112. Decision
Isaac slammed open the door of the house without a second thought, practically sprinting down the hallway in his haste. When he reached the parlor, he didn’t hesitate, grabbing the handle and turning it. Any and all unease he’d felt around Lilith was pushed aside in favor of the need to speak to her, to tell her all the thoughts thrumming in his head.
The door was unlocked.
It only occurred to Isaac as he was already stepping inside that Remus’s body might still be there, but thankfully, there was no hint of the demon anywhere. The loose papers and shelves that had been upended by the rising wind had been straightened back to normal, the parlor looking exactly the same as it had before the execution. Isaac found it a bit disturbing, how easy it was to erase all traces of the demon’s death. Of what had happened.
His eyes roamed about the room, finally landing on a familiar figure on the other side. Lilith sat on a small armchair beside the window, still in the same clothing as before. She didn’t have anything in her hands, wasn’t even sipping on tea. It was as if she'd been waiting.
Isaac didn’t bother with preamble. He strode across the small room, weaving around the draped curtains and the chandelier to come to a stop in front of Lilith.
“It wasn’t just Remus. Someone else attacked the humans.”
The woman looked up, calmly meeting his gaze. She wasn’t smiling. She didn’t have any expression at all.
Isaac shoved down his growing unease and kept talking, pulling out the tablet and gesturing to the screen. “I asked Fable to find the old stat sheets of the victims. One of the humans was level 34. Remus wouldn’t have been able to kill her.” Lilith remained silent. He kept talking, his thoughts pouring out in a flood.
“Remus probably killed the demons because of their relation to Lucius, but the humans had nothing to do with that. When I talked to Cedric, he said these four were part of Solonell City’s old government. A second perpetrator, I’m guessing someone involved in the rebellion, probably killed them to get their own revenge when the system was down.”
When he finally stopped talking, Lilith was still watching him with that unreadable look. She hadn’t reacted at all to what he’d said.
Isaac frowned, about to open his mouth to clarify, but he stopped himself.
“You have violated the System, freely using your abilities to kill.”
During the trial, Lilith hadn’t specified how many people Remus had killed. He took in her relaxed demeanor, her utter lack of surprise, and realization hit him.
“You knew.” The words came out quiet, the thought still settling. He repeated them, louder this time, grinding them out. “You knew.”
Lilith’s voice was perfectly calm.
“I suspected, yes.”
Isaac released a long breath, forcing his voice to remain steady. “Then we need to do something. I can keep investigating, and we could put out a notice or make some kind of announcement. Someone must know something.”
Lilith remained quiet, unmoved. Isaac frowned. A second thought rose.
“You…you’re not planning on investigating, are you.” It was more of a statement than a question. Finally, Lilith sighed and shifted her position.
“No, I’m not. Nor do I intend to release any announcements about this.”
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“Why not? If we had more people investigating, we—“
“Isaac,” Lilith interrupted. “What do you think an investigation would accomplish? Whoever the second perpetrator is would’ve been a higher level than Remus. They must have been tracking the movements of those humans for years to have located them so quickly. Do you really think someone like that would leave any evidence behind?”
“So you’re not even going to try? You’re just going to let a murderer run free?”
The woman laughed. It was nothing like her usual laughs, bell-like and clear as a spring breeze. This one was harsh and rough, its edges cutting.
“If you’re worried about encountering this person, then there’s no need for concern. Now that the System is back in place, they can no longer cause any harm.”
“That’s not the point.” Isaac felt his frustration rising, reaching a crescendo.
“What is the point, then? Justice?” She laughed again, that laugh that was so terribly wrong. “I would think you’d know better by now. You already encounter killers whenever you’re in the Underside without knowing it. This won’t change anything.”
Isaac clamped his fingers together into a tight fist. “Fine,” he gritted out. “I’ll just investigate on my own.”
“You will not.”
Now it was his turn to laugh, disbelieving and bitter. “What? If it doesn’t matter, then you shouldn’t care what I do with my time.”
Lilith narrowed her eyes, and in that brief instance, she seemed so alien that a chill ran down Isaac’s spine. He took an instinctive step back as she spoke.
“You—“
But before Lilith could continue, her voice caught. She raised a gloved hand to cover her mouth just as she broke into a fit of coughs. Her entire body shook with the force of them, rough and painful sounding. Isaac’s eyes widened, stunned, and he stepped forward, temporarily forgetting their argument.
Lilith batted his hand away before he could try to help. She exhaled, straightening and swallowing down the last few coughs like nothing had happened. It wasn’t enough to fool him. Now that he focused, he could see how tired she looked, could see the sickly hue her skin had taken on. Concern warred with lingering anger.
“…What was that?”
“Nothing for you to concern yourself with.” She rose from her seat, golden eyes steady and unyielding.
“The System error has already cost me some of my authority. Executing Remus helped restore a fraction of it, but not all. What do you think would happen if I announced that there was yet another System violator, one I wasn’t able to find on my own?”
Isaac watched her carefully, frowning. She shook her head, releasing a deep sigh.
“It’s difficult enough maintaining order in a place like this. I can’t afford any more weakness.”
Lilith stepped past Isaac, moving to the other end of the parlour. She reached for one of the vases of perfectly bloomed golden flowers, absently pinching one of the soft petals between her fingers.
Isaac watched her, taking in her careful movements and processing the words.
“…Is control really so important?”
Lilith smiled wryly. “It’s everything.”
She stepped back from the vase and shook her head, sighing again. Her voice was a little softer when she spoke again, a little closer to what she normally sounded like even if the whimsical lilt was still nowhere to be found.
“I understand you’re not used to how things work in the Underside. It can take some time to process.”
Isaac stared at her, then at the golden lights rising upwards through the window. They looked so innocuous like that, despite being the same color as the light that had rotted away Seaton’s arm, the light that had killed and tortured without remorse.
He closed his eyes, breathing deeply. In his hands, the tablet felt cold, and when he opened his eyes again, the screen was as black as the inky sky.
“I think,” he finally said, “I need a break.”
Lilith blinked. If the circumstances were different, Isaac might have marveled at the fact that he’d never seen her look so surprised before. “What do you mean?”
Isaac met her gaze, his own eyes hardening with resolve.
“I mean I’m taking a break from all this. I need time to think, sort things out. Until then, I won’t be coming back to the Underside. Who knows for how long.”
He stepped forward resolutely, shoving the tablet at her. His hands felt oddly empty without it, the missing weight all too pronounced. He ignored the feeling. He wasn’t going to have doubts now.
“Goodbye,” Isaac muttered.
Then he turned down the hallway and left the building, left the realm, and left the Underside behind.