Cesare looked around as the cafeteria door closed behind him. The teachers weren’t always here for breakfast, but they rarely missed lunch. Some day’s Elizabeth even joined them. Judging the time, Cesare led the group to the line to collect their trays.

Taking a seat at their table, Cesare smiled as Alexandra gave her prayer. It wasn’t that he thought God liked him or gave two shits about the world. He went along with it because he knew how much it meant to Alexandra. If it was worth her killing and dying for, it was worth him respecting.

Instead of reaching for his books, he watched the room, pieces falling into place as the plan coalesced out of angles and need. The girls didn’t talk or take out their books. They'd learned when Cesare turned inward to leave him alone. This was why they were with him, the flashes of black brilliance born out of malice and cruelty. There had been a time when they'd ask what the plan was, but that time was long past and dead before it could rip its way from the womb. He expected them to back him no matter the play, just as he'd kill for them. They were in this together, they hung together or by God they’d hang apart.

Elizabeth and Viktor came in late. The man looked as if a semi-truck had dragged him over three miles of bad road. His arm was in a sling, a hard-packed cast of black plaster encasing it from fingertip to shoulder. A slow dragging step marked the broken ribs and dislocated hip that had come from tangling with the edge of Kali's temper.

Even days after the school had gotten their first look at the beaten man whispers still followed Victor. No one knew what happened, but everyone agreed it had something to do with Cesare. It was one more rumor to add to the clinging shadows that surrounded him.

When the teachers were well into their food, Cesare stood, pulled into his wake the girls rose with him. The closest tables hushed as the Furies passed, prey knowing when the black tide moved with purpose, someone was going to get fucked up.

Taking the center of the room, Cesare gathered the student’s eyes, letting the moment build, a tinge of cruelty lighting his eyes. “Abraxas.” The word coated the air with a skim of corruption, quiet as betrayal, soft as poison.

All eyes turned to the dragon. Sitting at a table by himself, Abraxas slowly raised his head, looking at Cesare with cool disinterest. Setting his cup down, the dragon stood, summoning Blaez to him with a look. The last two members of the Thagirion joined up as they crossed the cafeteria. Pantagruel was out of commission in the infirmary, word was they transferring him to a hospital for rehabilitation.

Cesare watched them come, keeping the teachers table in the corner of his eye, knowing it was only a matter of time before Jerold backed his boys up. As the Thagirion entered the open space, Cesare pounced. “The Thagirion have a deal with the Brain Trust. A long-standing arrangement from what I’m told.”

Abraxas lips thinned in carefully controlled anger. Blaez paled, going white with realization. Jerold almost leapt to his feet, making for the group with steps a shade from running. Elizabeth followed behind the icehole, ready to cover Cesare's play.

Abraxas darted a look at the approaching teachers’, eyes running percentages and what ifs. “The Brain Trust has always supported the Thagirion.” Abraxas hedged, playing for time.

Cesare nodded. “You should really be giving them some kick back money. I know I'd cut them green if they were doing my homework for me.” It was just loud enough to reach the students. Shocked silence held the watcher’s eyes locked on the confrontation, anger trickling into eyes.

“I think we can take this somewhere private,” Jerold said, coming between the two groups, worry tightening his eyes.

Smiling at the man, Cesare prepared to sink the knife in. “Oh, that’s right, you were a Thagirion too. How much of your homework did the Brain Trust do for you?” A chocked off laugh split from the crowd.

“I resent that accusation,” Jerold ground out in a mist of super chilled air.

Shrugging, Cesare met the teachers cold anger. “I resent busting my ass to pass a class when golden boys get free rides,” Cesare said mildly, sweeping the crowd with a calculating look, gauging how they were taking the con.

“Is this true?” Elizabeth asked, coming up behind Cesare. The placement had nothing to do with chance. It was a statement; letting the school know her backing of the Furies went beyond sponsoring them.

“I think there are better places to have this discussion than in the middle of the cafeteria,” Jerold said, sidestepping the question with quiet desperation.

“You mean the students don't have a right to know the Thagirion have a deal with Brain Trust to do their homework? Or maybe you don’t want anyone to know your degree's based on other people’s work?” There was a moment when rage burned the man’s eyes, a long second where Cesare was sure the man would go for his throat.

“I never used Brain Trust,” Jerold spat out, ice creeping across the floor as the temperature plummeted. Sarah was coming through the crowd fast, eyes never leaving the seething form of the ice creature.

“So, there is a deal in place.” The statement drew low whistles from the crowd. The students slow building anger flared into roaring fire as they realized the biggest cheaters, were the ones in charge of catching the cheaters.

Jerold glared out at the crowd, skin writhing, tentacles of corruption squirming under the mask of humanity. Students averted their eyes at the black rage that swam through the man’s blue eyes. Locking onto Cesare, the man took one long step forward, mist rising from his hands.

Sarah caught Jerold’s shoulder in a white knuckled grip, stopping him. Whipping around, his temper settled under her unflinching eyes. “I'm saying that these allegations should be taken through proper channels,” Jerold growled out in a cloud of frozen vapor.

Cesare nodded sagely. “Of course. Those channels would be the ones accused of cheating for centuries, right?” His words focused the crowd, honing their anger. “The same ones that guarantee our safety while kids get sent to the infirmary. The ones advocating the strongest are entitled to take what they want from the weak. Isn’t that what you said Abraxas, something about lions and gazelles?”

Abraxas was watching the crowd with Cesare, but he didn’t look nearly as happy. There would never be any charges against the Thagirion. But Cesare wasn’t hunting charges, he wanted to drive a wedge between them and the school, to starkly mark out the difference between the Thagirion and the Furies. Mob rule had its own power, one that didn't care about truth, honesty, or issues, feels ruled its blade. And Cesare could make it feel good.

Abraxas held his tongue, realizing he'd lost. Cesare stepped into the space his question had opened. “Aren’t the scholarships determined by GPA?” Horror skipped from face to face as the fact sunk into the watching students, he could almost see the letters being written home to parents. “Didn’t you get a scholarship, Jerold?”

Taking a deep breath, the man’s eyes darted around at the furious students. No matter what he wanted, this conversation would happen here and now. “I never used the service of the Brain Trust.” Looking at the students, he tried and failed to get someone to meet his eyes.

“I understand,” Cesare said, the poisoned words dripping malice. “Of course, we believe you. After all you’ve done for us, it would be stupid not to. You led the Thagirion when you were in school and now, you’re in charge of the current incarnation.” Students sucked in their breaths, faces souring at the words.

Wincing, Jerold nodded his head, acknowledging the point. Looking over at Sarah, the man seemed to draw strength from her presence. Spreading his hands, his words were for the watching crowd. “The deal was in place before I started school, and while I thought the process sickening, I didn’t think it was my place to change it.”

“Tradition,” Cesare said, snapping the trap shut, relishing Jerold’s sick expression as the steel teeth bit deep. “A tradition where hard working students were passed up for scholarships by rich bitches that could pay. A tradition that made a mockery of teaching. A tradition that let the strong get stronger, condemning the weak to the gutter. Tell me, what happened to the man we caught selling homework assignments?”

Lisp twisting in a grimace, Jerold reluctantly answered, “We hunted down the ring, some were dismissed from school, others were given less harsh sentences.” The words dropped into the silence as the indictment of corruption they were.

“You prosecuted students for the crime the Thagirion's guilty of.” The statement rang through the room, branding the students hearts as the heat of anger cooled into stony hate.

Sighing, Jerold knew he was fucked but his pride wouldn’t let him back down. “It’s not like that. Yes, some Thagirion used the service, but I don’t know of any scholarships given out based on those results.”

“How many of the current Thagirion have used the service?” The whisper was a poisoned knife slipped into a lovers back, deaths bony caress ripping a baby's soul out of rotting flesh.

Blaez looked around with a trapped expression while Abraxas was more uncomfortable by the moment. Hesitating, Jerold’s eyes swept over the crowd, looking for words to turn the massacre. There was nothing but a sea of enemies where he used to have friends. “I don’t know .…”

Smiling tightly, Cesare purred into the silence. “Easy enough to find out, what kind of Thagirion would lie to the entire school?” The rhetorical question underscored a line in the hearts of the students, everyone knew the Thagirion had been doing that for centuries now. “Blaez, have you used the Brain Trust?”

Placed front and center, the wolf bit back a snarl. “You're one to talk with those two doing your homework.” The statement pushed Cesare into the light. Everyone knew the girls helped him with his classes, it was only a small step from that to doing the work for him.

Laughing, Cesare met the flaring eyes of the wolf. “Anyone whose seen my grades knows no one's doing my work but me.” The crowd burst into genuine laughter. It was an open secret that Cesare was one of the worst students in school. “I wonder what your grades show.” The statement neatly placed everyone’s eyes on the wolf. But the boy had learned his lesson, this time he kept his mouth shut.

Smiling, Cesare stepped back, Anastasia moving into the space, no words needed to be said, no cues given, they knew each other that well. She took the Thagirion in with a hint of distaste. “The Brain Trust is under the protection of the Furies. No longer will they be forced to do the Thagirion’s work to keep from being victimized. All students deserve a safe place, not just those that pay the Thagirion.” Her voice rang out beautifully clear through the room. Hardened anger shifted to hope at her words. Cesare would never inspire hope in anyone but the most desperate of people.

“We'll leave the matter of punishment to the Thagirion,” Anastasia said, neatly extricating the Furies from the matter.

Relief flooded Jerold’s eyes until he saw the deeper game played. Raw, frustrated fury contorted their faces when they got it. For the Furies to get deeper into the problem would dilute the slaughter of today. It was easy to point out problems and hold people up as failures, but it was damn near impossible to fix them.

No matter what the Thagirion did to redress the balance, the Furies would be there to call it a failure of corruption. They'd be safe in the place of the righteous, their words taken as fact. The way to break a political dissident wasn’t to fight them, it was to offer them a place in government.