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Bella was faced with a conundrum.
She hadn't told anyone about how her face resembled Noelle Gautier's, not even Xavier. She needed to talk to Noelle herself first before making any conclusions. A simple resemblance, no matter how striking, was not enough evidence for Bella to see any connections. She only had a point A, and point B could be just about anything, if it even existed at all. Right now, all she could attribute it to was complete happenstance. Even if her gut told her there was more to it.
Which was why, on the first free day, Bella searched the monastery for a person she heard might have the skillset to help. Word was that the leader of this year’s Golden Deer had inherited her father's cleverness, and a fresh perspective and maybe some brainstorming might help Bella make some progress. She finally managed to find her in the Golden Deer classroom, and Bella felt stupid for not checking there first.
Adel von Reigan was bent over an assignment near the front of the classroom, being quite hard to miss with her thick, wavy ponytail of long purple hair spilling over her shoulder as she hunched over some papers. Bella approached her classmate, and as she got closer she was able to make out a curious detail: as Adel wrote on the paper, she held in one hand a toy that looked like a wyvern but easily was squished into a compact ball, before returning to its original shape the moment she unfurled her fist. Bella blinked at the tiny thing, having never seen anything like it.
“Cool, isn’t it?” Adel asked before looking up with an easy smile. “They're getting pretty popular in Almyra. Really satisfying to play with too. Helps me focus in class.”
“...The professor doesn't take it?” Bella asked with a raised eyebrow.
Adel's smile turned smug as she snickered a bit into her hand. “Not if they don't see it,” she muttered just loud enough to hear. Then, in a snap, the expression changed from mischievous to a bright, cheerful grin. Bella probably would have missed the transition if she blinked. “Now! What can I help you with?”
Bella frowned at the weirdness of the sudden change, but made no comment as she sat down across from Adel anyway. She looked around to be absolutely sure that none of the other students around the room were looking their way, and leaned over the table a bit. “I need to talk to Noelle Gautier,” she explained under her breath.
“Wow, you're riskier than I thought you were,” Adel responded, sounding impressed. “There's been, what, twenty or something? Years of tension between Fraldarius and Gautier, I hear.”
“As long as I can remember, at least,” Bella confirmed.
“So what's got you wanting to interact?”
“Questions. But she seems too skittish to directly approach.”
“What kinda questions?”
Bella scowled. “That isn’t relevant,” she insisted.
Adel shook her head with feigned disappointment. “Worth a try,” she sighed dramatically, then met Bella's eyes again. “So you're trying to connect but she obviously won't make it easy. So why are you coming to me?”
“I need a plan. And strategy isn’t my strong suit.”
Adel’s green eyes suddenly gleamed with interest and narrowed, and her smile became downright conspiratorial as her fingers slowly laced together under her chin. “I see,” she responded slowly, her voice shifted back into the low, mischievous tone from a moment ago. “Color me intrigued. You've come to the right girl. Yours truly was raised and trained in the art of schemes by the man some call the ‘Master Tactician.’”
Bella rolled her eyes. “I'm aware. Can you help?”
“Now hold up. There's no such thing as a free scheme, y'know?”
“Are you seriously asking me for money for this?”
Adel grinned. “Nah. I just wanna know what questions you're gonna be asking the Gautier girl.”
Bella deadpanned. “You can't be fucking serious,” she scoffed.
“I am, actually. Juicy secrets are way more fun than gold. Besides, knowing what you want to ask might help with the scheming.”
“No it won't.”
Adel rhythmically tapped her fingernails on the table, still smirking smugly at Bella. “You'd be surprised how many plans fall apart due to failure to disclose information. That fact alone has even been weaponized in some wars by purposefully leaving out key intelligence, so that you can set up your enemies to fall into a trap.”
Bella huffed. However much she hated to admit it, that was a pretty valid point.
“So!” Adel chirped, and the odd gleam in her eyes all but vanished as her face once again instantly flipped expressions back to a sunny smile. “Do we have a deal?”
“Striking some kind of bargain in a dark corner, are we, Adel?”
If Bella were a bit more jumpy, the sudden voice now, at such a convenient moment, probably would have given her a very visible start. Instead her flinch was barely noticeable, due to many hours spent in the private training grounds in Fhirdiad Castle, training herself to be able to react to an attack from any direction. Not because she feared she would need that skill. She was just a bored thirteen-year-old back then, hijacking her best friend's tutoring sessions while their fathers sat hunched over boring paperwork for hours.
But if Bella thought her ability to withstand jumpscares was good, it appeared Adel’s was unnervingly perfect. There was not even a trace of surprise on her face, nor the smallest telling twitch of a finger as she turned in her seat slightly to grin amicably up at a disapproving scowl. Another girl had appeared, one who almost looked like she had been purposefully molded to be a direct contrast from Adel. While the princess's skin was a warm, light brown befitting her mixed heritage, this girl looked paler than Bella's father. Her impossibly neat blonde hair fell into an angled bob cut around her face, which couldn't be more different than the purple waves that looked like they owned the concept of frizz and were damn well proud. And the face that wore a carefree smile had pronounced but rounded features, while the displeased frown sat upon a face with sharp angles in the nose and chin.
“Genevieve!” Adel greeted with a tone so convincingly friendly, Bella would have been completely fooled if she hadn't spent the past several minutes watching the girl swap between two different expressions with a speed Bella didn't think was humanly possible. “You're just in time to hear another story about the Great Nader! You should join us!” And then she scooted over a bit and patted the bench next to her, still smiling. Bella had no idea what a great nader was, nor what Adel was thinking, inviting this girl to sit with them when they were in the middle of a conversation that Bella wasn't keen on revealing details about. But she kept her expression neutral to support the act.
Genevieve just wrinkled her nose. “No thank you,” she snapped. “I am not interested in spending time around you for fun. As a reminder, we are classmates, not friends. I came over here because I caught that insufferable smirk of yours and thought you were up to something again.”
Adel's smile turned into an overdramatic display of despair, her loud gasp managing to draw the attention of a few amused classmates around the room. She clutched at her heart, leaning away from Genevieve in mock despondency. “Gene! Darling! I'm so sorry! I… I cannot!” she wailed as if in some cheesy opera. “My family would never accept our love!”
Some of their audience giggled and snorted, hiding their faces in books. Genevieve, on the other hand, recoiled in disgust. “Your continued undignified insinuations reflect on your family! Your own father is the king! What would he say if he observed such crude behavior?”
Adel had sat up and was squishing her wyvern toy again. She let out a snort without looking up at Genevieve. “Nothing. He wouldn't get a word out because he would be losing his mind.”
“Ugh! Reprehensible!” Genevieve fumed, and turned on her heel before storming out. The quiet snickering lingered for just a bit longer in her wake before settling back down into silence. Bella turned back towards Adel with a raised eyebrow.
Seeming to sense a question, Adel shrugged with that smirk back on her face, but without the gleam in her eyes as her attention became focused on her toy again. “Genevieve Gloucester, daughter of Lord Gloucester. She has this weird fixation on me. I think she just wants to get me in trouble to humiliate my dad, but I get a kick out of her reactions when I suggest she's romantically obsessed with me.”
“That wasn't what I was going to ask,” Bella said with a slight frown.
“Oh?”
“You change expressions weirdly fast.”
“Ohhh, that! Pfft!” Adel laughed with a wave of her hand. “I'm a hobbyist actress. I've always thought method acting was really cool, but a bit too hardcore for me. So instead I cycle through different personas as quickly as I can. Gotta be able to get in and out of character fast.”
Something told Bella that wasn't the whole truth, but she didn’t know Adel well enough to tell since she looked so convincing and the reasoning seemed solid. So instead she just asked, “So why did you switch so much in front of me when you barely did for Genevieve?”
Adel shrugged. “Dunno. Maybe I was testing you. Seeing if you get put off by it.” Then, to Bella's surprise, a new smile appeared on her classmate's face. Unlike all others before it, this one looked completely genuine. “Or maybe it's because I get the feeling you don't mind people who wear a mask.”
Bella didn't know how to respond, so she chose not to. Then, in a blink, the cheerful grin was back, and Adel softly clapped her hands. “Now! I think we should talk about this later. Somewhere else. Too many people around here. Not an environment you want to be scheming in, right?”
“Right,” Bella echoed, a little distantly. Her expression remained mostly stoic, but her thoughts were racing. She had known Adel for maybe a week or so, and hadn't had an extended conversation with her until now. And to say she had a multi-faceted personality was an understatement.
‘Or maybe it's because I get the feeling you don't mind people who wear a mask.’
What was that supposed to mean? And why was it the only thing she said in that tone? Why was that the reason Adel swapped personas while talking to Bella so many times, when usually people gain trust by being honest? Too many questions, and not enough answers.
“Great!” Adel quipped excitedly. “I'll let you know a good time and place later. Right now I've got an assignment that I'm trying not to turn in late. Shoo, shoo!” And with that, she was scribbling away again.
Without any reason to argue, Bella did as she was asked and got up from her seat. “Thanks,” she remembered to say last-minute. Adel didn't seem to hear her, though, so she just turned and left the classroom. She had quite a lot to think about.