♚Chapter 5: Wolves Form Packs
KRISTER’S room smelled faintly of mold.
The walls were made of rough limestone, and the cramped space was furnished with only two work tables and the chair he sat on. It was far too small for a tailor’s workshop and too dark, lacking any windows to let in natural light.
But pincushions, measuring tape, scissors, and punch needles were scattered about. Several clothes were hanging on the back wall, further testifying that he was indeed working there.
“Mr. Tailor, this is our daughter,” Lauretta introduced Rock to Krister. “Her name is Roxy. She’s interested in sewing and seemed very taken by your embroidery.”
“Roxy…?” Krister repeated that name in a hoarse, cracked voice.
Of course, he had no way of knowing. All of the slum dwellers, including him, believed the owner of Floria Clothes Shop was a young man called Rock Floria.
And today, Rock was wearing a blue dress with amber embroidery to match the robes her aunt and uncle wore. A gold, gem-lined hairclip decorated her wine-colored tresses. It’d be impossible to mistake her for anything other than a woman unless you knew otherwise.
That was probably why Krister looked so terribly distraught.
He gave Rock a wild-eyed stare, completely disregarding Lauretta in the process.
Rock silently scowled, stopping the flustered tailor from saying something that could get them both killed.
“Is something the matter, Mr. Tailor?” Lauretta asked, suspicion edging into her voice.
“N-No, nothing’s wrong…” Krister responded as if he was coming up for air after being held underwater, his eyes still anchored on Rock.
Lauretta turned to follow his gaze, so Rock hurriedly injected herself into the conversation.
“He must be terribly busy, Auntie. His work table is cluttered with projects.”
“Oh dear, I didn’t realize…” Lauretta held her hand up to her lips in dismay, then apologetically continued, “Shall we come back another time, Roxy?”
“No, I—”
“I can at least chat if you don’t mind me working at the same time,” Krister said faster than Rock could. He glanced at Rock before turning back to Lauretta and saying, “I am humbled she has taken an interest in my embroidery. I know it’s rude to converse while I’m working, but I would love to speak with your daughter.”
“Really? I don’t mind if it doesn’t bother you, but…”
Lauretta seemed reluctant.
Perhaps she didn’t feel comfortable leaving Rock alone at the church during her first visit. But Rock also needed Lauretta to leave if she was ever going to get anywhere with her investigation.
“I’ll come find you as soon as we are finished talking shop, Auntie. Please tell me where I can find you.”
“I… I guess I will join my husband in speaking with the bishop,” Lauretta said, then she bowed to Krister. “I’m sorry to impose on you when you’re busy, Mr. Tailor. Please speak with my daughter for a little while.”
And then she left the cramped room without suspecting a thing.
The two tailors remained silent in the muffled underground room until the footsteps retreated into the distance. Once they were sure she was out of earshot, Krister looked up at Rock and cautiously asked:
“You’re…Rock Floria, aren’t ya?”
“I am. Long time no see, Krister.”
When Rock confirmed her identity, Krister leaned toward her to get a better look at her confounding appearance.
“Why’re ya dressed like a girl? Phoebe rub off on you?”
“That’s the first thing you want to ask?” Exasperated, Rock shrugged. “Spies need disguises, no?”
“That’s not all. Weren’t you just introduced as a noblewoman’s daughter? And not just any noblewoman, but that Lady Alexis!” Krister uttered her name as if it was the most terrifying one in the world.
That bothered Rock, but she decided to answer him first.
“Don’t worry about the small things. I’m more interested in your situation.”
“My situation…?”
“Why are you with the Werewolf Brotherhood? Tell me the truth.”
When Rock urged him to speak, terror filled Krister’s gaunt face. He lowered his voice to a barely audible whisper.
“I was kidnapped by the freakin’ cultists. They’re monsters, I tell ya! They just broke into my house in the middle of the night!”
His apartment definitely showed signs of a break-in. Phoebe said that if it was a kidnapping, it had to be a skilled group’s work. His guess seemed to be right on the money.
“Why were you kidnapped? You aren’t a werewolf, right?”
Krister’s eyes were the same charcoal-black that was listed on the missing person posters. He trembled like a tree in the middle of a tornado at the question.
“Don’t be ridiculous! Like hell I’d willingly become a damn werewolf!”
“Did they tell you to become one?”
“They told me they’d gladly grant me the power if I wanted it. But they only kidnapped me to work here.”
If they could offer the power that easily, then that meant someone in the Brotherhood had the ability to bestow the werewolf curse on others.
The same statue that turned Placido into a werewolf must still be somewhere in these ruins, she thought.
“They started off as ordinary customers.” Krister exhaled a shaky breath, as if recalling a traumatic memory. “I thought the money was too good to be true. But then they put in a huge order for thirty robes and were willing to pay for any expenses along the way. I jumped on the opportunity, and the customer was pretty nice at first, too.”
There’s always a catch when something sounds too good to be true.
Phoebe always stuck by that saying, but Krister didn’t. He stupidly accepted a job that smelled fishy.
“They couldn’t place that order in the capital. Blue robes are considered damned by that city’s churches, so no reputable tailor would touch that order with a thirty-foot pole. That’s why they came all the way out to the slums to find a tailor they could make disappear, if ya know what I mean. They settled on me, but it turns out they looked into you too.” Krister dropped his voice to an even more terrifying whisper, “They knew where you live.”
“What…?” Rock was speechless. Then she suddenly remembered the night she ran into Krister in front of her apartment. “Is that how you knew where I lived?”
“Yeah. They told me.”
“That’s hella creepy… And hey, shouldn’t that have freaked you out too?”
Shouldn’t there be a limit to how much caution and conscience someone’s willing to throw away in pursuit of riches?! Rock scowled, earning a bitter smile from him.
“You can say that again. I was a fool.” Sighing, he continued, “I got too full of myself. I deliberately delayed delivering the end product, hopin’ to milk ’em for all I could. I said crap like, ‘It’s taking longer than expected to get a hold of the fabric you wanted.’ That started to piss ’em off or somethin’, because the next thing I knew, I was trapped here, forced to do their bidding.”
“You reap what you sow.”
Krister seemed to have had that lesson burned into his very soul—he didn’t object to her criticism.
“But they’re still a hella crazy bunch, even without me screwing around. They broke my right leg the day they kidnapped me, saying it was to stop me from runnin’ away.”
“Your leg?”
Rock looked at Krister’s leg with a start.