(Leo)
***
"Hey, Sinclair."
"Mhm?" they hummed in that calm manner of theirs as they hugged me atop the soft flower petals during the serene, stationary night.
"Did you ever send any letters from Inei to Daemon or whatever during that deal?" I tried to form a complete sentence, but my eyes kept flickering shut.
"Yes," they stated. "Though I didn't read them. I'm sorry. Did you want to know about any of their contents perhaps?"
"No." I raised a weak hand as if to flip the page of the conversation. "Did Algor ever join you when you delivered stuff?"
They nodded. "Only sometimes. He said it calmed him to feel the papers between his fingers."
Giggling, they added, "I always thought that was strange. Maybe I should have taken it as a warning."
With a laugh, I inquired, "Only that?"
Although I could have made a crude joke, I decided not to enter any sensitive territory regarding that matter.
I continued, "Don't most of the letters Inei writes end up in the records room, too?"
"Yes."
"You ever gone in there?" An idea brewing, I clicked my tongue.
"No. I know who *does* go in there, though."
"Who, then?"
I moved around on their soft stomach to look them more in the eyes. Halting myself before I made a complete revolution, I settled on my side and determined that wasn't the best way to get a serious question through to them.
"Oh, I'll have to remember…" From being chewed, their lip had a strip of red painting it like an unfinished wall. "There are so many names I have to read in a day…"
"Just try? Please?" I locked my fingers over my chest.
"I think it was one of the advisors that had the key. The grumpy one that's always fixing a pistol or something."
Their description of Jisoo made me chuckle. "I know who you're talking about."
"Why do you have so many questions tonight?" they grumbled as a joke. "It's always 'who', 'what', 'when', 'where', and 'how' with you. I'm not mad, though. Just curious as to why."
I poked their cheek, and they puffed it out as if it annoyed them. "You ask questions when you want to get to know someone better."
"That wasn't even about *me*." They giggled.
"Oh, hush." Basking in our mutual, giddy warmth, I rolled my eyes. "Be glad I'm not here asking for your bank account information or anything private."
"What makes you think I would give it to you?"
"You're probably broke, so it wouldn't matter."
"Hey! You are, too!"
They reached their arms around to tickle me near my ribs, and I couldn't help but shout in laughter, rolling around in their grasp as they smiled so wide that I saw most of their teeth. Right then, I swore I spotted the sun and stars somewhere in there, too.
***
The flashbacks lasted a bit longer in my mind than I intended for them to, but they kept me occupied until I stood atop a trapdoor. It was hidden in one of the rooms on the bottom floor, and I had entered it before to retrieve alcohol for Sinclair.
I smiled to myself, recalling our jovial conversation into the deep hours of the night and forgetting the tension settling between us.
But now wasn't the time to think about that.
After pulling a piece of metal from the latch to unlock it, I flung the wooden door open. It looked as if it went to the abyss that was the sky below the kingdom, but there was so little light that I knew such a thing was impossible. I could instead imagine it went to the center of a planet or perhaps a rich underworld in which I could be a diver who swam in lakes of lava.
From experience, though, I knew the hatch had a ladder (that I would forgo using) which led to a chilly room. Like the swimmer I envisioned myself as, I dove headfirst into the black pit before letting my wings take over to land me safely on the floor.
I shook my hand. All the candles immediately lit up. (I was lucky they were so abundant in the castle that day as it would have been an inconvenience to dedicate one palm to holding a purple flame.)
Their light was reflected around the room by a vast array of wine bottles in different shades of green, giving the cellar an exotic but eerie glow. Puddles of the red liquid accumulated where bottles were cracked or sealed improperly with corks. Intricate wood shelves in the shape of many "x"s lined the walls and suspended the containers as high as the ceiling. I couldn't fathom why the king needed so much alcohol except for ceremonies, which were too rare to warrant maintaining the extravagant collection.
Like a miner walking into a cave, I felt certain the walls could fall around my chance at any moment. (Maybe to someone I looked like a minor walking into a tavern, though I was easily older than anyone who would have said that to me.) I had to proceed carefully to not hit a rock off-balance or slip along a small pool—as even the hardhat that was my magic could not save me from the consequences of such mistakes.
My wings came dangerously close to the racks several times, but I carefully proceeded through the center of the hallway until I was face-to-face with my forbidden gold mine: the locked records room.
The urgency of the situation hit me around then.
If I did not act fast enough, I would never have my suspicions answered. There was much more value in knowing I was wrong than not being able to investigate at all. I knew I was right in my convictions, however, to at least have the right to check for myself.
That was what I reassured myself as I took the key in my hand and trembling, placed it inside the cursed lock. With reluctance, I turned it, hearing the metal parts clank, clank, snap.
It was open. I inhaled, glad my palms had yet to become sweaty.
The hinges of the door needed to be oiled, but it opened fine for my purposes—though my wings were a tight fit.
Inside were rows of cabinets, each carefully labelled. I assumed Akiyoshi was the only person diligent enough to do so, and I secretly thanked him for making my life easier in a way he'd never know.
I searched the titles on the cabinets for a reasonable place to start.
*Medical records, monthly budgets, yearly budgets, food production records (which had a large "x" drawn on it), religious institutions…*
Damn! Nothing on the first wall seemed to be a plausible location for the letters. I turned my attention to a set on the other side of the room.
*Military data, historical documents (which was so full that the papers from the drawer sought to escape like buttons on a shirt that was too small), marriage papers, laws and regulations, Inei's personal shit (which had the king's name crossed out and replaced with "Akiyoshi" in red ink)…*
I got so upset that I kicked the cabinet and stubbed my toe. A curse word hung itself on the tip of my tongue, trying to escape through my exhales. I would not allow it to flee as I did my best not to draw attention to the hatch. Then, I glanced at another wall.
Somehow, I was dumb enough to not notice the largest cabinet—an industrial-looking wooden structure—was marked as "Notable Correspondence" on the front.
I almost slammed my head on one of the metal cabinets, but I resisted the urge to do so as I walked to the back wall.
The drawer slid out gently—even more so than the door despite probably being used less—and I ran my hands across the tops of various envelopes, inhaling the scent of old parchment. Each row was marked with a year and contained up to a hundred letters. Peering at a thick bundle from around twenty years ago, I was fortunate to know where I needed to start searching.
I began by pulling each slip gingerly from its place inside a bucket, but I soon realized I did more work than need be.
Grabbing the container, I dumped it on the ground so that I saw the majority of the addresses of the letters at once. Most labels indicated prior correspondence between King Inei and various assistants stationed throughout the kingdom, and I knew those were of no use to me.
A few envelopes were turned over, so I bent over to flip them to where I could read them. The first few I examined read the same, and when I reached for my seventh one, a voice yelled from outside the room.
"Leo! What are you doing in here?"
*Shit.*
Inei had gotten word of my stunt from someone. Probably Jisoo.
His frantic footsteps pounded against the stone floor like my heartbeat as he drew closer, and it became painfully clear that I only had a few seconds to act before he barged into the room. Hasty and scared, I stared at the entrance and lifted my arm, creating a magical barrier where the door was.
Inei did not see it as his whole body slammed into the transparent wall, and he collapsed like a bird crashing into a window. He stood and banged on it, thinking that would get him inside.
"Open this up!"
Seiji's concerned eyes reflected the candlelight behind the infuriated king.
"Leo! You had better not mess with any records about my daughter. Do you hear me?"
Inei's incessant, shrill shouting got on my nerves.
"I think you're gravely misinformed about what I'm doing if you heard it from your general."
"Then, explain yourself and get out!"
Picking up my seventh upside-down letter at last, I smirked. "I think I can do the first one for you."
I flipped the letter around, and it read: *King Daemon*.
My grin became bigger, sinister in a way.
"If my suspicion is correct, the magician didn't whisper in the children's ears." I removed the seal and opened the note, holding it up to Inei from afar. "He wrote it on a letter he intercepted, and he's right here in this castle."
On the back of the paper, I rubbed a strange but oddly expected set of indentions while my teeth showed, transforming me into some kind of carnivorous animal.
*Checkmate, Algor.*