Things were quiet – and that was scarier than the imminent threat of being gunned down by a group of vengeful cultists. Durandia’s scheme had conditioned me to expect trouble at every turn. Our first term and holiday while attending the academy as students were complete anarchy. Assassins on campus, political plots boiling, and mad cultists kidnapping everyone they could find.

To me it made perfect sense that the reveal of my secret identity to the gang was the portent of doom. Instead, Max was too busy trying to deal with Claude and his newly chosen investigation, Adrian was occupied with running his family’s empire and studying, and Samantha was already on the level.

Despite all of the drama, nothing at school changed.

This pattern continued for days, weeks, and then months. Months! I would have lost my head if I learned before that there’d be months of relative peace and quiet to deal with. It was driving me up the wall. My self-flagellating personality demanded that someone appear on campus and shoot at me right that instant before I started enjoying it.

At some point during our peaceful period, Max starting become a regular visitor to our hideout spot because Claude was ‘driving him up the wall’ while trying to look into the Wendy versus Dalia feud that I couldn’t give a single shit about. In short, Claude wasn’t making any new friends trying to stick his nose into that messy business.

Samantha was enjoying a cup of tea at the garden table, while I paced back and forth with a paranoid countenance. Max’s head rotated with me to follow my movements.

“What’s got Maria so on edge? Should I be worried too?” Max pondered.

Samantha shook her head, “No. She’s a pessimist to the core. If something terrible doesn’t happen within a two-week window of the last thing, she starts to become like this.”

“I guess I can appreciate that. Trends have a way of making you believe that you’re cursed, but maybe Maria should worry more about her studies than a hypothetical disaster coming over the horizon.”

I turned to face the table and crossed my arms grumpily; “I’ll have you know that my grades are almost perfect. You need not worry yourself with that.”

“There’s that suffocating sense of superiority we’re used to...”

Samantha shrugged, “It’s rightly earned, I feel.”

“I’m not here to lord it over you,” I replied, “I simply don’t like it when people attempt to impugn my efforts. I’ve been playing with the tennis club, keeping up with my exercises, and studying for all of my elective classes. It’s the best way to distract myself.”

“Maria said that she wasn’t all that interested in tennis when she signed up, and now she’s helping Lance out with his duties before they start.”

“It’s not strange to find a hidden love for a new hobby.”

Visual novels weren’t available in a world without computers anyway, and having to go through an otome game after spending the last three years of my life immersed in one would probably make me physically ill. With that said Samantha hadn’t expressed any interest in the cast of diverse and unique boys who were on offer. Romance was definitively not in the air at the academy.

Max adjusted his hair after sensing that a single strand had gone astray, “I forgot to say this earlier – but Adrian was hoping to have a word with you. I think he wants your assistance with an important matter.”

I stopped pacing, “Adrian wants my help? That must be serious. He wouldn’t be caught dead asking me for anything unless he had to.”

“It is concerning, so could you hear him out?”

I nodded. There was no harm in listening to his request.

“You two have gotten rather friendly lately,” Samantha observed, “What happened?”

Max chuckled, “Oh – nothing specific happened. We just started talking after the incident with the Scuncath and all. I realized that he’s eased up a lot since we started coming to the academy.”

I saw it differently. Max had found a kindred spirit in someone who was suffering the same internal conflict that he was. Adrian and Max didn’t know what to do with themselves, now or in the future. Max was the third-born son and had no expectations placed on him, and Adrian was presently being crushed by those same expectations thanks to his Father’s arrest. There was no doubt in my mind that Adrian wanted out as quickly as possible.

It was easy to remark that Adrian had what Max desired – but that ignored the truth of the exchange. They were both free to do as they pleased, yet they were struck with a sense of profound indecision. For Adrian, there was a pressing time limit to those considerations. The clock was ticking and he needed to be there to manage his business empire.

Our peaceful tea time was interrupted by Claude, who burst through the patio doors and ran towards us with intent in his eyes. I braced myself for a brain-cell annihilating discussion about whatever he’d come up with while he was away. Claude skidded to a halt in front of the table and doubled over to try and catch his breath.

“What is it, Claude?” Max asked with the resignation of a man trudging towards the gallows.

“I have completed my investigation!”

“Your what?” Samantha replied.

“My investigation! I’ve spent the past month delving deep into the rift between Dalia and Wendy, and I’ve reached a shocking conclusion. Hold on to your teacup – this is going to blow your mind.”

Max covered his face, “Here we go again.”

What followed was nigh incomprehensible. Claude started to plunge down into the rabbit hole that surrounded the argument between Dalia and Wendy in intense detail. Not a single word was spared. Claude talked through his thought process, the people he spoke with, what they said, where he went next, and the events that led up to it collated together from a variety of different eyewitnesses.

“...As I soon discovered – Wendy was the source of that unbecoming rumour about Dalia. She knew that Dalia hadn’t actually befriended Maria, but she also tried to warn Dalia that Louis Germain was more interested in Maria than he was in her, so that plan wouldn’t work anyway-”

It was taking a long time for Claude to work through his story. Max and Samantha had tuned out already. I stopped listening for a minute and when I returned, Claude was on a completely different topic to the one I left him on.

“I noticed that the two incidents were extremely similar. The methodology, the subtle manipulations that were leaked through into the public discourse, and the fact that the one girl who was at the centre of the debate remained ever elusive. I went back and rechecked my files...”

He pointed to me.

“...And I concluded that you were the one who orchestrated their quarry! It made me realize that this case had all the same hallmarks as the death of Professor Prier on this very same campus. The only person who could have done it, was you, Maria Walston-Carter. The theatre, the party, that was all you. You used your skills in shooting to kill without delay or remorse!”

Huh? I missed a step somewhere along the way.

Max spoke through clenched teeth, “Maria looks like she’s about to murder you.”

Claude finally looked at me and discovered the expression of sheer rage that covered my normally emotionless features.

“She’s outraged! Surely the last defence of the guilty party!”

I yelled, “I already told you that I was the one who did that, you nattering half-wit! I told you that two months ago! It took you until now to figure out that we weren’t all collectively lying to your face?”

It wasn’t just that. What really got to me was how Claude’s only cypher with which to decipher those previous mysteries was an idiotic argument between two girls whom I had nothing to do with. He’d convinced himself of what we had told him by wasting his time trying to attach me to something I didn’t actually do.

“You are, quite frankly, the most obnoxious, irritating and boorish boy in this entire academy! The length and breadth of your sheer stupidity are consistently expectation-defying! Just when I start to think that there is no bottom, you find a way to dig even deeper!”

Claude shrunk back as I unloaded a barrage of venomous words in his direction.

“Why are you so angry about it?”

“Because Samantha, Max and I have been telling you this for the past two months! Your ego is so inflated with needless hot air that you refused to accept it because you think that you’re the only one who is capable of figuring out the ‘mystery.’ There is no mystery! You saw it happen, forgot it, and then sneered at everyone else when they filled you in! I don’t know how Max puts up with you. If I were in his shoes I would have bloody well strangled you!”

Samantha covered her mouth and tried desperately not to laugh. This was the angriest she’d ever seen me get with anyone on campus. It wasn’t the desperate type of madness that she witnessed at the fort – this was sheer, childish, emotional rage at her dim-witted friend. Teeth bared, red-faced, with a foot stamping into the dirt to punctuate each and every word.

Max was in a different position. He didn’t know much about me beyond the image that I projected to the other students, so the mere thought of me becoming upset at someone else was a surprise more shocking than the truth of me being the one who killed all of those people. He couldn’t find it amusing, he was rendered unable to decide how he felt about the situation.

Claude held his hands up in a peace offering; “Uh. I’m sorry?”

“Don’t phrase that like a question. Idiot.”

Max stood between us and tried to prevent any murder from occurring in the academy’s back garden.

“Okay – there’s no need for you two to get into a fight over it. Let’s just be glad that Claude’s finally on the same page with the rest of us.”

“I don’t know if I should be glad at all. I have no faith in Claude being able to keep a secret.”

Claude frowned, “But you killed Professor Prier.”

“He tried to murder Felipe, and then me. The gun they found at the scene had his fingerprints all over it.”

“And what about what happened at the theatre?”

“That was clear-cut self-defence.”

Samantha vouched for my interpretation, “Maria did kind of... save my life back there.”

“Seriously?” Claude muttered, “Even if that’s the case – bringing a gun with you must be illegal in some kinda’ way, right?”

“They won’t care,” I replied.

I was more likely to get a pat on the back and a thank you than any real punishment for bringing a gun with me. Even then, that charge was almost impossible for them to prove without my Father throwing me under the proverbial bus. I could simply state that I stole the gun from one of the goons and made it work.

I pressed the attack, “And by the way, even though you’ve finally accepted what was bleedingly obvious to everyone else and admitted using my own words, you’re still wrong about my involvement with this Dalia affair. I have nothing to do with any of it.”

Adrian appeared at the doorway, attracted by the noise that Claude was making. I pushed Claude towards the table and forcibly sat him with Max and Samantha so that they could explain to him what was going on now that he was suddenly willing to listen to them.

“Please take care of this. Adrian is here to save me.”

“Yeah – we’ll handle this,” Samantha sighed.

I left them to it and approached Adrian.

“Max said you wished to speak with me.”

“I didn’t expect you to find me so soon.”

“Claude has that effect on people.”

We moved away from the table where the trio were sitting and to a private area further down the gardenway, close to the fountain that I liked to jog around when doing my training routine in the morning. After ensuring that nobody was here to eavesdrop on us, Adrian was happy to speak about his request.

Even though he was the one who requested me, Adrian seemed remiss to ask me for any assistance at all, never mind a matter of great importance like this. It was a big change from the contemptuous and hot-headed teenager who declared himself my eternal rival just a few years before. Having to handle all of his family’s business was wearing him down to a blunt edge.

His biggest worry was that based on past experiences, I would say no.

“I was hoping that you could help me with a problem.”

“If you want me to kill someone – I’m afraid I don’t do that on request,” I said under my breath.

Adrian shook his head in vehement denial; “No! I don’t want you to do that. You were the one who mentioned what my Uncle did while we were at the fort. Why did you willingly believe what Hoffman said back there?”

“I didn’t believe what he said, you just have to admit that there was some logic to what he claimed. You are the last one standing in the main family line. If you die, or find yourself indisposed like your father, then he will be the one to inherit the fortune. He will generate a strong legal claim to the family’s property.”

Property rights were complicated in Walser, but it was even more so when it came to noble families. The kicker was that Cathdra presumably structured his purchases so that the current head of the family held legal authority over them. This was a practice known as ‘Vardism,’ and it was shockingly common. Vardism was just centralization with a strange name, based on an obscure piece of forgotten noble history that I wasn’t savvy to.

The idea was that the head of the family ultimately had to be the one in charge of their operations. If someone was incapacitated, died, or was arrested – the belief was that the best way to ensure continuity was to give the new head full control of the houses’ business ventures. It was contractual law that gave the new head genuine legal claims to that property should they return in good health. Getting arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit murder was a fantastic way to cede your claims to the new head, as it happened.

That was how it went. Cathdra structured his purchases of those businesses under a contractual structure based on Vardism. If he was unable to fulfil his responsibilities as defined by that contract, then the legal rights would be passed down to his eldest child. There would inevitably be a backup clause in that contract that gave Cedric an entry into the contest too. If Adrian died in an unfortunate accident then he would be left alone at the top of the pile.

It there wasn’t a Vardist contract in force – then Adrian’s death would result in the property rights reverting back to Cathdra. That was perfectly fine when everyone was on the level and playing nice, but not ideal when a dirty, underhanded son of a bitch was trying to kill his own family members to get his hands on them.

That was one motive I couldn’t understand. Money did make the world go around. I spent my entire past life doing everything I could to get more of it, but living as Maria made me realize that there was nothing in high society for any one person to achieve beyond making even more of it. And for what, exactly? To cement his legacy? To get one over on his older brother?

I was experienced enough to accept that some people valued ‘family’ as little as a handful of dollar bills. That was no surprise to me. Cedric sounded as craven as they came.

Adrian grumbled, “You’re right. One of the family lawyers told me all about it when I asked. If I’d have known, I would have taken more precautions.”

“It’s like mathematics. Your Uncle is the only one who should know about your possession of the watch. He could have offered information about it in exchange for an assurance that they would steal from you.”

“But you figured out what it does,” he observed astutely.

“By virtue of having seen it, sensed the magical energy it emitted, and delving deep into an archive in my own time to discover the source of the mechanism inside. How many people do you think meet those specific conditions? The simplest answer is most often the correct one.”

The direction that our conversation was going clued me into what Adrian’s problem was. He wanted to know if Cedric was trying to kill him or not.

“I see. I see what you want to ask me now. You want evidence, firm evidence, to see whether what Hoffman said is true or not.”

Adrian’s brow furrowed; “This is the part where you make fun of me, isn’t it?”

“I do not find a single element of this situation amusing or ironic. Your competitive nature when it comes to target shooting is hardly a reason to revel in a very real threat to your wellbeing.”

Adrian was legitimately taken aback by my magnanimous attitude. He was expecting mockery, derision and laughter in equal amounts. That was the foundation of our relationship. Adrian would make a bold declaration about showing me up, and we’d have a quippy war of words before I inevitably won out when it came time to pull the trigger.

“Ugh. I guess you are every bit as mature as the other girls say you are. I’m making a fool of myself by saying that.”

“Why have you come to me?”

He chewed on the question for a moment and composed a polite answer, “I don’t expect you to whip out a gun and shoot Cedric dead, but from what I can tell, you’re very good at this sort of thing. Like the way you figured out what my watch did. I can’t think of anyone else to ask to help.”

What he meant was that he didn’t have any friends he could trust with it. That friendless air was made even worse by his Father’s arrest and the subsequent apology tour that he was forced to depart on. Nobody wanted to be seen with him, never mind entertain his greetings.

I waited too long to answer.

“I can pay you?” Adrian offered.

“Why would I ever need money?” I replied sardonically, “Both of us have more of it than we could ever hope to spend on ourselves.”

Adrian paused, “You’re right. That was stupid.”

“But I don’t see a reason not to help.”

His face lit up like the fourth of July. Finally, he had someone on his side.

“I assume it won’t be anything too... controversial? We get an invitation to his home, snoop around and press him for information. Does he still enjoy hosting his own shooting events? I haven’t been in a long while.”

“He does,” Adrian confirmed, “You would be a shoo-in for a spot if you asked.”

Another thought occurred to me while we made our plan. I still had my big chest of blackmail from Rentree’s place. It was a remote possibility that Cedric was mentioned somewhere in one of those letters – which would confirm his involvement in passing on the information that led to Caius stealing the watch.

Reading through them was going to be a pain in the ass, but nothing worth doing was easy. I’d have to be a moron not to take the chance to make our lives simpler by finding a smoking gun amongst what I already possessed at home. Failing that, I could ask for an invitation to one of Cedric’s shooting contests and break into his office while everyone was occupied.

This was turning into a pattern. How many offices had I broken into in the past year at this point? I had lost count.

“What are you going to do if we find the evidence that you’re looking for?”

Adrian’s joy was dampened by my piercing question. That was the big one, the key decision that he would have to wrestle with.

“I can’t pretend that there’ll be any love lost between us. If he did try to kill me, then I’ll be happy to see the back of him in whatever form that may be.”

“If we have to kill him? Are you willing to make that judgement?”

Adrian wanted so badly to charge ahead like he always did and declare his vengeful intentions, but he couldn’t. I was asking him if he wanted to be partly responsible for his Uncle being murdered in retaliation for his scheming. The face he made and the words he spoke were at odds with one another.

“If we have to. That’s what he gets. Don’t try killing people if you’re afraid of them killing you back.”

I offered him an alternative; “There are ways to make people comply without resorting to frank violence. Everyone is motivated by material desires, we simply need to threaten what he cares about most. His money.”

He was trying to knock Adrian from the top of the pile to get his grubby hands on their business empire. Money was the key. It was what drove him. If we could directly draw a line between his behaviour and losing what he already possessed – then we could control him.

Adrian stroked his chin, “But we can’t go and rob the bank where he keeps all of it.”

“No bank robbery is required. Is he not a businessman? A lot of his liquid cash will be tied up in various investments, and even a small problem can rapidly bloom into an empire-destroying rot.”

The first step was to find that weakness.

“Let’s make sure that your Uncle thinks twice before doing this again.”