TOA, "Keeping Secrets"

[unedited]

Warnings: Small, scary children. Pastfic detailing The Meeting Of the last of the Keterburg kids. Makes extensive use of extra-canon materials (Tales of Fandom, novels) to frame the fanfic; Jade's conviction to and method of meeting the prince are canon to both, and Peony's actions towards the end are canon to the novels. Contains some Jade being mean to Saphir, a lot of Peony dominating the conversation, and one referred animal autopsy.

.keeping secrets.
The manor had been empty for as long as they could remember. It was tall and stately, like all the other manors in this district of Keterburg -- the exceptionally wealthy district, exclusively populated by nobles and rich merchants -- with the same clean design. It had a very desirable location, right up against the main street that ran to the parks and to the commercial districts. It was surrounded by a high fence of cast iron, and within the boundary of its gates there was a perpetual rotation of no fewer than six armed guards. Two was typically enough for a manor of its size, and three if its owner actually lived within, rather than kept it as a summer house.

They had never seen the owner of this manor; his maids and man-servants and chefs and guards and tutors came and went from the grand estate, but never the one they cared for.

(The residence of the Emperor's youngest son.)

"Jade," Saphir said in a hiss, clinging with shaking hands to the other boy's sleeve. "Do we really need to get any closer than this? We'll get in trouble."

Jade shook him off without looking back and slipped around another manor, winding through the alley behind it until he could heft himself up onto the brick wall to one side of the manor. It was summer, but the air was already cold enough to make his breath visible in the air, and the warm yellow glow of the windows was inviting. He noted the layout of the guards, walking the wall beneath the overhanging tree branches. The vast majority of them were in the front, but there was another man out back, by the neat row of trash cans. (Best to focus on the larger group.)

Saphir was there again, looking miffed and practically crawling over the top of the brick wall nervously, so Jade told him, "It's this mansion. This is where Prince Peony is being kept." Like a prisoner. But no one would ever say something so scandalous, of course.

The shorter boy peered over his shoulder and his eyebrows drew together worriedly. "I knew it... It was pointless to come here. There's so many guards..."

He was going to latch on to Jade's arm again if not dissuaded. Jade took the precaution of moving a step away. "Well, it is pointless like this," he said coolly. "There's only seven of them, but it would be troublesome later on if I killed them."

Now Saphir really did latch onto his arm. "Jade, let's stop this! It's not worth it. I don't even care about the emperor's son!"

"But I want to meet him," Jade said softly, and hoped that this made it quite clear that he had utterly no interest in whether or not Saphir felt the same way.

The idea had been at the back of his mind ever since the prince had moved to Keterburg in Gnome Decan, several months ago; the rumors, the viscount's sudden nervousness whenever Jade saw him in public, and the new fuss that arose around the perpetually-abandoned manor the only signs of his presence. He never went outside and never attended classes.

Was he just too good for normal people? Or too precious to be allowed to associate with them? A fine but significant difference.

How is a prince different from a commoner, he wondered. Will he look imperial somehow? Will he bear some mettle deep in his heart that compels men to follow him? Is royal blood really as blue as they say?

Saphir had fallen fretfully silent, but Jade didn't mind; he was, at best, someone Jade spoke to because speaking to himself aloud made others think he was 'troubled'.

"If this is how they've set up their security," he mused, "the most effective way to get inside is to lead them away from the manor. As I expected."

"Wow..." Saphir murmured, his eyes wide when Jade glanced back at him. "You already have a plan! I knew it!" (From his anxiety of a moment earlier, it was obvious he had not known any such thing, but best not to quibble over minor details.) "But... how are you planning to get them away from the manor?"

Jade smiled, a secret smile that made Saphir lean in close with excitement. He said confidentially, "I'm going to do this."

He grabbed the smaller boy's collar and hauled him off-balance, then shoved him from the wall so that he landed with a yelp and a loud rustling in the brush beneath. A few quick running steps and Jade leaped nimbly off the wall, landing back in the alley, and he waited for the telltale sounds.

There was Saphir sputtering and moaning pathetically, climbing out of the topiary, and then hurrying footsteps, guards raising their voices to the intruder-- calling out, "Stop where you are!" "It's a child?!" "A child is trying to infiltrate the mansion!" "Arrest him!"

With another pitiful wail, Saphir bolted, and the guards after him.

Satisfied that his distraction had been well-made, Jade hopped over the wall for the last time and went up to the back door (so that guard had gone after all; he'd given it about even odds) to let himself in.

He entered into a pleasant, exquisitely-furnished living room, lavish with rich drapery and antique furniture and a grand roaring fireplace. A boy was at the window, leaning out so far that his head was outside and his feet slightly off the ground, but he drew back inside as he heard the door open and shut.

"Your Highness," Jade said pleasantly, studying the boy without bothering to disguise the cold analysis in his gaze. Prince Peony was blond and blue-eyed (a not uncommon coloring, in Malkuth), and his skin was rich and tanned (long exposure to the bright reflected sun of Grand Chokmah). Despite the cold he was clad in a sleeveless tunic and sandals over long, loose slacks that were cuffed in at his ankles (an obvious reflection of his previous warm climates, and current habit of remaining indoors).

And when he grinned broadly, he was missing a tooth.

Grinned? Perhaps he had not realized the situation he was in.

"Are you the one who chased off all my guards?" the prince said, his gaze bright and amused.

Well, he clearly understood that much, but the hypothetical danger Jade thus presented still wasn't evidenced in his bearing. Jade said modestly, "My work. But not myself, personally."

Rather than becoming wary of him, Peony edged closer, a private grin on his face like the smile that Jade had used to trick Saphir into thinking that they were sharing some intimacy. "So you had an accomplice? That sounds like something out of an adventure novel."

Jade refrained, barely, from asking him, Are you aware that this is an act of treason, not a setup for an adventure novel? He put his hands in his pockets and said, "An unwitting accomplice, I'm afraid. I'm certain Saphir didn't deliberately fall into your garden, and it was probably instinct that made him run from the guards."

"And, you're certain," Peony repeated, significantly.

"Quite certain," Jade said agreeably. "I pushed him."

The blond boy snickered and bounded up to slap Jade on the shoulder, making him blink and turn to look at the offending hand, but it was not moved and he decided to allow it. "That's horrible!" The prince sounded very cheerful. "I'm Peony!"

Jade smirked slightly. He was normally careful to ensure that figures of authority never saw his true intelligence, but he was rapidly getting the impression that this boy either didn't care or couldn't tell. "Yes, I already know who you are."

"Well, I figured," Peony said impatiently, "from the way you were calling me Your Highness and all that. But that was the cue for you to tell me your name."

He tilted his head, considering for a moment. It was, of course, wiser to avoid giving the prince his name, but -- he eyed the prince thoughtfully -- it wasn't as if they couldn't find him quickly enough, if Peony described him even in the slightest. Red eyes were far from common, and he must have noticed them by now.

"Jade," he said finally.

"How old are you?"

"Ten."

Peony's expression lit. "I'm eleven! You're perfect. Let me show you my room!"

He felt like he should have been annoyed when the prince seized his wrist and led him through the house, but Jade found himself only amused in the distant sort of way that came from the analysis of some embarrassing secret.

(He's lonely.)

The older boy had a thousand questions to ask him, and he answered them without protest or interruption. Peony's responses to his answers were equally as telling.

"Where do you live?"
"At the orphanage east of the park."
"Oh, wow, I'm sorry. I can't imagine never having had a mom."

"Do you have any living relatives?"
"Only one, a sister."
"That's great -- sisters are great."

"How old is she?"
"She just turned four."
"Younger, too! I would've liked a younger sibling, close to my age maybe, but things were already complicated enough with the four of us."

"Do you go to school?"
"I take classes at Professor Nebilim's school."
"Lucky...! I have to get tutored since I can't leave the manor, but I've always wanted to go to school with other kids."

It was very easy to read him, but the notes that Jade filed away in his mind were increasingly complex. Peony drew him into his room and waved proudly at what looked, to Jade, like pure chaos.

"They've let livestock in here," he pointed out. It's actually messier than a barn in here, I don't know how they could've mistaken it.

"That's Sherry," Peony said, tromping over a pile of clothing to wrap his arms around the rappig. It was adult-size and much too big for a small boy to embrace fully, but it leaned into the thin boy, seeking comfort. "She's sick, so I let her stay up here most of the time."

Jade eyed the creature. "Am I given to understand that this is a... pet?"

The prince grinned at him. "Well, dogs are too easy. Sherry is much cuter than a dog anyway." He rubbed between the rappig's ears, and they twitched wildly with pleasure. "My sister Amara swore to get me a new rappig for my birthday, so that I won't be too lonely when Sherry has to be put down."

There was that loneliness, voiced this time, but Jade was more curious about Peony's matter-of-fact mention of the animal's death. Saphir had bawled for a week when the puppy he'd been nurturing behind Professor Nebilim's house finally died. (Saphir had blamed the cold; the necropsy had indicated kidney failure.)

"That doesn't upset you?"

"Of course it does," Peony said, flopping onto the floor. "But crying won't make her healthy. Why are your eyes red?"

That was a question he had been expecting, albeit not quite in such unconcerned tones. Red eyes, after all, were nearly the exclusive province of monsters, and he had more than once been shied away from solely on the virtue of those eyes in the two years since he had put theory into practice.

Naturally, there was a long, intricate explanation of the fonic sight technique, involving fonon manipulation and the biology of the ocular fon slots and human perception of color, but Jade had learned from experience that no one asked that question with the intention of a real explanation. If they wanted that, they could press for it. Jade thought for a long moment and finally said just, "I opened the fon slots in my eyes all the way. It made them red."

Peony tilted his head. "Is that safe?" he asked (displaying an utterly surface comprehension of the topic).

"I don't recommend Your Highness try it with your current level of skill," Jade said, a wild understatement. He would certainly be beheaded if he gave an imperial prince the inspiration to blind or kill himself.

The prince grinned, and pressed, "You don't know what my current level of skill is."

It was very tempting to laugh at him, but Jade only said, without blinking, "Somehow I think regardless."

Peony laughed, appreciative of a joke he evidently shared.

There -- he had answered all the prince's questions with directness and honesty, and the other boy was as disarmed with good humor and amusement as he would ever be. He had made no effort to hide anything about himself and the prince was not wary of him. There would be no better time to ask the only question that really mattered.

"Why did you come to Keterburg?" he asked, studiedly absent, as if it had only just occurred to him, and he asked merely on a whim.

Peony stroked the rappig's side slowly; for a moment Jade thought he had seen through the ploy, and would not answer. But (perhaps it was only the sensitive nature of the subject?) he then murmured, "My brother Christoph had a falling-out with Dad and his wife, and a week later Her Majesty was poisoned. Then Dad sent all us younger kids away -- I guess he must've thought it was an attempt on the succession. I don't know where any of the others were sent to. Dad and Franz are the only ones left in the capital."

Jade stood still, watching Peony. The Empress was said to have died of a sudden illness -- he had read it in the newspaper. An assassination, and worse still, the suggestion that one of the bastard princes might have assassinated her in some vicious bid for power, was more than just a scandal. It held the potential to unsettle the entire empire, to start a civil war.

It was not something to confess to a stranger. Even if it hadn't been something that, logically speaking, should have hurt to confess to. "Why did you tell me that?"

Peony looked up at him, a small smile tugging up one corner of his lips -- a lopsided thing, unlike his other smiles, but not fake, not forced. Even now, that pitiful smile was real. "Because it's what you came here to ask. You've earned it."

Then something truly amazing happened.

Jade said, "The evidence against your brother is only circumstantial. It likely isn't his doing -- at least, I certainly hope no one in the royal family is so foolish."

And he didn't know why he'd said it.

It was, in fact, very curious, he thought analytically. He didn't have all the facts, or even any unbiased facts, so he hardly had the authority to make such a pronouncement, and he hated to be wrong. It was as if he had wanted to reassure the other boy. But that would imply some sort of interest in his welfare. And though of course he could let the prince come to no physical harm, not while Jade was in his presence and could be held responsible, he had acted to safeguard his emotional welfare.

What did the interest, implied by his own actions, imply about him?

Peony was smiling slightly, his chin resting on his knee. "We'll know if someone kills Christoph, I guess."

(Staying inside means no one can confirm that he's here. And that makes it harder to kill him.)

They heard a commotion downstairs, the heavy footsteps of armored guards and the piercing whine that only Saphir could have made. Jade sighed, moving for the window, and said lightly, "Sorry. If I delay leaving any longer, I'll have wasted all the trouble I went through to avoid being noticed coming in."

He would leave the same way he came -- quiet, unseen, and letting Saphir take the brunt of the struggle. But before he could propel himself over the windowsill, Peony leaped up and grabbed his arm.

"Wait!" he said, blue eyes bright and mischievous suddenly. "I'll shout for the guards if you don't wait!"

Jade paused, staring at the hand on his sleeve. I could kill you five times over before the guards come, he thought of saying, but the analytical part of him reasoned, It's a bluff. He wouldn't do it.

The sounds from below were growing louder. Jade glanced at the door, but Peony drew closer and whispered, "Promise you'll come back."

"What?"

"Promise or I'll call the guards!" Peony insisted, still with that broad grin on his face. "Even in jail the prisoners get visiting hours. This place should be at least as tolerable as jail. So you either come back, or I'll have the guards after you."

Jade felt his lips curve up, and immediately controlled the reaction, instead raising his eyebrows with cool dismissal. "My, you're quite the schemer, Your Highness."

"That's a yes," Peony pronounced in a triumphant whisper, hardly audible over the clunking of boots on the floorboards. He shoved the other boy back in the direction of the window. "Hurry up!"

Just as Jade had thought, a bluff. (Doesn't want to risk his partner in crime getting caught.) Jade smirked and hiked himself easily out the window and started to climb the ivy, swift and sure. He overheard from above,

"Your Highness!"

"Hi, Captain. Where did you guys get off to?"

"Your Highness, there was a boy trying to get into the estate, but he says he was with someone else -- a Jade Balfour, from Professor Nebilim's class. Have you seen any such boy?"

"Mmm, no, I haven't. It's just been me and Sherry up here."

"That's what I thought. I've met Professor Nebilim, and she said Jade is a model student. This miscreant must be trying to foist the blame on a classmate."

"Oh, hm. Where does she teach...?"

Jade hopped off the vines and landed lightly on his feet, then headed around the back -- the guard that had been there was still inside, dealing with Saphir's intrusion. He simply headed out into the alley behind the manor and then down the road that would take him back to the orphanage. The visit had been rewarding in a number of ways.

The prince had not been so different than other people. He looked normal, spoke and behaved normally. Certainly he was a bored child, not unintelligent, and desperate for company -- but no different than any boy might be in his position.

Still, there had been something about him. Not something imperial, he thought, but -- some charm or charisma, perhaps the result of his apparent good humor or genuine nature. Jade was curious to know what it was, as if with enough study he could categorize it and put it behind him.

Perhaps he really would come back.

No, he decided immediately, lips curving. He wouldn't be back. If Jade's hypothesis was correct, and there was something worth studying in the prince's sequestered existence, the other boy would almost certainly prove it by defying expectations and finding him. And if he didn't have the wit or the impetus to do so, then there was nothing about him worth studying-- Well, one admirable quirk of character hardly made up for dull complacency.

A week later, a new student calling himself Franz joined Professor Nebilim's classes, and stole the desk next to Jade for himself. He was bundled up in scarves and sweaters so deep as to make him look like an icebear, but beneath the wrappings he was blond and blue-eyed, and his skin was rich and tanned.

"Franz is quite a memorable name," Jade told him serenely, in what probably wouldn't have seemed like criticism to the unenlightened observer. "The heir to the throne of Malkuth is named Franz, isn't he?"

"Well," said Peony, his eyes dancing, "maybe Dad named me for Prince Franz. He's his favorite prince, after all."

There was definitely, Jade concluded, something about him.