By the next afternoon Sora had gotten his fill of lying in bed and being fussed over, and by the next morning had gotten his fill of more strenuous bedroom activities, too. The walls of the rooms were quite thin, but nobody pounded on them to complain. It was a port city, after all, and it turned out to be that sort of hotel. As they left for the day, one of the 'ladies' lounging about the parlor, a word used very loosely, caught Kairi's eye and gave her a barely perceptible nod, from one professional to another, acknowledging a job well done. Kairi choked, turned an unflattering shade of pink, and practically flattened Riku and Sora into the door in her haste to leave.
Since Porthaven had a surplus of short, blue-eyed, brown-haired boys milling about the harbors, it was decided that in the crush one more wasn't going to raise suspicions as long as they didn't linger too long in one place. Kairi did think it prudent to buy Sora a hat, however, since the porcupine that had taken up permanent residence on his head was a little too distinctive. They picked their way through the more odiferous end of the farmer's market nearest the hotel to the much busier, cleaner, sweeter-smelling central stretches to grab a simple meal of fruit and buttered bread. Kairi was just about to pay for a small basket of fresh strawberries when she spotted a familiar silver braid a few tables down. She replaced the strawberries, to the fruit-seller's disappointment, and elbowed her way down as politely as she could, Riku strolling along behind. "Sophie?" she said questioningly to the head of thin white hair. For a moment Kairi was afraid she had mistaken her for someone else, since this woman seemed to be standing taller, as if the weight hunching her back had been lifted.
Sophie spun about, brandishing the cod she had been about to purchase, but smiled when she saw who was greeting her. Hastily she replaced the fish on the pile. "Hello, Kairi, Riku. You look well. How did your…", and she paused to clear her throat and assume an expression of careful nonchalance, "mission go?"
"Not exactly according to plan, but we found him." She turned back to introduce Sora, but found he had wandered off across the way. "Hey! Would you come over here please?" she called at his back, and waved. Sophie looked pleasantly surprised that it was the skinny boy in a newsboy cap and not the bald, burly, steely-eyed dockworker he'd been standing next to that begin threading his way through the crowd.
"Are Howl and Calcifer treating you all right?" Riku asked.
"Oh, yes, yes. I'm Howl cleaning lady now, you see. He's really not so bad. It's a real mystery why everybody is so frightened of him."
"Sophie," whined the little man standing next to her. Kairi and Riku hadn't noticed him at first, since the top of his head wouldn't even have brushed Riku's elbow. He was wearing a large blue cloak (large on him, in any case) and a very impressive gray beard. The voice, though, came out like the wheedling of a little boy whose grandmother, but virtue of being old and talkative, was embarrassing him to death. Kairi blinked at him. He started guiltily and continued in a tone pitched much lower that nevertheless still sounded like an irritated nine-year-old. "You can't go around telling people that. Who'd you think started all those nasty stories in the first place?"
"These aren't just 'people', Markl. They saved my life out in the Waste, and it occurs to me that I never got to thank them properly. Riku, Kairi…and Sora," she said, nodding at each of them in turn, "I'm Sophie, professional cleaning witch, and this is Markl, Wizard…Wizard…"
"In Porthaven it's Jenkins," Markl supplied.
"Wizard Jenkins' apprentice," she finished. "I can't offer much, but if you haven't eaten, would crepes do for now?"
"What's crepes?" Sora asked, intrigued, since they sounded eminently edible, and he was intrigued by almost anything in that vein.
Sophie laughed. "You really aren't from around here, are you. I think we'll have to show you, now, provided you don't mind too much, Markl."
The midget scratched at his beard, clearly torn. "I can't eat in this thing. Oh…hold on a minute," he said, and disappeared behind a counter. There was some rustling, and a little pop, and from under that same counter ran a boy with curly auburn hair and a wad of blue fabric under his arm. "If Howl asks where all the money went, I'm telling him this was your idea, Sophie," Markl warned her.
Sophie laughed off the warning, and let Markl lead her by the hand through the crowd. Riku pulled Sora's hat a little lower over his eyes, just in case, and followed after them. I wouldn't hurt to get a little more information on this 'Howl', and they were all hungry. They went up and away from the sea, and as the level of the street rose, so did the quality of the architecture around them. The people too changed, the ladies in larger, more feathered hats and the men in vests and coats and more polished shoes. They saw few policemen, but Riku and Kairi made sure to sidle around to stand in their lines of sight.
Markl was confident in his directions, and before too long he made an abrupt right turn into a restaurant with large open windows and vanilla and chocolate stripes on the awning. The place was busy and they had to crush around one table just a bit too small for five people, even if one of them was nine, but Sora, Riku, and Kairi, thigh to thigh to thigh against the wall, didn't voice any objections. The waitress swung by with one pot of coffee and one of tea, and soon after the trio from the islands were initiated into the mystery of the crepe.
They turned out to be lacy pancakes thin enough to be wrapped around all sorts of delicious things, like sliced strawberries, sweetened fresh cheese, whipped cream, and blueberry jam, several of which both Sora and Markl, in their enthusiasm, got down their respective shirtfronts. It was difficult to maintain a stern front in the face of Sora, and when he began a demonstration of his remarkable ability to balance a place setting's worth of silverware on his face, Markl became a raucously giggling lost cause. Sora was the youngest in his family, and took this rare opportunity to borrow a little brother for a morning with great gusto. Sophie felt she ought to be the voice of order, or at least halfway decent manners, and scolded them halfheartedly throughout the meal, to little effect.
When it had began to wind down, all three declared the experiment in foreign cuisine a smashing success. With all the traveling they did, they had to be adventurous eaters or starve, but the dining out here was a far more satisfying experience than, say, the breakfast buffet Timon and Pumbaa had set up one extremely unpleasant and squishy morning in the Pridelands. There had been no going back for seconds that time, but today Sora was forced to challenge Riku to a coin toss for the last one on the plate.
Abruptly Kairi slapped her hand down on the coin as it landed, eliciting angry protests from both of the boys. "Look. Outside," she ordered loudly. They did, and there was a simultaneous clink of cups against saucers and the scratching of chairlegs on the floor as the other patrons did the same. Beyond the windows people were running, and like a river were flowing downhill, towards the sea.
"No raid bells," Markl observed. "Let's go check it out!" He slapped some bills down on the table and began snaking his way to the door, abandoning the last crepe to overpowering curiosity. He moved fast, for a boy with such short legs, and Sora tried to grab him by the sleeve before he disappeared into the crush and lost the slower Sophie. But the inexorable flow of the crowd swept him away, and he caught only a few flashes of his red curls as Markl wriggled like a fish through the mass of people. Riku grabbed Sora's wrist in turn and followed until the boy was lost from sight.
Carried along with the rest of the spectators, they found themselves almost back at the docks. It was the smoke they saw first. A wall of it had descended on the mouth of the harbor, greasy, black, and smelling of something more chemical and acrid than burning wood. At the head of the trail was a battleship struggling into its home port like a drowning dog, covered in black pockmarks and lying much, much too low in the water. "Come on, let's see what we can do," Sora yelled over the din.
Men in white uniforms and sailor's caps where streaming through the crowd too. "Hey! HEY!" Riku barked, pulled Sora up short by his wrist. "Away from the soldiers, not towards them!" he hissed in Sora's ear.
"Those men need help, " Sora said, as if that explained everything.
"Not from us. It wasn't Heartless that did that, Sora. Pretty soon this place is going to be swarming with people that might be a little too interested in you. We need to get out of here now." Sora didn't muster any counterarguments, but neither did he unlock the muscles of the arm Riku had wrapped his hand around. Sora looked up at Riku, a challenge in his eyes, and then back to the harbor. Tugs, fishing boats, and pleasure schooners were converging on the mortally wounded ironclad as quickly as their captains could manage, to scoop up the tiny white dots were spilling from its deck into the water.
Sora relaxed his arm in defeat and let Riku lead him away, although to Riku it was a flat victory. He thought he spotted Kairi's wine-red hair farther uphill and made for her. But before he reached shouting distance, there was a roar and three crashes that reverberated through the harbor as if the water had become the skin on a giant's drum. Three plumes of seawater shot high into the air for all to see, and the pitch of the shouting crowd lurched sharply from disbelief to terror; the river of bodies rapidly reversed its flow. Panic spread from mouth to mouth. The jostling turned hard and ugly. Someone shoved Sora hard in the side, and he stumbled into Riku, and when he looked up again Kairi had disappeared.
"Where's the kid?" Riku yelled.
"I don't see him. He knows the way back, but…wait! To your left! Red door! Just grab him!" Sora shoved back against the townspeople until he uncovered Markl flattened against a stack of crates. His face was smudged and his lip was cut, but although he did not seem nearly as enthusiastic about the spectacle as he had been ten minutes ago, at least he wasn't crying. Riku was an only child, and didn't have a clue what the proper response was to a kid in this case. He began to object loudly when Riku scooped him awkwardly up under his arms and accidentally smacked his lip against Riku's temple. A little girl further out in the crowd screamed in pain. He then thought better of asking to be put down.
Riku fixed his most impressive 'don't fuck with me' look on his face and started shoving, Sora following in his wake. People got out of the way. Riku had no idea where he was going, but Markl did, and he shouted directions into Riku's ear whenever they neared an intersections.
A second roar of turbines thundered high above their heads as the airship that had dropped the first warning wave of bombs into the harbor came by for another pass. The doors on its belly hold opened again, and the sound of panic intensified. Markl screamed and buried his head in Riku's hair.
But it wasn't bombs. It looked like a flock of doves fluttering down on them, hundreds upon hundreds of them. Sora grabbed one as it settled into a puddle and its wings became sodden with mud. It was no peace offering; they were only propaganda fliers. He tossed it aside after barely a glance. With a shaky sigh of relief, Markl urged them to a familiar green door, where they found Kairi and Sophie were waiting for them. Riku judged it safe to set Markl down on his feet without the chance he might be trampled.
All were well and accounted for, minus Markl's split lip and Sophie's wheezing. The boy fumbled with his keys for a moment, and let them all inside.
-ooo-
"Markl?" said the man standing by the fire, in tones mild irritation. He was carefully slouched over, so his blond hair fell in rakish locks over his eyes, with his arms crossed beneath the front of an open red-on-gold spring coat. His left eyebrow raised itself a fraction with each head that appeared through the door. "I was hoping that in my absence you did't take it upon yourself hang up a sign for Wizard Howl's Bed and Breakfast over the shop door?"
Markl immediately went on the defensive. "Don't blame me, Master Howl! Sophie invited them to breakfast, and then there was a ship that nearly got sunk and the Strangian's that did it came back to bomb the harbor and we all came running here, and—"
"Enough, Markl, I heard the explosions," he said, as if such a thing was commonplace. He straightened a little, to size up his new guests. He and Riku were nearly the same height, although there was substantially less of Howl, especially around the shoulders. If Riku was being kind, he would have described his build as 'slender', but he usually wasn't, so it would have been more accurate for him to say he could have snapped the man like a toothpick. Even so, he looked like someone who felt he could take care of himself, and anyone that tried going after him would probably be in for a painful surprise. "I suppose that puts the burden on Sophie for introductions, since I don't usually allow strangers into my house?" he said, when she wheezed her way painfully to the top of the stairs, although he directed the statement squarely at Riku with his cool gray eyes. It a languid sort of challenge cloaked in a gentleman's pleasantries.
When Markl hustled Sophie off to a chair and a glass of water, however, and Kairi stepped lightly up the stairs, his face smoothed immediately. Kairi turned to face him, her hand paused on the banister. Howl's eyes wandered over the trim figure she cut in her dress with an appraiser's eye. He did not stare—nothing so coarse—and his eyes lingered longest above her neck and not below, but the exchange grated on Riku's nerves worse than if he had simply spent the moment ogling her chest.
"I think Sophie needs a moment to catch her breath. Why don't you ask Calcifer? We've met," Kairi said, with mischief perking up the corners of her mouth. The fire demon very quietly and deliberately tried to sink into the hearthstones, and failed.
That surprised Howl, although the reaction was quickly smothered. "You were among the mysterious housebreakers last week, I take it. If you escaped this castle once, why come back? Aren't you afraid I'll steal your heart?" he asked, straightening fully and taking a few steps toward her.
Markl rolled his eyes so hard they were in serious danger of bouncing away under the kitchen cupboards. Kairi saw it, suppressed a snicker, and flashed Howl her most brilliant smile (with lots of teeth) and laughed, though probably not for the reason Howl assumed. "I've faced worse," she said. Riku and Sora exchanged looks.
"Guh. Fine," Calcifer forced out, looking about as impressed as Markl with Howl's double entendre. "She's Kairi. He's Riku. I've never met the short one before," he said, and snuck back under his nest of embers.
"That would be Sora," Sophie chimed in, who seemed to have recovered nicely with the assistance of a glass of water and a wet handtowel. "They did you a rather big favor I suppose Calcifer forget to mention."
"Oh?" Howl asked, faintly intrigued.
"The big nasty thing on the roof. We killed it. And all of its friends," Kairi supplied.
Howl looked faintly disturbed for a moment, then laughed and looked back at Calcifer, who was still squashed flat into the hearthstones with shame. His flames had taken on a pinkish-purple tinge near the base—the demonic version of a furious blush. "Were you perhaps not entirely truthful with me about where that thing had gone off to, Calcifer?" Howl asked, with a nice dusting of sarcasm. The demon grumbled something noncommittal and mostly inaudible that could have been creatively interpreted as an apology to the real exterminators. Howl let it go and turned back to Kairi with a shake of his head. "The Heartless hardly ever trouble me, but they can't seem to leave the house alone, especially the big ones. You have my thanks." Riku cleared his throat. "Both of you. However," he paused, to smile at Kairi again "I have business to attend to this morning. If you'd like to join me later for—"
"Hey!" Sora exclaimed suddenly, as his train of thought clicked and whirred and chugged into the station with a triumphant mental 'ding'. "Waitaminute. You call them Heartless too? Nobody else here has used that word."
"Too?" Howl repeatedly, puzzled. "A wizard named Ansem coined the term, if I recall correctly. But most people refer to them by their station: the Dark Servants."
Sora, Kairi, and Riku exchanged knowing glances. "Where did you hear that name?" Sora asked.
"When he introduced himself. We met, briefly, when I was still a student at the Royal Academy of Sorcery."
Three jaws went slack in perfect unison. Sora snapped his shut, and said: "Would it surprise you at all if we said we're from a planet call Radiant Garden?"
Howl blinked. "I think my appointments can wait," he declared.
-ooo-
It took a couple of hours and two pots of tea before the fall of Radiant Garden was pieced together to Howl's satisfaction. Markl hung at the end of the table, injecting awed questions about their clashes with the Heartless, which got Sora going on tangential stories that took quite a while to wind down. Howl grilled them on the contents of Ansem's reports, his philosophical theories, his magical techniques, his Apprentices, his retreat into hiding, his last days, and just about everything they knew about him up to his favorite flavor of ice cream (for completeness, Sora volunteered this information anyway). Sophie had produced a skein of yarn and a pair of knitting needles out of nowhere and flopped down on the chair in front of the fire, but she hung on their words almost as keenly as Markl, and the scarf she started hardly grew at all as they talked.
Howl seemed to sag back into his chair with every new scrap of information, as if they pressed down on him with a physical weight. By the time all his questions had been answered, he had slouched so far down in his seat the next snippet of bad news seemed likely to shove him all the way to the floor. "I never trusted the Heartless," he said, resting his head on the fingers of one hand. "But I underestimated how deeply that distrust should have gone. Most other sorcerers use them as servants and errand boys…you may have seen one or two on the street, and there are masses of them supporting the army. I kept one or two of my own when I was still in the King's good graces, even. It will take a lot of convincing for the Parliament to have them banned outright—especially with the war going the way it has."
"The Ingary Daily says you guys are winning," Riku remarked.
"The reporters are lying through their teeth," Howl commented. "Or rather their pens. I've seen it with my own eyes. The Strangians have firebombed most of the southern coastal towns and are working their way north. I doubt their troopships are far behind."
The unsteady click-click-click of Sophie's knitting needles emanating from behind him stopped abruptly. "Do you think they'll get all the way up the river to Market Chipping?" she asked, her voice pinched with desperation. "My sister's still there."
"They won't, 'cause we'll stop them," Sora declared. "We have to stop them. The Heartless will suck up all that hurt and anger and spit it right back at you—everybody will be toast on both sides. They don't care what you're fighting about as long as you're fighting." He paused, and cocked his head as he realized they were still missing that piece of information. "Which is what, again?"
"A little over a year ago Crown Prince Stephen disappeared on his holiday to one of the mountain towns on the Strangian side of the Waste. He was the King of Strangia's only heir. According to his seers, the Prince is alive and within our borders. He vowed to show Ingary no mercy until his son was returned," Howl explained.
"Okaaaaaaaay…so why didn't your King give him back?" Sora asked.
"There is no back," Howl said darkly. "No one abducted him, at least not with the government's support. Hundreds of wizards, fortune hunters, and fools went out looking for their Prince, and none of them came back with him. Some never came back at all. Theories abound, but my personal opinion is that he nipped across the border to do some illegal big-game hunting and was eaten by a bear."
"Why would the King of Strangia do all that, though? There wouldn't be any reason for your country to kidnap Stephen, so why doesn't he see you're all innocent?" Sora asked, perplexed. It seemed very clear to him. There was an accident, a terrible accident, but not one innocent people should have to atone for.
"The why doesn't matter, at this point. But if we could give the King of Strangia indisputable proof his son's disappearance wasn't anybody's fault, we could stop this stupid war and make both sides look to their real enemies," she ventured.
"So…how're we actually going to do that?" Riku asked dryly, addressing the room. "I'll note down poking through a million piles of bear crap as 'Plan B'. Anybody have a Plan A?"
Kairi looked hurt for a moment, and looked at Riku as if she wished he didn't always have to be so blunt about being right. She thought for a moment and tried a different angle. "Who did Ansem talk to when he visited before?" Kairi asked. "Would they listen to the Princess of Radiant Garden if she showed up to argue that case against the Heartless?"
"Finding Stephen is probably impossible; I've tried, so your approach may be my world's best chance," Howl said, briefly clenching his jaw before allowing the unpleasant conclusion free, "if not my country's. Ansem was greatly respected…the advice of anyone from his homeworld would carry a certain weight with Madame Suliman, his Majesty's chief sorceress and…ah…'pioneer' of our world's experiments with the Heartless. The Academy has been starved for news since his Apprentices stopped paying us visits. How quickly could she make it here?"
"She is here," Kairi said. "She's me."
"You're of royal blood?" Howl said, pleasantly taken aback. He pushed himself up from the unhappy puddle he'd melted into on the chair and leaned forward to sweep his eyes over her again. "I wouldn't have taken you for a Princess when we first met. You lacked the—"
"Poofy dress and ten pounds of gold jewelry?" Riku interrupted sourly.
Howl ignored the verbal intrusion and took his chin delicately in his hand to gaze into her eyes. "The self-absorption and frivolity of so many court ladies. Not many would sacrifice their jewels and rouge for the good of the common people." He chuckled to himself. "And unlike them, your beauty doesn't require that assistance."
Against her will, Kairi found herself blushing, and hoped nobody else would notice in the ruddy firelight. Sora and Riku never told her she was beautiful. Not because they didn't think so, but because they were so used to her face it would be like commenting suddenly the sky was blue—nobody need voice it because it was understood, and even then, it wasn't her face but her heart that kept them bound together. Still, Warrior of the Light or not, she was still a woman, and it was a nice thing to hear now and then. The ends of Kairi's lips curled up a little…until she noticed Riku was glaring at her through lowered lashes, his mouth twisted into a faint sneer.
"How soon can you secure her an audience and get this over with?" he asked Howl impatiently.
"Within two days. Madame Suliman sent me a summons to appear at the palace—both me's, Wizard Jenkins and Wizard Pendragon—so I'm sure I could slip her in."
"Great. Wonderful. Thanks," Riku said, with unmistakable sarcasm and none of the mentioned gratitude. "Since that's all sorted out, I wouldn't want to keep you from
what I'm sure is a day chock-full of pressing wizard business. Kairi, Sora, let's go," he said, and it was unmistakably an order, not a request.
"You'll need proper attire to pay a visit to the palace, and there's a good deal more information about Madame Suliman you ought to know before you speak with her," Howl said, addressing Kairi. "Come by tomorrow morning and I'll see to both."
Kairi sensed another sarcastic remark readying for launch, and, nearing the end of her expansive patience with Riku's rudeness, aborted it by kicking him in the ankle and saying very graciously to Howl, "I will, thank you." She rose and collected her hat and bag while Markl scampered up to let them out the right facet of the magical door.
Looking slightly embarrassed on Riku's behalf, Sora got up and followed them. "Same here. Nice to meet you and thanks for breakfast, Sophie."
She smiled. "You're very welcome. Stop by again!"
Kairi heaved a long-suffering sigh once the door shut and their hosts were no longer in earshot. "Riku, was that all really necessary? You were rude the whole time, and not your everpresent low-level aura of rude…intentionally rude."
"That guy rubs me the wrong way," Riku said, thoroughly unapologetic.
"But he was really helpful—he's even going to get Kairi an audience with somebody important enough to call off the Heartless. I liked him," Sora said.
"You like everybody that hasn't tried to beat you to a bloody pulp, and even some of the ones that did. Your opinion on Howl is therefore invalid," he said to Sora. "Now, if we could leave aside for a moment that I think he's a weasel…there wasn't anything about him that seemed off? Not at all?"
Kairi set down her bag and leaned against the side of the building, working at a loose piece of the sidewalk's brickwork with her shoe. Riku was good at grating on the nerves, and it was abundantly clear to her why he'd decided to start once she and Howl had met. But she also valued his judgment, so Kairi tried to box up her irritation with him and set it aside. She pictured Howl in her mind, his mannerisms, his speech, the way he carried himself. "Maybe, now that you mention it…like he wasn't all there. Listening to him talk is almost like watching an actor on stage." Kairi said, thinking aloud.
"Right," Riku said triumphantly. "Wasn't all there. Like he was missing a piece. A big important heart-shaped piece. Did you catch what he said? Something along the lines of 'They don't bother me much anymore'? He used to work with the Heartless, then something happened, and they're not interested in him anymore. Can you think of a bigger, redder flag?"
"Oh. Oh no," Sora breathed suddenly. "When those thugs dragged me to the station, they had wanted posters up on the wall. There were a bunch of Howl, and I could've sworn he had black hair in the pictures. Maybe he could've dyed it…maybe not."
"All right," Kairi conceded. "That's all true…and all circumstantial evidence. Maybe he does bleach his hair and have his own secrets to hide and his own reasons for being odd. The only surefire way we ourselves have to tell a human from a Nobody is to stab them and see if there's body left behind to bury. And we're not experimenting with this unless we actually find him in the process of harvesting hearts or doing something equally horrible. Even if he does turn out to be a Nobody, he's trying to help, and he hasn't done anything yet!"
"That we know of," Riku added.
Sora scrubbed his face and addressed Kairi. "I know I've never been the brightest crayon in the box, but if I've learned anything it's that Nobodies are bad news, even if they seem okay at first. Thirteen out of fourteen of the ones we met so far've tried to beat the snot out of me or Riku, and the exception was a serious exception." Kairi didn't look like she was buying it. "What?" he said.
"Axel," she said simply.
"Look, Kairi…" Riku began, "as much as I appreciate how he spent the last five minutes of his non-life, I got the impression he spent almost every minute up to that point being a twofaced backstabbing dickwad."
"Fine," Kairi said, not ready to surrender yet. "And how much of that was Xehanort's influence and how much was actually their own free will? I'm just saying I have serious reservations about knocking off somebody…a Nobody…whatever…I just don't think I could pick a fight with an individual that keeps a teddybear collection on his wall unless he gave me a really good reason."
"We'll have to watch him, wait and see," Sora decided. "I don't trust Nobodies, but I do like Howl, we don't have enough evidence to convict him yet."
"That's good enough for me," Kairi said. "Come on, we should get going. The less time you spend out in the open, the better."