Con Men and Chocolate
"Welcome back, Diana. Do you really have to keep working with this bastard?"
"Did everything go all right with the errand you ran? And so — when am I going to be allowed into the royal palace?"
Several people were there to welcome me when I arrived at the estate. Among them, Chyo and Loomdrax came rushing up the moment I opened my office door and bombarded me with questions.
"Hello, Auntie. Hello, Loomdrax."
Like a lady of proper breeding, I offered my greetings first.
"I trust everyone's been well."
I asked in the hope that nothing had gone wrong, and in response Chyo shoved Loomdrax out of her way and stepped forward.
"Well? Of course nothing's been well! This bastard conned me, Diana. I'm about to throw this son of a bitch straight back into Bulta Prison."
Chyo glared at Loomdrax as though she could kill him where he stood.
And Bulta Prison, of all places.
Ever since Loomdrax's escape, the prison had been in an uproar. It had taken no small effort to scrub away every trace connecting him to us. Apparently, life inside Bulta Prison was sheer misery these days. In fact, I'd heard that even now the guards cut loose over his escape were tearing through the kingdom in search of him, eyes blazing. They were hardly experts at tracking people, but when a man nurses a grudge, there's no telling what he might do.
Sooner or later, I'd have to set a rumor loose that Loomdrax had fled abroad.
Thinking this, I looked at Loomdrax.
"Conned you? I'm the wronged party here, Diana."
Loomdrax launched into his own defense.
"Diana, for fraud to hold up, there has to be an actual loss. Did I cause this woman the slightest harm? No, I did not. Ours was a transaction both parties entered into by agreement, was it not?"
Watching the two of them bicker back and forth made my head throb.
"That's enough. Both of you."
I moved to part them with my arms and make for my chair — only to be seized from both sides.
"Diana, just hear me out."
"Yes, Diana, you listen. Hear us out first, then render your verdict. That I am innocent."
Grown adults, clinging to a thirteen-year-old and pleading their cases. It was a sight to behold.
"Since you two seem determined to keep forgetting, allow me to remind you: I am thirteen. Too young to be weighing the rights and wrongs of fraudulent schemes — and doubly too young to be arbitrating a matter that involves a heavyweight con man like Loomdrax, and Auntie Chyo, head of Chyorny, at that."
"Ah...."
"Hmm...."
The two of them looked as though they had attained some great enlightenment.
"If that's understood, then kindly settle your dispute on your own. Take it to the constabulary, if you like."
I said it knowing perfectly well they wouldn't go. Either way, I succeeded in silencing them both, and at long last I was able to sit down in my own chair.
"Good grief. Diana is thirteen... It has never once crossed my mind."
Chyo murmured, dazed.
"Tell me about it. I've never thought of you as thirteen either. Thirteen it is, then."
Loomdrax said.
I shook my head hard, laid both arms on the table, laced my fingers together, and regarded the two of them with grave composure.
"Now. Enough about my age — shall we get to why you two came all the way to my office?"
Loomdrax shuddered from head to toe, then spoke with the air of a man struck by profound revelation.
"You're not really thirteen."
"Thirteen on the outside, maybe."
As if they hadn't been at each other's throats minutes ago, the two of them traded murmurs of agreement and carried right on.
"Enough. Sit down, both of you. And Loomdrax — let me make myself absolutely clear one more time. You promised, remember? No scams for a while."
Loomdrax murmured a feeble protest that it hadn't been a scam, while Chyo lifted her chin. Apparently he believed I was siding with Chyo. Grown adults, so childish.
"No scams from here on out."
"Ah, but isn't that a bit much?"
Loomdrax, who had been listening in silence, shot back flatly.
"What else would you have? Telling a con man not to con? I love my work. I take real pride in it, you know."
I could only click my tongue at his ironclad professional ethic. His sense of morality was quite simply beyond anything I was capable of understanding.
"Fine. Then let's amend our rule a little."
"Amend it how?"
"That you may scam."
Loomdrax took half a step back. Then he began studying me with narrowed eyes.
"Hold on — you're not Diana, are you? That disguise is masterful work. Who are you, really?"
Poking fun at a child — such fun, isn't it? The heights of adult maturity, truly.
I clicked my tongue and asked.
"You don't want to?"
"Who said I didn't want to? It's just that there's the contract, and the very person who ordered me never to do it again is now telling me to — it struck me as strange, is all."
Loomdrax spoke as though he were a man who held his contracts in the highest regard.
"Isn't it dangerous?"
Chyo asked, drawing close to me. The instant the word scam entered the conversation, her expression had hardened. She was perfectly willing to turn a blind eye to her Chyorny agents using every means imaginable to pry out information, but she hated the thought of me being tangled up in crime.
"That's none of my business."
I drew a firm line between myself and Loomdrax's schemes.
Loomdrax rounded his eyes and leaned in close. Come to think of it, his eyes were a different color today. Loomdrax made a point of altering his appearance, bit by bit, every single day. One day he would stretch the tip of his nose into a hawk's beak; another, he would enlarge his ears. And today, it seemed, he had changed the color of his eyes.
"You do look rather different today, don't you?"
Somewhere along the way Loomdrax had grown chummy with the estate's servants too, and whenever anyone asked, he would answer with perfect serenity:
"It's your imagination."
When I pressed him on why he kept subtly changing his face, his clothes, and his hairstyle, this was what he told me:
"So that later, when anyone asks about me, every last one of them describes a different man."
He meant to sow chaos in any investigation. When I first heard it, I'd felt a flicker of pity for him. A life spent never revealing your true self can't be an easy one — having to agonize every single morning over what to change about yourself that day.
But there had been no cause for concern whatsoever. After several days of observation, I could confirm it: the man was thoroughly enjoying himself.
"So I choose who I scam?"
Loomdrax's gaze slid toward Chyo. Her face twisting, she made to rise from her seat — the squabble I had only just laid to rest threatened to reignite.
Oh, my aching head.
Pressing a hand to my forehead, I offered a condition.
"We'll add a special clause. My people are off-limits."
"Then who's fair game?"
Faces of people I would dearly love to see Loomdrax take down a peg flashed one after another through my mind — but I named none of them. Catching the shift in my expression, Loomdrax broke into a sly grin.
"There, now you finally look thirteen. Someone's been bullying our Diana, haven't they? Just give me the name."
Loomdrax said, grinning wide.
I shrugged. I couldn't very well name names myself. From here on out, Loomdrax would have to scout out his own targets. If he kept himself busy with that, there would be that much less of him pestering Chyo or Jenice. Two birds with one stone.
Ignoring the way Loomdrax's eyes had begun to sparkle, I changed the subject.
"Let's wrap up the Phoenix Bank matter. We'll be needing funds — how much, exactly?"
Loomdrax's face fell into open disappointment. 'Phoenix Bank is a con too — so how come it gets treated differently?!'
I very nearly demanded to know why the very same con was being held to a different standard, but the question struck me as far too odd, so I swallowed it back down.
"Hurry up and tell me. There's no time."
When I pointed at the clock sitting on the table, Loomdrax launched into his explanation — his meeting with the director of Phoenix Bank, and the funds we would need.
The director of Phoenix Bank believed, with unshakable conviction, that Loomdrax was a nobleman from abroad. Chyo had lent aid in every way, material and otherwise, to dress him up as a wealthy foreign aristocrat. And I had supplied the money. Loomdrax had approached the director as though he intended to invest a fortune, won his favor, and then turned on his heel at the decisive moment. It went without saying that the director would demand to know why.
"Phoenix Bank's reputation hasn't been good of late."
When the director asked what it would take for him to go through with the deal, Loomdrax suggested that he simply sell the bank — surely selling now, while he still could, and washing his hands of the whole affair would work out in the director's favor. The director asked for a few days' time, and spent them darting from one secret meeting with the bank's investors to another. Entirely unaware, of course, that those investors had already crossed over to Loomdrax's side long before. And this very morning, while Julia's every thought was consumed by Dayson's birthday breakfast banquet, the meeting that would decide the sale of Phoenix Bank was called to order.
Working out the date and timing it just right had kept both Loomdrax and me thoroughly busy. The matter had to be settled while Julia's mind was elsewhere — because the moment she was at leisure again, Julia would never leave Phoenix Bank alone.
"Except the director has raised his asking price. He's saying he won't sell for just anything."
At the news that my own funds alone might not suffice, the office fell silent.
"It's all right. The money, I mean."
"How do you figure?"
There was Mother's vault to draw on — and above all, I was due to be granted the marriage permission within a matter of days. I trusted that Karman would reach out to me without delay. And my prediction proved right on the mark.
It was an afternoon of steady, drumming rain.
Karman studied the visitor who entered through the door with a level stare. Setting down the fountain pen in his hand, he spoke.
"So you've come."
He had summoned them himself, yet offered neither a warm word nor an inquiry after their health — the manner of a man receiving uninvited guests. The two visitors, for their part, observed every courtesy.
"Sit."
Moments later, the crisp click of heeled shoes rang through the room. Karman watched the two of them settle onto the sofa, and only rose from his desk a long while after. No sooner had he taken the seat across from them than came a knock at the door, and the chamberlain entered bearing a tray of tea and refreshments.
"Bring it here."
The refreshments the chamberlain laid out were, one and all, sugary things thickly coated in chocolate — adorable little confections no sane person could ever believe were meant for Karman to eat. At the sight of them, Diana allowed herself a faint smile.
Karman's gaze lingered instead on Cassion, who hadn't so much as stirred at the sight of the chocolate pastries.
"I hear children are fond of these. Eat."
His tone was parched and brusque as ever. In a voice like that, eating the chocolate might well send a man into convulsions — and Cassion could not readily bring himself to reach out.
"Don't mind if I do."
Diana picked up a piece of chocolate. Crunch. At the crisp sound of her biting into it, Cassion glanced sideways at her.
"You should try one too, Your Highness."
Munch, munch. Having eaten the chocolate — just bitter enough to balance out its sweetness — and even rinsed her mouth clean with tea, Diana spoke.
Karman was watching Cassion all the while. The chocolate had come to feel like some colossal trial. He didn't want to eat it — and yet Cassion forced a piece to his lips regardless. Watching him do it, Karman's mouth twitched into a brief smile: a smile impossible to read as either goodwill or scorn.
"I quite enjoyed the adorable little play at the banquet hall."
The busily working lips of Diana and Cassion stopped at the very same instant.
Karman remained leaning slightly forward, reaching for his teacup — and so Diana could not see his face.
"Was the banquet hall so unbearable that you had to slip away by way of staging a play? When it was a seat you were bound to keep, as a prince."