The Royal Thief

Extra story: Chocolate

It's an early story but I owe you guys something this week!

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"We're going to get caught," Cara said nervously.

"Not if you relax and talk quieter." Morie squeezed herself through the narrow doorway into the dusty wall passage beyond. At fifteen she was already getting too tall to fit through comfortably, though Nemia, just behind her, slipped in without a sound. Cara, third in line as usual, shut the door behind them, turning the dark gray of the nighttime castle in pure blackness.

"God, how can you see anything in here?"

"Shh."

She huffed but fell silent for a minute as they shuffled through the walls. "We didn't have to take the passages. Why can't we ever do anything the easy way?"

"Have you met Morie?" Nemia snickered quietly, and they all stifled laughs.

"This is funner," Morie told them.

"You say 'funner', but I hear 'dustier'."

Morie only proved her point by sneezing loudly.

"Shh," Nemia reminded her, and a few moments later they'd exited through another narrow, hidden door into the kitchens.

"See? And we weren't caught."

"We wouldn't have been caught even if we were in the halls. Going to the kitchen isn't illegal."

"I'm the expert on what's legal," Morie insisted, pulling open a cabinet. "So where do they keep it?"

"Up there, on the high shelf." Nemia pointed and Morie, a good head taller than them since her last growth spirt, stood on her toes to look at the rows of tins and jars.

"Got it!"

"You're far to excited about this."

Morie grinned and tossed the box she'd taken from the shelf at her. "I've been a perfect angel for two weeks--" Nemia interrupted this with a giggle but she continued. "--two utterly boring weeks. I haven't done anything wrong in ages! How am I supposed to keep myself sane?"

"Well, if stealing chocolate is the only way," Cara said doubtfully.

"At the moment, it is. Open it!"

They made a small fire in the fireplace and sat on the ground in front of it with the box between them, the cubes of dark chocolate melting in their hands. "Mmm. Should've brought Sam an' Nick," Nemia commented with her mouth full.

"Forget it, they'd eat it all," Morie said emphatically.

Cara swatted her hand away from the box. "You mean the way you are?"

"Yes, exactly. There's only room for one thief here." Somehow with her other hand she'd managed to grab another piece anyway.

"Careful, don't eat it all," Nemia reminded them, licking the chocolate off her fingers.

"Why not? They'll know somebody was eating it anyway."

"More than likely they'll even know it was us."Cara shook the box, choosing another piece. "You have to wonder why they haven't gotten a better place to put it."

"Maybe they feel bad."

"Feel bad about what?" Nemia asked.

Apparently not seeing Cara's emphatic hand gestures, Morie said, "You know, about you."

Nemia froze, then quickly withdrew her hand from the box. "What?"

Cara hit Morie's knee but once again failed to trigger any consideration of her words. "Because of what that boy said earlier today."

"But-- they don't know about that, do they?" She looked from Morie to Cara and back, her expression growing alarmed.

"Of course they do, everyone in the ca--" Cara's elbow jabs finally triggered a response. "Uh-- no, I don't think they know."

"Yes you do!" Nemia's voice squeaked sharply with panic.

"Let's be reasonable here," Cara reminded her, putting a piece of chocolate in her hand. "Just because they heard doesn't mean they think anything of it."

"Then why did Morie say they left the chocolate for us because they felt bad?!"

"Um..." She shot a frustrated glance at Morie, who was finally looking properly sheepish.

"I, uh, just meant that they... they..." She looked around for inspiration but failed to find any. "Okay, look, it's not that bad."

"Yes it is! They wouldn't feel bad if they didn't believe what he said!"

"Hey, that's not true! We don't believe him and we still feel bad for you!" Morie paused. "Actually, I don't think that came out right."

It was a little too late, tears already welling up in her eyes. "It's not fair, he can just go and say that and have everyone believe him when these people have known me forever--"

"But they don't, no one believes him!" Morie said desperately, leaning forward.

"You don't know that!"

"Of course I do!"

Cara scooted back a little space, alarmed that even Morie seemed close to tears now.

"Nemia, you're perfectly human, everyone knows that."

"Unless of course I'm just a little bit not," she sniffed. "You heard what he said."

"Yes, I did. And guess what? Nearly every bit of it applies to me too. So if you're going to say that he might be right, or that everyone else might think he's right, you have to be willing to look me in the eye and say that they also believe I'm less than human."

She considered that for a moment, wiping the tears off her face. "But..."

"No but. Guardians aren't more or less anything, and you being the Assassin doesn't matter either. We're both the same as anyone else. Savion Regenmace is just full of hot, smelly air and he's never done anything in his life to deserve you listening to him."

She took her time to think about it. It was true, that Savion had spoken to her but accused both of them. And surely Morie was right, no one saw her as different, at least not in a fundamental, human-versus-other-species kind of way. If nothing else, whatever label they had, they had to share. Probably. "Alright."

"Good. Are either of you taking this last piece, or can I have it?"

"I knew it wouldn't last," Cara muttered.

"The chocolate?"

"No, the emotional stuff. But I want that chocolate."

"Too late."