And there it was. No more dancing around the subject. Albanos really hadn't expected it to be so on the nose. He honestly hadn't expected him to mention it at all. He'd just assumed Hagglit had handled those memories the same way he had -- bottling them up until they disappeared entirely, until the subconscious stress of it inevitably ruptured something in his brain and ended it all. Maybe age had softened Portnoy up. Maybe it was time he let it have a chance to do the same for him.
Suddenly, he could feel every ache, every creak, every old wound that had never healed right. He knew that his hair, once brown as the mahogany of the office desk, was beginning to gray. He imagined he could almost feel that happening, little screams from each strand as some silent predator stalked the jungles of his scalp, sucking the life and color out of its victims.
He was angry for being made to feel this way, and at the same time almost too tired to care. Three weeks of hard marching to get back here, a place he had made such effort to keep well beyond the horizon, had taken it out of him. As had the climb over the fence, for that matter. It never used to be like this, back in the good old days...oh gods, he'd just thought about the good old days.
"Look...can I have a night to think about it? I need to sleep on this."
"Of course. Retiring to a desk job is a big decision. I wouldn't dare ask you to make a snap judgment. We both know you have a poor track record with those."
The principal saw the man's jaw clench and sighed.
"I'm sorry...old habits, you know? I've had a room prepared for you in the male dormitory. You'll be listed as a 'traveling dignitary' on the manifest. Most of the students are gone and no one else knows you're here. I don't think you, of all people, will have any trouble keeping out of sight for a night. I can't exactly summon someone to guide you, though. Gossip travels through this place faster than poison through a sickly orphan."
"I know the way."
"Excellent, you'll be needing this then," Hagglit said, handing over an envelope. "It contains your room number, your key, and a few pieces of information regarding this employment opportunity which you might find interesting."
"Can I take the book?" Albanos gestured toward the bound volume of his outstanding bounties, still lying on the desk.
"Be my guest. I'm sure you'll find it quite entertaining the kinds of reasons people have come up with to kill you over the years. That tends to happen when you continue your particular line of work outside the system, you know," he admonished while shoving the tome into Albanos's chest, as though lecturing a particularly dense young pupil.
"I will be by in the morning to collect your decision, but now if you'll excuse me, I have my duties to attend to. Fall semester begins in a week and we have a lot to take care of. Traps to reset and rearrange in the mazes, training dummies to sew the heads back onto, and coffers in the dungeon to fill with all kinds of dangerous elements. Wouldn't want the new thieves disappointed now would we?"
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
He clamored on about all the matters that needed his attention as he ushered Albanos to the exit with a gentle but persistent shove. As the door opened, he paused for a second, having once again not heard the creak he'd purposely let develop in the middle hinge. Albanos pulled a small tube out of his pocket, thrusting it into Hagglit's hand in the closest approximation to a handshake the men had shared in decades. The tube unceremoniously vomited a drop of viscous, brown goo onto Portnoy's palm.
"I fixed your door. You can thank me later. I know you're busy."
Hagglit sighed and kept listing his duties as he pushed him into the hallway, taking some satisfaction in wiping the oil off on his company's shoulder.
"I never meant for anything to happen to her, you know," Albanos interrupted, once he was fully in the corridor, viable escape routes in either direction. "You must have always known that. You knew me well enough then to know I never wanted any of this."
He turned to see Hagglit staring at him, looking even older than before, but with the same cold fire in his eyes that burned there the last time they stood before one another, so many years ago.
"Some nights I do. Only some though." And with that, he slammed the door.
The report echoed through the dark stone passages several times, causing Albanos to unconsciously skitter down the shadowy hallway, in case anyone decided to see what all the fuss was about. The last thing he wanted was to kill a potential future student of his in self-defense on his first night back. They'd be lighting the odd torch or two soon anyway, getting ready for the evening's remedial summer lessons.
The place was exactly the same as he remembered it, three decades past. Assassins and thieves weren't much for change when it came to where they lived. Muscle memory and kinesthetics were everything. Redecorating made it harder to sneak around with ease and familiarity, which in turn made it harder to know all the different ways everyone else would be sneaking around in various attempts to harm you. While killing other students was generally frowned upon, a well-placed, non-lethal stab wound to an upperclassman showed initiative and reflected well on your final reports. If you could tag a faculty member (and live, of course), you wouldn't have to buy your own lunch for a month.
This was the main building, the dominant structure in the center of the yard. It was all classrooms, offices, and practice halls, and extended several floors below ground to cleverly designed training dungeons and fake noble houses for both thieves and assassins to hone their skills. Thief classes and faculty in the east wing, Assassins in the west. They tried to tell you that it was symbolic, with the assassins in the west like the setting sun, their job being to send their targets into that eternal night. They tried to tell you a lot of things around here though.
It was now completely dark outside, and as Albanos slipped out of the main building and back into the yard, he could see what students had stayed on for summer classes strolling (slinking, lurking, creeping, stalking, or oozing) about the place, beginning their nights. He worked his way over to the side of the main building to wait for the activity to die down a bit before he tried to find his room.
In the cool evening air, he came as close to relaxing as he had since receiving Portnoy's letter a month ago. He marveled at the stars, at how remarkable it was that they looked every bit the same as they had when it was he and his friends beginning their own nights here. He breathed in the vague hint of wisteria from the nearby woods. And he remembered.