Salamanca called. She's opening another… facility and would like the complete package, as per usual." There was a hint of embarrassment in the young boy's voice. He was still at that age when even the mention of a brothel made his cheeks go crimson and his voice falter.

Maybe I should take him along for one of the inspections, Tenzin thought. He'd see that, at its core, a brothel is just another building. Nothing more. At least, before business commences.

"Next thing," the boy continued, "one of those personal contracts of yours arrived. This is a big one."

It was Itzel Kukulkan's payment. Whenever one of his Fixer contracts was complete, Tenzin had the payment delivered to one of several shell companies. From there, the money travelled through a chain of legitimate companies, run by people who didn't much care what passed through their books as long as they got a cut. Several transfers later, roughly ten per cent lighter, the payment reached Tashi Security disguised as revenue from a fabricated contract. The route was never the same; Tenzin randomly selected the companies involved each time. He sent the instructions to the first company, which passed them along.

It was a complicated system with many checks and balances. None of the people involved actually knew Tenzin, and the second-to-last company in the chain always assumed that Tashi Security was merely another stop along the way. Nobody suspected it was the final destination. One of Tenzin's contacts in his Fixer persona was always on the lookout for new, failing businessmen willing to entangle themselves in the web for a little extra cash. After all, there was no harm in letting some money pass through their company, right? New companies entered the pool every month while others inevitably dropped out, leaving roughly three hundred active at any given time.

Tenzin took the contract papers from Karmichael and feigned an impressed whistle. The boy had never voiced any suspicions about the origins of these semi-frequent contracts, despite the fact that they generated a sizeable portion of the company's income. He most likely attributed them to Tenzin's craftiness and connections.

"And lastly, the gentleman outside."

"Yes, the gentleman. Is there any way we could reschedule him? Or perhaps you could talk to him?"

Karmichael faltered. "I, um, of course. I would be honoured, sir. But don't you find it a little… rude? Passing him off to me?"

Tenzin looked at him, confused. "I thought you'd be elated."

"No. I mean, yes. I don't mean rude towards me, but towards him. He's been waiting for a while now, and with his background, I would've thought you'd want to handle him yourself."

"His background?"

His assistant's eyes widened until they seemed ready to fall from their sockets. "You don't know?"

"Know what?" Tenzin's irritation grew. Sometimes, the boy's age showed. "Out with it, Karmichael!"

"That's Cato Averinthius Porcius. The current director of the Serpentine Archives."

Suddenly, the image of the stolen necklace in Tenzin's possession flashed through his mind. It all made sense now: why Karmichael was so nervous, why Porcius had approached him in such haste, and why the man had seemed vaguely familiar.

Something felt off, however. Why would such an important man approach him alone on the street, and why would he wait for so long? Unless Cato Porcius was one of those rare people who didn't allow status and influence to strip him of his modesty.

A new opportunity might have just landed in Tenzin's lap. With some luck, he could resolve his necklace issue with unprecedented elegance, perhaps earning himself some legitimate goodwill in the process.

 

[Fuzed]

Cato Averinthius Porcius was a paper-pusher. An impressive paper-pusher, no doubt about it. But a paper-pusher nonetheless. During the last war, he had been kept from conscription through the intervention of his father, Marcus Averinthius Porcius. The middle name, Averinthius, derived from Marcus's military victories in the Averinthian War, during which he had served as the lead general. The honorary title had since become part of his name, proudly carried by the family. Which was why it came as such a surprise — and arguably even a scandal — when Marcus's eldest son didn't join the war effort but instead took up the post of Director of the Serpentine Archives. Though many official reasons were cited in the thirty-five-page submission to the Military Consulate, only one thing pushed the request out of the realm of fiction and into reality: the signature at the bottom of the page — Military General Marcus Averinthius Porcius.

Cato Porcius, to his credit, tried to oppose the motion. He fought vehemently for the right to join Erashkalla's war effort, but he was still a young man then, and his voice carried little weight. Not when compared to his father's, at least. Regardless of his efforts, his reputation suffered because of his father's protectiveness, and to this day he had to endure the scornful looks of veterans who had lost limbs, family and friends in the war.

But the man's downtrodden demeanour could hardly be attributed to his reputation. That was something he had long since learned to live with. Tenzin assumed the more immediate cause of his woes was the necklace resting so peacefully inside his Ring back at the Factory. With that in mind, he was honestly surprised Porcius managed to look as composed as he did, even if his appearance fell somewhat short of the standards usually associated with the Porcius family.

Tenzin ushered Karmichael back to his desk and closed the door behind him. He took a deep breath to ground himself, trying to recover from the whiplash of what his assistant had just told him. Once he realised he wasn't going to feel any more prepared in the next few minutes, he opened the door to the waiting room.

"Mr Porcius, please do come in."

The man smiled amicably. The kind of smile one displayed for a business acquaintance. The kind that didn't reach the eyes. He stood, retrieved his hat from the seat beside him and followed Tenzin's gesture into the office. Once inside, he looked around, inspecting the artwork on the walls and the arches overhead. He gave a quiet hum of approval and nodded to himself.

"I apologise for the delay," Tenzin said. "I hope you haven't been waiting too long."

The man looked at Tenzin, once again wearing the appropriate smile. "Not at all."

Tenzin gestured for Porcius to sit in the leather chair across from his desk. The man nodded and did so, resting his hat on his lap. He idly stroked its rim, almost subconsciously. A nervous tic of some kind, Tenzin assumed.

Quite the reason to be nervous, Tenzin thought.

After Tenzin sat down and interlaced his fingers, Porcius spoke without prompting. "I wasn't sure you recognised me," he said, his voice measured. It sounded more like an observation than an accusation.

"I must admit, I couldn't place you at first. Back at the Educatory. I didn't realise our children were classmates."

"Your daughter speaks very highly of you, Mr Tashi. So highly, in fact, that it earned you my visit."

"Pelzie is a blessing of a child. Though I doubt she could convey the intricacies of my work with much accuracy, so I must admit I'm curious why you chose to approach me. Which isn't to say I'm complaining, merely…"

Tenzin stopped. That wasn't quite how he wanted to phrase it.

"As you can surely appreciate, a healthy measure of scepticism goes a long way in my line of work. I can't help but apply some of it to this meeting as well."

Porcius nodded knowingly. "It's as you say, Mr Tashi. Scepticism is a powerful tool when wielded appropriately. Allow me to alleviate some of your worries. You aren't the first person I've approached, but I do hope you're the last."

Something in that final sentence sounded almost genuinely desperate.

"I had my people run a background check on your operation, and I must say, I am impressed."

A sudden spike of panic jolted Tenzin. If the Porcius family decided to pour their considerable resources into investigating him, they might uncover the Factory, no matter how carefully he had concealed its connection to himself. But the fact that Porcius himself — and not the Constabulary — had come knocking suggested that Tenzin's precautions had held. For now.

"You flatter me too much," Tenzin said, affecting a sheepish tone.

A new worry immediately set up shop in his mind. Whatever Porcius wanted from him had to be substantial, most likely something involving the Serpentine Archives. To any ordinary security contractor, a man such as Porcius seeking their assistance would be a blessing. They would jump at the opportunity — kill for it, even. But for Tenzin, it meant stepping into the spotlight. It meant exposing himself to a potentially endless stream of scrutiny, and no matter how carefully crafted the lie, enough questions could eventually unravel it.

Then again, no sane businessman would turn down an opportunity of this magnitude without good reason. Refusing Porcius outright might invite even more suspicion.

Suddenly, Tenzin found himself regretting the little surge of excitement he had felt upon learning the man's identity.

"You are too modest, Mr Tashi," Porcius continued. "Which is a good quality in a man of your profession. Modest men make fewer mistakes. They measure thrice before they cut, in my experience. I consider myself a modest man, if saying so doesn't directly contradict the claim. I have, however, acted in haste recently. And as you surely know, it didn't end well."

Tenzin merely nodded gravely.

"I don't doubt that any explanation of my current situation would be entirely superfluous. Nonetheless, allow me the luxury of unburdening myself and perhaps providing a more complete picture than you might glean from the rumours around the city." He shifted in his seat and looked down at his hat. His gaze was tired but steady and contemplative. There was no sign of defeat in his posture.

"Before I continue, however, Mr Tashi," he said quietly, the softness of his voice carrying an unmistakable edge. "You can be trusted, am I right?"

The eyes that looked up at Tenzin weren't the same ones he had seen before. This was Cato Averinthius Porcius. A powerful man. A dangerous man.

"I hope I make my meaning clear when I say none of this will leave this room."

Tenzin's first instinct was to meet the man's stare without flinching. Show him he wasn't intimidated. And in truth, he wasn't — if anything, he felt a flicker of excitement at being confronted by someone formidable. But Tenzin Tashi was a private security contractor who had ostensibly spent most of his military career behind a desk. Officially, at least. And Porcius wasn't on the short list of people who knew the truth.

So Tenzin dutifully played the intimidated ex-clerk, allowing his eyes to widen and his mouth to work wordlessly for a second before replying. "O-of course, Mr Porcius. I take my clients very seriously, and secrecy is paramount in my field. You can trust that whatever you say will go with me to my grave!"

The deliberate turn of phrase elicited a slight twitch of Porcius's lip. Amusement, perhaps. "Good. I am glad to hear that. Secrets can be dangerous." He leaned back in his seat, visibly more relaxed. Even the weariness in his eyes seemed to recede. The man sitting before Tenzin now seemed almost unrecognisable from the one who had approached him outside the Educatory that very morning.

"As you well know, items of immense national value were stolen from my Archives. Under my watch. Because of that, I am now subjected to a great deal of scrutiny and criticism. There is even talk of stripping me of my position and the honorary title of Averinthius."

At that, Porcius looked away, smiled faintly and scoffed — genuine disdain, Tenzin assumed, for the family title.

"Naturally, I would like to prevent that. To do so, however, I have to prove that I fulfilled my duties."

"We can run a security audit and—"

"Please, don't interrupt me."

Tenzin apologised with a smile and motioned for him to continue.

"As I was saying, I have done everything right, and there is no reason for me to be punished. I have it from credible sources that the robbery was an inside job. And I am more than certain it had something to do with the failed sting on the Kukulkan safe house."

The last sentence escaped him in a quiet hiss.

Tenzin's eyes widened. There was no need for embellishment or acting; he truly was as shocked as he appeared. This was effectively confirmation of his wild theory. If the robbery was an inside job, it would explain how the necklace had been planted and why the Constabulary had arrived at the safe house so soon that night.

It would mean Munay Bat-Erdene was in bed with the Constabulary, cleverly using them to rid himself of the competition. Whatever relationship existed between them had most likely ended the moment Munay caught wind of Tika's disappearance. By now, Munay surely had no illusions about his son's fate. He knew Tika was dead.

Yet only a week earlier, Tenzin would have dismissed the very idea of one of the Families working with the Constabulary as absurd. What could possibly have driven Munay to such a thing? Desperation? Greed?

The old Patriarch wouldn't stand by such an operation, Tenzin thought.

Tenzin felt a rising unease. For the most part, he understood the politics of Belshazzar. He knew what to expect from whom. He knew the important players and the important events. Information was the most expensive currency in the city, and Tenzin was a rich man.

But this was unprecedented. So far outside what he considered possible that, when the idea had first occurred to him, even his own mind had dismissed it as absurd. The clues had been there all along. His preconceived notions had simply prevented him from seeing the conclusion they pointed towards.

"I understand your surprise," Porcius said, reminding Tenzin that he wasn't alone. "I too was shocked when I first learned of it. It might seem absurd. Frivolous, even. But such is the work of our Constabulary, I'm afraid."

Porcius paused, as though only then realising what he had said.

"I apologise. I hope I haven't offended you."

For a split second, Tenzin was confused. Then he realised Porcius must have made the connection to Sonam — and, presumably, to Tenzin's own history with the Constabulary. The man confirmed it immediately.

"Mrs Tashi was close to the constable who was murdered, I have heard. And you were there to witness it as well? That must have been traumatising."

The disconcerting calmness with which Porcius uttered the last sentence sent an alarm blaring through Tenzin's mind. Something wasn't right. His instincts, honed by years of experience, told him this man was hiding something.

Feigning mild offence, Tenzin leaned forward. "What are you here for, Mr Porcius? I certainly hope insulting my wife's profession and her dead colleague isn't the purpose of this visit."

The silence stretched on for an uncomfortably long time. Finally, Porcius chuckled, his shoulders joining the parade and bobbing with the laugh in an exaggerated display.

"You're very good at it," he said finally.

Tenzin frowned.

"At hiding it," Porcius added, though that did little to clarify anything.

He stood and straightened his jacket. The books on the shelf to his right seemed to pique his interest, and Porcius wandered over to inspect them. Tenzin's unease intensified. Panic crept in. He didn't understand what was happening. This man unnerved him. Not knowing unnerved him. It felt like being the punchline of a joke he only heard the last half of.

"I… must admit, you have me confused, Mr Porcius," Tenzin said tentatively.

Porcius pulled a book from the shelf and inspected it. He turned to Tenzin and smiled. "Are you an avid reader of the philosophies, Mr Tashi?"

"The evidence surely speaks for itself," Tenzin said, the tension now creeping into his voice. He stood and walked over to Porcius, taking the book from his hand. "I don't think we are a good match, Mr Porcius. I am sorry, but… I won't be your last stop after all."

Tenzin started to think the story might be entirely fabricated. Or was this man truly an oddball and there was nothing more to it? He had met his share of unique people. Many of them were still part of his organisation. But this felt deliberate. Meticulous. Not some odd personal quirk. Instead, it seemed like a preconceived strategy to put Tenzin on edge. Was he testing him?

Porcius let go of the book and sat back down while Tenzin slotted the bound volume back into place. The director of the Serpentine Archives smiled at him like a wolf regarding its prey and said, "I'm afraid we are only getting started, Mr Tashi." From inside his suit, he produced a single sheet of paper. It was yellowed with age and hung loosely from his hand. From the lettering, Tenzin recognised it as an old state document.

Porcius placed the paper gently on the desk and pushed it towards Tenzin. Tenzin hesitated for a second before finally leaning in.

Tenzin's heart attempted to pummel its way out of his chest as he read the first few lines. It wasn't until he reached the middle section that he truly felt fear.

There, alone in a small hand-drawn table, stood his name — proof that the Factory had once belonged directly to him.

"Perhaps I haven't made myself clear, Mr Tenzin," Porcius said. "I am not here seeking your aid, but that of the Fix. Now, shall we talk?"

 

[Fuzed]

Tenzin fought to suppress his immediate reaction, because it would be one of terror. It took all the composure he had to project honest confusion. "I… am afraid I don't follow? What fix? And what's this deed about?" Tenzin said, once again looking at the paper in his hand that showed he once was the rightful owner of the Factory.

"You're good, Mr Tashi," Cato said with a playful smile. "Very good. But the insurmountable evidence isn't doing you any favours. How about we both drop this game of charades and get to the point. We are both busy men. You especially, two jobs and a family?"

Tenzin sneered at the threat and dropped the deed to the table, standing up and walking to the liquor cabinet behind him. He poured himself a drink and drank the first glass, savouring it. The next glass he took with himself to the table. He locked eyes with Cato and waited for a little more, thinking. Analysing what his next step should be. What did the man want?

"This morning," Tenzin started at last, "was that a threat?"

Cato shook his head casually. "Not at all. It was merely final confirmation."

"Confirmation of what?"

"That you're the real deal. If I had only seen the fabricated military record, you'd be a low ranked clerk. But you also have a purged military record, Mr Tashi. Not sealed, purged. I've only heard of those, never actually saw any. Not even yours. Must have been some good reading. I was curious as to what a middle-aged suburban security consultant was doing with a purged record. So I had my people do some digging. And do you know what they came up with?"

Tenzin didn't reply.

"Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not a single shred of suspicious evidence. Which in itself is suspicious. There was a second where I thought, you might only be someone bearing the same name as the Tenzin Tashi in those records. But then one of my analysts brought me a video. A completely unrelated investigation into a group of Fixers ostensibly aiding the crime Families in our lovely city. Could you imagine my surprise, one of these men used the Sarasturi kick? A real beauty, that one. But just as your military record, I've never actually seen one in action. The men that have mastered it are either dead, long retired or deep undercover agents of the Shahaii. So how come this fixer could perform it and in a real scenario at that?"

Cato released a light chuckle. He looked at the glass in Tenzin's hand, most likely implying he'd like a drink. Tenzin ignored him and waited.

"I had my people dive in a little deeper. After cross-referencing all the confirmed activity of the fixers over a one year period, a curiosity emerged. Not once in all that time did an occasion arise where these fixers acted simultaneously. Hence we concluded, the fixers were in fact not some rogue group, but rather a single rogue individual. The Fix, is what we named our dossier on you."

"Who's 'we'?"

"My people," Cato said. "None of your business. It wasn't until a week later, when I suddenly had a thought. Was there perchance a connection between that mysterious purged record and the Fixer who wielded the well-guarded Shahaii fighting style? And with that connection made," Cato said, leaning forward and laughing, "it was child's play. Like a beautiful bouquet, your story unravelled. The building you own. Or owned. The chain of transactions you lead it through was honestly astounding and it took considerable manpower to trace it back to you. But we did. I only wanted to perform one last check before confronting you — I needed to meet this man in person. You turned out to be completely ordinary. Which was all the confirmation I needed, that the Tenzin Tashi everybody knows is a lie."

Tenzin considered what he had just heard. A part of him wondered if the purposeful use of the word 'we' was nothing but a clever precaution. What would stop Tenzin from silencing the man here and now? Apart from the public setting, it would be the fact that someone else knew. Whoever 'they' were, if they knew of Tenzin and his connection to the Fix, Cato not returning safely would undoubtedly trigger some kind of safety mechanism. There was only one avenue this conversation could now take.

Tenzin lifted his hands in mock surrender and laughed. "You got me." That clearly unnerved Cato, because it must have felt like a portion of the power he wielded just dissipated. "Let us talk somewhat openly in that case. You have shown me some of your cards. Undoubtedly, you're keeping some nuggets of wisdom purposefully hidden from me, but alas, there's nothing I can do about that. What I can do is ask you what you want. So, what do you hope to achieve by coming to me like this?"

Cato had to visibly compose himself. In his head, the flow of the conversation undoubtedly went in a different direction. Or, if nothing else, at least at a different speed.

"Well," he said, clearing his throat. "In a way, I have already made my reasons abundantly clear, Mr Tashi. I need the Fix's help with a problem."

"And that problem being the stolen jewels," Tenzin said.

Cato bobbed his head around, as if that wasn't entirely the right characterisation of the issue. "It's more nuanced than that. You see, my position in the Serpentine Archives is crucial for certain plans. And I need to ensure I can remain in my seat for the foreseeable future. However, I see this as an opportunity for some — let's call them — structural changes to the environment."

Tenzin thought back to an article he had read maybe a year ago. Until that moment, Cato Porcius had been a name in a ledger somewhere, but he'd never actually known about his past or affiliations until that article. Therein, the author spoke about an internal strife between the Serpentine Archives and the Constabulary.

Cato Averinthius Porcius, the Director of the Serpentine Archives, was a loud proponent of the Independence Act, which would allow the Serpentine Archives to tear itself away from the Constabulary's control. As it stood, security and control of the Archives on an institutional level actually belonged to the Constabulary. The Director was a powerful figure when it came to the day-to-day operations, but when it came to the larger questions, he was ultimately beholden to decisions made within the Military Consulate.

Because of this largely obsolete chain of command, which had long been outgrown by the scope of the responsibilities the Serpentine Archives had, Cato Porcius argued that the institution should become an independent agent, governing itself. The Military Consulate's lobbyists fought vehemently against this proposal, ultimately citing the "constitutional hurdles, which are insurmountable under the current tense political climate."

Which was a fancy way of saying, Fuck you! to Cato.

"You want to use this failure of the Constabulary as a driving vehicle for the Independence Act," Tenzin said, more an observation than a question.

Cato's eyes widened for an almost imperceptible moment. He nodded. "Talking like this, I am glad I hadn't underestimated you and made extensive preparations. Seeing as you already know the broad strokes, let me give you the finer details. Once I leave this room, I will have contracted both the services of Tashi Security, as well as those of the Fix. Having you around under legitimate pretences will make it easier to hide our real dealings from prying eyes. Officially, Tashi Security will merely serve as an outside security consultant. Your company will be subject to some brief scrutiny for suddenly acquiring such a contract. But your books are solid enough to withstand the cursory inspection. After that, nobody else will be interested enough to dive further. You will be forgotten by then. That's when the real work will start."

"And by real work, you mean finding the jewels," Tenzin said, fishing for confirmation of whether or not Cato knew about the most recent dangerous secret of his.

"Exactly so. Your task will actually be simple. Find the jewels, return them to me and I will do the rest. After that, we might part ways amicably or continue a potentially beneficial relationship. Who knows?"

Tenzin allowed the silence to linger. One thing bothered him.

"You had 'your people', as you called them, find out all this information about me. Why don't they find the jewels?"

"They tried," Cato said. "But the trail went cold a while back. And besides, my people are great at information gathering, but using that information in the field, that's where we need help oftentimes."

"And that's my role. Will I get to meet these people of yours?"

"No, you won't."

"Didn't hurt to ask," Tenzin said. "How would you like to proceed?"

Cato stood up, buttoning his suit and straightening his cufflinks. "Right now, you will call in that lovely assistant of yours. Tell him you just got a new client. Show some elation. After that, I will leave and you will receive the official contract from the Archives' lawyers, sketching the boundaries of our collaboration."

"And our real purpose? Should I start looking for the jewels?"

"Yes, and make haste. I need to move quickly while the fiasco is still fresh in everyone's mind. Once you find them, you hand them over and I will deal with the rest."

"Who will have found them officially? You cannot just claim you manifested them."

Cato grinned like a devil. "That, Mr Tashi, does not need to concern you. Now, shall we?" He nodded towards the door behind him and extended his hand.

Tenzin stood and called for Karmichael.

The boy walked in, most likely not expecting what he saw, for he halted in the doorway. "Yes, Mr Tashi?"

"Karmichael, would you please show our newest client out." Tenzin positively beamed. It was the performance of a lifetime, seeing as on the inside, he was terrified. Every well-guarded secret he had spent years of his life and vast sums of money to hide had just been laid bare. And he had no idea how.

Karmichael did as he was instructed, opening the door for Cato and bowing his head in respect. The subservience of the boy was to be expected under the ostensible circumstances. But after the conversation Tenzin and Cato had just had, it felt like an insult.

Tenzin would never hold it against him, of course. The boy knew nothing of what had just transpired — and he never could. But Tenzin was still irritated.

Once Cato was outside his office and Tenzin was alone, he dropped back into the seat and propped up his head as a massive headache began to emerge.

Then he noticed a tiny white strip of paper on the table.

He reached for it and saw a familiar pattern of sixteen numbers and letters.

It was a Hexman code.

It was the Fix's turn to figure out a story of when and how he found the jewels. After all, he had already completed his task before it had even been assigned.

 

[Fuzed]

The neighbourhood in which the Tashis lived was known as the Green Leaf by its inhabitants. Most of the people who lived there were Tenzin and Sonam's age or younger. Middle-aged families with children. Upper-class. Politicians, businessmen. High-ranking officers of some sort.

When Tenzin and Sonam were expecting Lachlan, they took their time choosing the right neighbourhood to settle in. Luckily, even then, their budget allowed them to choose based not on what they could afford, but on where they wanted to live. Eventually, they settled on the Green Leaf.

The people in the neighbourhood welcomed them warmly, and many friendships formed almost immediately. Over the years, many people moved out and others moved in. Some friendships weakened through years of little contact; others strengthened.

Out of all the people they had met over the years, a small group had formed. It consisted of Tenzin and Sonam and three other couples. Over time, children had joined the fray, adding a fresh new layer to their semi-regular meetings.

It had been perhaps two months since they had last met. Usually, Tenzin looked forward to these evenings and the opportunity to exchange mundane anecdotes from daily life. But that night, when he came home and Sonam told him they were expected at their usual winter soirée spot, he found himself disinterested. Annoyed, even. He had just come from one of the most terrifying meetings of his life with Cato Porcius, and now he had to act nonchalantly in front of some of his dearest friends.

The McCrees had a large estate with a closed-off terrace, perfect for long evenings of conversation while the kids occupied themselves inside the house. Joining the Tashis would be the Kleins and the Weeks family, both with their respective children.

Most of the kids were roughly the same age, with Pelzie being the obvious exception. Despite the age difference, they had adopted her as something of a younger sister and were surprisingly protective of her. She occasionally joined them on their more innocent adventures around the neighbourhood, though Sonam knew better than to let her four-year-old tag along most of the time. They were teenagers, after all.

Tonight was one of those familiar winter evenings. The cold, mixed with a light drizzle, encouraged everyone to spend as little time outside as possible and hurry towards the warmth indoors. The kids were somewhere inside the main house, while the adults gathered around the large table.

Hafsa, the Weeks' eldest daughter, was already eighteen and usually abstained from these — in her own words — 'tedious events'. Her plans had fallen through that evening, however, leaving her to entertain herself at the adults' table. Tenzin suspected she quite enjoyed being included rather than treated as one of the kids, so whenever he had the opportunity, he drew her into the conversation.

He had also invited her to a round of strata, a deceptively simple strategy board game often used by the military to train recruits' strategic thinking. It came as no surprise that Martin McCree owned a set.

The flow of conversation was pleasant, albeit somewhat predictable. There was only so much a group of acquainted adults could talk about when most of their professions demanded an unhealthy amount of secrecy.

Anya McCree was a member of the Pankrati Council — the highest elected governmental body in Erashkalla. She was only a White Panki, the second-lowest position one could hold within the Council, but it was an honour nonetheless.

Her husband, Martin, was part of the Shahaii. Keeping secrets — and, even more importantly, uncovering them — was supposedly his bread and butter. The Shahaii were tasked with supplying the military with whatever information it needed to make educated decisions about where, when and how to fight. Or not fight, as had so often been the case in recent years.

The Erashkalla military isn't what it used to be, Tenzin thought whenever he saw Martin. Or heard him speak.

In spite of his profession, Martin was surprisingly willing to share stories of his accomplishments with the group, albeit in hushed tones, as though that diminished the unprofessionalism in any meaningful way.

The Kleins were no different. Phillipa Klein was a semi-important priestess of Sanctity. She danced on the precipice of real importance. Depending on whom you asked, she was either the most important priestess in this district of the city or a largely inconsequential figure. Understandably, Phillipa firmly asserted the former, while Tenzin's scepticism pushed him towards the latter.

Regardless, she was tight-lipped to a fault. Tenzin had long since concluded that secrecy was simply another way of selling her ostensible importance.

Simon, her husband, was the only person in the group who could speak about his work with any openness. He owned a very lucrative chain of bookshops in the central district. Even the King's attendants had a standing order exclusively in his shops for books to feed the royal Hexmen.

In a way, Simon was the most fascinating person of the lot, if only because he could actually talk about his work. He often entertained the group with anecdotes about disgruntled, delighted or astounded customers. What made his bookshops stand out was that they supplied popular titles — in Tenzin's eyes, mostly meaningless drivel — to the masses. Historically, most of the books sold were on histories, autobiographies and other non-fiction. Fictional titles had only started making rounds in the last couple of decades, and Simon was a pioneer.

Because of that shift, Simon's bookshops made the majority of their sales from selling to private readers, not to Hexmen owners looking to feed them. The only thing that interested Tenzin about the statistic was the feat of data-gathering required to produce it. He even doubted its veracity, but the claim seemed so inconsequential that he saw no reason for Simon to lie.

And then there were Tenzin and Sonam. Sonam being a high-ranking Constable and Tenzin working in private security only reinforced the unspoken pact of secrecy that permeated these meetings.

Nonetheless, Tenzin occasionally supplied the group with seemingly innocuous — and frequently entirely fictional — accounts of his work, adopting the same conspiratorial tone Martin favoured. It was a controlled way of shaping expectations and maintaining his carefully constructed image, both in his wife's eyes and among his friends.

Throughout the evening, Tenzin felt distant. His mind kept returning to Cato Porcius. He had managed to maintain a semblance of nonchalance until the man left his office, but now, with time to consider everything that had been said, he couldn't shake the unease.

Somebody must have tattled, Tenzin concluded. How else could Cato have known? But who? Only very few people knew, and Tenzin was confident they remained silent. But he might have to check. Most people only knew him as Fix. Some tried to pry further but either hit a dead end, or had to be dissuaded.

Sonam placed a hand on his leg, jolting him back to reality. She gave him a slight, knowing smile, suggesting she understood that his mind was somewhere other than the evening conversation.

She knew him too well.

The irony, Tenzin thought.

There had been a time when he felt guilty about lying to his wife. But she lied to him too, he knew. Secrecy and lies were what they did. They were part of their jobs. Long ago, Tenzin had accepted that. He had learned to live with those flaws in both himself and his wife.

And somehow, their relationship had only grown stronger despite them.

The evening conversation had once again settled on Martin's escapades in the Shahaii. Yet again, the buffoon was doing his reputation no favours by spilling another secret. Tenzin wouldn't trust the man with his recipe book. By the following morning, half the neighbourhood would know exactly how much truffle oil he used.

"And then, believe it or not, they all had to go into hiding! As the great Labarna is my witness, they all did!"

Martin bellowed with laughter. If nothing else, he had a pleasant voice, Tenzin concluded. The others answered with a cordial, though considerably more muted, chorus of laughter. Tenzin joined in as well, plastering on a smile.

A mildly awkward silence followed. Nobody seemed quite sure whether Martin had finished or was merely catching his breath before continuing. Fortunately, the arrival of their kids spared everyone from having to find out.

Brundt — Martin and Anya's eldest son — led the charge onto the terrace, followed closely by Kareem and Lachlan. From what little Tenzin had heard his son say about the other two boys, Brundt took after his father in more ways than would likely benefit him in the future.

Kareem, meanwhile, was the spitting image of Phillipa in both appearance and behaviour. Luckily, at fifteen, he didn't yet have enough accomplishments to inflate.

"Papa," Brundt said, surprising everyone with how out of breath he was. "Would you show Kar and Lach the moves you showed me last week? Please?"

"What moves?" Phillipa interjected immediately, straightening as though a bolt of lightning had corrected her posture.

Martin laughed. "Oh, just a couple of moves I showed my boy. In case he ever needed to protect someone."

He glanced towards Kareem and Lachlan. Whether the boys — or anybody else — noticed, Tenzin couldn't say. Martin stood and made his way towards a more open section of the terrace.

Phillipa immediately began to protest, but Kareem silenced her with a groan and an emphatic insistence that he wanted to see whatever 'Uncle Martin' had taught Brundt.

Even the open section of the terrace seemed cramped for whatever undoubtedly flamboyant display of physical prowess Martin was about to put on. But it wasn't Tenzin's house that might suffer the consequences of such buffoonery, so he didn't much care.

He shot a quick glare in Lachlan's direction. His son immediately shook his head with a smile.

Good boy, Tenzin thought, a sudden wave of pride enveloping him.

Surprisingly, it was Kareem who volunteered to step forward rather than Brundt, much to his mother's dismay. Brundt merely watched with a smug smile, apparently eager to see his friend get his arse handed to him. Whatever Tenzin thought of Martin, the man was a trained soldier, after all.

The lanky boy walked up to him and raised his hands in what he most likely considered a fighting stance. Tenzin barely suppressed a chuckle, remembering the first time he had raised his own hands in defence, convinced that all his problems could be solved with his fists.

His first fight had gone about as well as Kareem's demonstration was likely to go now.

Martin instructed the boy on the positioning of his shoulders and elbows, stepping in whenever necessary to correct his posture. He showed him the basics of protecting his face and the vulnerable parts of his torso, demonstrating common mistakes with light smacks of his palm to illustrate just how painful they could be.

Kareem nodded furiously, absorbing every lesson with eager curiosity. Simon was a good man, but he was no fighter. The only lessons his son could expect from him were calligraphy and ancient literature. For a boy Kareem's age, this was a rare treat.

Once the careful, meticulous demonstration of the importance of a proper stance had concluded, Martin returned to his spot. He stood perhaps five paces from the boy, towering over him at two metres tall, his shoulders broad enough to make Kareem look even lankier by comparison.

"Ready?" Martin asked, grinning.

The moron was enjoying it. Not the fighting — the attention.

Tenzin wanted to roll his eyes, but instead exchanged a worried look with his wife, silently thanking all the ancestors for gifting Lachlan with enough good sense not to involve himself in this farce.

Kareem answered with a terse nod.

"Come at me with all you have!" Martin said, letting his arms drop into a relaxed posture — the exact opposite of what he had just taught Kareem. He even turned slightly, exposing his side to the boy.

Whatever hesitation Kareem had about hurting his friend's father vanished. He rushed forward, his upper body stiff, his arms held exactly where Martin had positioned them.

Four paces. Three. Kareem drew back his fist. Two. He was on him.

Martin's response left much to be desired in terms of efficiency or elegance, but it worked. He sidestepped Kareem's charge and caught him by the wrist as he passed. His other hand drove beneath Kareem's elbow, turning him in a semicircle and twisting the arm behind his back.

Kareem yelped as Martin forced the hand higher, his fingers nearly reaching the back of his neck.

He was overdoing it. Tenzin was about to stand and intervene when Martin seemed to realise the same. He released Kareem and clapped him on the shoulder, letting out that maniacal laugh of his.

"And that was only one of the moves I could think of on the spot!"

Kareem's reverent expression betrayed only a glimmer of the pain he was doubtless feeling in his elbow and shoulder. Martin followed up with even more bravado, explaining what Kareem should have done differently.

Tenzin felt a retort brewing, so he distracted himself by asking Lachlan where Pelzie was. As always, that kid had a mind of her own. Apparently, she was entertaining herself with the Hexman of the McCree household. From what Lachlan said, she was making him read aloud to her.

His conversation with Lachlan was cut short by Martin's call.

"Tenzin! How about we show the younglings how the old school does it?"

Of course he chooses me, Tenzin thought, doing his best to suppress a sigh.

"I'm not much of a fighter," Tenzin said. He wanted to suggest that perhaps Martin should ask Simon instead, but he had enough tact not to involve the poor man unnecessarily.

Martin shook his head in disbelief. "Oh, by the merciful king, Tenzin. Don't make me ask again. Or are you afraid after my display?"

The mockery in his tone was palpable.

"Honestly, who wouldn't be? You beat a fifteen-year-old kid. All by yourself."

Sonam muffled a laugh and leaned towards Tenzin.

"Just entertain him, love," she whispered.

Tenzin gave a quiet groan as he reached for the buttons of his dinner jacket.

"The pen is mightier than the sword, but only if the other person can read."

Tenzin stood and took off his dinner jacket. Sonam accepted it from him with an encouraging smile. Lachlan, on the other hand, wasn't exactly beaming with pride. Tenzin supposed no boy wanted to watch his father humiliate himself in front of his friends.

For a brief moment, Tenzin entertained the thought of actually wiping the floor with Martin. The man was long overdue for a bitter taste of consequence. Lachlan's expression almost gave him the final push he needed, but it would only complicate matters.

He would have to stomach it.

Perhaps one day his son would understand.

The open space suddenly felt much smaller when Tenzin stepped into it. His mind assessed his surroundings instinctively, years of training mapping distances, angles and obstacles before he could stop it.

He forced all of that back down. Reflexes he had painstakingly acquired over decades were forced into hibernation.

Contempt, however, pushed its way forward. That, he didn't push away. He let it fuel him, carry him through the humiliation that was about to follow.

Tenzin only hoped he wouldn't have to pretend to be too badly hurt. Even he might struggle to sell that lie.

The hardest part was pretending to be as helpless as everyone expected him to be.

A gentle soul, Sonam sometimes called him. She had once said it in front of the others, and Martin had immediately seized upon it. He eventually tired of the joke, but even years later, the memory still irritated Tenzin.

Tenzin raised his hands, planting his elbows firmly at his sides.

Just a couple of seconds and I can go back to sitting and talking.

But Martin evidently had other plans whirling around in that echo chamber he called his mind. With a gleeful smile, he walked over to the table, plucked a knife from the charcuterie board and returned.

At that, even Martin's wife began to protest. Sonam's disinterest vanished, replaced by a worried look, while Lachlan tensed and moved closer to his mother.

"I don't think that's necessary, Martin," Tenzin said, but his objection fell on deaf ears.

Martin waved the knife with a grin. "I thought we might show the kids how real adults fight."

He held the knife out to Tenzin.

"Now come at me! Don't be afraid. I'm a professional."

A scoff and a laugh fought for the right to escape Tenzin's mouth, but for what felt like the hundredth time that night, he pushed them both down.

Then he charged.

Slowly. Or slowly enough.

Martin intercepted Tenzin's raised, knife-wielding hand with his forearm and caught his wrist with the other, squeezing hard enough to sell the move. Tenzin knew the Military Basic Training Guidebook front to back and recognised the technique immediately. It was supposed to be a disarm.

He had never once seen it work outside a controlled environment.

Martin, fortunately, didn't know that.

The knife clattered to the ground as Martin pressed the bulk of his body against Tenzin and hauled him over his shoulder. Tenzin landed on the ground, the knife resting only a few centimetres from piercing his kidney.

Idiot!

The jolt of pain that shot through his body from the point where his back struck the ground was entirely real. He didn't have to fake the groan that escaped through his gritted teeth.

He could stay down for a moment.

People would expect that.

The voice of Anya McCree shouting at her husband overshadowed the sudden hushed silence that permeated the room after Tenzin's contact with the ground.

Through one barely open eye, Tenzin caught Martin's sheepish expression. It didn't take any particular talent for reading people to see that things had not gone according to plan.

Idiot.

Sonam rushed over and crouched beside Tenzin. She cradled his head in her palm, slowly lifting him into a seated position. Her reassuring tone and words calmed him almost immediately.

She mistook his inner turmoil for shock, perhaps a rush of adrenaline. But she was wrong.

It was anger.

Anger mixed with contempt and a weariness born of incessant contact with idiocy and incompetence he couldn't openly call out. His frustration was close to boiling over when Sonam came to the rescue of his fried nerves.

Blessedly, Sonam immediately turned her attention to diagnosing his pain. She engaged his mind with a series of questions about where he was hurt and how badly.

The pain itself had been an afterthought, so Tenzin had to consciously refocus and work out what actually hurt, the obvious spots notwithstanding. Those required little imagination.

But a private security consultant should have been much worse for wear after such a tumble.

"Maybe we should get you to the Medikers," Sonam said. "Just to be sure."

That was where Tenzin had to draw the line.

"It's alright, Sonam. I'm fine. It was nothing."

"Didn't seem like nothing to me," she said.

Her jaw shifted with the grinding of her teeth.

Tenzin loved how protective his wife became when it came to him. He would never admit it to anybody, but he liked being pampered by her. Protected — at least ostensibly — by her.

She was cute when her brow furrowed in that peculiar way only hers seemed capable of. Now, once again, it formed that familiar crease across her forehead that Tenzin loved so much.

His hand rose almost subconsciously to caress her cheek.

"It's fine," he said, lending his voice a sharpness she would recognise as not being aimed at her. "I'd like to stand now."

It was Martin who rushed to his aid, grabbing him by the arm and beneath the shoulder to help him up. He apologised profusely.

Tenzin entertained no illusions that concern for a friend had suddenly sobered the man. He merely thanked Anya for possessing enough good sense to lend some to her husband by way of shouting it at him.

"Tenzin, I hope you aren't hurt anywhere. Let me take a look. I do have some training as—"

"I think you've done enough, Martin."

Sonam's cold tone, accompanied by an icy glare, stopped the buffoon in his tracks.

"It's getting late, and we were about to leave before you started that riveting story anyway. So I think we'll take our leave now."

If Martin were ever to acquire a Ring, Tenzin had no doubt he would contract the Form of Mood solely so that he could continually ruin it with his idiocy.

This wasn't the first — and would definitely not be the last — time one of their evening get-togethers had been cut short by something Martin did. Though, as his aching back reminded Tenzin, this had to be a new low.

Lachlan went to fetch Pelzie, then returned to help his father towards the carriage waiting outside. The Weeks and Kleins made their goodbyes as well, leaving shortly after the Tashis.

Phillipa and Sonam exchanged a few hushed words which, judging by their furrowed brows, could only have been a string of insults directed at their host.

Simon stopped beside Tenzin.

"Thank you," Simon said without preamble.

"What for?" Tenzin asked, genuinely unable to unravel his meaning.

"For not pulling me into that shitparade." Simon smiled pensively. "I appreciate it. I don't think I'd have been able to walk if that had happened to me. You're tougher than you let on, Tenzin."

The compliment sent a shudder through Tenzin. Simon meant nothing by it — it was merely an innocuous attempt to make him feel better — but it struck directly at the secret Tenzin had spent years protecting.

The creeping paranoia that someone might glimpse his true self, already inflamed by his encounter with Cato Porcius that afternoon, flared anew.

"Thank you," Tenzin said, hoping to retire the topic. Luckily, Simon fulfilled his wishes.

"Why don't you stop by the bookshop in the First next time you're in the area? I don't think anybody's ever visited the shop just to see me." He laughed. "I didn't mean to make that sound so pathetic. Sorry."

Tenzin echoed the laughter. In all the chaos of his world, this perfectly normal invitation from one friend to another felt like a warm hug to his soul.

"Not pathetic at all. But I can sure help fix that. I'll stop by sometime soon."

"I'll show you all the data and statistics. You seemed interested in that the last time I spoke about it."

Simon clapped Tenzin on the shoulder. "Don't keep me waiting."

Sonam approached just as Simon retreated back to his family.

All three families boarded their respective carriages, and soon the rhythmic clatter of wheels against cobbles accompanied Tenzin and his family on their way home. Sonam leaned into her husband, resting her head on his shoulder. Pelzie fell asleep almost immediately after they started moving, her head nestled in her brother's lap.

Lachlan stared out of the window, watching the passing buildings with a worried look on his face.

I might have to talk to him about what happened, Tenzin thought.

He now realised what pained him most wasn't his back. Or his ego. It was the thought that his son now saw him as a weak man. Easily beaten by a buffoon.

His heart clenched, and Tenzin squeezed his eyes shut. He so desperately wanted to tell them the truth. Unburden himself. Be himself.

But he couldn't.

His true past was a monster best kept in the dark, where no one could see it.

Or fear it.

His wife — undoubtedly sensing his tension — planted a kiss on his cheek. She leaned closer, her warm breath tingling his ear.

"I love you for your gentle soul," she whispered.

Tenzin released the tension in his shoulders for her benefit. Inside, however, the words felt like another dagger through his heart.

If that is true, he thought, then you don't love me for my soul.

And that idea haunted him.