Four

Penelope stared at the man in silence while the man stared back at her.  

She licked her lips nervously as she lets out. "When did you know?" 

"When I grabbed your wrist." The man replied. "What on earth would possess a lady to go through such an unscrupulous scheme? What will your parents say? They must be sick with worry and even if you are an orphan, what will your relatives think? Females are not meant to roam and sleep in streets, they are always taken care of…" Vallas rants filling the room with his anger, maybe one of the reasons why this hits too close to his feelings was because the girl he was supposed to get married to do something of this sort in a bid to escape getting married to a warrior. She was found out as a girl while escaping and was killed in the worse nightmare available to a lady. And it is like this Girl in front of him wanted to follow in Riya footsteps. 

"By being married without their opinion. I don't want to get married to someone who isn't my choice and I will not be forced to." Penelope whispered fiercely cutting Vallas short as he stared at the girl in front of him with an amazed look. If only she was a male, she would have shook the empire, he would have trained her to be the perfect little protégé and the world would have bowed at his feet. 

"And your parents, don't you think that they are worried sick about your disappearance instead. If they had known that it would have resulted to this, don't you think that they would have listened to your opinion on the man and wouldn't have forced you?" 

"I didn't have a choice, I left for my parents, and this is the only way which they would get to survive." Penelope jumped up, too heated to stay still while Vallas pricked her conscience with his words, making her feel more like a failure and sad of her decisions even though she knew that it was the only one she could have taken. "And it didn't matter if they had listened to my opinion or not, the bastard refused to listen to no. My parents never wanted him for me." 

Vallas rubbed his forehead as he listened to the girl who was pacing, she was clearly agitated but he wouldn't let up on his interrogation. He needed the truth and if he had to pressure her into giving the full story which was making out to be more interesting with the little tidbits she was offering then he would. "What happened? I want the full story."

"And if I don't want to share?" Penelope returns glaring into Vallas eyes. 

Vallas was the picture of calm when he shrugged like he couldn't care less of what happens. "Then I send you to a whore house, I get paid for you wasting my time and Cain would never think to look for you there and when I do need the information which you have, I will come back to buy you free and you will be grateful enough to tell me everything I want to know." 

Penelope flinched so hard, throwing herself as far from Vallas as possible but it still didn't change his words or stop them from being true, she would be grateful if he did save her from a place like that to offer him anything he wants to know. "You don't have any power over me to make that kind of decision." Penelope voice shook no matter how much she tried to hide the tremors in them. 

"And who will stop me, You have no family around you to stop me from laying claim to you." Vallas said cruelly and when Penelope knelt down shakily as tears fall from her eyes, Vallas softened his tone. "And that is why females stay with their family no matter what because there are worse scenarios which exists. Now tell me why you feel it was worth it for you to leave your family." 

"Because they would have protected me until the end and that is not a good thing at all because the platoon sent to my village would have done everything possible to make me hang for my crimes."

"And what are the crimes?" Vallas asked and when Penelope turned her face away, he continued. "You know that I am not the bad person here but I can be if you are proving difficult, I already own you without knowing your deadly secrets, me knowing them will not change anything and you are aware of that fact."

"I killed a man. He was the leader of the platoon sent to my district." Penelope whispered as Vallas leant back into his chair with shock. He would have never expected to hear that, not in a million years. Penelope raised her head and looked at Vallas with a hard glint in her eyes. "And I would have done that again if I was still in the same situation as before." 

"Interesting." Was all Vallas could mutter. Penelope, it would seem is the perfect choice for his purpose, whether she was a girl or not. "Go on." He urged her to tell the entire story and she obliged. 

"My father is a retired army officer, he wore the golden Raven on his amour. One day a new Platoon was posted to our village and it started its dictatorial reign which my father couldn't stand for. My father disgust drew Lieutenant Dinos attention to my family and my attitude kept it. He wanted to own me and break me and none of us wanted that. We tried everything to shake the man attention away from me but he didn't budge. He was fixated on me to the extent that I had guards watching my every steps, he sent flowers which I didn't want, find excuses to touch me, creeping me out and when he saw that my father was not going to hand me over to him, he started with the threats, my mother business was the first to go. Then a fire was set on our crops. I tried to send a message outside the district to people who could help but he intercepted it and threatened to almost kill my mother, it was clear to other that we were his targets so they distance themselves away from us. I couldn't blame them, I would have done the same thing, as if all the grief he caused my family wasn't enough, he tried to rape me so I killed him. 

"It was not intentional but it is something which I would do over and over again if I was faced with that scenario. My body belong to no one but me. After killing him, I went home, got as much as I could carry without arousing suspicions and stole off. Eventually people will connect the dots but I hope that their wrath on my parents won't be as much as it ought to be if I was still there." Penelope finished her sad tale with her face turned away from Vallas as he digested all that she had told him. 

"You did the right thing." Vallas said as Penelope turned her teary eyes to look at him in shock but he continued. "Your father would have been very proud of you, I am very proud of you." 

"Why?" Penelope asked confused. "I killed a man and you are proud?"

Yes I am, I am proud because you killed a man for your belief, all I need to do is make you believe in what I believe and you will reign down wrath of the likes nobody has ever seen because you believe in it being the right thing.  That was Vallas thought but he didn't say so.  "Precisely so." Vallas replied as Penelope brow went even lower in confusion. 

"I am not a killer."  Penelope voiced. 

"I don't want a killer. I just want someone who will be just. Someone who has enough reason to hate the likes of that lieutenant, people like Cain. Someone who has enough drive to want to bring them down. And right now, you are this person." Vallas replied as he stood up.

"I am a girl." Penelope protested. 

"And you weren't to be stopped then, now that you are a boy, nothing can stop you." 

Penelope brows cleared from her confusion, she understood what the man was offering her. A chance to maintain her new identity. "I get to remain Penn with you?"

"I only know Penn." Vallas returns. 

"And if I say no?" Penelope prods as Vallas smiled. 

"We will be like family, I don't want you to have any reason not to trust me so it will be best if I don't answer that." Vallas responded as Penelope nodded her head. 

"Good enough and now, what next?" she asked him.

Vallas offered his hand for a hand shake. "Be my son, my ward, my legacy and my heir. We will correct the wrongs in the empire and we will do more than survive, we will thrive." 

Penelope mulls the offer within her, it was better than what she had currently which was nothing and who knows, maybe with this, she could get to return home one day and help her real parents. She looked at Vallas, he will be a formidable foe to have but also a formidable friend too. If she does what he wants, he will always have her back, no matter what. The devil and the high sea, it was said. She took his hand in agreement to be his legacy. She chose to the devil.