“…” Ode halted his awkward arm stretches, his mouth quirking after a pause. “…What if the ‘fish’ I hook turns out to be less a big bad and more a big spender with deep pockets.”
“Quit jawing,” Faust said, landing a solid smack on his new teammate’s backside that sent Ode stumbling forward. “You got a slicker way to fish?”
“Count your blessings. All you have to do is strut down the catwalk once on the cruise ship to weed out the suspects. Eva and I don’t have your god-given looks, so we have to rack our brains fishing for a needle in a haystack.”
The two bantered as they left the bathroom. Faust pushed the small cart parked in the suite’s living room, while Ode picked up the silver tray holding only half a piece of cake.
Once they stepped out the door, Faust, who needed to stay as inconspicuous as possible, quickly melted into the crowd. Ode adjusted his posture, adopting the elegant stance and measured steps he reserved only for formal banquets, and strode through the doorway. His expression remained perfectly neutral as he passed down the corridor, drawing more than a few admiring stares.
That wasn’t a problem. What worried him was if any of those stares led to someone actually approaching him. Ode thought to himself.
He actually hoped Faust’s guess was right—that the threatening letter came from political rivals, not some cult. The kind of damage a cult could inflict was far worse—
“Sigh…” A familiar voice, utterly unexpected, suddenly sounded from behind him. It cut off Ode’s internal grumbling mid-thought and nearly made him drop the tray in his hands.
One of his old professors from Mida University was here for some reason, clutching at someone and prattling on. From the sound of it, the professor had spotted the waiter’s back ahead of him and it reminded him of a student. “You can’t imagine how disappointed I was when I learned he skipped the final civil service interview. I can guarantee it—with his talents, he could’ve helped you achieve great things… But why did he give up that chance at the last minute?”
“…” Cold sweat beaded on Ode’s forehead. Part of it was guilt over not being able to explain the truth, but mostly it was sheer embarrassment—he was still wearing that skin-tight tailcoat that made him look like a male stripper! If the professor recognized him now, he’d rather the world end right there.
Ode quickened his pace unobtrusively—
“Ode?” A second familiar voice landed like a curse, sending a chill straight to his scalp.
The corridor went silent for one second, two seconds—then exploded.
Ode broke into a long-legged stride, heading away from the professor. The professor lit up with excitement, gripping the inexplicably present Cavendish and demanding, “Who did you say? Which Ode? Ode Douglas?!”
The royal bodyguards trailing Cavendish immediately lost it, surging forward to separate the rude old professor from America who dared lay hands on His Grace the Duke. At the same time, the MI5 agents surrounding the professor and the Prime Minister countered just as fiercely, ordering the bodyguards not to wave threatening weapons near the Prime Minister.
【Damn.】 Faust’s voice echoed faintly in the earpiece, tinged with eager gossip. 【What did you do?】
【I thought that Duke Cavendish was your lover. You even wore a mask—how’d he spot you? Are a blind man’s senses really that sharp? He recognized you just walking past?】
“…” Ode squeezed his eyes shut in agony, trying to block out reality.
How could anyone screw up this badly?
But there was no helping it. Cavendish might be the only one in the world immune to his disguises—after all, the man couldn’t even see him, and whatever method he used to identify people remained a mystery.
【Quit playing dead. Go shut your lover up—unless you want him blowing your cover in front of everyone, outing the fact that someone’s disguised and lurking on the ship?】
“…” Ode hovered on the edge of despair for half a second before opening his eyes. He whistled sharply at Cavendish, who was already opening his mouth for more explosive revelations, then turned back to the luxury cabin he’d just left. He knocked on the door and pushed it open.
【? You calling a dog or what?】
Ode ignored Faust, crossing his arms and leaning against the doorframe. Less than five seconds later, a certain troublemaking bastard who knew better sauntered in with steady steps. He even asked in a calm, puzzled tone upon entering, “How are you—”
The waiter snatched the duke’s gentleman’s cane with fierce speed and swung it ruthlessly at his leg—pure force, no holding back. If Faust had been standing there, his leg bone would’ve snapped in two.
Yet the duke’s sturdy frame merely drew in a sharp hiss of pain. His hand slid up along the cane, palm clamping Ode’s wrist in a twist, slamming him against the wall. “Got some nerve. Tired of working on this ship?”
【…Fuck!】 Faust’s enraged voice burst from the earpiece, like he’d just been kicked by a passing couple. 【I’m warning you—this is work! Get rid of him and get back to hooking big fish!】
“…” Ode pressed his dead-fish stare against the wall, pinned in place. Yeah, he thought, great plan of yours—hook the big fish. Now the biggest one on this ship has bitten. Happy now?
“What’s that buzzing thing?” The biggest fish drawled, plucking the earpiece from Ode’s ear with agonizing gentleness that nearly tickled.
The next second, it splashed into half a glass of water on the entryway cabinet. Then the “big fish’s” tall, solid body closed in, slowly squeezing the air from Ode’s lungs. A hand gripped his jaw, forcing his head around, feeding scant oxygen back through lips and tongues in a deep, entwining kiss.
“You’re… enough,” Ode mumbled through a gap in the kiss. “I’m still working.”
“What kind of work has you dressed like this?” Cavendish’s palm burned hotter than his tongue, almost tricking Ode into thinking he was kissing a real human. “Can I get a taste of this service first?”
Ode started to turn his head to refuse, but the words caught on his tongue. Instead, he thoughtfully shifted his hips a little:
“If you can coax the intel I want from the god you worship—no worries, I won’t ask anything too tricky, since I wouldn’t trust it anyway. Just tell me if there are really any Black Brotherhood cultists lurking on this cruise ship.”
“…” Cavendish’s hand stilled. A few seconds later, he repeated with wry amusement, “‘Talking schemes in the middle of flirting kinda kills the mood’?”
Ode met his gaze levelly. “If His Grace the Duke finds it no fun, you could always let me go.”
“…” Cavendish didn’t move.
His chin rested in the hollow of Ode’s shoulder as he turned his head, pondering at length. It went on so long that Ode almost felt like the man savored their verbal sparring—like a chess obsessive poring over every move in a famous game, relishing the back-and-forth. “What if I neither tell you… nor let you go?”
He asked with dead seriousness, like an audience member querying the speaker mid-lecture.
Ode replied just as earnestly. “Do you like fried corpses?”
“…” Cavendish, who’d reviewed that long list of death records at the Bell Tower, raised his hands and let Ode go. Ode could picture the fragile image he’d painted in the man’s mind now—like a thin glass doll that a stiff breeze might shatter.
After some thought, Cavendish said, “It’s hard to say if the people on this ship belong to the Black Brotherhood—they haven’t formally joined. But this operation has definitely gotten plenty of help from them.”
“…” Ode’s eyes flickered. The next instant, he shoved the now-useless intel source aside, fished the earpiece from the water, shook it dry, and said gravely to his teammate, “There are definitely troublemakers on board, and more than one. I think we can drop the guest search. Their financial situation probably isn’t great—they’re most likely among the staff.”
【What? I thought you were busy smooching your lover. Where’d you get that intel? Reliable?】
Ode: “Of course.”
It was the one question he could ask where he could also verify Cavendish’s answer.
If Cavendish were in league with the Black Brotherhood, he’d flat-out deny their existence instead of narrowing the scope for him. Defining the range would make it easier to check, exposing his position.
And if he wasn’t? A man too lazy to shield his own cult wouldn’t bother protecting the Black Brotherhood and their foreign gods. Yog-Sothoth wasn’t Nyarlathotep—they didn’t meddle for shits and giggles.
Ode hooked the other earpiece out of the glass with a knuckle. Before he could shake it off, Cavendish’s body heat pressed against his back, shoving him forward against the entryway cabinet.
Cavendish’s slightly pointed teeth nipped his earlobe—not too hard, not too soft—while his fingertips traced words across the thin fabric of the tailcoat: ‘You’re no Little Prince. The Little Prince isn’t this sly—you’re clearly a Little Fox.’
The freshly rescued earpiece plunged back into the water with a plink. Faust sounded unnervingly alert on the other end: 【What was that sound?? You’re not making out with your lover, are you? Your breathing sounds off—and you still haven’t explained why!】
“…” Ode’s abs tensed rock-hard. Gritting his teeth, he twisted his arm back and yanked Cavendish’s hand out from under the tailcoat hem. “My intel says: ‘It’s hard to say if the people on this ship belong to the Black Brotherhood—they haven’t formally joined. But this operation has definitely gotten plenty of help from them.'”
“The guest list was handpicked by world leaders—the Brotherhood couldn’t infiltrate that. But the staff… there’s plenty of room to sneak in.”
Ode’s voice cracked on the last word, his body shuddering. The cabinet creaked in response.
Cavendish pinned against him, murmuring almost inaudibly into the ear without the earpiece: ‘Where’s my service?’
Shiver, shiver, shiver.
A polite knock sounded at the door. An elderly voice, oddly familiar, filtered through: “Pardon the intrusion, but I think I just saw two gentlemen enter this room? Everything all right in there? Waiters don’t usually linger in guests’ cabins this long.”
Ode started toward the door to answer and get back to work. But as Cavendish grabbed his trembling wrist and pulled him back, a memory sliced through the haze in his brain: “—That voice. I heard it in Dreamcatcher Town. Whispering in my ear, telling me not to get mixed up with you.”
A low rumble rolled from Cavendish’s throat, like he was muttering about some meddling old coot cockblocking again.
But only one question flashed through Ode’s mind:
Snatching away another Great Old One from Dagon’s side, interrupting the Father of Sharks’ summoning ritual—both acts had benefited him.
Back then, underwater, he’d been slaying Dagon while Cavendish played weak amid the seagrass. So who had done those things?
…Those voices whispering in his ear?
The old man knocking at the door right now?
