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Dorian rushed down the street, following the squad of royal guards.

It was by sheer luck that he was in the palace barracks when Edwards Guardian Samuel, barged through the door, demanding soldiers in Edwards name.

Everything moved chaotically fast after that. Despite Dorian demanding answers from Samuel, he still couldn’t afford to hear the whole story, not with Edward being in potential danger.

Even after getting those few base facts out of Edwards Guardian, Dorian still couldn’t phantom what possessed his brother to drag himself into a situation like this. Still, not willing to waste any more time Dorian personally took a band of soldiers into the streets and rushed to his brother’s side.

From what he gathered, Edward was not in mortal danger, he was in some sort of filthy cesspool of an underground betting ring. Unfortunately, things tended to get pretty dangerous at places like that, so getting to his brother as quickly as he could was Dorians top priority.

His worry for his brother didn’t take away from his anger though, he was furious. At a lot of things, his brother included.

To Edwards credit he more than behaved these last few months while he was recuperating. He even started to take up some of his official duties, attend meetings with city officials and had talks with their father.

Dorian even accompanied him sometimes, it was… pleasant in a way, to spend more time with his family, no matter how grim the discussion they had while in the presence of their father.

And now, all of a sudden, this… By the gods. Just when he started to get used to more reliable Edward, and he goes and does something like this. What in the heavens possessed him to go to such a place.

These arenas, gambling dens and such… Dorian didn’t like any of it.

They were sort of illegal, in a way. If it were up to him such things wouldn’t be allowed at all, but as his father’s influence waned, the grip over nobility did the same. And there were always lesser people who approved of and took pleasure in such disgusting practices.

No matter, at least tonight he had an excuse to eradicate one of those vile places and with good reason too.

Dorian frowned as he and the band of guards rounded another corner, his imposing frame easily keeping pace with the guards. Being a good head and shoulder taller than his company he was among the first to see the corner of the winding street in front of them that flowed downwards into the fifth section of the city.

Jogging down the cobbled street that was flanked by neat rows of stone houses, Dorian had no trouble seeing the first markings of the gambling districts. Easily recognizable by increasing number of purple colored market stalls and signs pointing into various side streets.

Following the iron torchlight posts that hung on street corners Dorian and the squad accompanying him followed Samuel who took a sharp turn and descended down a steep set of stairs, leading them in a darker alleyway.

Dorian took the stairs that led down towards the steep cliff below which lay the fifth level of the City and passed the bend on the stairway, coming up on the more open path that went down into the gloom, reveling many red tiled roofs bellow him that slightly shone with condensate mist and moonlight.

Following after Samuel, Dorian rushed down the pathway and into the alleys bellow him, soon arriving at the widening square shrouded in the darkness of surrounding buildings. Hidden in the gloom of the middle of the square was barely light entrance to one of the underground sewer maintenance shafts, now most likely repurposed to serve as a fighting arena.

There already were several squads of city guards milling about the entrance when Dorian finally arrived with the soldiers, and Dorian blessed his luck. It seemed that Samuel at least had enough presence of mind to notify local guards before coming to the palace barracks for royal guards. There was it seemed; at least some use to him.

Heads turned towards Dorian as his heavy footsteps echoed down the street, quickly crossing the distance towards the arena entrance.

As soon as he was near enough to take stock of the situation he noticed a familiar silvery form of his brother, standing in front of the arena entrance with a malnourished and gaunt woman under his arm.

"EDWARD!" he bellowed. The girl next to Edward Immediately turned towards him and took a protective step in front of his brother but was stopped by a gentle tug of his hand.

As Dorian slowed to a full stop in front of Edward he stared at the scene in front of him, glaring at everyone, his brother the girl, and the twitching corpse of what appeared to be a slave master of some sort, judging by the many inscribed rings on his blackened hands. His brother took that moment to turn to him and he calmly said.

"Dorian, I'm glad you are here."

It took Dorian a good few moments to form his response while he just stood there, breathing angrily and trying to form some sort of sense of what the hell had happened here.

“Now,…” his brother said while raising his hand placatingly “… I know you are probably wondering about what happened here, but before you start breaking things just keep in mind, that I have a perfectly reasonable explanation of everything that happened, AND almost as reasonable excuse to be here.”

Dorian took a deep breath and bottled his anger for later. Instead of lashing out he tiredly rubbed his face while motioning Edward to continue.

Beneath his “calm” façade, he actually wanted to yell at someone so badly, but more than that, he was loath to prove Edwards point So he reigned in his emotion as best he could and tried to gather enough patience to hear this through.

“All right, I understand you will ultimately hold this against me, but for the past few months I have been investigating some places that I think are connected to the attempt at my life.”

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Holding the bridge of his nose in attempt to stop the upcoming headache Dorian just nodded.

He actually managed to spend some time with Edward these last few months, and while his brother acted spoiled and arrogant sometimes, his overall behavior changed for the better to a noticeable degree. Dorian suspected that with all of the substances burned out of his system by lyrium Edward was finally able to think more clearly and see the folly of his way.

For once, he seemed to be correct in his assumption.

While in Dorians opinion, Edward still spent money frivolously, he did stop abusing opiates.

Of course, his change in behavior didn’t extend to alcohol, nor women for that matter, as Edward did still go overboard with hard spirits and he seemed to spend much of his time in the presence of various girls. It bothered Dorian that Edward made no distinction between nobles or common girls in his conquest to bed as many women as he possibly could, but he couldn’t really judge him in that regard. At least he seemed do develop true hatred to drugs of any kind.

But to be honest, while Edward did a fine job at keeping it hidden, Dorian could tell that the attempt at his life left deep emotional scars on him, and he suspected that his nonchalant behavior and his galivanting was a way to cope with everything that happened to him.

He had the opportunity to see similar behavior with veterans who survived life threatening situations. Usually there were the small tells, weird actions that helped them deal with their fear.

Edward was no exception. And aside from drinking and fornication, he seemed to deal with his fear by constantly trying to weed out the suspects of his assassination and to eliminate the possible threats to his life.

A slight paranoia of sorts. For now, Dorian was not overly concerned with his behavior, as some paranoia was generally healthy for royalty, but he did promise himself that he would have a talk with Edward if his behavior started to get out of hand.

After all, it was not long ago that Edward was almost killed or worse, so it was only natural that he was still shaken by everything that happened, still held by the fear that someone was out there, trying to either kill him, or subdue him through deplorable means.

He would learn, in time, that being a part of royal family meant that there was always someone out there who was trying to do you harm.

After all, Edward was not the first royal son who fell to such wicked plots. Unlike those few unfortunate ones, he at least was lucky enough to escape with both his life and mind intact.

Focusing again on his brother he nodded his head and listened.

“This…” Edward turned toward the sever entrance “… was one of the fighting arenas, and a gambling den among other things. I have vague recollections of being brought here on several occasions… ermm back when I was not sound of mind…”

He was not of sound mind right now either, Dorian wanted to comment, but through supreme effort of will he managed to hold his tongue.

“…anyway, I suspected there was some information to be gathered out here, so instructed Samuel as well as few others to keep an eye out on things. As it turned out, tonight was supposed to be one of more important nights as far as attendance goes in these places, so I came here to scout out a few faces, maybe see anyone I can recognize or just to acquire some information…”

“Edward…” Dorian sighed in frustration. “…the Royal spymasters are already investigating the matter, there is hardly anything you could do that they already didn’t think of. It is your duty right now, to keep yourself safe above all else, not to go off galivanting who knows where, getting into places like… like this.” He pointed towards the foreboding entrance.

Edward just shifted uncomfortably, gesturing as he continued.

“Yes, I understand that, Dorian. On an intellectual level, I really do. Sometimes however, there are things you just have to do because you feel like it’s the right course of action. Tonight was no different.”

“Oh by the seven cursed hells Edward,” Dorian interrupted him in desperation, “Don’t tell me you came here, to the bloody murder arena, in the middle of gods damned night, without any guards...”

“Ehh, I did have Samuel with me.” Edward said pointedly.

“…WITHOUT any guards, Edward…” Dorian just verbally barreled over him. “… That you did all that, just because of what? your intuition telling you to do it?”

Dorian spit out the words filled with vitriol and glared at his brother who seemed to lean away, and out of Dorians reach.

“Ahhh, well, yes true, true. But in this particular instance I believe this was a little more than just mere intuition Dorian.”

“Ohhh yes, enlighten me Edward, if not for your sharpened natural intuition and supreme logic that was what made you come out here by yourself, what was it?”

“Well, … “Edwards face considerably brightened at the question and he threw his arm across the shoulder of the robed, gaunt girl beside him. “…Fate of course.”

Dorian just turned his gaze to the miserable girl that seemed to glare at him like she wanted to gouge his eyes out. Why, did his little brother saved the girl? Was she grateful, was that the reason why she was so protectively shifting in front of Edward…. Ohh. Ohhhhh.

“Ohhhh.” He said and leaned back in surprise.

“Dorian…” Edward said as he gestured towards the girl. “This is my new Guardian. Her name is Chains.”

Well, that explained a lot of things. Dorian had his fair share of experiences with Guardians so he knew how twisted the fate could get when it came to such encounters. It made Edwards decisions tonight much more understandable, if he too experienced the same hunches and pulls of fates like Dorian did when he met his guardians. Fate could be strange that way.

“That… would explain a lot.” Dorian said to Edward while turning towards the girl.

“We will have to exchange the experiences when it comes to finding new Guardians, but that will have to wait.”

Shifting his gaze to the corpse in front of Edwards feet he asked.

“And who is this supposed to be?”

“Ahhh.” Edward sighed and turned his gaze downwards towards the sick corpse of a slave owner of.

“That was Chains former master, I had him brought here for questioning after I secured her safety. I wanted to draw some information out of him but the man was unfortunately quicker than me. So, by the time I had him before my feet he had already consumed a potion of some kind. Poison if I am correct. I tried to administer an antidote with what I had on my person but without knowing what exactly he ingested … well you can see for yourself.”

Dorian took note of the blisters and almost rotted flesh on the corpse. He had seen similar side effects when people tried to neutralize a variation of a nightshade poison, usually a deadly and painless poison, with some of the more potent universal antidotes. The reaction would prolong the victim’s life but ultimately the effect was the same, if a bit more gruesome.

More interesting than the slavers corpse was confirmation that Edward developed serious interest in alchemy.

The spymasters had already notified him of Edwards newfound obsession, and his growing interest in alchemical market in the City, but really what with everything that happened to him, and his newfound magical abilities, was it really that surprising. It made a lot of sense to Dorian, that Edward would want to know more about the ways he was almost destroyed with, how else could he deal with them in the future.

He would have to speak with him privately about the matter, while his growing interest was to be approved off, he still had to be careful not to let it grow into an obsession.

“Yes…” Dorian said as he took stook of the body. “Looks like a variation of Nightshade extract, can’t really be possible to know what kind exactly. I suppose you tried to save him for questioning by administering… a moon lily salve, or something similar?”

Pleasant surprise colored Edwards face as he answered

“A moon lotus salve, how did you know? I got it from a royal alchemist. It was supposed to put him into induced comma but it didn’t work as I hoped it would. Some sort of counter action of the poison I suppose.”

“hmmm,” Dorian nodded. “I have seen similar effects down south; they use a lot of poison in the marches. I’m no alchemist but it seems like something they could make.”

Edward turned to him excitedly.

“Do you think he is involve…”

“Not here Edward.” Dorian interrupted. “There is time and place for such things. For now, you are to leave this case for the spymasters.”

Reluctant, Edward frowned and seemed like he would protest but he schooled himself and reluctantly gave in.

“Ahh very well, I do need to take care of Chains anyway, is the Physician awake this time of night do you think?”

Dorian chuckled. “Well, I’m sure you will find out. Now off you go, I’ll take care of things here, and don’t worry, we will discuss our findings with father tomorrow.”

Edward nodded at that.

“Thank you, Dorian.”

With that he took turned away and directed the girl away from the gloomy square, towards the upper reaches of the city.

Dorian sighed and turned to the milling groups of guards and detained nobles.

There would be no rest for the wicked it seemed, not tonight.