Chapter Text
Izumi Kyouka met Paul Verlaine for the first time in the snow, still bleeding from the ribs from a botched training session held by Akutagawa. Originally, the boss, Mori Ougai, wanted her to train exclusively under him, but the session showed she still needed refinement, one that the unrestrained nature of Rashomon couldn't provide. So she ended up here, climbing the steps to follow Verlaine inside. He didn't wait for her to catch up, disappearing before her eyes adjusted to the darkness.
When she finally entered, they were in a room with no windows, deep in the Port Mafia's underground compound. The place was built out of damp stone, and was colder than outside. Verlaine was seated at the far end, alone, hands clasped in his lap as if waiting for divine judgment. Behind him, the shadows hung like curtains. He didn’t move when she entered, and neither did she. Her eyes trained on his expression- unreadable.
He didn't look up.
“You’re the child,” he said at last. His voice was soft, but not kind like her father. Not cruel either, like Akutagawa's voice. Just… tired.
“And you’re the ghost,” she replied, because she’d heard that, too. That Paul Verlaine wasn’t a man but a weapon with a body. That no one who trained under him returned the same. The only one she had heard survived after training under Verlaine was Akutagawa Gin, and she (having learned she was female only recently) was ruthless in her skill. It took strength to return from such harshness.
But Kyouka wasn’t sure if she wanted to return at all.
Mori had smiled when he handed her over, after Kyouka came back from Akutagawa's sessions more and more broken than remade. “A fitting mentor, for a child like you,” he’d said, like it was a blessing. “You’ll learn well under him. The snow remembers its roots.”
Now, standing before Verlaine, Kyouka didn’t feel anything but cold.
“Sit,” he said.
She did.
They didn’t speak again for hours. Verlaine handed her gauze. She wrapped her ribs. He watched her do it, neither helping nor turning away. When she winced, he didn’t blink. When she finished, he finally stood.
“You’ll train in the mornings. Kill in the evenings. Sleep when permitted.”
Kyouka nodded.
“You hesitate, I’ll leave you behind. You disobey, I’ll break your legs. You kill like they tell you, you’ll live.”
He stepped closer. She didn’t move. His eyes were like knives that didn’t need to cut anymore to hurt.
“Remember. If you want kindness,” he said, “you should’ve died when they did.”
“I didn’t,” she replied, taking all of the grief inside of her and curling it deep within.
His clouded gaze faded in clarity for a moment, and he looked at her like she was real.
“Then you better learn to live like it.”
Training began the next day.
No Demon Snow. No abilities. Just knives, poisons, and the mechanics of death.
Verlaine didn’t speak unless it was to correct her. He moved like a ghost she knew he was and hit like a falling star. The first time she tried to mimic his grip, he disarmed her with a flick of the wrist and left her breathless on the floor.
“Your mother held her knife like a knife,” he said then. “Not a sword. Why don’t you?”
Kyouka stared at him in surprise, in the ache to know. “You knew her?”
“I knew of her.” He walked past her and picked up the blade. “And I know what she became.”
He didn’t say it with scorn to mock her, though. He said it with resignation.
That night, Kyouka didn’t sleep. She sat cross-legged on the futon, back straight, eyes fixed on the mobile phone in her palm. The screen cast a soft glow across her face. She didn’t press play. She didn’t need to. She already knew every word of her mother's last voicemail.
Verlaine watched from the hallway, unseen. He’d been on his way to the armory when he noticed the light. She looked small. Not in the way children looked small, but in the way, survivors did- in the way, things got smaller after the fire, not before it. Compressed. Hardened. It reminded him of Chuuya years ago, when he thought anger was armor and silence was strength.
No tears. Just stillness.
Verlaine leaned against the cold wall and closed his eyes.
He remembered a time he used to mistake stillness and love for control. It took him decades (and blood, and failure, not to mention Rimbaud’s ghost) to realize it wasn’t the same thing. He exhaled through his nose quietly, with careful measurement. This girl wasn't like him, not quite yet. And maybe that meant she didn't have to become him, either.
He pushed off the wall and walked away without a word. Kyouka heard him leave when his footsteps echoed.
She didn’t look up.