Maria had returned home for the summer break to see to her mother. Distant as they were, she was cognizant of her obligation to check on the other woman. They were blood after all, thin and weak as that blood was.

What she had not expected was to find Lady Claes and her brother in her home speaking with her mother when she returned with groceries. Lord Claes, at least, had the decency to look awkward, clearly uncomfortable being there, but Lady Claes merely smiled and she somehow got the subject turned around to helping set up their vegetable patch. Clearly it was just a pretext to leave the area while her brother imposed himself on one or even both of them– blood was not the only hedonistic indulgence at Cainhurst, merely the preferred– but to her surprise Lord Claes proceeded to apologize for her sister's behavior. Strange. Was her control of her harem not as absolute as Maria had thought?

Eventually Lord Claes managed to get his sister back into their carriage, with hurried but apparently sincere well wishes and something about not wishing to impose on the Campbells for dinner. That was… surprisingly thoughtful of them. It would certainly be difficult if they had to prepare supper for twice the planned number of people, possibly more. She had heard rumors of the amount of food Lady Claes could put away.

Still, Maria had to wonder. Why had the two of them been in the area? As far as she knew, the Duke of Claes' holdings were far from here. While Lady Claes was a known eccentric– and even she was willing to admit that was just rich-noble talk for 'blood-addled crazy', if of the non-violent sort– surely they didn't really come all the way here just too look at agricultural fields? The Duchy of Claes surely had peasant tenants much closer to home, did they not?

A thought struck Maria, and she paused in her food preparation slightly to glance sideways at her mother, who was tending to the stove. To her knowledge, her mother was one of the few blonde women in town, and the only one without close neighbors. Try as she might, Maria had never been able to decipher to her satisfaction whose bastard she was. Could it be…?

How perverse, yet not completely unexpected of nobility. Had Keith's father passed down his secret mistress to his son? Or, more likely, his daughter, considering Katarina Claes's known appetites for the beautiful. Perhaps it had been a reward of some sort, some sort of twisted reward for her political accomplishments at school. Or possibly even something as simple as passing her academics. It would not surprise Maria to learn that Lady Claes' parents had encouraged her not to bring public shame upon the family by rewarding her their secret shame.

She eyed her mother's hips. Was there any stiffness there? Should she expect a new sibling within the year? After all, who knew how long the three of them had been alone before she arrived. Well, at least they had probably not done their debauchery in the kitchen. It did not smell of blood and phantasm slime.

…

Unless they had done their debauchery out in the vegetable patch, and Lady Claes had left to hide the evidence while her brother kept her distracted…

Maria shuddered slightly. A mature mind or not, thinking of her mother doing such things with the Claes siblings was mildly disturbing and made her wish for a quick sip of sedative to spare her mind these dark and unknowable truths.

Wait… does this mean that she was their half sibling? Earth magic ran in their blood, true, but it has always been said her Light magic was a rare gift. Had they tried to draw her into their web of deviance, knowing full well they shared the blood dregs of their father? Surely even the nobility of this land were not so perverted.

She thought of what she knew of Lady Claes and her many lovers.

…

Perhaps she should rethink carrying about a dagger at the academy. It seemed likely Katarina Claes' lust was not satiable.

With the decision to carry a dagger came the necessary training. She had thought that she could simply take up a weapon and wield it as she had before. However, she had found that while her mind and spirit knew the movements, her body did not. And so she had to retrain her muscle memory, familiarizing herself with the movements of a small blade. In the early mornings, she left her dormitory, found a place in school grounds behind the dormitory building, and drilled the movements back into her muscle. Growing up as a peasant had forced hard muscles upon her, harder than they had been when she'd been the same age in her old life. She moved with care, however, eschewing to relearn the movements that would have her smoothly break her own skin to pour her blood on the blade, and with it catalyze the blood arts she had learned. They were better left buried.

One morning, as she was finishing her drills and turning back to have a quick wash before she walked to school for that day's classes, she heard a soft yet distinct sound upon the air. Curious, she turned towards it, wondering who else were honing their skill so early. Some of the male students had been taught the way of the sword, and might even be regarded as skilled, but those so inclined to continue honing their skills did so at the grounds of the school specifically set aside for it. There was no need to do so in the early morning unless they were very dedicated or…

Well. Maria was practicing in the morning.

And so, apparently, was Katarina Claes.

She was clad in mannish trousers not dissimilar to what Maria was wearing, if a bit better cut. Unlike what Maria would have imagined had she been told the noble practiced the sword– energetic, overextended, fast but weak, with atrocious footwork– Katarina moved with precise, practiced moves, each repetition smooth and sure. Her footwork never wavered, stepping just so and keeping her herself properly centered at all times. There was no wild flailing of a complete amateur, no pointless energetics of a beginner, only the dull, repetitive movements of someone who actually knew what they were doing and had at least mastered the basics.

Maria watched, astonished, as Katarina Claes practiced something she could not in good conscience find fault in: a self-discipline that she had previously though the duke's daughter did not possess, as it had been seemingly absent from every other part of how she had comported herself. Her blue eyes were dull and empty in the way only completely losing yourself to the boring repetition of what you were doing could achieve, and she did not even notice the sweat that glistened on her face.

Maria watched, as unobtrusive as if she had downed one of the Choir's strange blue elixirs until Lady Claes' maid interrupted and drew her lady's attention to the time, so that they could return to the dormitories to refresh themselves. Maria found herself breathing with a curious heaviness as she loosened her collar slightly. She hurried back to her own dorms, her feet knowing the way even as her mind's eyes saw little but for the smooth, repetitive movements of Lady Claes' practice blade; her sure, taut muscles; the way her bosom did not heave with each breath but remained firm and in control…

Maria considered. Her possible half-sister was apparently more dangerous than she appeared. While Lady Maria would willingly test herself against anyone, beast or hunter, with but a dagger in her hand, that was in a body filled with the thick, cursed blood of Cainhurst, strengthened by the echoes of those who had fallen to her blade and those devoured from coldblood. In this body, strong but untrained, unblooded, with only thin blood running in its veins, she would not like her chances against even a moderately skilled swordsman if all she had was a dagger.

There was no helping it. Even as she retrained her body, she would need to acquire some sort of sword for herself, even one merely made of wood. It would not be her lost Rakuyo, but she would need to be at her best to protect her virtue, such as it was, from the Lady Claes should she ever decide to press her suit with a blade in her hand…