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Chapter 2
(In which van Zieks solves an unhinged case and teaches Kazuma the most important lesson.)
"It's a right mess, it is," the inspector said as he surveyed the apartment. "We're sure we've got the bloke who did it, but we can't find the weapon even though he was apprehended here. And we had to force open the door to the other room to get at the victim, but then how'd the fellow shoot her through the door? It's a real head-scratcher."
Van Zieks raked cold, assessing eyes over the scene, arms crossed tightly over his chest and expression impassive. Kazuma stuck close by his side, determined to give no one cause to complain that he might be violating the terms of his probation by wandering away from his mentor's watchful gaze.
The room showed small signs of struggle, a lamp knocked off the table and a chair tipped on its side, but the action had happened in the room next door. The body had already been removed, but through the doorway at the other end of the room, he could make out the pool of blood soaking into the floorboards.
"Well?" the inspector prompted when he got no immediate response. "What do you make of it, Lord van Zieks?"
"I think that you should recover the murder weapon first."
"Would love to do that for you, sir, but we've searched the whole apartment and can't find the blasted thing. We've no clue where it might be."
"Under the loose floorboard, I'd expect."
"The what?"
Van Zieks strode briskly to the center of the room and crouched down to peel back the fraying blue rug positioned between the couches. One floorboard stuck up a little above the others, and he pried it up to reveal a small cavity. Kazuma and the inspector gathered around as he lifted the gun out of the hole, along with a small box.
"Cor blimey!" said the inspector. "How'd you know that was there?"
"Mr. Asogi?" van Zieks asked as he examined first the gun and then the box. When he opened the latter, a handful of coins and a coiled necklace glimmered in the light.
Kazuma started in surprise. "What?"
"Please explain for the inspector."
Kazuma stared at van Zieks very hard, but the man was more interested in his inspection of the newly acquired evidence. He'd certainly had no idea the hidey-hole was there. But this was how van Zieks had always been, asking questions to prod Kazuma into coming up with answers.
Kazuma looked at the floor, the rug, the hole.
"The rug," he said. "It wasn't perfectly flat, but wrinkled into folds here at the corner. It could have been due to a struggle, but the other disturbed items are on the other side of the room. And the corner of the board was peeking out. It's not quite level with the rest of the floor."
"Good," said van Zieks. "Since the police already searched for the weapon and the perpetrator never left the apartment, it had to be hidden somewhere less obvious. When the perpetrator realized the police and witnesses were outside and he couldn't effect an escape, he hid the gun. I suspect they were using this as a place to store valuables and this box is unrelated to the case, but you should take it into evidence anyway, Inspector."
"Bloody unnatural, it is," the inspector said, taking the items to look them over. "You've got a sharp eye, sir."
"A deduction worthy of Mr. Sholmes," Kazuma said, impressed despite himself.
A pained look flickered across van Zieks's face. "Kindly do not compare me to that buffoon."
"I'm just saying–"
"Mr. Asogi, how many bullets do we need to account for at the scene?"
Kazuma sighed. "Inspector, how many gunshot wounds did the victim sustain?"
"Still waiting on the autopsy report, but I can tell you myself that there were two in the body," the inspector said.
"And in the gun?"
"What?"
"How many bullets are missing from the gun?"
"Oh." The inspector fiddled with the firearm. "Looks like there are three rounds missing, but it might not have been fully loaded to start with."
"Or we might have a bullet unaccounted for," van Zieks said, rising to his feet and looking around the room. "I don't like loose ends. Come, Mr. Asogi. Let's inspect the rest of the scene."
They combed over the rest of the apartment, but it wasn't until they were wrapping up that Kazuma noticed something as he stepped between the two rooms. He peered closer at the doorway.
"What is it?" van Zieks asked.
"Maybe nothing, but… The hinges here, they're all scraped up."
Van Zieks leaned closer and frowned at the scoring along the hinges. The metal was marked by light scratch marks near the tops of the hinges, and one even had a rather deep gouge.
"Inspector, when you forced the door open, did you try forcing it at the hinges?"
The inspector shook his head. "No, sir. We jimmied the lock. That could just be old damage."
"Maybe…" Van Zieks looked up, his gaze traveling up the doorframe to the ceiling. "Ah. Here is your third bullet, Mr. Asogi."
Kazuma followed his gaze to spot the splintered hole in the ceiling above their heads. "What's it doing up there?"
"I don't know yet. Inspector, have your men extract the bullet. Kindly have all photographic prints and witness statements delivered to the Prosecutor's Office at your earliest convenience, along with the evidence catalog and autopsy report when they become available. We look forward to the report of the Yard's preliminary findings."
"Yes, sir!" the inspector said.
Van Zieks strode back out into the street, gesturing Kazuma after him. "Some prosecutors do not take part in the Yard's investigations and only have the reports delivered to them after, but you should always strive to explore every avenue. Scotland Yard is very good at what it does and you should not expect to find things they have missed every time, but it's always helpful to get a grasp of the case. Also, the prosecution assumes much of the responsibility and risk for the evidence, witnesses, and investigation, so it's wise to keep a close eye on those things. Remind me to retrieve the McGilded case files for you. Most blatant case of tampering with evidence inside the courtroom itself that I've ever seen, and I took the fall for it. It's an interesting case study. And you might find it of interest to see one of Mr. Naruhodo's old cases as well."
"One of Ryunosuke's cases?" Kazuma raised his eyebrows. "You allowed evidence to be tampered with?"
Van Zieks grimaced. "It was an…unprecedented situation. That old shyster was as brazen as they come. You can review the notes on your own time. We have work to do."
And they did nothing but work until the case went to trial. Interviewing witnesses, constructing a diorama of the scene, reviewing evidence and autopsy reports, liaising with the Yard, revisiting the crime scene, constructing arguments… Van Zieks sometimes took a more leisurely approach when there were no upcoming cases that interested him enough to take on, but once he had a case, he always attacked it with ferocious intensity. He was constantly on the move, supervising every part of the investigation that he could, speaking to every witness and detective, leaving no stone unturned. He tackled paperwork and reports with cold focus, constructed and tore apart and reconstructed arguments, wrote out the defense's potential arguments just to prepare rebuttals… It was exhausting, trying to keep up with him.
He was a hunting hound with a scent, and he worked longer and longer hours with fewer and fewer breaks. It was up to Kazuma to complain that they hadn't eaten lunch yet or to pick up sandwiches on his way in. Still, he counted himself lucky that van Zieks dismissed him at reasonable hours.
Despite all their work, the case was a tricky one. They knew the accused had done it, but there were still loose ends and details that didn't quite fit together. The accused had been the only other person in the apartment and hadn't had the opportunity to flee. Witnesses had heard the victim screaming well before the gunshots went off, and the police were pounding on the door almost before the deed was done. But the door between the victim and the accused was shut and locked from the inside, their best guess that the victim had shut it herself after being shot even though the wounds looked grievous enough to be instantly fatal and she'd collapsed in a pool of blood well outside reach of the door, and there was still that mystifying third bullet in the ceiling. It wasn't enough to collapse their case, but it was enough to give the defense a foothold and plant doubts.
They went in expecting a fight, and they got one. Kazuma stood at van Zieks's shoulder, shuffling through papers and producing evidence for consideration almost without being asked. Occasionally, van Zieks asked a question in a low voice—"If you were prosecuting, how would you respond to that?"—but for the most part he was focused on their opponent.
The defense attorney had a narrow, ratlike face and smug, sharp-edged demeanor. He lacked any shred of Ryunosuke's brilliance, but he did know how to pick low-hanging fruit and occasionally managed to make a point, even though van Zieks had already considered most of them and volleyed back a retort almost before the words were out in the open.
And then he lit upon the window. Kazuma scowled as the other attorney questioned the inspector on the stand regarding the window in the room where the victim had been found, gracelessly pushing the argument that the real perpetrator had entered and exited through there, or otherwise that the bullet had entered the room from the outside. A colossal waste of time, as far as Kazuma was concerned.
"How would you respond?" van Zieks asked in a low voice.
He didn't look at Kazuma, cold gaze assessing their opponent as he badgered the witness with more inane questions about the infernal window.
"The window's a dead end," Kazuma said. "It jammed halfway up the frame. It wouldn't open enough for anyone to get through it, and the apartment is on the third story. The windows on the opposite building are all boarded up, and the chances of someone shooting through the window are vanishingly unlikely."
"The defense knows that already."
Kazuma hesitated, considering, and then an idea hit him in a sudden burst. "The hinges. If the police didn't damage them… It's possible the damage is old, but what if the accused damaged them while getting into the room to shoot the victim? It's the only other point of entry."
"Good," said van Zieks. He drew two pictures—one of the hinges and one of the gun—from the folder of prints and gave them one last critical look. Then he slammed his fist down on the bench with excessive force, interrupting the defense mid-sentence. "Objection! You are wasting the court's time with this chicanery. The window is entirely irrelevant to this case."
The other lawyer smirked. "Actually, it–"
"The window was stuck half open. No one but a child could have squeezed through, and there are no facing windows from which someone could have shot inside. The victim was facing the door when she was shot—in the chest. Either the victim attempted to open the window herself in order to escape—perhaps unlikely, given that they were on the third floor—or the accused opened it himself afterwards in the hopes of providing an alternative explanation when it became clear he couldn't escape. It does not matter."
"Oh, but it does. How else would–?"
"As you can see from this print, damage was discovered to the hinges of the door. Damage done when the accused took the door off its hinges after the victim locked herself in the other room."
"That's absurd!" The defense attorney frowned at the photograph, brows drawn together. "It would have taken time to do such a thing. In the middle of a murder? Unlikely."
"Ah, but according to witness testimony, the victim was heard screaming well before the gunshots began."
"Ridiculous conjecture! This damage could have happened at any time. There's no evidence to say it happened the night of the murder."
"In fact, there is: the third bullet."
Kazuma started in surprise. The question formed on his lips, but he bit it back, knowing it wasn't his place to interfere during proceedings.
"What on earth are you driving at?" the defense attorney asked.
"If you look at the gun, you will see a number of scratches and gouges along the back grip," van Zieks said.
"So the gun was in poor repair."
"No. When the victim locked herself in the other room and began screaming, the accused took the door off its hinges and shot her twice in quick succession. When he realized he was cornered, he panicked. He opened the window to plant doubts that the shot might have come from outside. He hid the gun beneath the loose floorboard where they normally kept their valuables. But first, he put the door back on its hinges so that it would look like he had no way to shoot his wife. The police were banging on the front door, he was panicking, and when he went to put the hinge pins back in, maybe they got stuck, or his hands were shaking too badly. In his haste, he began hammering at the heads of the pins with the back of the gun still in his hand to force them into place. As one might suspect, eventually the gun discharged—as evidenced by the third bullet, found in the ceiling above the door."
Kazuma watched in awe as the defense's argument collapsed into rubble and van Zieks seized on the opening to hammer the final nails into the coffin. The sudden turn of their argument had taken him by surprise as much as the defense, but finally all the pieces were slotting together.
Afterwards, when the gavel had come down and they caught a carriage back to the office to handle the aftermath of paperwork and reports, Kazuma said, "I can't believe you figured it out at the last second."
Van Zieks grimaced. "It seems some of Mr. Naruhodo's method has rubbed off on me after all. He was always discovering new evidence and puzzling out mysteries in the middle of court."
Kazuma laughed. "Oh, he'll love hearing that."
"Well, don't tell him," van Zieks said, glaring. "It's a terribly unstructured way of going about things. It's much safer to solve all the mysteries you can before walking into the courtroom. I can't believe I missed it. It was careless of me."
"No one else figured it out either. I suppose you can't be perfect all the time."
Van Zieks sniffed, but then said, after a brief pause, "Good work. If you hadn't taken note of the damaged hinges, we would not have sorted out the truth of it. That attention to detail will serve you well."
"Well, you found the bullet," Kazuma said, surprised van Zieks had bothered commenting on the matter at all. "And put everything together, even if it was at the last moment."
"For your own edification, people seldom look up without obvious cause. Most of the time, you'll find nothing. But at a scene where every detail counts, it's always worth checking."
Van Zieks gazed out the window, apparently finished with the conversation. Kazuma watched him out of the corner of his eye until the carriage finally rolled to a stop, still marveling over how brilliantly van Zieks had played his cards, pieced together the truth, and scored an impressive win.
He had almost forgotten, in the midst of his smoldering resentment, how much he admired the man.
If nothing else, the return to regular casework seemed to let some of the tension out of the office. It was another outlet to vent the strain that built in their silences as they rubbed shoulders in the same room, and it kept them occupied with things besides sniping at each other. Kazuma found van Zieks more tolerable when he was focused on investigating scenes or reviewing evidence, and the on-the-job training was infinitely preferable to reading through essays of the man's corrections in order to rewrite reports for the third time.
But there were still reports to write. Over their current casework, of course, but van Zieks regularly handed over old case files and asked Kazuma to construct a case out of them. The corrections were still nitpicky and numerous, but at least they weren't written like essays anymore. Now van Zieks insisted on talking through his main points in person and letting Kazuma read over the more minor corrections on his own. This had the downside of being forced to listen to van Zieks lecture and having to answer dozens of his leading questions, but Kazuma found that he could more easily grasp the points his mentor was trying to make.
That said, he still much preferred casework. When he walked into the office after lunch and saw van Zieks flipping through the report he'd submitted the previous day, he barely resisted the urge to sigh.
"Let's go over this," van Zieks said without looking up.
When their in-person instruction had first resumed in earnest, he had dragged in an extra chair and left it sitting against the far wall, where it stayed until he gestured imperiously from behind his desk and Kazuma lugged it over to sit in while they spent hours pouring over reports or casework. Personally, Kazuma preferred sitting seiza-style at his own low desk, but van Zieks would never deign to sit on the floor. Kazuma could have just stood, but van Zieks had grumbled something about bad posture and acquired the chair from parts unknown.
Kazuma dragged the chair over, sighing loudly like he always did to show that he deemed it unnecessary, even though he secretly preferred it to standing in place for hours. As usual, he could spot notations marked all over his work.
"I thought that one was rather good," he grumbled.
"It is," van Zieks said. "Much better than the drivel you were turning in a few weeks ago."
Kazuma scowled but let the comment slide for the sake of expediting the process. "What did I miss this time?"
"Not much, really. You're exactly right. This is exactly how the case went, and every argument and deduction you made just happens to be correct."
Kazuma frowned, taken aback. Van Zieks never said that everything was correct.
"Why all the notes, then?"
Van Zieks sighed. "We're going to talk through this. On paper, this is good. Technically, everything is accurate. But you've gone about it the wrong way."
"Wrong way?"
"This is…a complicated case. You've proven very insightful to see through all the twists and turns so clearly. That said… You have the correct answer, but it sounds rather unbelievable, doesn't it?"
"So? It's the truth."
"Yes, but our job is not only to uncover the truth, but to present it. If you start your opening argument with something that sounds wildly implausible to the judge and jury, you'll have a harder time winning them over, even if you're right. Not to mention that the defense will cry conjecture from the beginning. Sometimes you have to come at a problem sideways. You start with a simple explanation, something that makes sense and is easy to understand. You lay out the facts of the case and the evidence to build the groundwork, and then when the defense begins to chip away at a minor detail here or there, you present another explanation.
"Like in the case of the door being taken off its hinges. Even if I'd deduced the full story beforehand, I would not have put that into an opening statement. It would have sounded…unhinged."
Kazuma looked at him sharply, wondering if that was supposed to be a joke. "Unhinged?"
Van Zieks's face stayed perfectly blank. "The prosecution's job is to present a story by which the defendant could have committed the crime, and the defense's job is to poke holes in it. If we go back and forth, crossing out all the obvious possibilities, the jury will be more willing to believe the less probable answer when we present it. After all, we've already disproven everything more likely.
"A couple of points to note. We do not hide evidence or lie about things we know to be true or false. When you are looking to start with a safer line of attack while building the case, it's generally best to pick a possibility that is mundanely plausible, largely supported by the evidence, and as close to what actually happened as you can get it while still being easy to swallow. And then, when other possibilities have been exhausted or you've pointed out enough inconsistencies to raise doubts—or let the defense do it for you—you tip your hand. Just…be careful. You don't want the jury to think you've intentionally deceived them, or they are liable to grow angry and mistrustful. And our intention is not to deceive them. It is to guide them to the truth, and sometimes the best way to help someone understand is to give them the tools and evidence they need and prod them into discovering the answer themselves rather than spoon-feeding it to them."
Kazuma frowned. "Like how you ask me questions to prod me into thinking a problem through and solving it myself instead of just giving me the answer."
A faint shadow crossed van Zieks's face, the ghost of a smile. "Very good. You'll find this technique is particularly useful when the answer is something they are not likely—or do not want—to believe. Let them think it through, guide them on the right path, and they will come to the right conclusion themselves, or at least be more open to considering it when you raise an objection that spells it out.
"In this particular case, you are absolutely correct, and in a perfectly logical world, this would be how you would construct your argument. But we will save ourselves a great deal of trouble if we come at the problem sideways and build up to where we want to go. Here. Look at all the points you've made. We don't need to change your argument, just reorder it. If you were to rearrange all these elements to tell a seamless story, starting with something easy to argue and ending with the truth, where would you start?"
Kazuma did not find this lesson as intuitive as the others. He had always preferred to tackle problems head-on, and this delicate arranging of the truth seemed more complicated than just spelling things out from the start. It wasn't that he didn't understand van Zieks's point—he even agreed, knowing how fickle juries and judges could be—but he still disliked it greatly. He could build a story using the evidence to guide him, but he found it trickier to then tear it back apart and rearrange it in such a way that it started off wrong but still ended up in the right place, each piece of evidence and explanation carefully building up to the final truth.
He broke down his argument and experimented with shuffling the pieces around, looking for another way to make them connect and the starting framework that he could fit them all into. Van Zieks let him puzzle through it, occasionally asking a leading question or making a suggestion when he grew too frustrated. It took longer than Kazuma cared to admit.
"This is the worst," he said, glowering at his butchered argument. "It's much easier to just say what you mean outright."
"I see that you could use more practice," van Zieks said. "Not to worry, I can think of a handful of other cases that benefited from similar treatment. I will pull the files for you."
Kazuma wished he had not said anything at all. "Really, there's no need to go to all that trouble…"
"Oh, it's no trouble at all." For a moment, van Zieks's voice sounded just a little bit sly, even though his expression didn't change. "The look on your face will be recompense enough."
Kazuma gawked at him, taken aback. That was the second almost-joke this morning. He hadn't been aware van Zieks was capable of it.
"Was that supposed to be a–?"
"But I think you've had enough for now, and we need to work on our current case. I want to meet with the Yard to clear up a few points on this apparent new lead of theirs. Let's go."
Van Zieks was already halfway out the door by the time Kazuma processed that, so the mystery remained.
They spent the rest of the afternoon at the Yard, being briefed over a new turn in their current investigation. There was a new witness to interview, new evidence to examine, and a new potential motive on the table to analyze. Two days' worth of work was suddenly on shaky ground, and Kazuma could tell that van Zieks was gearing up for more sleepless nights tearing their case apart and refashioning it by the way he had started snapping at everyone and the sudden undercurrent of jittery tension sharpening his every movement. Wonderful. He'd be in a waspish mood until he'd sorted things out to his satisfaction.
Kazuma kept his mouth shut and tried to stay out of his mentor's way. Let the detectives take the brunt of the man's irritation. Luckily, van Zieks was too busy bossing everyone around and berating them for not following up on this lead sooner to pay Kazuma much mind at all for the time being.
By the time van Zieks decided he'd squeezed everything he could out of the detectives, it was already nearing dusk.
"Ridiculous," he muttered as he swept out of the building and into the streets, leaving a gaggle of flustered detectives breathing a collective sigh of relief behind him. "It was beyond careless not to follow up on such a simple matter right from the start. Inspector Gregson would never–" He broke off abruptly, his ire draining out of him like a deflating balloon. "Never mind. I assume you realize this means we'll need to reexamine every element of this case before we proceed any further. We will be very busy these next few days."
Kazuma eyed him warily. "I had gathered that, yes."
Van Zieks lapsed into silence. His strides were as brisk and clipped as ever, but he seemed to have lost some of his sharp edge and didn't turn his biting commentary on Kazuma just yet.
They were some two streets away from the office before van Zieks finally spoke again.
"Do you see that shop up ahead, to your right?"
Kazuma cast a dubious look at the small bookstore they were quickly bearing down on. "Yes?"
"Go inside and wait."
"What? Why?"
"Must you question everything? Just go."
That was when he noticed that beneath his cloak, van Zieks had dropped his hand to the hilt of his sword. Kazuma stiffened, cursing his carelessness. Now he could hear the footsteps behind them, at least two, maybe three sets.
"Oh," he said. "That's inconvenient."
There could just be innocent pedestrians strolling behind them, but the strides were brisk, slowly closing the distance, and this particular street was not busy. And, as van Zieks had taught him, people following behind were often enemies. Better to assume the worst and be pleasantly surprised than ignore a gut feeling and end up dead.
Van Zieks blew out a breath when Kazuma's hand dropped to his sword. "You–"
Boots scuffled on the cobblestones behind them, and they spun about, pulling swords from sheaths. Three men pounced from the shadows. Kazuma raised his sword against that of the first, the impact jarring up his arm. The other two attackers converged on van Zieks, so Kazuma turned his full attention to the unlucky soul who had chosen to challenge him and left his mentor to his own scuffle.
The attacker swung his sword with competence but no great skill. Kazuma easily parried, blocked, lunged. The saber in his hands was not Karuma, but he knew how to drag it through the motions of Japanese swordplay and adjust for the differences. Years of dedicated sword practice gave him a definite edge.
He struck hard, fast, and his opponent's sword went clattering to the ground.
"I yield!" the man said quickly, holding up his hands. "I yield."
"Stay right there."
It was not honorable to strike an unarmed man, and although Kazuma found the easy surrender pathetic and distasteful, he supposed it wouldn't be proper to ignore it and continue the fight. He pointed his sword at the man's throat in warning and cast a quick glance over his shoulder.
One of the other men was on the ground, gasping and clutching at a gash across his side. Van Zieks still dueled with the other, steel clanging against steel as he pushed forward mercilessly, cutting through his opponent's defense with brutal efficiency. It seemed the situation was well in hand.
Kazuma turned back just in time to catch the flash of movement as the first man surged forward and shoved him hard. He lost his balance and went crashing to the ground, a surprised cry lodging in his throat as the air was knocked out of him. A sharp pain jolted up his arm from his elbow, his grip slackening on his sword as his nerves went white-hot and numb.
His assailant snatched up the sword Kazuma had relieved him of earlier and brought the blade down without hesitation.
Kazuma rolled to the side, bringing up his arm in defense. The brunt of the blow missed him as he lurched out of the way, but the blade bit into his forearm before skating off and scraping against the cobblestones. Pain ran like fire up his arm.
Kazuma's hand clenched tight around the hilt of his sword again and he brought it up, but he was on his back, at an awkward angle, and he still didn't have full feeling in his fingers. He might be able to avert the worst of a blow, but all he could really do was try to buy himself some time and the opportunity to get back on his feet.
The sword came down again and he braced himself for impact, but another blade came hurtling through the air to intercept it. The assailant's blade was flicked aside almost contemptuously, and van Zieks stepped over Kazuma to drive his own blade through the other man's stomach. The man cried out in pain, sword clattering to the ground as he pressed his hands to his wound.
"I suggest you run," van Zieks said, voice low and indifferent, as if he were merely inquiring about the weather.
The man took one look at him and scrambled off into the shadows. Kazuma staggered to his feet, sword at the ready, but they were alone. The other attackers seemed to have fled as well in the confusion.
"Don't you think we should turn them over to the police?" he asked, sheathing his sword and pressing a hand to his wound. He gritted his teeth against the pain.
"They are a low priority at the moment." Van Zieks turned back, cool eyes raking up and down Kazuma, assessing. "Let me see."
Kazuma reluctantly moved his hand away, and van Zieks wrapped a hand around his wrist to hold the arm steady while he examined the wound under the dim light of the streetlamps. Kazuma grimaced at the sting as blood bubbled up and dripped to the ground.
"It doesn't seem too deep," he said. More luck than anything. The blow could have easily cut down to the bone if it had come down at a slightly different angle.
"No," van Zieks said. "But it needs stitches."
"Stitches?" Kazuma sighed. "I wasn't looking forward to spending the evening at the hospital."
"I'll do it. We're closer to the office. Come." Van Zieks unfastened his cloak and folded it over itself again and again before pressing it to the wound and wrapping it around Kazuma's arm. "Keep pressure on it."
When Kazuma only blinked at him blankly, van Zieks dropped a hand on his shoulder and firmly turned him around, steering him down the street again in the direction of the office. Kazuma's mind was still a little too fuzzy with pain to object.
"You'll do it?" he asked as he let van Zieks lead him along.
"Yes. And next time I give you an order, you'll follow it. I've already told you, this is beyond the scope of your apprenticeship. Keep out of it when you can."
"I won't have an apprenticeship left if you get yourself killed in the street."
"I've survived well enough without your help. These assailants are not after you. Do not engage them unless necessary."
"I figured it was just a consequence of remaining in your care. And like you suggested, I've considered it already."
Van Zieks heaved a sigh and prodded Kazuma around the corner. He did not seem particularly urgent, only briskly businesslike as usual, which Kazuma hoped was a good sign that he wasn't about to bleed to death.
When they reached the office, van Zieks ushered Kazuma inside and sat him down in the chair as he went to fetch the medical kit.
"Pay attention," he said, arranging his chosen implements on the desk. "If you're going to get yourself into trouble, you had best know how to clean yourself up again. Here."
He plucked a bottle from the depths of the kit and poured a small amount of liquid into a spoon, offering it to Kazuma.
"What is it?" Kazuma asked suspiciously.
"Laudanum. This is going to hurt, and it will go easier if you aren't moving about. It's only a very small dose. Enough to take the edge off, hopefully, but little more."
Kazuma eyed the nearly full bottle. "It doesn't look like you've been taking much of it."
"No. I'm careful with things that can cloud my mind. Listen, because this is important. It's here if you need it, but it is only for emergencies, and you must take it only in small doses. It might be touted as a miraculous cure-all, but it's addictive too, if you take it too frequently. It's useful when you need to dull pain enough to tend your wounds or get yourself to a hospital. Beyond that, you shouldn't need it."
Kazuma considered a moment longer and then took the medicine. Despite van Zieks's warning, laudanum was commonly taken for any number of ailments here in Britain, so it couldn't be too bad.
"I assume you remember how to clean a wound," van Zieks said as he pulled off his gloves and unwrapped his cloak from around Kazuma's arm.
Kazuma nodded. That was a lesson van Zieks had given him the first time he'd been present for a street attack, back when he didn't remember lessons that might have been taught to him by Doctor Mikotoba first.
He carefully shrugged off his coat and pushed up his sleeve, grimacing as the coarse fabric slid across the wound. Van Zieks dabbed away the excess blood and got to work.
"If the wound is deep enough to see fat or bone, it will need stitches. If it's longer than this"—he measured a length along Kazuma's arm with his fingers, considerably shorter than the wound in question—"it will need stitches. If the bleeding won't stop, it will likely need stitches.
"If you need stitches, you will go to the hospital in most cases. They can do it better than you can, and depending on where your injury is located, it may be difficult to suture it yourself. But you should know how if you need to. Pay attention. You'll want to be careful. The better a job you do, the cleaner the wound will heal and the less likely it is to get infected."
By the time van Zieks had cleaned the wound, Kazuma was starting to feel a little numb and detached. It still hurt when the needle went in, but he clenched his teeth and kept as still as he could. Van Zieks usually tended injuries in stony silence, but now he kept up a steady stream of instructions as he demonstrated how to draw the skin together, how to make the stitch and tie it off, how tight each stitch needed to be and how far apart from the next. His fingers, without the gloves, were strangely long and delicate in the lamplight, moving with practiced efficiency as they worked.
Finally, van Zieks wrapped a bandage around the sutured wound and began cleaning the blood off his hands and from where it had spattered on the ground. He wrapped his cloak into a wad with the bloody parts inside and packed everything back into the medical kit.
"You should be fine," he said. "We will remove the stitches later. Within the next two weeks. Make sure to keep them dry for the next few days."
Kazuma looked blankly down at his bandaged arm and then at the bloodied cloak as van Zieks bundled it under his arm and pulled his gloves back on. It was more than van Zieks had needed to do for him. Perhaps intervening on the street could be considered almost an expectation or simple matter of fairness, given that Kazuma had stepped in on his mentor's behalf first. But van Zieks had no obligation to do anything more than pack Kazuma off to the hospital and go home for the night. Certainly no obligation to donate his clothing as makeshift bandages and tend the wound himself for the sake of giving Kazuma a lesson on how to care for himself in an emergency.
Maybe it was just the laudanum making Kazuma question such a thing, but still…
"Thank you," he said.
Van Zieks looked back at him, eyebrows lifting. "Goodness, Mr. Asogi. Perhaps I gave you too strong a dose after all."
Kazuma scowled. "Usually, people just say you're welcome and move on."
Van Zieks tilted his head, regarding Kazuma with a considering air, and then said, "You're welcome. Wait here. I'll be right back."
He swept out of the room. Kazuma stared after him, taken aback that he'd actually taken the—largely sarcastic—guidance.
Van Zieks reappeared a few minutes later and gestured for Kazuma to follow. When Kazuma stood, he felt strangely untethered from his body and swayed on his feet. Van Zieks took him by his uninjured elbow and led him out of the office and into the street.
"That's disconcerting," Kazuma mumbled. His tongue felt thick and heavy in his mouth.
"Yes, I find it unpleasant. Come." Van Zieks guided Kazuma into the carriage waiting outside the building and sat him down on the bench before taking the seat across from him.
"Where are we going?"
"I'm taking you home."
Kazuma scowled as the carriage lurched beneath them and started rolling. "I can–"
"You are injured and drugged. I would be remiss in my responsibilities if I left you to find your own way home."
Kazuma grumbled to himself, but there was no point protesting when they were already on their way. He hoped they were at least headed to the right place—he was exhausted and achy and wanted to collapse in his bed and sleep for a week. But he supposed that van Zieks was the one who had first arranged his lodgings for him, and Kazuma had yet to find new ones.
"Why bother with all this?" he muttered instead. "I can take care of myself. Lessons in stitching myself up are a little beyond the scope of my apprenticeship, aren't they?"
"You have made it within the scope of your apprenticeship by insisting on inserting yourself into my fights. You can't have it both ways."
Kazuma huffed out a breath and lapsed into silence. He didn't have the energy to pick a proper fight right now.
Van Zieks didn't say anything else for so long that Kazuma assumed the conversation was finished. In fact, he was so sure of it that it surprised him when the older prosecutor spoke again.
"I was around your age when I was first branded as the Reaper." Van Zieks's face shimmered pale and murky in the glass as he gazed out into the night. "The attacks started quickly. I was walking home one night when I was ambushed. My own fault, perhaps. It was foolish to walk the streets so blatantly. But it was one of the few small freedoms left to me in my imprisonment, and I was not—and am not—willing to give it up. I fended my assailant off, but I took a deep gash to the abdomen.
"I did not go to the hospital. I had been there a few months prior, and an opportunistic man was able to insinuate himself inside and carve an X into my face before being pulled off me, so I did not consider it a place of safety."
Kazuma straightened up and eyed van Zieks with interest. He had always wondered about the distinctive scar between van Zieks's eyes and the man's obvious aversion to hospitals, but he had never expected to receive an answer. Something about the story or the flat tone in which it was delivered itched at the underside of his skin. It just wasn't honorable to attack someone undergoing medical treatment.
"What did you do?" he asked.
"I dragged myself across half of London to the manor. I was alone and trusted no one—I would fix it myself. I had no idea what I was doing. I wasn't thinking clearly from the blood loss and didn't clean the wound properly. The stitches were too tight, too deep, too uneven. I blacked out halfway through and woke up in a pool of blood. The bleeding wouldn't stop. But I was determined, so I pressed on.
"I made an utter mess of it, of course. It healed badly and became infected. I ended up in the hospital anyway, delirious with fever. It took months to recover fully."
"Months?" Kazuma asked, horrified.
"It probably didn't help that I insisted on going back to work once the fever broke," van Zieks said, indifferent. "Frankly, I'm lucky to have survived. After that, I made it a point to improve my medical knowledge, reading books and asking questions of the doctors when I was in the hospital and such. It's unwise to take chances with one's health.
"And so I am passing this lesson on to you, so that if you should ever find yourself in such a situation and are unable to receive outside medical assistance, you will hopefully not make such a mess of things."
Kazuma gaped at him, mouth hanging halfway open. It could just be the drugs muddling his brain, but a feeling a little too close to pity mixed with horror was twisting his stomach into knots. The story had been delivered in an emotionless monotone, but he could envision it nonetheless, and it was ugly.
"That's…" He trailed off, unsure of what he was supposed to say to something like that.
The carriage bumped to a stop.
"Goodnight, Mr. Asogi." Van Zieks leaned his head against the window, staring out at the darkened streets. "You may decide in the morning whether you feel well enough to come to the office. Make sure to check your wound. If it becomes inflamed, I will take you to the hospital. Go sleep it off."
Kazuma's mouth worked soundlessly, but he still couldn't think of anything to say. In the end, he just clambered out of the carriage and let himself into his flat, where his dreams were thick and syrupy and colored red.
The day after the stitches came out some two weeks later, Kazuma had barely set foot in the office after his lunch break when van Zieks ushered him right back out.
"Where are we going?" he asked, keeping pace as van Zieks strode down the street.
"We are taking a field trip this afternoon."
"Why?"
"Because the weather is nice and we've been cooped up in the office too long," van Zieks said with a distinct edge of sarcasm. "Why do you think? We're going to have a different kind of lesson today."
Kazuma scowled. "What kind of lesson?"
They were between cases, having wrapped up their most recent trial a few days before, so as far as Kazuma was aware, they had no crime scene to investigate or Yard detectives to meet. Interim work was usually confined to paperwork and case reports.
Van Zieks sighed and crossed the street. "We are going to practice sparring. I trust this will be more to your liking than writing reports."
"Sparring?" Kazuma repeated, caught entirely off guard.
"As you insist on placing yourself in dangerous situations, you should endeavor to keep your skills sharp."
"I practice my swordsmanship every day," he snapped. "My skills are always sharp."
"And that's good, but not exactly the same as practicing against a live opponent. Besides, I thought you'd jump at the opportunity to try sticking a blade through me."
Kazuma…could not say that opportunity was entirely unwelcome. Not that he was looking to hurt van Zieks, of course. The man had gone well out of his way for this apprenticeship, and Kazuma needed him. Still, swinging a sword at him did sound cathartic.
"You're going to regret nitpicking my work so much now," he said more cheerfully.
Van Zieks eyed him sidelong. "Yes, I thought that might improve your mood."
Thankfully, the weather was actually nice for once, since they were apparently walking a fair distance. Kazuma was just about to complain when the manor came into sight. He shot a look at the man beside him, surprised that van Zieks would bring him here, but his mentor ignored him and headed around the side of the imposing house.
A large grassy area spread out before the gardens, and van Zieks shrugged off his cloak and suit jacket to drape them over the back of a wrought iron chair that sat on the patio beside a small table for taking tea in the sunshine. Not that there was ever much sunshine in London, as far as Kazuma was aware.
"You may remove your outerwear," van Zieks said, marching into the grass and turning back to face Kazuma. "We will be at this for a while, and you wouldn't want to sully it."
He looked different in just his shirtsleeves, without all his ostentatious formal regalia. Still formidable, but also more…human. Just a man, like any other. No wonder he always kept his coat wrapped around him like armor.
Kazuma tossed his coat across the back of another chair and followed after van Zieks, stopping a safe distance away. "How do you want to do this?"
Van Zieks drew his sword and held it at the ready. "Try to stab me."
Kazuma had actually been asking about the rules of engagement, if they were continuing the matches to first blood or until someone was forced to yield, but he supposed it would be poor form to actually draw blood from a superior. It might happen in the course of things since van Zieks didn't seem inclined to use blunted practice swords, but Kazuma would try not to do anything too egregious.
After that terrible encounter with Gregson where he'd broken Karuma's tip, he was wary of his own bloodlust. The last thing he needed was to get a taste of van Zieks's blood and get addicted. Whatever monster lay dormant inside him was not something he wanted to reawaken. And, truthfully, he didn't dream about slitting his mentor's throat anymore. He might not like the man, might still resent him for everything, but that didn't mean he wanted him dead. That would be the pinnacle of ingratitude after everything van Zieks had done for him.
Still… As far as instructions went, 'try to stab me' was about all he needed.
He pulled his blade free and lunged forward. Van Zieks parried easily, and they fell into the rhythmic push and pull of swordplay.
There was an elegance to van Zieks's movements, something a little like the grace of dancing. Pretty, but taught more for show than battle readiness. Interesting. Kazuma was usually too preoccupied fending off his own opponents to pay close attention to his mentor's swordwork, but he had thought it was a little less…courtly. An odd choice for someone more used to fighting for his life, but Kazuma supposed van Zieks had grown up in the nobility, where pretty manners and sophisticated gestures counted for more than practicality. No matter. That would be an easier style to overcome than one more suited to proper dueling.
Kazuma made a lightning-quick thrust under van Zieks's guard and was met by steel. He started in surprise, amazed that van Zieks could reverse course so quickly to meet his blade.
Suddenly, Kazuma was playing defense as van Zieks abandoned the elegance of whatever he'd learned in the classroom and drove forward with quick, hard strokes. There was no more wasted movement, no more thought for the show of it. This was the rough, brutal efficiency that might be expected of the formidable Reaper of the Bailey. It wasn't pretty, but it was effective. And he could hit hard. The impact jarred up Kazuma's arm when he blocked the blade, setting his teeth on edge.
Kazuma bared his teeth in a grin and hit back. He loved a good fight, and van Zieks had been right: solo swordwork and untrained ruffians off the street just didn't provide the same thrill.
They circled each other, slashed, parried, lunged forward and danced back again. Every so often, van Zieks would sneak in a weaselly kind of strike, something unprovoked and unexpected, not the kind of blow one would normally see in a fair fight where both parties had been trained to duel honorably.
Who are you, really? Kazuma thought as he just barely managed to avoid another such blow. You are half a dozen men rolled into one.
Van Zieks fought like a gentleman, but also like a seasoned fighter with a hint of the sneakiness of a scoundrel. And perhaps he was that way in all things. He had learned his courtly manners and knew how to use them, but he also engaged in blunt discourtesy and wasn't afraid to bully people around. He was merciless in the courtroom, but often formal and proper outside it. And then there were those sneaky moments, where he would do something unexpected, underhanded, and not seem bothered by it at all. Still, some of those moments were different. Also unexpected, but almost…kind. Like stitching up his apprentice's wound and taking him home or fighting to keep him in the country even after the Reaper trial. Van Zieks was a man who generally did the honorable, courteous thing in the most dishonorable, discourteous way possible.
Kazuma never had been able to get a read on him. Every time he thought he was starting to understand van Zieks, another facet appeared out of nowhere. He was half convinced that his mentor was secretly three men in a trench coat, and it was always a toss-up which one would be in charge minute by minute.
Van Zieks pushed forward, implacable, and Kazuma reluctantly gave ground, blocking the blows and looking for his opening. Finally, he saw a small break in the man's guard and drew his sword back in preparation to change angles.
The pommel struck something hard behind him, jarring up the blade and halting its momentum. Kazuma had no time to readjust or determine what had happened before van Zieks's blade was at his throat, hovering mere centimeters above the skin. He swallowed hard against cold steel.
Van Zieks held the blade there for a moment until it was clear Kazuma had no intention of moving and then stepped away.
"Pay attention to your surroundings," he said. "Especially when you're fighting in the streets, with obstacles all around and crooks who know the terrain better than you do. Use it to your advantage if you can, and don't ever let yourself get trapped."
Kazuma looked over his shoulder to see that he had nearly been backed into a tree. How careless of him not to have noticed. Careless or…unsavvy. He shot a sharp look at van Zieks. He had the feeling that it had not been entirely an accident.
"I know that," he snapped, smarting. It was an embarrassing mistake. "Let's go again."
This time, he barely managed half a dozen strokes before van Zieks smacked the flat of his blade into his injured arm. Kazuma flinched back, a pained gasp sticking in his throat, and in the instant he faltered, the tip of van Zieks's blade appeared at his chest, hovering just over his heart.
"Guard your weaknesses," van Zieks said. "You're favoring your arm. The way you hold it so carefully would let anyone know it was injured if they paid attention. Unscrupulous opponents will take advantage."
"That's not very honorable," Kazuma snarled through gritted teeth, clutching at his arm.
Truthfully, van Zieks had not struck that blow as hard as he could have. Having felt the force bearing down on his blade with every strike he blocked, Kazuma could feel the difference. This had been a light, warning strike, careful not to further damage the injury. But it still stung, and it was beyond unchivalrous to strike at an opponent's known injury.
"No, it is not," van Zieks said, lifting his sword to the ready. "Again."
Kazuma struck hard, fast. He was angry now. Van Zieks was very good, but Kazuma could keep pace with him. The only reason he was winning was because of cheap, underhanded tricks.
Kazuma drove forward so viciously that van Zieks slowly gave ground. Kazuma was sharp, focused. He matched van Zieks blow for blow. They danced around each other for a long time before Kazuma saw his opening. He thrust forward, forcing van Zieks's blade aside and bringing the tip of his own blade to the man's throat.
"I'm surprised you even let me anywhere near your throat with a blade," he said, mouth curling into a sharp-edged smile.
For a man so wary of attack, it seemed an odd choice for van Zieks to let his apprentice, who professed hatred for him and had already tried to send him to the gallows, 'try to stab' him. It would be too easy for Kazuma to accidentally run his blade through van Zieks's throat.
But van Zieks did not look afraid. His eyes were cold and inexpressive, his expression unchanging.
It wasn't that Kazuma wanted to gloat, exactly. That would be unsportsmanlike. But a smug sense of triumph buoyed him up nonetheless.
Something slammed into the side of his knee, making his legs buckle. He went down with a yelp as van Zieks leaned back and kicked him again, hard. Then he was flat on his back, blinking up dazedly as van Zieks stood over him. He felt the chill of steel against his throat again.
"If you were going to kill me, it would have been foolish to stand around talking about it beforehand," van Zieks said.
Kazuma scowled. "I wasn't going to. I just thought it was strange that you gave me the opportunity."
"If I thought you were going to try, I wouldn't have given it to you."
"Well, what was that? I won! You can't just do that. The match was over."
"No, it wasn't. I never yielded. You should never assume a fight is over until you know it is. Isn't that how you got that gash in your arm? You should always be on guard. You can often read a man's intentions in his eyes before he strikes, if you're paying attention. A more reliable indicator than the word of some back-alley ruffian."
Van Zieks's eyes hadn't given anything away, though. Their chilly, blank sheen had not changed once between when he'd been dueling and had a sword pressed to his throat and turned the tables to loom overhead his downed opponent. He was a blank wall. Maybe hardly human after all. Or maybe it was a mask he wore specifically for this reason, because he knew how to read intentions in people's eyes and was wary of giving away too much himself.
"That wasn't very honorable at all," Kazuma snapped. "Downright cheating, even."
Van Zieks sighed. "You are missing the point of this lesson."
"Which is?"
Van Zieks said nothing for a moment, hovering above Kazuma in perfect stillness, but then said, "I had the opportunity to spar with your father, on occasion. He always fought with honor, played by the rules. You fight very much like him."
Kazuma's breath caught in his throat, and his heart seized violently. He had not been expecting his father's ghost to enter the arena today. He wasn't sure that he liked hearing van Zieks talk about him. He didn't like that van Zieks had been given the opportunity to spar with his father, to know his father, when Kazuma had been robbed of those years. What right did van Zieks have to speak of the man he had falsely convicted?
"My father was an honorable man," Kazuma spat.
He hoped that twisted the knife. Genshin Asogi had been an honorable man. An honorable man who had killed van Zieks's dishonorable brother in an honorable duel.
If the sentiment hit home, it didn't show on van Zieks's face. He didn't so much as twitch.
"Yes," he said. "And now he's dead. The only reason I've survived this long is because I am not an honorable man."
Kazuma flinched, surprised. "But–"
Van Zieks's words were as cold and implacable as his eyes. "The attacks I endure, that you insist on taking part in, are not like gentlemanly dueling. These men are vicious, hardened criminals out for murder. They do not abide by any code of chivalry or honor. They will fight dirty, by whatever means necessary. Street fighting is not like the sparring you are used to. Sometimes it is necessary to crawl into the gutter along with them and fight for your life.
"Pay attention, because this is the most important lesson I will teach you: guard your life jealously, for you have only one. If your choices are to die honorably or live through dishonorable tactics, you choose to live, Mr. Asogi. You live."
The sword at Kazuma's throat vanished. He stared up at van Zieks, heart in his throat, and the man gestured impatiently for him to rise. Kazuma regained his feet slowly, watching his mentor as if he'd never seen him before in all his life, mind buzzing. A crimson line trickled down van Zieks's throat, stark against his pale skin and the white collar of his shirt, but he hardly seemed to notice. Kazuma had not broken skin. Van Zieks had cut himself while escaping from Kazuma's grasp—the price he'd considered worth paying even in a match where his life wasn't at stake. He was a man who knew how to survive, and who was not afraid of what he might have to do to ensure it.
Van Zieks held his sword at the ready, eyes still as blank and polished as river stones. "Again."