Chapter Text
It is, as it so happens, slightly harder to teach someone how to be an Assassin than it is to learn how to be an Assassin. Which Jacob knew, on some level, but actually putting that into practice is something else. It’s also a little harder to find people who are Assassin material than Jacob thought it might be after he’d rather literally stumbled into Miss Corwin—she remains their first and only new recruit in the weeks to come.
But she’s already a quick climber, something Jacob witnessed firsthand. And a quicker learner, which he hadn’t yet. She’s incredibly curious, asking questions about everything, and fortunately there’s enough other Assassins around that she can usually get a decent answer from someone, even if that someone is almost never actually Jacob.
(The way she smiles at him when he does, though... it makes him want to try, all the same.)
That said. Jacob is, perhaps, not entirely appreciative of his sister hauling him off the train specifically to make fun of him about Miss Corwin.
As far as places to be getting teased go, though, not directly in front of Celeste Corwin is something of an improvement.
“I can’t help but notice you’re quite fond of our newest recruit,” is what Evie opens with, of course, as if Jacob had any doubt at to why she dragged him out here. On the off chance he did, the way she’s smirking at him confirms it.
Jacob shrugs, doing his best to look nonchalant. “Who wouldn’t be?” he asks. “She’s brilliant.”
“Well, yes.” The way Evie’s looking at him makes him think he might’ve slightly missed the mark on nonchalant. “You’re also thoroughly unsubtle.”
“Whatever is that supposed to mean, dear sister of mine?”
“On the off chance you don’t know, I certainly won’t be ruining it by telling you,” Evie says, eyes twinkling with mischief.
“Spoilsport,” Jacob replies, nudging her arm.
Evie laughs. “In all seriousness, Jacob—”
Whatever his sister was about to say, in all likelihood something profoundly embarrassing, it’s interrupted by the sound of quiet voices somewhere on the streets beneath them suddenly growing much louder. Evie falls silent, drawing closer to the edge of the building to peer over it. Jacob wordlessly follows.
“Listen to me!” a weary constable demands of an older man with a full mustache and beard. “I have been ordered to keep your rallies off the streets!”
“No, you must listen to me,” the bearded man counters, which is audacious of him. “The people in this city are in dire need of your assistance!”
The constable scoffs and storms off. Jacob glances over at Evie, raising an eyebrow.
“Now, what do you think that’s about?” he asks her.
“I suppose we ought to find out,” Evie says.
In unison, they descend from the roof and begin to approach the bearded man. He turns at their approach, and before either of them speaks, he says, “Ah, you are Jacob Frye, are you not? And Evie Frye?”
Evie’s expression hardens. “We are at a disadvantage, sir...?”
“Karl Marx,” the man says, which is not a name Jacob remembers ever having heard before. “Much like you, I am an activist of sorts.”
“You’ve got the look of a man who wants something,” Jacob says, a little suspicious himself.
“Indeed, you’ve done more for London’s citizens lately than any endeavor has accomplished in a decade.” Well, that’s flattering. “But those citizens were already well provided for. I challenge you both to help those who really need your assistance. The working people.”
To Jacob’s immense surprise, Evie opens her mouth before he can. “An interesting challenge. We accept.”
Jacob leans a little closer to his sister. “Shouldn’t we at least talk about these things fir...”
He breaks off when her expression doesn’t shift, and turns back toward Marx.
“Sod it,” he says with a sigh, “we accept.”
Marx gestures for the two of them to follow him, and starts down the street. “I am organizing a discreet meeting with some like-minded friends to discuss trades unions,” he says. “Alas, the police seem to have noticed my activities. They’ve stuck to me like flies on Scheiße.”
Jacob makes a vague noise of acknowledgment, as does Evie, which is all the invitation Marx needs to continue speaking. “In any case, I need you to help me get to the meeting without the interference of the police.”
What ends up happening, since there’s two of them, is that Evie sticks with Marx while Jacob gets the comparatively much more exciting job of running ahead, making the people spying for the police conveniently disappear, and wondering what the hell Evie has gotten them into here. If she’s any closer to figuring it out by the time he doubles back, rejoining them with a nod, she doesn’t say anything to that effect before Marx goes to speak with a contact of his.
And then Jacob asks, “Who even is he?”
“Someone who requested our help, Jacob,” Evie replies, “and who very clearly needs it given the attention he has attracted.”
So... she hasn’t the slightest clue either. For all that Jacob has been trying to get his sister to plan less and act more for what might as well be their whole lives, now’s a hell of a time to pick up an impulsive streak of her own.
“You know, I had similar problems with the police in Paris,” Marx comments as he rejoins them. “Well, Paris and Brussels. And also perhaps Cologne.”
Well. This man is more of a troublemaker than Jacob can lay claim to, if he’s gotten into that much strife with the police. Behind Marx’s back, Jacob raises an eyebrow at Evie and smirks. She rolls her eyes in return and while she doesn’t say a word, Jacob’s pretty sure she got the message.
“Our next worthy ally awaits in a nearby pub,” Marx proclaims. “Onwards!”
Once they reach the pub, Marx says, “No doubt the police already have agents stationed within. I’ll wait here until the coast is clear.”
They could go in and find the spy. Or they could do something more fun, like starting a brawl outside. Jacob grins at Evie, tilting his head.
Evie considers this, then says, smiling a little, “Why not? I saw some Rooks on the way here.”
Score one for Jacob.
The Rooks, as it turns out, are more than happy to pick a fight with the remnants of the Blighters that still like to cause problems all across London. So convenient this lot to be near the pub.
A pair of uniformed constables and someone who must be their plainclothes spy—Eagle Vision confirms that—run outside to try and break up the fight almost as soon as it starts. Typical.
Evie assassinates their spy without hesitation, and Jacob certainly won’t shed any tears over the constables falling to the brawl. Jacob casually tails Marx into the pub, this time. His next ‘worthy ally’ looks normal enough, but then, Karl Marx hardly looks like the sort to have attracted so much negative attention from the police in no less than four major cities.
“The usual location,” Marx tells a man leaning on the bar. “One hour.”
“Right you are, Mister Marx, sir.”
Well, Jacob got absolutely nothing useful out of that. He follows Marx back out of the pub and wordlessly shakes his head to Evie’s questioning look before their new... friend might be a strong word... starts to speak again.
“I believe our work here is complete,” he says with satisfaction. “Come, let’s slip away and get to the meeting.”
And maybe, just maybe, something about this meeting will result in the man making slightly more sense.
“I do appreciate your assistance in this matter,” he says to them as he leads the way. “Only when workers are able to assemble freely and in strength will we be able to achieve the reforms we most assuredly deserve.”
Marx pauses for a moment to look at the two of them. “Might I trouble you to stay nearby until the meeting is over?” he asks. “I fear we may yet meet with some mischief.”
“Of course,” Evie says without hesitation, and not for the first time this evening, Jacob wonders how he wound up being the less impulsive one.
It seems, when they reach the usual location in question, that Marx’s fears were warranted. There’s several constables present.
“I told you, Marx will be here! Heard it from the man’s own lips! Now, about my payment.”
“You’ll get your thirty pieces, chum, don’t you worry,” one of the policemen replies.
Jacob exchanges a look with Evie, as Marx hurriedly takes several steps back from where he was peering around a building to rejoin them.
“It seems the movement is ever doomed to be betrayed from within,” Marx says, and Jacob would truly love to shake this man by the shoulders and ask what on earth about him led to any of this. “Will you fetch the gentleman back here? I would look him in the eye and ask why he went back on his brethren.”
“Sure thing,” Jacob says, then nods to his sister. “Your turn.”
Evie chuckles. “Alright, but we shouldn’t meet here.”
“Graveyard’s close?” Jacob offers with a shrug.
“That’ll do,” Evie says, splitting off to go separate Marx’s former friend from the constables he’s with.
“If you’ll follow me, Mister Marx?” Jacob says, wondering once again how he ended up involved in this nonsense.
He’s still wondering when Evie turns up in said graveyard a couple minutes after them, the snitch’s arm twisted behind his back and (Jacob assumes) the constables he was with none the wiser.
“Simon. My friend,” Marx opens with, “What possessed you to do this thing? Has the Party not taken care of you?”
(What the hell is this Party?)
“The guv’nor at the mill say any man what joins a union, he’ll be put out of work come sunup,” Simon replies. “How long will the Party feed my family for?”
“If we do not stand together, we are lost.” Marx sighs. “My heart is broken, Simon. Please go.”
Simon goes. And only then does Marx turn to at least one very confused Assassin (if Evie’s equally confused by this, she’s hiding it better) and say, “I thank you, my friends. I hope you will continue to aid the struggle when the opportunity presents itself.”
“You’re... welcome?” Jacob says uncertainly.
He hopes Miss Corwin is having a less confusing night than he is.
The good news is that her night seems to be going much better than Jacob’s. The better news is that he’s scarcely set foot into the train car when her head snaps over and she smiles at him.
(Jacob doesn’t have to look back to know that Evie is giving him a very knowing look behind his back. So he doesn’t.)
Instead, he smiles back at her and makes his way over. She marks her place in the book she has open in her lap and sets it aside in favor of looking up at him. Her brow furrows slightly.
“Did you get into a fight?”
“Started one,” Jacob says cheerfully. “How did you know?”
“She does have eyes, Jacob,” says Evie.
“You have blood on your sleeves,” Miss Corwin says simply.
“So I do.” Jacob glances down at it. “It’s not mine, if that’s what’s eating you.”
Her expression smooths out a bit at that. “Good. So you won, then?”
Jacob grins at her. “What do you take me for?”
Miss Corwin laughs. “You can’t blame me for checking,” she says, playfully shoving at his arm.
He finds himself chuckling too. It’s so easy to laugh around her.
“So how has your night been, Miss Corwin?” Evie asks politely. (It sounds suspiciously like she is also trying not to laugh, definitely at Jacob’s expense.)
She looks over at Evie. “Good,” she says brightly. “Jayadeep left me this to read, and it’s been interesting.”
She holds up the book—more Assassin history, by the look of things—for Evie to see.
Evie brightens. “Is that one of Arno Dorian’s journals?”
Miss Corwin nods. “Translated out of French,” she says. “Which I appreciate, because my French is... nonexistent.”
“Mine is little better,” Evie says, which is a blatant lie but Jacob appreciates her trying not to intimidate Miss Corwin. “What time period, if I may ask? Mister Dorian was... a very different person at the end of his life than when he became an Assassin, to put it lightly.”
“I think this is one of the earlier ones.” She looks down at the book, then back up with a grimace. “Jayadeep may have given me this as a suggestion of... what not to do.”
“He was that bad?” Jacob asks.
Evie lets out a long-suffering sigh. So he’s got to ask, elbowing her with a grin, “Better or worse than I was?”
She elbows him back without hesitation, then says, “Worse.”
Jacob whistles. “And I’ve never heard of him before?”
“I... doubt Father wanted to give you any ideas,” Evie says, though her expression is halfway apologetic.
Well. That would do it. And also rather quickly kills any amusement he was feeling.
“Right,” Jacob mutters, looking down. “I had enough of those on my own.”
Miss Corwin grimaces and sets the book aside.
“You didn’t deliberately discard the Creed to work with the daughter of the former Templar Grand Master,” Evie says.
Jacob thinks he’s entirely justified in how baffled the laugh that escapes him is. “He didn’t.”
“He did,” Miss Corwin says, rubbing the bridge of her nose.
“...Christ,” Jacob says.
“His life was... certainly something,” she says, giving the book a mystified look.
“In fairness,” Evie says, “I believe you could describe a great many prominent Assassins’ lives that way. Potentially including ours.”
Jacob laughs. “Potentially? Evie.”
Evie rolls her eyes, and Miss Corwin hides a giggle behind her hand.
“Say what you will about being an Assassin,” Jacob goes on, “but stay one for long enough and it certainly won’t be boring!”
“Returning to the subject of Jayadeep,” Evie says, as if she’s one to talk about being unsubtle, “where is he, at the moment?”
Miss Corwin gives Jacob a knowing look before she turns back to Evie and replies, “He said something about stopping by his shop.”
Evie smiles. “I’ll see if I can catch him there, then. If you’ll both excuse me...”
They both wave her off, and then Miss Corwin looks at Jacob.
“So... why did you start a fight?” she asks.
Jacob tells her. This eventually results in him explaining the whole confusing situation with one Karl Marx, as much as he can when he’s still baffled by nearly everything about it.
“I’m supposed to be the impulsive twin!” he complains at the end of it, though he’s mostly joking. Mostly.
Miss Corwin laughs and says, “I suppose your sister had other ideas tonight.”
“Suppose so,” Jacob says with a sigh. “It’s still weird, is what it is.”
She pats him on the shoulder, and Jacob finds he minds the weirdness a little bit less in the face of that.