The Gentleman's Agony

The Noble Quarter at dawn was a study in contrasts. The streets were immaculate, swept clean by workers who arrived before sunrise and disappeared before the aristocrats woke. The buildings were magnificent—three and four-story mansions with marble facades and gilded balconies. And the security was omnipresent—guards on every corner, magical wards glowing faintly in the early morning light, detection spells that would alert the authorities to any unauthorized magical activity.

Silas and Elara stood in an alley two blocks from their target, studying the lawyer's office through a gap in the buildings. The office occupied the ground floor of a converted townhouse, with living quarters above and a small courtyard in the back.

"Three guards visible from here," Silas murmured. "Probably more inside. And those wards on the windows—those are expensive. Military-grade detection spells."

"Can we get past them?" Elara asked.

"Maybe. The wards are designed to detect magical intrusion, but they're not perfect. If we can find a physical entry point that isn't warded, we might be able to get in without triggering the alarms."

"And if we can't?"

"Then we improvise." Silas pulled out the papers Madame Thorne had given them—detailed floor plans of the building, guard schedules, and notes on the lawyer's habits. "According to this, the lawyer arrives at eight o'clock every morning. He's punctual to a fault, which means we have about ninety minutes to get in, find the documents, and get out."

"What documents are we looking for exactly?"

"Financial records. Correspondence. Anything that connects the Chancellor to the Red Hand or shows illegal activity." Silas folded the papers and tucked them away. "Madame Thorne's intelligence suggests the lawyer keeps sensitive documents in a safe in his private office on the second floor."

"A safe. Of course." Elara's voice was dry. "Do you know how to crack a safe?"

"I know the theory. I've never actually done it."

"That's reassuring."

"I'm a fast learner." Silas checked the street, making sure no one was watching them. "Come on. We'll approach from the back, through the courtyard. There's a service entrance that the cleaning staff uses. If we time it right, we can slip in when they arrive."

They moved through the alleys, staying out of sight of the main streets. The Noble Quarter was waking up slowly—servants emerging from service entrances, delivery carts making their rounds, guards changing shifts. Silas timed their movements carefully, using the rhythm of the quarter's morning routine to mask their presence.

The courtyard behind the lawyer's office was small and enclosed by high walls. A single door led into the building, and Silas could see the faint shimmer of a ward across its threshold.

"There," Elara whispered, pointing to a window on the second floor. "That window doesn't have a ward."

Silas looked up and saw she was right. The window was slightly open, probably for ventilation, and there was no visible magical protection.

"Good eye," he said. "But we'll need to climb to reach it."

"The drainpipe?"

"Too exposed. But there's a trellis on the side wall. If we can reach it, we can climb up to the balcony and access the window from there."

They waited until a delivery cart passed by, using the noise to cover their movement as they scaled the courtyard wall. The trellis was old but sturdy, covered in climbing roses that provided both handholds and cover.

Silas went first, testing each section of the trellis before committing his weight. His injured leg protested, but the bond was lending him Elara's strength and coordination, making the climb manageable.

He reached the balcony and pulled himself over the railing, then reached down to help Elara up. She climbed with surprising grace, her fear of heights apparently overcome by necessity.

The window was indeed open, and Silas carefully pushed it wider, listening for any sound of movement inside. The room beyond was dark and quiet—a storage room, from the look of it, filled with boxes and filing cabinets.

They slipped inside, and Silas closed the window behind them, leaving it slightly ajar for a quick exit if needed.

"Where's the private office?" Elara whispered.

"Down the hall, third door on the left." Silas moved to the storage room door and opened it carefully, checking the hallway beyond. It was empty, lit by magical lamps that cast a soft, steady glow.

They moved quickly and quietly, their footsteps muffled by the thick carpet. The building was silent except for the distant sound of someone moving around on the ground floor—probably a servant preparing for the lawyer's arrival.

The private office door was locked, but it was a simple mechanical lock, not a magical one. Silas pulled out the letter opener he'd taken from the palace and used it to manipulate the lock mechanism. It took him three tries, but eventually the lock clicked open.

The office was exactly what Silas had expected—expensive furniture, walls lined with law books, a large desk covered in neat stacks of papers. And in the corner, partially hidden behind a painting of some long-dead aristocrat, was the safe.

"There," Silas said, moving toward it.

The safe was a substantial piece of work—steel construction, combination lock, probably warded against magical tampering. Silas examined it carefully, looking for weaknesses.

"Can you open it?" Elara asked.

"I can try." He pressed his ear against the safe and began to turn the dial slowly, listening for the subtle clicks that would indicate the tumblers falling into place.

It was delicate work, requiring absolute concentration. Silas blocked out everything else—the sound of movement downstairs, Elara's nervous breathing, the constant background hum of the bond—and focused entirely on the safe.

Click. First number.

Click. Second number.

Click. Third number.

The safe door swung open, revealing stacks of documents and several small boxes. Silas began pulling out papers, scanning them quickly for anything relevant.

"Here," he said, finding a ledger. "Financial records. Payments to various shell companies, all dated within the last two years."

"Are they connected to the Red Hand?" Elara asked, looking over his shoulder.

"Not obviously. But look at the amounts—they're consistent with what Tobias told us about the Chancellor's funding. And these company names..." He flipped through the pages. "These are the same intermediaries Tobias mentioned."

"That's not proof."

"No, but it's evidence. If we can connect these shell companies to the Red Hand, we'll have a paper trail that leads directly to the Chancellor."

Silas continued searching through the safe, pulling out more documents. There were letters, contracts, financial statements—a treasure trove of information about the Chancellor's private dealings.

And then he found it.

A letter, written in the Chancellor's own hand, addressed to someone identified only as "R." The content was carefully worded, but the meaning was clear: the Chancellor was providing funding and resources to an organization that was planning "direct action" against the crown.

"This is it," Silas said, his voice tight with excitement. "This is the proof we need."

"Let me see." Elara took the letter and read it carefully. "It's not explicit. He doesn't mention the Red Hand by name."

"He doesn't have to. The timing matches, the amounts match, and the language is clear enough. Combined with the financial records, this is enough to raise serious questions about the Chancellor's loyalty."

"Will it be enough to stop him?"

"I don't know. But it's more than we had an hour ago."

Silas was about to close the safe when he noticed something else—a small wooden box tucked in the back corner. He pulled it out and opened it, revealing a collection of Proxy Collars.

They were old Collars, tarnished and dull, each one marked with a name and a date. Silas recognized the format—these were memorial Collars, kept as records of Proxies who had died in service.

"What are those?" Elara asked.

"Collars from dead Proxies." Silas picked one up, reading the inscription. "Marcus Thorne. Died in service, age twenty-three. That's the Chancellor's nephew—the one Madame Thorne told us about."

"The Chancellor had a Proxy?"

"Apparently. And not just one." Silas counted the Collars. "Seven. He's gone through seven Proxies in the last twenty years."

"That's..." Elara's voice was horrified. "That's a death every three years."

"Less, actually. Some of these dates are only a year apart." Silas felt something cold settle in his stomach. "The Chancellor is one of those aristocrats who burns through Proxies quickly. He uses them up and replaces them without a second thought."

"Why would he keep the Collars?"

"Trophies, maybe. Or insurance—proof that he followed proper procedures when his Proxies died." Silas put the Collar back in the box. "Either way, it's another piece of evidence. It shows a pattern of abuse and disregard for Proxy welfare."

He was about to close the box when he noticed something else—a small notebook tucked beneath the Collars. He pulled it out and opened it, and his blood ran cold.

It was a journal, written in the Chancellor's hand, documenting his experiments with Proxy bonds. He'd been trying to find ways to increase the efficiency of magical transfer, to push Proxies harder without killing them too quickly.

The entries were clinical, detached, describing his Proxies' suffering with the same tone someone might use to document a scientific experiment. There were notes about pain thresholds, recovery times, optimal spell frequencies. And at the end, there was a conclusion: "Current Proxy bond design is inefficient. Recommend development of enhanced bonding protocols that allow for greater magical throughput."

"What is it?" Elara asked, seeing Silas's expression.

"Evidence that the Chancellor is a monster." Silas handed her the journal. "Read it. See what your government has been doing to people like me."

Elara read, and through the bond, Silas felt her horror and disgust grow with each page. By the time she finished, she was shaking.

"This is... this is torture. Systematic, documented torture."

"Yes," Silas said simply. "It is."

"And he wants to make it worse. He wants to create bonds that push Proxies even harder."

"That's what 'enhanced bonding protocols' means. More pain, more damage, more death. All in the name of efficiency."

Elara closed the journal, her face pale. "We have to stop him. Not just for political reasons, but because if he becomes King, he'll implement these protocols across the entire kingdom. Thousands of Proxies will suffer even more than they already do."

"Tens of thousands," Silas corrected. "There are approximately fifty thousand active Proxies in the kingdom. If the Chancellor implements his enhanced protocols, most of them will be dead within five years."

"Then we take everything. All of it. Every piece of evidence we can carry."

Silas began stuffing documents into a leather satchel he'd brought for this purpose. The financial records, the letters, the journal, even the box of Collars—all of it went into the bag.

They were almost finished when they heard footsteps in the hallway.

Silas froze, his hand on the satchel. Through the door, he could hear voices—two people, maybe three, moving toward the office.

"—told you to have those documents ready by this morning."

"I apologize, Chancellor. I wasn't expecting you so early."

The Chancellor. He was here, in the building, right now.

Silas looked at Elara, and through the bond, he felt her panic spike. They were trapped—the only exit was the door, and the Chancellor was about to walk through it.

"The window," Silas whispered. "Now."

They moved quickly, Silas grabbing the satchel while Elara opened the window. But they'd only made it halfway across the room when the office door opened.

The Chancellor stood in the doorway, flanked by two guards. He was exactly as Silas remembered from the palace—tall, thin, with silver hair and a face like carved granite. His eyes widened slightly when he saw them, and then his expression shifted to something that might have been satisfaction.

"Well," he said calmly. "This is unexpected. Princess Elara, I've been looking everywhere for you."

"Chancellor Thorne," Elara replied, her voice steady despite her fear. "I wish I could say it was good to see you."

"I'm sure you do. And you must be Silas Vane, the Proxy who's been causing so much trouble." The Chancellor's eyes flicked to the open safe, the scattered documents, the satchel in Silas's hand. "I see you've been going through my private papers. That's very rude."

"So is treason," Silas replied. "But you seem to have made a habit of it."

"Treason?" The Chancellor smiled. "My dear boy, I'm not the one who kidnapped the Princess and fled the palace. You are."

"I didn't kidnap anyone. I saved her life."

"That's your version of events. Mine is quite different." The Chancellor gestured to the guards. "Seize them. Carefully—we don't want to harm the Princess."

The guards moved forward, and Silas made a split-second decision. He grabbed Elara's hand and pulled, not toward the window, but toward the Chancellor himself.

It was a desperate move, relying on the Chancellor's instinct to protect himself. And it worked—the Chancellor stepped back, and the guards hesitated, not wanting to risk hitting their employer.

Silas and Elara burst through the doorway and into the hallway, running for the stairs. Behind them, they could hear the Chancellor shouting orders, the guards scrambling to follow.

They made it down the stairs and into the ground floor, where more guards were waiting. Silas counted six of them, all armed, all blocking the exits.

"Surrender," one of the guards said. "You're surrounded."

Silas looked around, calculating odds and options. They couldn't fight six armed guards. They couldn't run—all the exits were blocked. And they couldn't hide—the building was too small, and the guards would search every room.

Which left only one option.

"Elara," he said quietly. "I need you to trust me."

"What are you going to do?"

"Something stupid." He turned to face the guards, his hands raised in apparent surrender. "All right. We'll come quietly. But first, I have a question for the Chancellor."

The Chancellor had descended the stairs and was standing behind the guards, his expression carefully neutral. "What question?"

"How many Proxies have you killed?" Silas asked. "I found seven Collars in your safe. Is that all of them, or are there more?"

The Chancellor's expression didn't change. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't you? Marcus Thorne, died at twenty-three. Elena Voss, died at nineteen. Thomas Crane, died at twenty-five. Should I go on?"

"Those Proxies died in service, as is sometimes necessary. Their deaths were unfortunate but legal."

"Legal." Silas laughed, a harsh sound. "You worked them to death, documented their suffering in your journal, and then kept their Collars as trophies. That's not legal. That's murder."

"You're delusional. Guards, take him."

The guards moved forward, and Silas did something he'd never done before in his fifteen years as a Proxy.

He reached through the bond to Elara and pulled. Not to take her strength or her vitality, but to access her magical potential. She was an aristocrat, trained in magic since childhood, with a reservoir of power that she'd never had to use carefully because she'd always had a Proxy to absorb the costs.

Now, through their unique bond, Silas could access that power directly.

He cast a spell—a simple one, just a burst of force that knocked the guards backward. But the cost was enormous, and it hit both of them simultaneously.

Silas felt his ribs crack, felt his lungs compress, felt blood vessels burst in his eyes and nose. And through the bond, he felt Elara experiencing the same thing—not as intensely, because the bond was distributing the cost between them, but enough to make her cry out in pain.

They both collapsed, and the guards scrambled to their feet, weapons drawn.

"Don't kill them!" the Chancellor shouted. "I need them alive!"

But Silas wasn't done. He cast another spell, this one more complex—a wall of force that blocked the hallway, separating them from the guards. The cost was even worse, and Silas felt something in his spine crack, felt his left arm go numb.

Elara was screaming now, feeling the pain through the bond, but she was also moving, pulling Silas to his feet and dragging him toward a side door.

They burst through it and found themselves in a kitchen. A servant screamed and dropped a tray of dishes. Silas and Elara ran past her, through another door, and into a narrow service corridor.

Behind them, they could hear the guards breaking through the force wall, the Chancellor shouting orders, the sound of pursuit getting closer.

"The courtyard," Silas gasped, his voice rough with pain. "We can climb the wall."

They emerged into the courtyard, and Silas immediately saw the problem. The wall was twelve feet high, and he could barely stand, let alone climb.

"I can't make it," he said. "Elara, you need to go without me."

"No." Her voice was fierce. "We're bonded. We go together or not at all."

"That's very noble, but—"

"Shut up and climb."

She grabbed him and half-pushed, half-threw him at the wall. Silas caught the top edge with his good hand and pulled, using every bit of strength the bond could lend him. His broken ribs screamed in protest, his damaged spine sent jolts of agony through his entire body, but he kept climbing.

Elara climbed beside him, her face pale with pain but her movements determined. They reached the top of the wall just as the guards burst into the courtyard.

"There! Stop them!"

Silas and Elara dropped down the other side, landing hard in an alley. Silas's legs gave out, and he collapsed, the satchel of documents spilling across the cobblestones.

"Get up," Elara said, gathering the documents. "Silas, we have to keep moving."

"I know." He forced himself to his feet, leaning heavily on Elara. "The Dockside Quarter. We can lose them there."

They ran, or rather, they stumbled through the alleys while guards shouted behind them. Silas's body was failing—the costs from the spells were too much, even distributed through the bond. He could feel his organs shutting down, his bones cracking under the strain, his nervous system overloading.

But he kept moving, because stopping meant capture, and capture meant death.

They made it three blocks before Silas collapsed again, this time unable to get up. His vision was graying at the edges, and he could taste blood in his mouth.

"Silas!" Elara was crying, trying to pull him to his feet. "Please, you have to get up. We're almost there."

"Go," he managed to say. "Take the documents. Get to Madame Thorne. Tell her everything."

"I'm not leaving you."

"You have to. The bond—it'll hurt, but you can survive the separation for a few hours. Long enough to get help."

"No." She was sobbing now, her tears falling on his face. "I won't leave you. I won't."

Through the bond, Silas felt her determination, her refusal to abandon him even though it meant risking her own life. And he felt something else—something he hadn't felt in fifteen years.

He felt cared for. Valued. Like his life mattered to someone.

It was enough to give him the strength to try one more time.

He grabbed Elara's hand and pulled himself up, using her as a crutch. They staggered forward, moving through the alleys like two drunks, leaving a trail of blood behind them.

And somehow, impossibly, they made it to the Dockside Quarter.

The docks were busy with morning traffic—sailors loading cargo, merchants haggling over prices, workers moving crates and barrels. Silas and Elara blended into the crowd, just two more injured people in a district where injuries were common and questions were rare.

They found a narrow space between two warehouses and collapsed, both of them too exhausted and hurt to move any further.

"We made it," Elara whispered. "We actually made it."

"For now," Silas replied. His voice was barely audible, and he could feel his consciousness slipping. "Elara, listen to me. The documents—they're proof. Get them to Madame Thorne. She'll know what to do."

"I will. But first, we need to get you medical attention."

"No time. The guards will be searching the docks soon. You need to move."

"We need to move. Together." She pulled him closer, and through the bond, Silas felt her pouring her strength into him, trying to keep him conscious. "Stay with me, Silas. Don't you dare die on me now."

"I'll try," he said. "But Elara, if I don't make it—"

"You'll make it. You've survived fifteen years of torture. You can survive this."

"Maybe." His vision was fading, darkness creeping in from the edges. "But if I don't... thank you. For seeing me. For treating me like a person. For caring."

"Silas—"

But he was already gone, consciousness slipping away into darkness.

The last thing he felt was Elara's hand in his, and the bond between them, holding him together even as his body tried to fall apart.

*

End of Chapter 6