an unkindness of ravens

trente-deux

— trente-deux ; thirty two —

IT WAS PAST midnight when the cameras finally switched off, with Mandy seeing them off stage with lots of hand shakes and a promise that they could keep the clothes, and Henri was exhausted. Not only had he played a game, been smashed in the stomach by an angry dealer, and had an interview on a talkshow, but he'd spent the entire day and night before too stressed to sleep or relax properly. He was pretty much dead on his feet as he was ushered into the waiting room but instantly felt more awake when Jean yanked him to a stop by the shoulder.

"How did he kill them?" he asked, in low urgent French.

It was the last thing Henri was expecting and it took him a second to find his voice. "Bullet to the head," he said numbly.

"Good," Jean said, something in his voice cracking. "At least they didn't suffer."

The words felt so out of place that something in Henri cracked too and he had to blink back the sudden mistiness in his eyes. "I'm sorry — "

"Don't." Jean briefly closed his eyes and sighed as he opened them again. "These are the separate paths we have taken and it's too late to change them. There isn't much I can do now that the Master has you. I might never see you again, but you are still my brother, whether I want that or not. If you need help you can call me. My number — "

"I have it," Henri muttered. "Soren gave it to me."

"I know firsthand playing for the Ravens won't be easy, but you have no choice. The Moriyamas will always have their claim on you, just as they do on me, but if you survive those five years at Edgar Allan you've made it. You will never be free but you will be alive. You have to live," he said quietly. "Our parents gave their lives so you could have yours."

There was nothing accusatory or hostile in his tone, just resignation, but Henri still felt the words like a punch to the stomach. "I didn't want them to," Henri said sharply, not sure who he was trying to convince. "You don't think I regret it every day? That I don't wish it had been me instead?"

"Regret is a pointless emotion. Don't waste your time on it," Jean said, as if it was really that simple. "What's done is done and you have to move on. Lingering over the past doesn't bode well."

"Do you really not care at all?" Henri demanded, feeling irrational anger rising up in his chest. It was more frustration at himself than anything, that he had spent a lifetime feeling independent and standing here in front of Jean made him feel like a little boy who needed answers from someone older. The older brother he'd never had. "I just tell you our parents are dead, shot in the head, and you're telling me that feeling upset is a waste of time?"

"You think I'm not upset?" Jean's expression was livid. "Fuck you. They were my parents first, of course I'm fucking upset."

"You have a funny way of showing it."

Jean's eyes flashed angrily. "Don't presume to think you know how I feel about anything. You don't even know me."

"You're right," Henri snapped. "I don't know you. And you don't know me. So let's stop pretending you give a shit about what happens to me and that I'm not just the Ravens replacement to get beaten on your behalf. Handy, isn't it? Another Moreau to take the heat so you can continue with your life?"

"You ungrateful brat," Jean hissed, grabbing Henri by the collar of his shirt. "I have no obligation to treat you kindly. They died because of you and yet you throw that back in their faces? You don't deserve it. I hope the Master and Ravens ruin you."