The Iron Rose: Volume 1

Zhi peered through the glass case of the chocolate shop at school with a look of indifference on his face. Last minute shoppers were pulling boxes and purchasing them. But he was considering the collection with more care. Each one was beautiful anyway, so he wasn’t too concerned with the visual. Many were decorated with hearts or roses or something conveying the holiday. The smell was good too. At least, as far as he could tell for not liking sweets. The scent of chocolate and sugar was emphasized by the warmth of the room, and it was starting to make his head fuzzy. With the smell getting to his head, he straightened and rubbed a hand over his face in an attempt to massage it out.

“Zhi!” Zhi blinked and looked at the two male students that called to him. Coming to his side, they looked in with him and wondered. “I’ve never seen you in here before.”

“Mmm. I don’t have much of a sweet tooth,” he said, looking at all that was there under the lights shining in the case. The atmosphere was giddy and the ambience warm with golds and reds everywhere. It was shiny like polished precious metals and whimsical for the holiday.

“No? Well, that makes sense then. But even for the last couple of Lover’s Days,” the other started, holding his boxes close and peering at him. “You’ve never given any.”

“I haven’t had anyone I wanted to give any to before.” He put his hands in his pockets as he tilted his head at the lot there. “I’m not even sure if I’m going to get any.” He glanced at the others and pointed at the desserts in the case. “Are they even any good?” He asked, ignoring the crowd’s chatter around him.

“Sure. All these are gourmet. It’s the stripe’s sweet shop you don’t want to go to,” the first said with an amused look of disgust on his face. “They’re all brought in from some shop in town that sells ’em cheap. Old, low quality ingredients with a preservative taste you can’t get out of your mouth. At least, that’s what I heard from those brave enough to try it.”

“And of course, the academy re-sells them for a ridiculous price,” the other laughed.

“But that’s what you get for being a stripe!” They both broke out into laughter.

“Ugh.” Zhi turned away from them with a sour expression. “Now you’re being annoying.”

The others frowned at him as he turned to consider the candies again.

The golden light from the shop lit up his face so it too shone gold. For a moment, his classmates admired him without shame. He was like a well-sculpted figure of white marble that reflected and put to shame the beauty of his surroundings. Used to his pretty-boy looks, they weren’t bothered by their own attraction to him. Not anymore.

“Do you like stripes, Zhi?” One of them asked, holding a small box wrapped in aluminum gold with a red satin ribbon in his hands.

“I don’t know. I’ve only met one.” Saying so, he remembered the blonde stripe who had carried Gudomlay out of the academy to take to her guardian. He wondered. Would he be giving her chocolates? He glanced at the others still watching him and straightened. “Who’re those for?” He asked with a nod at the candies.

“Oh, these?” The first looked at his friend and then laughed nervously. He shifted them so their wrappings made a high shuffling noise. “Well, one’s for this girl in my class and these are for Gudomlay,” he explained, showing the boxes to him.

Zhi blinked. “Why do you have a set for Gudomlay?” He asked, remembering his and her conversation earlier that day. It seemed strange. “It’s Lover’s Day. Aren’t you supposed to be getting them for the person you like?” He asked. That’s the impression he’d always been under. Why would anyone spend their money giving a gift to a person they barely spoke to?

“Of course. That’s why we have the other set,” the other said, balancing them between his hands like a scale. He was looking between them, seeming to consider it all very normal.

“Everyone gets chocolates for Gudomlay,” his friend started. “I mean. She’s like--the star pet,” he said with a side glance and shrug. A few girls came in so he smiled at their short skirts. “Besides…” He started again, slowly tearing his eyes away. “Everyone likes Gudomlay, they’re just too scared to say it.”

“Why does everyone like her?” Zhi asked, feeling a little annoyed.

They shrugged. “Why do you?”

He froze then. In the background, he heard a checker ring another boy up and call for the next customer. Realizing that that last purchase might have been for Gudomlay, he turned away. He wondered. Did he like her? But if he didn’t, why did it bother him so much that so many men were buying her chocolates? Why was he here? They were right. He’d never come to this shop before.

“What is everyone afraid of?” He asked instead of answering them.

“Several things,” the first started with the raise of his finger. “Her guardian for starters. He’s a stripe’s professor. No one wants to be associated with that side of the school. And yet...”

“And yet she feels so far out of our league that it seems useless to even worry about him.” He was rolling one of the boxes he had between his hands so its edges poked and tickled his palm.

“I see.” With that, Zhi turned and fought his way through the crowd and out of the shop without buying a thing. The other students looked after him, not quite sure what had happened. But they shrugged to one another and went back to their own business. Zhi was smart and friendly but no one knew much about him since he didn’t let anyone get close.

He went back into the academy and went up the stairs, passing the airy rooms and classes to go to the top level. At the end of the stairs was a door. When there, he took out a card from his pocket and held it up as if showing it to the white wood. With a click it opened, and Zhi stepped into a room full of computers and other students. They were sitting at them and typing away noisily. Some even seemed a bit frantic.

“Where have you been?” A severe looking young woman with slicked back hair and light brown eyes glared at him as he entered. She was wearing a lab coat like all the others and scowled when he went to his seat without putting one on. “Zhi!” She shouted, gripping her clear thin tablet fiercely. The room was dark with black walls and computers everywhere. Even with so many lights coming from them, the space didn’t glow at all.

“I’m faster at decoding than anyone else here. I’ll get done before them all,” he said with an absent wave at the rest of the students. “I’ll get your information.”

“Zhi.” She slammed her hands on the side of his desk but spoke quietly.

He glanced up at her, a little taken aback by her sense of urgency. Carina wasn’t usually so short with him, for he really was the best at the lab. And he really did get done before anyone else despite arriving later than scheduled. Something was wrong.

“We are getting a message through the prompter,” she said. “It’s urgent. But whoever is putting it through has not only broken through your firewall. He doesn’t seem to want to just let anyone see the message he’s sending.” Her voice was tight and didn’t disguise her vexation as her pen trembled between her tense fingers.

“What is it coming in through as?” He asked, now shifting to the prompter. When he did he blinked, his eyes following the fast scrolling of an ancient text of a dead language.

“Jyukai,” she replied, straightening and crossing her arms. “Ancient dead Jyukai, and as far as I know, you’re the only one who knows the language. This message, Zhi, seems to be for you.”

Zhi thinned his lips and started typing, his head still twisted around to face the prompter screen on the wall to the side of him. Then, the text was zooming on his computer screen. He turned to it and started typing even faster, hurrying to catch up with the scrolling glyphs zooming through his computer.

But then he realized. “No, this is just for anyone who knows dead languages. It’s not only Jyukai.” His eyes squinted as he started to catch glimpses of other dead languages. “This person is looking for someone who has immersed themselves in knowledge. Not just anyone will do. I’m getting Orsgar, Baylorn, Afriks...everything is being used in this message.” He took out a pair of glasses and lifted them onto his nose as he leaned in toward the screen, concentrating even more.

“I decode one and I have to unlock another. And more telling, there are equations and riddles being used as checkpoints. The glyphs aren’t the message. They’re the test to find someone who will hear and take the message seriously.” His brow came down as his fingers whirled with more haste across his keyboard. “Who is this guy?” He muttered to himself with hidden fascination.

And then it all suddenly stopped.

Carina stared at the blank screen, blinking with uncertainty as Zhi’s eye narrowed. To him, it wasn’t a blank screen. He saw text and, at first, it didn’t make sense.

Save my flower.

What did that mean?

Rogue Death Stalkers.

Save my flower.

“Rogue D.S.?” Zhi stared narrow-eyed at the simple text.

“What?” Carina lowered her brow and looked down at him, the screens light shining on her.

“Rogue Death Stalkers.” He whirled around and pointed at someone across the room. “What’s our intel on the all boy’s academy attack?” He shouted.

The student, alarmed by him raising his voice since he never did, pulled up a screen that would answer his question. “Death Stalker students sighted staking out the school. They’ve been monitoring star students presumably to pick out a target. They have a kidnapping assignment.”

“How many have been spotted?” Zhi asked, his arms crossed as he leaned back in his chair.

“Four known D.S. students, sir,” the student replied looking back at him with the creek of his chair.

“Any B.E. students they’ve been stalking?” He asked, now standing and glancing at the others.

“It seems they’ve been showing up around five different students.”

“Give me the names of whatever females they’ve been considering,” he said with the wave of his hand. The student turned to print out the profiles of the students they’d been monitoring. As he did, Zhi turned to Carina. “Do we know of any B.E. females who have a relationship with a D.S. student or faculty member?” He asked. “Someone whose lover would want her protected from his peers or pupils?”

Carina shook her head. “The interaction between schools is so limited. It’s hard to say if any of the students maintain a relationship outside of our own schools.” But that this person was referring to the student in trouble as a flower didn’t make them think this was a family relation.

“Zhi,” the student called, coming to him quickly. Zhi looked up at him and accepted the papers with a shuffling sound. “There’s only one,” he explained when Zhi looked confused by the thin stack.

Zhi glanced through and wondered. “Britta Gunvald,” he said, his brow coming together. She was one of Gudomlay’s friends. But not only that, she was a fatal opponent. Who in their right mind would target her?

“The war ruler girl,” Carina said on a sigh. “It makes sense. She’s a high-profile student here, both for her family name and abilities. She’s one of the most advanced tactician and battle students Black Eel has.” She crossed her arms, looking troubled. “I don’t know why they’d want to mess with her, though. She’s such a dangerous choice to base your grade on,” she added, voicing what Zhi had already concluded.

“I’ll talk to her,” he said, now moving past her.

Carina glanced at him but nodded. Of all the tech students, Zhi had the most apt social skills. Everyone liked him for the most part. And he had a way of getting people to talk without them realizing they were giving anything away. If Britta had a secret lover at Death Stalker, then Zhi would likely be able to get her to let that slip.

“Where is she?” He called to the surveillance team. They already had her up for him and, with a glance, he saw that she was in the home ec kitchen with her friend Tapp.

He left the lab, carrying Britta’s file with him. It wasn’t far to the kitchen. When he arrived, the scent of chocolate and the sound of giggling made him take pause. He frowned, not liking the idea of encroaching on a Lover’s Day prep but... Tapping the file against his thigh, he went in anyway. What he saw made him wonder with a complicated face.

Tapp had a smudge of flour on her cheek, Britta was stirring something fiercely, and the kitchen was a mess. Despite the appearance of it all, the chocolates and brownies looked well made. But then there was silence and he felt out of place. He glanced at the girls then, who blinked at him, pausing from their work to wonder why he was there.

He sighed and went to them, his gaze fixed on Britta so he wouldn’t forget why he was there. “Do you have a boyfriend at Death Stalker?” He asked, putting her file on the table she worked at. It slid a little until the spots of wet ingredients and spray of flower stopped it in its tracks.

“Huh?” She scrunched her nose at him and stuck her finger covered in brownie batter in her mouth. “What boyfriend?” She asked, her brow twisted and voice muffled by her finger.

“What kind of guy comes in here asking that question so bluntly?” Tapp asked, glaring at him. “Have you no tact?”

Zhi glanced at her and bowed his head. “Forgive me, it’s a matter of surveillance and I’d rather not beat around the bush as they say.” He glanced at Britta again. “You’re being targeted by D.S. students for a hostage case they’re planning. According to their class schedule, they have an assignment due soon. It requires them to select a student and obtain them for their grade.

“Of course, nothing bad will happen to you. Not unless you’re caught by some rogue students. Which, according to an anonymous message likely from a D.S. student himself, has hinted at.” He adjusted his glasses and tilted his head with a sigh. The sweet smelling desserts they were making were hurting his head like those at the store. “We’re taking precautions and trying to pinpoint which student he’s speaking of. According to our team, you are the only female student being stalked at this time. So I thought it best to ask you directly,” he explained.

“Whoa.” Britta blinked at him, pulling her finger out of her mouth. Then she grinned. “That’s so cool,” she cried with delight as she twisted towards Tapp next to her. “I’m being targeted for someone else’s grade! Wait...” Her face fell and she glanced at Tapp. “Does that mean that I’m an easy target or am I high-profile enough that I’m being sought after as a challenge?” She asked, looking nervous about the answer.

Tapp grinned. “Obviously the latter.”

“Right?” Britta smiled boldly. “Right.” She did a fist pump and looked back at Zhi. “Rogues or not. They’re not gonna get a good score if they come after me. Don’t worry about it,” she said with a grin that came up into her eyes so they squinted.

Zhi frowned at her. “I think you’re missing the point. Someone went through a lot of trouble to make sure the right person got the message about the rouge students. I can’t take this lightly. Do you really have no relation with one of them?”

Britta shook her head. “I don’t know anyone from Death Stalker Academy,” she said seriously, still stirring her batter. Even her face was a little clueless as she thought about it. “All my friends and family attend Black Eel. I don’t know anyone who’d want to look out for me over there.”

“How do you know this is a warning for a girl anyway?” Tapp asked. “Might they be messing with you all? I mean.” She shrugged. “If they have intelligence that you know they’re coming, this may be a tactical piece of bait,” she said.

Zhi rubbed his face, looking tired. “No. I wish that were it. But I have this nagging feeling that someone at our school is in a lot of trouble. And if I can’t find out who, I won’t be able to protect her.”