"Where did you even get all that shit." Emery shrugged in response.

"I borrowed it."

"From who?"

"Does it matter?" I knew it didn't matter what I said, Emery wasn't going to tell me.

"I like disguises," Emery said suddenly, a little smirk on his face. "They're fun." I suddenly was met with the realization that I hardly knew anything about Emery. I had no idea his past, where his ridiculous swordsmanship came from, his social status, only that he was an argumentive prick with mysterious tattoos. I leaned forward in my chair slightly.

"Hey Emery, you some sort of actor or something?" The other boy looked at me, his expression unreadable.

"I guess you could say that...in a way. I always wanted to be one. When I was little my uncle took me to see a show and I thought it was the greatest thing I had ever seen." He sighed, almost wistfully. "My uncle and I used to be close like that. He would take me out to see all sorts of productions. Plays and operas and carnivals, I loved them all! One day I even tried to run away to become an actor but as you can probably guess that plan didn't exactly work out- ah!" His dark eyes suddenly widened at the sound of a door opening and a small group of men entering. He looked back to me again and mouthed the words, 'keep talking'.

"Uhhh," I just kept staring at Emery struggling to find something to say. I was vaguely aware of the men Emery had been watching sitting down behind us. "I never really got to see theater as a kid growing up. I was poor and I uh...my sister and I lived on the streets for quite some time." I got Emery's attention suddenly with that, though I wasn't exactly sure why.

"Your sister? What was she like?" I shut my eyes for a moment, trying to remember her.

"She was kind, and she always looked out for me." That was until she suddenly abandoned me out of nowhere. "I would have done anything for her. She was all I had."

"Had?"

I caught myself almost immediately after I said it there was no way I was telling Emery my entire backstory, especially because I had no idea how he knew so much about me. He already knew I was here because of a rigged tournament there was no need for me to tell him anything more. I simply shook my head.

"I don't want to talk about it...okay?" Emery looked like he wanted to say something more but surprisingly left the matter alone. Suddenly Emery leaned across the table and grabbed me by the back of the head pulling my face close to him.

"What the hell are you..."

"Fight with me," he whispered softly. I stared back at him, a clear look of confusion on my face.

"What?" Emery rolled his eyes before hissing.

"Prove to me you're not the dumbass I think you are just fight with me you asshole. Call me a whore." I had no idea what was going on but I had already agreed to Emery's plan there was no going back now, at least I would get to insult Emery with no consequences this time.

"You...whore."

"Louder," Emery whispered. Sighing I stood up and yelled about as loudly as I could,

"YOU WHORE." This got the attention of almost everyone in the tavern and I could almost immediately feel the dozens of eyes on me. Emery faked a sob.

"Oh Adam! How could you! We were supposed to get married, I've been nothing but loyal to you. How could you do this to your poor sweet Agnes." He put a hand to his head and faked a swoon.

"I uh..." Emery gave me a desperate nod to keep going. "How can I trust you? I've seen the way you look at him...him the uh...baker!" Emery gasped.

"The baker! My love you claimed that it was the miller yesterday and the fisherman the day before. You are so jealous, I love you Adam, I would never do anything to betray you." He faked a sob.

"I don't want to hear it Agnes. Your lies mean nothing to me now."

"Adam I have no where else to go! You're all I have. I spent my life savings to support you! Now I see, you were just using me for my money and now that you have it you want nothing to do with me! You're just finding a way to get rid of me so you can do the same thing to another pretty face. Curse you Adam, curse you!" He was shrieking with such intensity even I almost forgot he was just acting. I opened my mouth to say something but he dashed off. I saw him run over to the group of men we had seen walking earlier and I could only pick up a bit of their conversations.

"I'm sorry...he's so cruel to me. May I sit with you please? I just need..." another fake sob, "some kind words and a nice meal."

"Of course, let me buy you a drink miss."

"Oh thank you sir! Thank you! My...it's a bit chilly."

"You can borrow my coat."

Well, it looked like Emery's ability to manipulate men was even more increased when he was dressed as a woman. I stared at the floor trying to make my eavesdropping a little less obvious. I could still feel some eyes on me giving me small glares.

"Hey," one of the men behind me at the table with Emery suddenly said. "You ever been to this tavern before."

"No sir."

"I hear they always need some music. You got a pretty voice to fit that lovely face, we'd love to hear you sing darling."

"Oh I..." I could practically hear the smile in Emery's voice. "Why of course sir." I heard one of the men call the tavern keeper over and then watched out of the corner of my eye as Emery was led to the piano. An elderly man had been sitting there almost the entire time we had been there plucking away at some kind of tune that just sort of faded into the background. I heard them whispering a bit, probably agreeing upon some song both parties knew before Emery stepped forward. Great, Emery was good at everything, no question he was about to be lapping in the attention this little stunt was about to get him. Emery opened his mouth to sing and I prepared for an angelic voice to match his appearance. What came out of his mouth was...probably the worst singing voice I had ever heard in my life. It sounded like something between a seagull screeching and some poor animal being murdered. I could hardly listen to whatever folk song Emery was singing because I was trying so hard to hold myself together and not just burst out laughing. I could tell others around me were trying to do the same. The worst part was that Emery didn't seem to be aware of how terrible his singing was, on the contrary he appeared to think that his voice was the most beautiful thing known to man. Don't laugh, I kept telling myself, concentrate on the lyris. Emery was singing, or attempting to anyways, some old folk song from the northern edges of the kingdom. I had heard it a few times before.

"Child dear so cold and young, in my arms such a tender one. Head towards the door and wait for me there." I blinked, that last line. I didn't remember that being in the song. Was it a new verse that had been added? "Outside I'll teach you trust me child." Emery was staring at me and I stared back, finding my gaze locked onto those dark brown eyes. He sang that strange last verse yet again. "Head towards the door and wait for me there." Then it hit me. Emery was trying to tell me to leave the building and wait for him outside. Feeling stupid I tried to casually stand up and exit out of the tavern. All eyes had been on my earlier but now with everyone's attention glued to Emery and his God awful singing I was actually able to make my escape hardly being noticed. Finally I made it out and was standing in the middle of the street. I had no idea how long I was going to have to wait for Emery. Suddenly I saw a figure approaching at a rapid pace, some plump middle aged man was running through the streets as if his life depended on it. I straightened, confused. What the hell?

"HELP!" The man yelled, clearly out of breathe. "SOMEONE HELP ME! THESE PEOPLE ARE INSANE-" and then I saw what the man was running from. Munny, Gani, Gerner and Alexander had somehow all teamed together and were currently charging after this man down the street.

"NICKY GET OUT OF THE WAY!" Gerner yelled. Suddenly I saw him hoist Munny up and all of a sudden the boy sprung landing on the man's shoulders and knocking him to the ground. The other's surrounded him crowding around the fallen man. I made eye contact for a moment with Gani, but the boy just shook his head mouthing the words, 'I didn't approve of this'. Gerner grabbed the poor man by the collar hoisting him up.

"Where is the vial old man? Don't make me ask more than once!" The man shook his head.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Liar! Search him!" Alexander nodded beginning to go through the man's pockets. Gerner grinned. "Okay, remember once we find the vial we're going to do a draw to which team gets it, then we'll help the other team get their vial-"

"He has nothing on him," Alexander shook his head. "We uh...we just tackled some random guy." Gerner let go of the man slowly. I could see Gani simply shaking his head behind him.

"I am...so sorry," Gerner said forcing an awkward laugh. "We were sure you were someone else uh...can I buy you a drink-" the disheveled man shook his head before bolting as if his life depended on it. "Woah...I could have sworn we had the right guy. That was uh...awkward." Gani sighed stepping forward.

"It wouldn't have been if you hadn't decided we needed to catch him."

"Touche."

Munny pulled at my sleeve now.

"Hey Nicky? What's with that weird jacket." I blinked, totally forgetting I was wearing it.

"Oh uh...Emery gave it to me. I don't know where he got it or where he got..." Munny arched a grow.

"Got what?"

"Well...Emery is kind of dressed as a woman right now."

If Gerner had been drinking he would have spit at that.

'He WHAT?"

"I don't know!" I said with a shrug. "He said it was part of his plan." Gerner grinned now.

"Well he hasn't succeeded yet. We just passed Orla a few minutes ago before the whole...err chase thing. She said no one had found any of them yet."

"Until now," a voice suddenly chimed from behind us. And there was Emery, still dressed in a pink dress and blonde wig, the vial held in his hand. Everyone's mouth seemed to drop open and I wasn't sure if it was from the outfit, the vial or both. Emery just smirked giving me a little wink. "See? I told you I could get it."
"How did you...?" Emery chuckled, I knew I didn't even have to ask the dozens of questions buzzing around in my head. Emery was such a show off he would be more than happy to tell us every detail of his plan.

"Well, first of all I decided to take a different approach. I knew everyone was going to be looking for men that looked like assassins so I instead decided to look for the men who looked like actors. There aren't many places to go in any town really and everyone has to eat. Thus I decided the tavern would be the best place to try and scope people out. There were three groups of them after all and all three groups wouldn't stick together so it was quite obvious at least one of them would come in there. I knew whoever they were would be on the lookout for the Kingsmen in training which meant that they wouldn't be anywhere near as alert with none near by. They're on the lookout for boys, not women so I knew disguising myself as a girl was the best course of action."

"Where did you even get that by the way-"

"Nicky I'm TALKING!" He cleared his throat again. "Anyways, I disguised Nicky and I before starting to look out for them. I knew who they were almost the second they entered. Their jackets were made with fabric from Katras, I could tell from the fray on the side. The fabric is more for show and is supposed to look more expensive than it costs. There's no practical use for it so normal townsfolk wouldn't have any use for it, actors on the other hand are a whole other animal. They both looked around before entering which is another clue and the most obvious of all judging from the third man's roots... blonde was most certainly not his natural hair color. Now as we all know only two types of people in towns like this would have hair dye, actors and prostitutes. Judging from the man's face he was clearly not the later. Aha! But how could I tell these were the fake assassins and not normal actors? I had to go with my gut!" Emery's long ass monologue was making my head spin but I still tried to follow along the best I could. "Anyways, I forged a distraction, a fight with Nicky so they would be thinking of that and not well...staying alert and guarded. I managed to get one to take off his jacket which luckily allowed me to see the clear line of the vial in his pocket. Then it was only a matter of stealing it. They weren't on alert so when they asked me to go up to sing so I merely swiped it when going past them and voila." He held up the vile once more triumphantly.

"Woah..." was all Munny managed to say, the rest all nodding in agreement. I guess I really had gotten lucky being paired with Emery. Despite myself...and I hated to admit this more than anyone, but I was actually kind of impressed and maybe even a little proud. Gerner finally ran a hand through his hair.

"Well it looks like there's only two more vials left." He nodded to Munny and Alexander. "We probably should split up again. Best of luck." He gave them a little salute before turning to Emery and I. "And congratulations you two." Emery turned to me now.

"Alright well we better get this baby to Orla." I nodded in response and we began to turn away from the others. Emery was still a mystery to me. There was so much I didn't know about him. Yet...this still was great...this was more points going into the final tournament. The final tournament...then it hit me. This was all almost over. Next week we would compete among ourselves and then it would be over. I would finally be besides the false prince. For some reason this realization made my skin crawl.