Chapter 8

Eventually, Valentine had to leave.

Anne was adamant about this.

Firm. Resolute. Unshakeable.

There was absolutely no way Valentine Fontaine was lingering in her home longer than necessary.

So, naturally, he took his time.

"You could just admit you'll miss me," he said, grinning as he leaned against the doorway.

Anne folded her arms. Glaring.

"I'll miss you the way I'd miss a parasite," she deadpanned.

Valentine clutched his chest. "How poetic."

"Get out."

Behind her, Elric and Tomas were watching with great interest.

Tomas looked genuinely conflicted.

"Does he have to leave?" he asked.

"Yes," Anne said firmly.

"No," Valentine said at the exact same time.

Anne twitched.

Elric, the more strategic of the two, squinted at Valentine.

"You'll come back, right?"

Anne shot him a betrayed look.

Valentine, of course, beamed.

"Only if your sister doesn't kill me first."

Tomas nodded solemnly. "Sounds fair."

Anne groaned. Too tired for this.

Valentine took that as his cue to leave, finally stepping outside. The dim light of Blackmire's eternally overcast morning stretched across the wet streets, glinting off puddles and broken lantern glass.

Still—he hesitated.

Turned back.

And, with a rare sort of sincerity:

"Well, Anne," he said, "this has been fun."

Anne narrowed her eyes.

"Define fun."

He smirked.

But—

Just before he could turn away, Elric suddenly strode up to him.

Then, with zero hesitation, he held out his hand.

Valentine raised a brow.

"Handshake?"

Elric nodded. Serious. "You earned it."

Valentine chuckled. But—he took it. Gave it one firm shake.

Then—

Tomas jumped forward and latched onto him.

Anne's soul left her body.

Tomas hugged like a barnacle.

It was sudden, forceful, and done with the unshakable confidence of a child who did whatever the hell he wanted.

"…Huh," Valentine said.

Anne, mortified: "Tomas, let go."

"No," Tomas said.

Valentine grinned.

Anne considered murder.

But, mercifully, Tomas finally released him.

And just like that—Valentine was gone.

Swaggering down the street, hands in his pockets, whistling a tune that had no name.

Anne watched him go, frowning.

Something odd sat heavy in her chest.

She didn't like it.

Didn't trust it.

But she also couldn't ignore it.

And the moment she shut the door—

Elric smirked.

"So," he said. "You think he's pretty?"

Anne grabbed a pillow and threw it at his head.

***

Getting kicked out of Anne's house was an interesting experience for Valentine Fontaine.

He had been forcibly escorted to the door, handed his coat (albeit begrudgingly), and then left standing in the cold street like an unwanted cat that had been fed once and now refused to leave.

It was hilarious.

Anne had glared at him, still groggy from sleep.

"Out."

Valentine had grinned. "Ah, my darling, you wound me."

"OUT."

She had shoved him with all the strength of someone who had two younger brothers and too many problems.

Now, as he dusted off his coat and adjusted his cuffs, he considered the facts:

He had successfully invaded a household, fed a family, and walked away without being stabbed.

Anne's brothers were dangerous creatures and he respected them.Anne herself? Complicated. Sharp. Tired. Stronger than she knew.

She had also almost smiled at him. Almost.

Progress.

Now, he needed a drink.

Or, rather—

He needed other people to drink.

And there was no place better for that than Love No Bar.

As he strolled toward Love No Bar, hands tucked into his coat pockets, Valentine observed.

A pickpocket working a drunkard near an alley. Small, nimble hands. A whisper of a knife. A coin purse vanishing into a ragged sleeve. The drunkard, too far gone, didn't even notice.

A group of enforcers—not the city guard (who were useless) but some low-tier gang muscle—dragging a man into a back alley. His muffled protests ended with the heavy thud of a fist meeting ribs. A debt collector's work, most likely.

A courier boy, young and nervous, running a package through the backstreets. Probably something illegal. Maybe drugs. Maybe something worse.

A woman leaning against a lamppost, smoking lazily, keeping an eye on a passing merchant cart. Scouting. Valentine could tell by the way she tilted her chin ever so slightly at the two men loitering nearby—her crew, waiting for the signal.

A priest from the Church of the Broken Eye handing out pamphlets to passing workers. No one took them. He stood there anyway, muttering sermons to himself.

Blackmire's filth wasn't just in the alleys or the gutters.

It was woven into the air.

And everyone breathed it.

***

Love No Bar wasn't a bar in the traditional sense.

It was a graveyard of failed ambition, where thieves, mercenaries, and lowlifes gathered not to drown their sorrows, but to force-feed them liquor until they passed out.

The bartender, a man known only as Two-Tooth Terry (he had more than two teeth, but none of them were good), nodded as Valentine strutted in.

"Fontaine."

"Terry."

"You looking for a fight or a drink?"

Valentine smiled. "A drink. But I'll take a fight if it comes free."

Terry grunted. "Usual, then?"

"Usual."

Which meant not a drink for himself—but drinks for everyone else.

Drunken fools were the best informants.

Unlike professionals, who would charge for knowledge, or cowards, who would lie for safety, a drunk simply talked.

Even if they didn't mean to.

Even if they didn't realize it.

Valentine listened with the patience of a vulture, picking apart the ramblings of the wasted like a butcher carving meat.

"…so then I says to him, 'That ain't my cow, that's me wife!'" someone slurred, cackling.

"I swear on me mother's grave, the shipment's comin' in through the west docks—"

"Markov's been lookin' for someone. Some kid.""Dunno who, but he's askin' a lotta questions 'bout the orphanages.""Orphanages been gettin' real quiet these days, y'know? Kids goin' missin' and all.""Ain't safe for strays in Blackmire no more."

His fingers drummed lightly against the table. A pattern was forming.

"Kids."

"Orphanages."

"Missing."

A cold thread of familiarity wove itself through his thoughts.

Valentine wasn't naive—Blackmire had never been kind to the weak.

But if someone was targeting orphans… well.

That was something else entirely.

Something worth investigating.

He tilted his head, watching the man across from him take another deep gulp of whatever excuse for liquor Terry had served.

"You said orphanages," Valentine said, voice light. "Which ones?"

The man blinked blearily. "Huh?"

Valentine's smile was sharp. "The missing kids. Which orphanages?"

The drunk frowned, rubbing his nose like he was trying to rub together two thoughts.

"Dunno 'bout all of 'em," he muttered. "But I heard… the one in the Southern Ward. Saint Letha's, maybe."

Valentine committed that to memory.

But before he could press further, a dangerous distraction presented itself.

A man across the table thumped his tankard down, hard.

"You're wrong, Fontaine," he slurred.

Valentine blinked. "I'm sorry, what?"

Reynolds, a particularly loud and stubborn drunk, squinted at him with the intensity of a man who has already lost the argument but refuses to admit it.

"Michael Mennet is overrated."

The entire table went silent.

Valentine slowly turned to face him. "I'm sorry. What did you just say?"

Reynolds folded his arms. "I said—" he leaned forward, enunciating every word, "Michael. Mennet. Is. Overrated."

Valentine inhaled deeply.

Then, with the patience of a saint and the fury of a man who has been personally offended, he spoke:

"You uncultured swine."

Reynolds slammed his tankard down again. "Louis Jackel is superior in every way!"

Valentine stood up so fast his chair fell over. "Louis Jackel is a hack with the musical range of a dying goat."

Reynolds also stood up. "You take that back, you pompous bastard."

Valentine slammed his hands on the table. "Michael Mennet reinvented modern composition, you absolute buffoon. His work is elegant, emotional, and transcendent. Jackel? Jackel is for people who think banging on a piano is artistry."

Reynolds shoved his sleeves up. "Say that again, Fontaine."

Valentine smirked. "Jackel is for people who—"

Before he could finish, Reynolds swung.

The punch whiffed.

Reynolds, too drunk to aim properly, stumbled forward instead.

Valentine sidestepped elegantly, watching as Reynolds crashed into another patron, who then spilled his drink all over a man known as Big Brian.

Big Brian was not a man to spill drinks on.

"Oi," he rumbled. "Who did that?"

Reynolds, dazed, pointed at Valentine. "That guy."

Valentine's eyes widened. "Oh, you little—"

Big Brian swung.

Valentine ducked.

The punch hit someone else.

That someone else hit someone else.

And just like that, the entire bar erupted into chaos.

Terry, still behind the bar, sighed deeply.

"Shoulda asked for payment up front."

***

The first punch came from a bystander.

Some poor soul who had no idea what was happening but decided to take a side anyway.

It landed square on someone else's nose.

Which, naturally, resulted in chaos.

Tables flipped. Chairs became weapons. A man went flying over the counter.

Valentine, despite being the catalyst of this nonsense, was thriving.

He ducked beneath a swing, caught a bottle mid-air, and gracefully smashed it over someone's head.

Reynolds, meanwhile, had taken off his jacket and was wielding it like a whip.

"Mennet's compositions were predictable!" he howled, attempting to strangle Valentine with a sleeve.

Valentine, elegant even in the throes of combat, shoved him off and kicked a stool into his shins.

"Predictable?!" he echoed, dodging a flying tankard. "The man revolutionized the way music was structured—you incompetent, rhythm-deaf, sewer rat!"

Somewhere in the chaos, a third party had entered the argument.

"Mennet was a genius!" a stranger yelled, throwing a punch at someone who had been nowhere near the conversation.

"JACKEL HAD BETTER HARMONICS, YOU SWINE!" someone else screamed, before getting tackled to the ground.

Terry, the bartender, watched his livelihood crumble before his eyes and just started taking bets. Just every Tuesday thing.

The fight raged on, but Valentine was not a man to lose.

With the precision of an artist, he weaved through the carnage, grabbed Reynolds by the collar, and—in a move both graceful and petty—

Slammed him face-first into the counter.

A moment of stillness.

Then—Reynolds groaned.

Valentine leaned over him, smug as hell.

"Repeat after me," he said, enjoying himself far too much.

Reynolds, dazed, muttered something incomprehensible.

Valentine grinned.

"That's what I thought."

And with that, he turned away, stepping over an unconscious body as the brawl continued without him.

After all, he had more important matters to attend to.

Like, say—finding out why the hell orphans were going missing.

***

The orphans.

That was the next thread to pull.

The bar fight hadn't given him Light's name, but it had given him patterns.

Children disappearing from orphanages.

Which meant someone was taking them.

Which meant someone knew something.

Valentine hummed, eyes flickering over the crowd.

Finding the right information in Blackmire was like fishing in a swamp—you had to know where to cast the line, and you had to be prepared for the occasional corpse instead of a fish.

If orphans were being stolen, then the people who ran Blackmire's underground dealings would know about it.

Which meant he needed to start asking questions in the right ears.

And he had just the right place to start.

With a final glance toward the alley—toward the lingering ghosts of the past few days—Valentine adjusted his cufflinks, smoothed his lapel, and stepped into the city once more.

Time to go knocking.