HAWK & SABLE | ONE

CIRINIQUE DIAO HAD SPENT much of her life on ships.

It had been a ship that brought her parents on trip after trip until they were struck down by a disease in some foreign, exotic island. It had been a ship where she and her sister, Cass, were separated from their family all those years ago and sent wayward to Arecia to care for themselves. It had been a ship that brought her away from Cass after that, to strange Sai, the place that was once their home from which they were exiled from, to the care of Lady Kuroki.

And here she was, making that journey once more.

The sea was quiet tonight. The wind blew in soft breezes, caressing her cheek. Her hair blew behind her, loosely tied up in a simple fashion. She wore a clean, silk gown, the ones they wore in Arecia. Besides her, Asteria, Countess of Zi Yan, dressed in luxurious emerald silk, was talking.

"Princess Irina will meet us at the capital," she said, tilting her head, "but she'll send out a few carriages for us. We will have guards for Hua Jueying." Asteria was one of her dearest friends. Among the girls of her age, the two of them were the most experienced, both having been trained long before they arrived at Lady Kuroki's doorsteps. And Asteria was powerful. In a few decades, she'd be one of the most powerful women in the world. And even now, she had the ear of both the Empress and a princess of Sai.

"Irina would be overjoyed." Ciri's presence in Sai remained under close wraps. Most people assumed Lady Kuroki's school was in Asayama, in which they did have a campus, but the true school was in the mountains of Sai. It was thanks to Princess Irina she was allowed to step foot in the country in the first place, her family having been exiled almost a decade ago. Another friend.

Ciri knew some of the most dangerous women in the world. Maybe she could be counted among those esteemed numbers. The thought always made her feel a little bit giddy.

Asteria scoffed. "I'd be surprised if she wasn't. A traitor, Ciri. And a lead for an elusive mole. We're bringing back a treasure trove for her."

"Perhaps she will break into Prince Ruge's private collection and give us some good wine in return," Ciri said dryly. Asteria's eyes danced with mirth. The Crown Prince had the best of the best, but none of them were quite daring enough to risk his rage for a bit of alcohol. Princess Irina, his devoted and loving cousin, was quite another story.

"I will be sure to ask," Asteria chortled, mouth twisting into a grin. "Or maybe Ryan would do it willingly." They spoke Arecian on this ship. She wasn't sure why. The sailors were all Saian.

"He owes us too," Ciri shrugged. The few of them technically belonged to Irina's Circle of Herons, or were at least affiliated with it, but they worked closely with the Crown Prince and his allies. There was no bitter, envious rivalry between the two cousins. Ruge was the heir, and Irina— Longyu was his loyal advisor. It was a seamless partnership.

"And now we discuss your viscount."

Ciri raised a brow. "He's not my viscount, Asteria. I hadn't seen him for two years before that dratted cell."

Asteria shrugged. "The viscount, then. He's charming. Irina would act annoyed but be secretly amused. There are few foreigners in the Bone Court at this time of year."

"He'll be alright. I worked with him in Kon Ria. He was fine there, and that was more than two years ago. His father is Jack Dumont, Asteria." Laurence's father was a legendary spy. Ciri was not worried. The Bone Court was not treacherous unless you were an enemy, and the Arecians came this time as allies bringing gifts.

"I know." Asteria must have met the man once or twice. Jack Dumont would have had business with her father, the emperor's spymaster. Laurence looked enough like his father. She'd been able to realise whose son he was even when she was eight and starving.

Damn. That was ten years ago. Ten years that Dalton, Dumont and Cadieux had found them in that hellhole of a home and brought them away. Cass, her sister, had been recruited into the Arecian Secret Service, and Ciri had been sent to Lady Kuroki's. To become a Saian spy. Life was full of ironies. And now Cass was busy getting herself reacquainted with Marcus Dalton, Lord Farnworth. She expected an engagement to be announced within the next year. Cass deserved happiness.

"Next time, tell us before you run off to random coastal cities to investigate treason." Asteria combed her fingers through her long, silky black hair. "At least give us a heads-up so that we could avoid something like this."

"Lady Kuroki would have insisted I take one of you with me," Ciri pointed out, "which I did not want to do. I wanted to keep this between me and Cass."

Asteria sniffled. "A foolish decision. Though I suppose you've probably already been lectured regarding this by both my dearest aunt and Danna."

"I have heard a hefty speech from both Lady Kuroki and Danna over my supposed recklessness, yes." Ciri fought a grin. "Between the both of them, I've heard quite enough. You can save your words, Asteria dearest."

Suddenly she felt a new presence on the docks. Two new presences. Ciri turned her head by the slightest bit. "Danna, Io, you've finally come to join us."

"Lady Kuroki claims she has a headache and has decided to stay below deck." Daneira Pang stalked forward, her natural predatory grace on full display. She usually hid that, except with people she was comfortable with. Someone whose trust had been shattered one too many times, leaving a hollow hole that few could fill. She yanked off the gloves on her hands, dangling them from two fingers before bunching them into a ball and stuffing it into a pocket.

Iolanthe Mi was a bundle of excitement compared to Danna, light-footed and grinning. "It's been a while since we've been like this."

Asteria raised a brow. "We had a similar meeting when we were travelling here from Asayama, Io darling."

"Yes, but Ciri wasn't here, was she?" Io hooked her arm with hers. Ciri was almost the same height as the twelve-year-old girl, which made her slightly depressed. But then, Io had always been unnaturally tall. And very precocious.

There were two kinds of girls under Lady Kuroki's care. There were the ones like her and Asteria, trained from the cradle to become dangerously lethal and exquisitely deadly. Whose future was carved in the stars from the day they were born and never questioned. They grew up with powerful and rich families who groomed them to be the next greats of their generation. And then there were girls like Danna and Io, who fought tooth and nail in a world that gave them nothing. Girls who were missing something, who had no one to turn to because their family were dead or had abandoned them long ago. Lady Kuroki's students were either one or the other. They were a strange little family, sister-in-arms. In a world that was cruel, they found each other.

Danna shrugged. "Hua Jueying's swearing and cursing like a rabid dog. It's quite embarrassing if you ask me. I've learnt quite an array of interesting and creative Saian swear words from listening to him in the past few days." That was the treasure trove Asteria was referring to. A traitor, a bitter, exiled former nobleman who decided to bring ruin to the rising empire. Ciri understood his sentiments, of course— her great-aunt had mused about similar measures in the early days of her own exile, when she still hadn't fully grasped the reality of the situation yet. But Ciri was a Saian agent now, no matter what, so Hua Jueying had to be taken down.

"I hope you kept the child away from him," Asteria laughed, tapping Io on the shoulder. She was one of the youngest of the Kuroki girls, but she'd been there for years. She was there three years after Ciri arrived, starving and shivering with an invalid aunt who didn't live for much longer. The daughter of a former student. One of the rare girls who were not of noble blood— Io's mother had been a spy, yes, but a courtesan.

Io's lips twisted upwards. "She tried." The girl had taken some extreme joy in Hua Jueying being captured. Something personal, Ciri thought.

Among this small group, Ciri was the odd one out. She spent most of her days not with Lady Kuroki and her fellow students at their Saian campus but traversing the world. She wasn't exactly a student anymore, but she hadn't graduated either. An anomaly, the independent agent running around town. Why the baroness tolerated her, she had no idea. Asteria, Danna and Io were a team, the school's best agents. A future duchess could glean them invitations anywhere. Danna was respectable although her family was lesser-known, and Io could usually pass off as Asteria's distant country cousin. She let them talk, allowing herself to fade into the background. If any of the three girls noticed, they didn't make an effort on including her back into the conversation. She didn't mind.

She didn't belong anyways.

✢

LAURENCE DUMONT, Viscount Archsham, son of legendary spy Jack Dumont and protege of Arecian spymaster Phillippe Cadieux, stared up at the ceiling of his cabin as the ship sailed over the vast, endless ocean, and wondered if he should try counting sheep.

It was pathetic, really. But he hadn't been able to get good, decent sleep since he was captured by the raving madman currently being held captive in the same ship. He wasn't sure why. He wasn't being plagued by nightmares like he sometimes was, and he had been through much worse than that dark cell he had been thrust into. And he was bone tired most of the day. But he just couldn't sleep.

He rolled around his bed, suppressing a groan. Damn. He needed to do something about this sooner or later. Not tonight, though.

His feet landed on the wooden planks, fingers combing through his ink black hair. His room was dark, and he yanked open the curtains. Moonlight streamed into the cabin, illuminating the bed he had been lying on.

It's been a few busy weeks. Between Cassalyn Diao's injuries, his own capture, and then this journey, Laurence was beginning to regret a lot of his life choices. The first one of which was agreeing to accompany the students of Lady Kuroki and Hua Jueying on this damned journey to Sai.

But he knew why he did it. He didn't want to stay in Sai, watch Cass and Marcus, his closest friends fall head over heels again. He didn't want to be treated by a bloody invalid. And he wanted to watch over Ciri, who had proven that no matter what, she wasn't fully capable of protecting herself against all the evil in the world.

Now he was acting like a protective brother. That was Cass and Marcus's job, not his. He pinched his nose, throwing his head back against the wall, eyes tilted heavenwards.

Some days, he felt like he was drowning. He was a viscount, with tenants depending on him, and he was old enough to need to partake in politics. He was a spy. He was a society darling. Everything stacked up after a while. The ton saw him as the dashing young rake. His friends saw him as the joy and laughter in every situation.

He played his roles well. But at night, when he was just him with no one to act for, Laurence felt hollow. Empty.

He screwed his eyes shut and sucked in a deep breath. He needed air.

He was on the way to the deck within seconds. If any of the crew members were still awake, they stayed out of his way, out of sight. The men on this ship were used to transporting nobility around, it seemed. Out of sight, out of mind. But Laurence had played crewmember on ships like this before, on missions. He knew what it was like, so he always went out of his way to be courteous to everyone.

The deck was dead quiet. Just how he wanted it. Heading towards the side of the ship, he took in a breath of the salty sea air, feeling the wind blow his hair back. His nightshirt was thin and made of cotton, but he didn't mind the chilling cool that blew against his skin. On nights like this, that was comforting.

He couldn't see any shore from here. It was miles and miles of water, and the aquatic beasts that swam beneath. He wondered what was under their very ship at this moment. His lips twisted upwards as his mind jumped to the diagrams of oceanic monsters he'd read when he was a child. Those books and diagrams had been his haven from a father who wasn't quite sure what to do with him and a mother who died too early on. He stopped reading as much once he became an Arecian Service agent, but he still picked up a book once in a while.

He found himself wondering if any of the Kuroki girls had brought a book, and if so, whether he could borrow it for a while. Did Ciri read? He'd never seen her with a book, but then he rarely saw her out of the field. Their paths mostly crossed on missions. The youngest Kuroki girl, Iolanthe Mi, was young enough to still be in the schoolroom. He doubted he'd be interested in the books she read. Miss Daneira seemed like a reader. Lady Asteria fucking terrified him.

And that wasn't even considering the old dragon herself, Baroness Kuroki. Maybe he really should have left this fate for Marcus. Though he'd probably have been too busy making calf eyes at Cass to notice.

His lips curled into an unconscious smirk at the thought. They were so painfully in love. He didn't want to watch it, but it didn't mean he wasn't happy for them. God knew they both deserved it after so long. He always thought their original estrangement was dumb as all hell anyways. It shouldn't have taken them six years to get back together. But then again, both of them were stubborn bastards.

"And what on earth are you smirking over, Lord Archsham?"

His head snapped around, startled. She had snuck up on him while he was lost in thought. That was careless of him. He wouldn't make that mistake again. He steadied himself, straightening, and tilted his head. "Ciri. Not much. Just thinking."

"What are you doing here in the middle of the night?" She was a sight under the starlight, dark brown hair let down, slightly mussed up. Her nightgown was carefully hidden behind a dark green cloak embroidered with flowers, laced with fur at the sides. Ciri was renowned for her beauty throughout the courts of the world, and he himself had never quite gotten immune to it.

He offered a half-shrug. "Couldn't sleep. The usual."

She was silent for a moment. Cirinique Diao didn't strike you as the kind of person who'd be comfortable in quiet, but she was. He'd realised that she rarely sought to fill it the way many other people did.

"Nightmares?" Her voice was soft, songbird like. Another one of her prowess. She could manipulate her voice better than anyone else he knew. But the simple word was filled with underlying anguish, a desperation. For what?

"Sort of." He laid his arms on the barriers keeping him from tumbling into the sea.

She took a step forward, standing next to him, staring at the sea. After a moment, she broke the silent companionship they had formed, reciting, "Breakers rise and smash and foam— the paths of both the sun and moon, seem to spiral from those waves: the luminescent Milky Way, seems churned within those depths."

His mind snapped with recognition. "Behold the Dark Green Sea. Guan Cang Hai. Haven't heard that one for a while."

"You generally do not keep company with poetic Saians and their flowery accolades." A wry grin crossed her lips. "We are excellent company, of course, but only occasionally. People tire of us easily."

He had a feeling he'd never tire of her, though he didn't say that. Instead, he replied, "Your sister doesn't recite poems very often."

"Cass did not grow up in Sai. Or surrounded by Saians."

"Cass was in Sai until she was twelve," he pointed out.

"Let me rephrase. She did not spend her formative years in Sai. She is a woman of the world, travelling around, never anchoring herself to one place. It's a peaceful but pointless existence."

"Are you not much the same way?"

Too-wise, cynical and understanding Ciri shut her eyes and replied, "Ah, but no. I have a place I call my home, you see, that I always return to at the end of every journey. Cass lacked that for the past six years."

"The school in Asayama?"

He was baiting her. They both knew it. It didn't take a genius to realise that they wouldn't truly set up a school for young Saian spies in foreign Asayama, especially since the two countries still had unsolved bad blood between them from decades prior. The building in Asayama was just a front.

Ciri's eyes flickered open, and she casted him an annoyed look. "You are not very good at being subtle, my lord. If I didn't tell Cass, I would not tell you either." She didn't even tell Cass? Impressive. He knew the two girls kept secrets from each other, but this was a bit much, wasn't it?

Or maybe Ciri knew Cass would be forced to lie to them otherwise, because while the Arecian government was well-aware of the true function of Lady Kuroki's School for Girls and tolerated it and kept its secrets, the Saians were still not trusted. They'd attempt to pry the location of the school out of her. Laurence had never fully wrapped his head around how Cass was allowed to work for them.

"It was a good try." He tilted his head in concession. "And what are you doing here, Miss Cirinique Diao?"

"I like it here at night. It's peaceful. Makes you feel like the only person in the world, at least for a little bit. I welcome the solitude sometimes." They both lived social lives, under the spotlight and the scrutinising eyes of foreign governments and aristocrats.

"Not afraid of being tired in the morning?"

"We've both slept less than this in far worse environments." They had. His damned mission to ice cold Grimsnes came to mind. Those few months had been living hell. He'd gone alone. He spent half the time trying not to freeze to death and the other half running from hostile soldiers. Semi-successful. He finished what he went there to do but didn't achieve much more past that.

Kon Ria, the last time they had worked together, had been successful. They routed Epimur spies hoping to gain a hold there. Ciri, because Kon Ria was next to Sai and if Kon Ria fell to western influence Sai could very well be next; Laurence because Arecia and Epimur hadn't gotten along then and wouldn't get along now. That, and he had the striking suspicion Arecia had been hoping to expose any weaknesses in Kon Ria for their own future attempts to control it.

He wasn't sure what he felt about that.

"That is fair," he admitted. "Don't you want to hold onto as much sleep as you could glean?"

Ciri said, "You cannot think or achieve much while you are sleeping." The words were dry, her head leaning sideways as she regarded the dark black abyss underneath them. Ciri's wit was as much a weapon as any of her blades. She had cultivated it from an early age, learning under masters, her older sister included. She could, Laurence thought, charm the scales of a snake.

As could he. In this aspect, they were evenly matched.

"I do believe that is the point of sleeping, my dearest Cirinique," he replied, matching her tone. "A rest, at the end of the day, when exhaustion sets into your bones and your muscles feel heavy and clumsy. It refreshes your mind, soul and body, preparing you for a new day and its new challenges."

Ciri marvelled, "And I am the one with a way with words?"

They both had a low chuckle at that. This little midnight camaraderie comforted him in a way, though he wasn't sure why or how. Maybe it's because he'd been lonely for so long, either the third wheel looking on with a forced grin on his face, or he was always on his own. His father died, his mother died, and he had no siblings or close relatives. The Arecian Secret Service was his family, but there was always that aspect of work keeping him on his toes. Cadieux was getting married. Apparently, Luke had found the woman he wished to marry too. And even a blindman could see where Cass and Marcus's path was leading.

He was being left behind. Damn, he hated that feeling. He was always the life of the party, the trendsetter, he'd forgotten how it felt to be the outsider.

"How old are you again?" He suddenly asked, raising a brow, glancing at her profile.

A faint smile tugged at her lips. "Nineteen. I spent my nineteenth birthday in a cell after being captured by a madman. That's one occasion to remember. Io laughed like a madman when she heard that."

"She's a jolly girl. This life hasn't stamped out all the naivety and gaity in that girl yet."

Ciri shook her head. "She's good at pretending. Just like us. The world kicked it out of her long ago. What you see is an excellently erected shield. It's tragic, especially for one so young."

He mused over that for a bit. "We were all robbed of a childhood."

She lifted her shoulders in a casual shrug. "I suppose you could say that. But this life prepared us for harsher climates. Nothing can catch us off guard. Every single one of us are survivors. We can take whatever the world throws at us." Her chin was lifted, her posture proud. Laurence nodded. That was true. For the cheap price of childhood bliss, they had been turned into apex predators, dangerous and lethal in this world full of sheep and wolves hidden among them.

"I suppose the sacrifice is worth it," he said, turning back to the sea.