Chapter Fourteen Kael Knows #2
The photograph showed the hospital entrance. Haruki beneath the awning. Renji facing him, his hand extended towards the wound in Haruki's side. The angle made the distance between them appear smaller than it had been. Or perhaps Renji remembered it incorrectly.
On the reverse, visible through the plastic, were the words: HE SHOULD NOT HAVE SURVIVED.
Renji read them twice.
"When was this taken?"
"Three weeks ago."
"Who had it?"
"It was left for Ishida."
Renji looked up.
"For him."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"To assess his reaction."
Renji's gaze returned to the image. Haruki had been photographed without either of them noticing. A failure. An unacceptable one.
"What reaction did they expect?"
Kael did not answer. Renji looked at him.
"What did he do?"
"He kept it."
"Of course he kept it. It was evidence."
"He concealed it when I asked for it."
"That proves only that he does not trust you."
"He ordered surveillance around your building."
Renji became still.
"He what?"
"His people are already checking traffic cameras and surrounding roads."
"He has no authority to—"
Kael laughed. It was brief and entirely without humour.
"There. That look again."
"This is not amusing."
"No."
Kael's expression sobered.
"It is dangerous."
"For him."
"For both of you."
"There is no both."
"You allowed him into your home."
"That does not create a collective identity."
"You told him what you are."
"Because he asked."
"You have been asked before."
Renji looked away. Rarely directly. But yes. There had been opportunities to tell others — people he loved, people who loved him. He had chosen silence until the truth became impossible, then allowed distance to do what honesty might have prevented.
Kael saw the answer.
"You told him because he asked," he repeated. "And because you wanted him to know."
Renji stood.
"This conversation is finished."
Kael remained seated.
"You played him music."
Renji stared at him.
"I am going to remove the key from you."
"You can try."
"You are insufferable."
"And you are in love."
The apartment became silent. Not the ordinary silence of books and rain.
Something total. Renji's face did not change.
He had survived courts, wars, inquisitions and centuries of men trying to discover what frightened him.
He had learned to conceal pain before Kael's grandparents were born.
Still, for one disastrous second, he could not speak.
Kael watched him. Then took another drink of tea.
"That is an absurd conclusion."
"It is an observation."
"You have confused interest with—"
"No."
"Concern after a threat is not—"
"No."
"Physical attraction does not constitute—"
"You find him attractive?"
Renji stopped. Kael's mouth twitched amused. Renji hated him.
"Leave."
"I have not finished my tea."
"I will throw it away."
"You would never waste that variety."
Renji stepped towards him. Kael lifted the cup out of reach. The movement was so childish that Renji nearly struck him.
"You have known Haruki for a matter of weeks," Renji said.
"Haruki."
Renji went still.
"You called him Haruki."
"That is his name."
"You called him Ishida five minutes ago."
"You called him Ishida."
"I am not in love with him."
"Neither am I."
Kael's expression softened again.
"Not yet, perhaps."
"There is no perhaps."
"You forget how well I know you."
"I try to."
"You have spent centuries making yourself useful to people so they will never notice you want to be wanted."
The humour vanished. Renji felt the sentence enter places he did not permit Kael to see.
"That is enough."
"You let him see this apartment."
"Yes."
"You told him the truth."
"Yes."
"You allowed him to remain after he knew."
"Yes."
Kael held his gaze.
"And when I told you he had entered a possible Unveiled site, you were on your feet before I finished the sentence."
Renji said nothing.
"You are frightened," Kael said.
"For his safety."
"I know."
"That does not mean what you think it means."
"It means exactly what I think."
Renji turned towards the window. Morning light had begun to strengthen beyond the rain.
People moved along the street below, umbrellas passing beneath power lines and bare branches.
Haruki would be leaving the warehouse soon.
Unless Kael had detained him. Unless he had found another lead.
Unless the photograph had caused him to do something reckless.
Renji was already calculating how long it would take to reach the freight district.
Behind him, Kael finished his tea. The cup touched the table.
"Do not go there," he said.
Renji looked over his shoulder.
"I had no intention of doing so."
"You are wearing outdoor shoes."
Renji looked down. He had put them on after Kael mentioned the warehouse. He had no memory of doing it.
Kael rose. This time, he did not smile.
"The photograph was not the only thing they left."
Renji's attention sharpened.
"What else?"
"An observation wall. Four years of surveillance on the Ishida Family."
"Four years?"
"At least."
"That predates the Archive discovery."
"Yes."
"And the tunnel excavation."
"Yes."
Renji thought of the physician's journal, the mural, the symbol repeated across records the Accord had concealed from nearly everyone alive.
"The Archive was not uncovered by chance," he said.
"We do not know that."
"You suspect it."
Kael put on his coat.
"I suspect the Unveiled permitted it to be found."
"Why?"
"That is the question."
"You know more than you have told Haruki."
"Yes."
"You know what the White Lotus represents."
Kael adjusted one cuff.
"I know what it represented."
Renji waited. Kael did not continue.
"You came into my home, accused me of being in love and drank my tea," Renji said. "You can answer one question."
"I accused you of nothing."
"You stated it as fact."
"Because it is more efficient."
"The lotus."
Kael glanced towards the sword resting on its stand. For a moment, his expression seemed far older than his face.
"The Archive was never merely a collection of records," he said.
"What was it?"
"A record of a promise."
"Between whom?"
Kael looked at him.
"The White Lotus and those they believed would survive them."
Renji felt unease move slowly through him.
"Who were they?"
"That answer is buried for a reason."
"People are dying for it."
"People died to create it."
Renji stepped closer.
"Does the Unveiled want the Archive destroyed?"
Kael's eyes moved to the photograph on the table.
"No."
The answer altered everything.
"They burned the chamber."
"They destroyed what they did not want recovered."
"And removed the rest."
"Yes."
"So they are searching for something."
Kael opened the door.
"For someone."
Renji stared at him.
"Who?"
Kael stepped into the corridor. Then he paused and looked back towards the apartment — the second chair, the two cups, the record shelf disturbed by an evening Renji still refused to name.
"That," Kael said, "is not the only question you should be asking." His gaze settled on Renji. "You should ask why, after four years of watching Haruki Ishida, they chose now to let him know."
Renji absorbed that.
"You're leaving again."
"Shanghai."
"You said that was probably nothing."
"It has become considerably less probably nothing."
"What changed?"
"A rumour became a name. And the name is worth crossing an ocean for."
Then Kael changed the subject.
"You need more tea."
He closed the door behind him.
Renji stood alone in the apartment. On the table, the photograph remained between two cups. His eyes moved first to the words printed on the back. Then to Haruki.
Kael had meant the investigation. Renji knew that. He also knew, with equal certainty, that he had not meant only the investigation.