Ch.9
I knocked on the ORC clubroom door twice, opened it without waiting for an answer, walked past Kiba who was reading by the window, past Akeno who was pouring tea at the side table, and sat down in the guest chair across from Rias's desk.
Rias looked up from paperwork. She was wearing her school uniform, hair down, a pen in her hand. The blue-green eyes tracked me from the doorway to the chair with the focused attention of someone recalculating a chess position they thought they'd already solved.
"Hyoudou-kun." She set the pen down. "You could have called ahead."
"I need your help," I said. "And you're going to want to hear what I have to say before you name your price."
Her eyebrows went up. Behind me, I heard Akeno make a small sound that could have been surprise or amusement.
Rias folded her hands on the desk. "I'm listening."
"The Fallen Angel cell in the church on the hill is planning to extract a Sacred Gear from a human girl. The girl's name is Asia Argento. The Sacred Gear is Twilight Healing. The extraction will kill her. They're doing it in the next day or two."
The room got quiet. Kiba had stopped reading. Akeno's teapot paused mid-pour.
"How do you know this?" Rias asked.
"I've been scouting. Watching patterns. Talking to people." I met her eyes. "The details don't matter. What matters is that the intel is good and the clock is running."
Rias studied me. She was trying to decide whether to push on the source or accept the product. She went with the product. Smart.
"A Sacred Gear extraction on Devil territory," she said slowly. "Unauthorized by Grigori. Raynare's rogue cell."
"Yeah."
"That's a provocation. An attack on our territory." Her jaw tightened. An unauthorized Fallen Angel operation in Gremory-Sitri territory gave her grounds to respond. Grounds she hadn't had when she'd only been watching me get stabbed at a fountain. "If I move against the church, it's a political statement. The other factions will notice."
"They'll also notice if you don't. A Longinus wielder gets attacked on your turf, a human girl gets killed in your jurisdiction, and the Gremory heiress does nothing? That's a statement too."
Her lips pressed together.
"You said you needed my help."
"Your peerage. Kiba for the exorcists. Koneko for the rank-and-file. Akeno for aerial support. You for the authority to make the action legitimate."
"And you?"
"I go in first. I find Asia. I handle Raynare."
"You handle Raynare." She let the words sit. "The Fallen Angel who nearly killed you last week."
"I've had time to practice."
"You've had time to get one or two additional Boosts. She has wings, flight, and an arsenal of light spears."
"And I have information she doesn't expect me to have."
Rias leaned back in her chair. Her arms crossed. The uniform pulled across her chest with the motion. Then I was back on the conversation.
"What's your price?" I asked.
Her mouth curved. "The same one I offered last time."
"Peerage."
"Eight Pawn pieces. Full Devil reincarnation. Access to everything I have to offer." She spread her hands. "I need a powerful piece. You need protection. This is a clean exchange."
"I told you my answer."
"Your answer was no. I'm asking if it's changed."
"It hasn't."
Silence. Across the room, Koneko set down a cup of tea in front of me. I hadn't asked for it yet. She'd apparently decided to skip the requesting stage entirely and just deliver. I took a sip. Green tea, hot, slightly bitter.
"Thanks, Koneko."
"…Mm." She went back to her corner. From the chair by the window, Kiba watched the exchange with a polite smile that was doing a lot of work to hide genuine interest.
"Then what are you offering?" Rias said. Her voice had cooled.
"An alliance. Joint operation. Your peerage assaults the church; I go in as an independent combatant. We share the win, share the credit, share the political cover. You get to tell the Maou council you defended your territory against Fallen Angel incursion. I get Asia out alive."
"And afterward?"
"Afterward we stay allies. I cooperate with the ORC. I share intelligence. I train with your people. But I stay independent. No pieces. No contract. No leash."
"That's an extraordinary amount of benefit for someone who's giving me nothing binding."
"I'm giving you a reason to raid a church full of Fallen Angels, which you've been wanting to do since the first one showed up in your territory. And I'm giving you a Longinus wielder who fights alongside you voluntarily, which is worth more than a Pawn who's there because he has to be."
"A Pawn who's there because he has to be would also follow orders."
"Do you want obedience or competence?"
"I want both."
"You can't have both. Pick one."
Her mouth twitched. She was trying not to smile.
"You're infuriating," she said.
"I've been told."
She stared at me. Her jaw was working. Her eyes narrowed, widened, narrowed again.
"You want me to commit my entire peerage to a military action on the promise of a handshake deal."
"And a favor."
"What favor?"
"An unnamed one. Redeemable at a time of your choosing. I owe you one. You decide what it's worth when you need it."
She blinked. Her mouth opened slightly.
"You're serious."
"I don't negotiate with things I'm not willing to pay."
She leaned forward. Both hands flat on the desk, weight shifting, bringing her face closer to mine across the polished wood. I didn't lean back. The distance between us collapsed to inches. I could smell her from here, red tea and that floral warmth I'd caught twice before, in the courtyard and at the fountain. Her blue-green eyes were close enough that the late-afternoon light was catching individual flecks of gold in the iris.
Her hand was flat on the desk. Her pinky was touching mine. Neither of us had planned it. Her finger was warm against the side of mine and neither of us moved it.
I pressed my finger against hers. Just barely. Just enough that the contact went from accidental to deliberate.
Her breath caught. A tiny hitch, inaudible if I hadn't been inches from her mouth. Her eyes widened a fraction and her lips parted.
"Ara ara." Akeno's voice came from the couch, warm and layered with amusement. "Should I leave you two alone?"
Rias pulled back. Her chair scraped the floor. Her cheeks were pink and she tucked a strand of crimson hair behind her ear with more precision than the gesture required.
"That won't be necessary, Akeno." Her voice was composed. Her ears were red.
I grinned. I didn't try to hide it.
Rias looked at me. At the grin. Her nostrils flared and her eyes narrowed, annoyance warring with a thing she wasn't going to name in front of her Queen. Then she straightened in her chair and the heiress mask came back on.
"Fine," she said. "Alliance terms. Joint operation. Your favor to be named later." She picked up her pen and pointed it at me. "But if you get killed because you refused to let me reincarnate you, I will never forgive you."
"Noted."
"We move tomorrow night. I'll brief the peerage tonight." She looked at Kiba, who nodded. At Koneko, who ate a chip. At Akeno, who was still smiling. "Akeno, work up an aerial approach. I want lightning suppression on the perimeter within thirty seconds of entry. Kiba, you're on the exorcist detail with Koneko. I'll coordinate from the perimeter and handle any Fallen Angels that try to flee."
"And me?" I said.
"You go in through the front door. You find the girl. You handle Raynare." She met my eyes. The heiress was talking now, the one who'd been running a Devil peerage since she was a teenager. "Try not to die. I mean that. If you go down in there, I won't have time to resurrect you mid-combat, and I'd rather have you alive and stubborn than dead and regrettable."
"That might be the nicest thing you've ever said to me."
"Don't get used to it."
I stood. The tea was finished. Koneko had already cleared the cup from the table, which I hadn't noticed her do, which was either impressive service or concerning stealth. Probably both.
At the door, Akeno stopped me with a hand on my arm.
"You're brave," she said. "Or foolish. With boys it's usually hard to tell."
"Can't it be both?"
"Ufufu." Her fingers squeezed my arm once, just above the elbow, and let go. "It usually is."
I walked home in the early evening light. A man was walking a golden retriever on the other side of the street. The dog stopped to investigate a fire hydrant with the thoroughness of a forensic investigator. The man waited, checking his watch.
Must be nice.
"The Gremory girl agreed faster than I expected," Ddraig said.
"She wanted a reason to hit the church. I gave her one. And the unnamed favor sweetened it. Devils think in debts."
"You know a great deal about how Devils think for a human who has been in this world for barely a week."
"I'm a fast learner."
"You are a liar. A skilled one. But a liar."
"We've been over this."
"We have. I am not complaining. Your lies serve useful purposes." A pause. "And the moment at the desk?"
I walked for a few steps without answering.
"What moment?"
"The one where you pressed your finger against hers and her breathing changed."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"I am literally inside your skull. I felt your pulse spike."
"Goodnight, Ddraig."
"Partner. We share a body. I feel what you feel."
"Goodnight, Ddraig."
She went quiet, but the quality of the silence was the dragon equivalent of a raised eyebrow.
Tomorrow night. The church. Asia.
I went inside. Ate dinner. Went upstairs. Set an alarm. And lay in the dark thinking about red tea and warm fingers and the look on Rias Gremory's face when I'd pressed back.
Then I stopped thinking about that and started thinking about light spears and black wings and the sound Asia had made when she'd said the word "witch," and the thinking got a lot less pleasant and a lot more focused.
Tomorrow night I was going to walk into a church full of Fallen Angels and bring a girl home.
I closed my eyes. Sleep came slow.