Chapter Text
“This feels like something Lauren would do,” Kym mumbled as she ascended the stairs a few paces behind Will.
The apartment was unassuming, tucked among rows of identical homes in red and beige brick. A silver 16 was the only means of differentiation between Kieran’s dwelling and that of his neighbors.
“Do you even have a search warrant?”
“Of course I do!” Will scoffed. “Do you really think I’d go so far as to break the law?”
Kym shrugged. “Like I said, you’re acting more like Lauren than yourself.”
He huffed out a breath, knocking sharply on the door. Kym perched on her toes, leaning around him and pressing her ear to the wood.
No answer.
Three more knocks were met with utter silence.
Will clenched his teeth, taking a few steps back before surging forward and slamming his heel below the handle. There was a splintering crack as the door creaked open.
Kym let out a long sigh. “Wasn’t that a little unnecessary?”
“What was the better alternative?” He asked, stepping into the apartment.
“Picking the lock?”
“That would have taken too long.”
She followed somewhat reluctantly, nudging through the doorway and squinting in the darkness beyond. Her eyes soon adjusted to the view of a disappointingly normal apartment–green couch, faded carpet, tiny kitchen stuffed in a corner. The only points of mild interest were the massive bookshelves and the fact that the only light source seemed to be a flimsy bulb dangling above the counter.
“I wonder why he isn’t home.” She said, watching as the light bulb sputtered to life.
“Probably out slitting someone’s throat.” Will muttered, hand hovering over the switch.
“Or maybe-'' Kym cut off, abruptly realizing that her first instinct was to suggest he was on a date with Lauren. She decided now was not the best time to make that insinuation. “Maybe he’s dying of tuberculosis in an alley because he can’t pay his medical bills.”
Will rolled his eyes.
“Seriously, would you quit being so harsh? You were given this information barely two days ago, I feel like you haven’t given time to properly consider it.”
“What is there to consider? He’s murdered dozens of people, the actions speak for themselves.”
“He’s also the man who sang karaoke with you at the bar.”
Will flinched. “Yeah, well, he can be an assassin and a terrible singer. Those are not mutually exclusive.”
“That’s not my point. I just…never mind.”
When Will had first approached her with the accusation that Kieran White, the timid, handsome archivist was moonlighting as a notorious assassin, she could have laughed. Should have laughed. Instead, the thought had taken root in her brain and the longer it festered, more pieces clicked into place.
She’d already suspected him of living a double life, and the identity of Lauren's partner in crime had only grown more obvious after the factory incident. It was easy to forget that the role of Lauren's partner was filled not only by a crime-fighting vigilante, but someone with Scythe connections. Easier still to forget that the only known member of the Phantom Scythe Lauren had come into contact with was the Purple Hyacinth himself.
Even with the terrifyingly plausible evidence, she wanted to deny it. The image she had built of Kieran White in her head simply didn’t line up with the truth. He seemed the type to cry if he accidentally stepped on a dandelion. But apparently he wasn’t opposed to killing flowers either.
The entire situation was somewhat ridiculous. A contradictory mess of lies and truths and closet-skeletons.
To avoid drowning in the chaos, thought she normally thrived in it when said chaos didn’t involve kill counts larger than the stack of paperwork on her desk, she came to two conclusions:
One: Regardless of her bias, logic dictated that Kieran was the Purple Hyacinth and the other half of Lune.
Two: There was more to that story. Because Lauren’s awful dates were not nearly bad enough to make a serial killer appealing.
Plus, Kieran had saved their lives. With five perfect headshots, which was kind of incriminating, but still. Her organs would have been splattered all over the floor otherwise.
It seemed Will had not yet reached conclusion two. Or the second half of conclusion one, for that matter.
She hesitated to implicate Lauren if he hadn't already recognized her involvement. That wasn’t her story to tell. What she needed was for all four of them to sit down and have a civil conversation over a bowl of watermelon, preferably not in a glass factory full of explosives and terrorists. That was hard to do when Will had already taken it upon himself to prove Kieran’s guilt. So in response, she had taken it upon herself to stall until she could buy more watermelon and figure out how to kidnap two police officers and an assassin.
Kym ran a hand along the bookshelf, pulling out a few titles to inspect them before returning them to their places.
“I dunno, seems like an average apartment to me.”
“Obviously,” Will muttered. “He wouldn’t leave any evidence in plain sight. Or else he would have been caught years ago.”
Kym rolled her eyes.
“Or maybe we’re trashing the living room of an innocent archivist who has been nothing but nice to everyone. I don’t see how-“
“Belladonna said so!” Will snapped, turning to glare and the Sergeant.
“Uh-huh. An assassin on equal footing with the Purple Hyacinth, who could have easily been lying. Why would you take her word for it?”
“Why not?” Will said defensively, flipping over the couch cushions. “She seemed dead set on killing him. She had nothing to gain by lying.”
“She didn’t have anything to lose either,” Kym pointed out.
“Well, neither do I.”
“Um, your job?”
Will sighed. “Look, if it turns out Belladonna misled me, the most I lose is Kieran’s respect. And given that my trust in him has already been severely shaken, I think I’ll live.”
“Yeah, well, as of now the only reason for suspicion is this man’s obsession with classic literature. How anyone reads this stuff without getting bored to death is beyond me,” she said, making a face at the book she was holding before returning it to the shelf. “Maybe there’s a secret room behind this. With the books he actually reads, like ‘how to get away with murder and become an infamous assassin in five easy steps.’” She began tugging books from the shelf with a new eagerness, determined to prove that one of them would act as a lever and reveal an ominous passageway. Her search proved fruitless and she huffed, stuffing the books back into place. “Or maybe he’s just a total nerd.”
She shuffled across the carpet, dropping to a crouch in front of the fireplace and peering up the shaft.
“Any corpses up there?” She called into the dust and darkness. When no response came, she shrugged and sat back on her heels to prod at the few logs of firewood that looked like they hadn’t been burned in years.
“Over here!” Will exclaimed.
“What is it?” Kym asked, not bothering to look up. “Did you find a secret hyacinth garden?”
“Help me open this door.”
She finally glanced at the door to which Will was referring, on the other side of the room apparently locked. She let out a low groan and stood, dusting the cinders from her pants.
“Remember, if we get jumpscared again you’re not supposed to catch me,” she said.
Will snorted. “I’ll go in first.” He kicked the door open again, and Kym winced.
“Really? Why would you ask for my help if you were just going to—“ She cut off, gaping through the doorway.
Rather than being greeted by a rotting corpse, they found stacks upon stacks of haphazard boxes, sheets of paper spilling over the edges. A desk sat at the opposite end under a window, bathed in sunlight and surrounded by drawings. Nearly every inch of the walls were filled with them.
“Woah,” Kym breathed. “Do you think he drew all of this?”
“Most likely. He lives alone, as far as I know.”
Cautiously following Will, as if she was afraid to disturb the floating dust motes, Kym approached the desk. She found several unfinished sketches, one of which depicted a man with floppy brown hair, a top hat and cloak tied with ribbon. He reminded her of the magician from the Circus Royale, and her suspicion was confirmed by the second drawing—a woman with space buns and a spiky collar.
Morpheus and Artemis.
Something about it struck her as odd, though she wasn’t sure why. Recent discoveries had revealed the circus to be undeniably tied to the Phantom Scythe, though she wasn’t sure how far that connection extended. Kieran and Lauren had gone to the circus before the factory incident, giving a perfectly innocent reason for him to have drawn two of the performers. But perhaps there was more to it.
“He’s a wonderful artist,” Kym noted, turning to admire a sketch of three children, grinning widely at a hat filled with coins.
“But why keep all of this locked up…” Will wondered aloud, thumbing through a stack of paper.
“He is humble. Though I guess the locked door is overdoing it a little.”
Kym’s eyes drifted along the wall, only to find her own face staring back at her. “Aw, look!” She exclaimed. “It’s us, Will!” She pointed enthusiastically to a drawing of the two of them, in a pose not unlike the one they stood in now. Her finger was outstretched, almost poking Will in the face as he recoiled back.
He did not share her enthusiasm this time around either.
“Interesting,” he said, then returned to the paper he’d been observing.
Kym frowned at him. “It’s cute,” she insisted. Her eyes fell on a sketch of Lauren, her hair tucked into a scarf, a soft smile shaping her lips.
Kym faltered. “This feels like an invasion of privacy.”
“We’re investigating. That’s kind of the point.”
“Yeah, but…he’s our friend, isn’t he? It feels wrong to be going through this stuff. Especially since it seems so…personal.”
“You can’t keep thinking of him as a friend. By the time this is over, he’ll be far from it.”
“We don’t have proof yet!” Kym protested. The words came out more desperate than she’d hoped. “So far, this has been pointless.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure,” Will said. His face had gone nearly as pale as the paper in his hand. Overcome with curiosity, Kym shifted closer to get a better look. Yet another familiar face–Neyra’s–was captured in graphite. Her hair was tied in a loose ponytail and her arms were spread as if to present something. She seemed amused, more so than the muted expressions she usually wore would indicate. How or why Kieran ever could have been on the receiving end of such an interaction, Kym didn’t know.
“Far as I’m aware, Kieran and Neyra have never met,” Will whispered.
“Well…” Kym tore her eyes away from the drawing. “There was a lot about Neyra you didn’t know, right?”
“It’s too big of a coincidence. This must have been drawn fairly recently. How recently, I’m not sure. But perhaps someone could tell us.”
“What exactly are you trying to do?”
“Find evidence that connects Kieran to Neyra’s disappearance. It won’t be enough to prove that he’s the Purple Hyacinth, but at the very least it’ll convince Hermann to open a proper case.”
“And then what? Belladonna didn’t give you the information for free.”
“Then I’ll…I don’t know. If he really is the Hyacinth, she won’t be the only person trying to kill him.”
Kym sighed. He was right. Death awaited the Purple Hyacinth whether it was part of an official sentence or not. And maybe he deserved it. But she couldn't help but feel that, at least from a purely strategic outlook, killing him wouldn’t bring the salvation everyone hoped for. Especially if he was part of Lune.
She turned slowly, scrutinizing the room for anything of significance. Her eyes fell on a painting set in a gold frame on the back wall. She squinted, taking a step back to stare at it in full.
“Isn’t that–?” Her elbow bumped into a stack of boxes and sent them tumbling to the floor.
“Shit.”
Will groaned, turning to glare at her as she bent to collect the scattered paper. “Really? You couldn't be any less stealthy.”
Kym paused, hands hovering over the drawings. A symbol, drawn again and again with repeated urgency, marked the surface of each one. Some were a light scrawl, others were traced over and over and over until the pages had torn. The charcoal stained her fingers as she sifted through them.
“Will,” she said softly, brushing papers aside and uncovering nothing but darkness, growing deeper and more oppressive with every page. “I don’t think we should be looking at this.”
“For the last time,” Will said, exasperated. “I have permission-“
She shook her head. It was as if something had crawled under her skin, invasive and prickling. “I know, I….I’ll just search the bedroom instead.”
Shoving the boxes back into place, she stumbled toward the door.
Will’s eyes lingered on her as she backed away, flickering with what might have been concern before she slipped out of sight.
The bedroom was far less interesting than the one she’d just vacated, furnished with a small bed, nightstand and yet another bookshelf.
“Yeesh,” She mumbled to herself. “He makes the local library look like a joke.”
She dropped to her knees and peered under the bed. “Still no corpses.”
Sitting up, she began tapping the floorboards, waiting for one to come loose and reveal a secret basement filled with hyacinths or skulls or dried blood or anything more legitimately suspicious than what they’d uncovered thus far. She didn’t want Kieran to be the Purple Hyacinth, but if she was going to track down the most dangerous assassin in Ardhalis, the least he could do was be less boring.
She flipped over the pillow, then lifted the edge of the mattress, freezing when the action revealed a sheathed dagger lying on the bed frame. It didn’t have to mean anything. Maybe he was just paranoid, as most people were.
“Find anything?” Will asked, entering the room. Kym eyed the crumpled paper in his hands, which he hastily shoved in his pocket.
“You took the drawings?”
“A few,” he admitted. “I think they’ll be useful.”
“There’s a knife under the mattress.” Kym said.
Will sucked in a breath as he crossed to her side of the bed, following her line of sight.
“I think this is enough to rouse suspicion,” He said.
“Plenty of people keep weapons in their bedrooms,” Kym argued. “People hoping to defend themselves against assassins.”
“Then why not a gun? Surely it’s more effective.”
“He said he doesn’t use them.”
“Why would a man who dislikes guns feel safer using a knife unless he was well trained with one?”
“Personal preference?” Kym said helplessly.
“The Purple Hyacinth has never used a gun.”
Kym swallowed, suddenly remembering that moment in the factory. “To our knowledge.”
“I’ll collect the evidence. You check to make sure we didn’t miss anything.”
There was finality in his words, but she couldn’t bring herself to move until he nudged her out of the way.
She wandered back through the apartment, half-hearted in doing as he asked. Her mind was elsewhere as she straightened books, poring over the drawings yet again. They were undoubtedly missing something, but she wasn’t sure it was a physical item that could be discovered. There had to be information that could justify the existence of Kieran and the Purple Hyacinth as one in the same. And it wasn’t completely impossible to find.
Maybe this felt like something Lauren would do, because she already had.