Well, shit.

  Su stood at the edge of the forest, staring down at the sprawling mess of Eldermount. It looked the same. A bustling, noisy, headache-inducing monument to everything she’d rather be avoiding.

  Last time she’d seen this place, she’d been a goddamn war hero. Lord Crestfall, the Immortal Scam, Savior of Elderwood. Now? She was just a nobody.

  The two quests pulsed in her vision, a pair of glowing, annoying to-do lists.

  OBJECTIVE: THE CHAIN OF GOLD - Stop Vane's transaction. (Get gud, noob)

  REWARD: LEVEL 5, SABOTAGE SKILL

  OBJECTIVE: SELF-ACTUALIZATION - Find Lana. (You know, the one who turned your ribs into gravel? Yeah, her.)

  *WARNING: SHE'S OUT THERE. PROBABLY BUYING A NEW HAMMER.

  The system, being its usual helpful self, decided now was the perfect time to chime in with a "suggestion."

  SUGGESTED PATH: SEEK ALLIANCE WITH COMMANDER AKSEN. REPUTATION BONUSES MAY APPLY. INITIATE ‘AUDIENCE WITH THE KING’ QUEST CHAIN.

  Su let out a snort that was half-laugh, half-gag. Oh, hell no, she muttered. I am not doing that song and dance again. I am not getting involved in your stupid war or becoming your feathery general, and I am definitely not letting that tired old king look at me like I'm a talking paperweight.

  She was not following the script. The system could shove its "suggested paths" right up its glowing, metaphorical ass.

  Her plan was simple.

  Step one: Get into the city without being seen. (Easy. She was a master of being drab and uninteresting.)

  Step two:Find out what shiny thing Vane was selling. (Probably something that went boom.)

  Step three:Ruin his day so spectacularly that the Chancellor wept into his silk handkerchiefs.

  Step four:Locate Lana. And then... well, she hadn't decided on step four yet. A strongly worded peck? A psychic projection of the hammer coming down on her head? The options were plentiful.

  She just waddled in behind a hay cart, looking for all the world like someone's lost, disappointing livestock. The guards didn't even blink.

  The streets were a chaotic with the smells and sounds of baking bread, horse shit, cheap perfume, and the constant yelling of merchants. It was overwhelming, but also… familiar, in a really annoying way.

  Her first stop was instinctual. The seedier part of town, near the docks. Where information was cheaper than the ale.

  She found a tavern called The Leaky Bucket. It looked like it was held together by grime and regret. Perfect.

  She didn't go through the kitchen. That was a one-way ticket to becoming tomorrow's special. Instead, she slipped in through the main door, blending into the shadowy corner near the hearth. The place was packed with dockworkers, sailors, and a few people who looked like they’d stab you for your shoes.

  Her eyes scanned the room and spotted her mark: two dockworkers, already three sheets to the wind, complaining loudly about their boss.

  "...and then he says, 'Hurry up with them Vane crates!'" one slurred, slamming his tankard down. "I says, 'They're heavy as a dead dragon, mate! Clank like a bag of swords!'"

  Bingo.

  The other worker shook his head. "Aye, and the dockmaster's walkin' around with a new gold chain thick enough to anchor a ship. Paid off, he is. Meanwhile, my back's near broken."

  Su absorbed the info.

  SKILL UNLOCKED: ‘SHADOW LISTENING’ (NOVICE)

  EFFECT: YOU ARE UNNATURALLY GOOD AT BEING IGNORED. SLIGHTLY INCREASES EAVESDROPPING EFFICIENCY IN CROWDED, DISREPUTABLE AREAS.

  Satisfied, she turned to leave and that's when it happened.

  A massive, ham-fisted dockworker, lurching back from the bar, stumbled and kicked a half-empty tankard. It skittered across the floor, its foamy contents splashing directly over Su’s dull feathers.

  The man blinked down at her. "Oi. What's this ugly pigeon doin' in here?"

  Before Su could even process the insult, the man's face split into a drunken, predatory grin. "Lookit that! Free supper!"

  He lunged for her.

  WTF!!

  Su squawked, darting between his legs. The man roared, stumbling and crashing into a table, sending cards and coins flying. The tavern erupted into chaos.

  She scrambled under tables and between legs, a blur of wet, beer-scented feathers. She burst out the back door of the tavern into a grimy alley, the sounds of a burgeoning bar fight echoing behind her.

  She shook herself, sending droplets of cheap ale flying. So much for a quiet information-gathering mission.

  The western docks were her next stop. And there he was. Alistair Vane, overseeing the loading of a sleek, non-descript merchant vessel. The crates being hauled up the plank were indeed heavy, and they did indeed clank.

  NEW SUB-OBJECTIVE: ‘THE CHAIN OF GOLD’

  SABOTAGE THE SHIPMENT. SUGGESTED METHOD: CUT THE PRIMARY DOCK LINE. (BORING.)

  If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  Cut a line? Lame. The system had no imagination.

  Su’s eyes scanned the dock, landing on a different, much more interesting solution. A group of sailors were rolling a huge barrel marked with a giant ‘X’ and the word “GROG” towards the ship. The universal symbol for "really strong alcohol for sailors who have given up on life."

  She waited until the grog barrel was positioned right at the top of the gangplank, directly above where Vane was standing, checking a manifest. She focused, pulling on her Mimicry skill. She mimicked the sound of splintering wood.

  It was a sharp CRACK that echoed right from the base of the grog barrel.

  The sailors holding it yelped, instinctively leaping back. The barrel, suddenly "unstable," wobbled precariously.

  Vane looked up, his eyes widening. "You idiots! Steady that—!"

  It was too late. With a final, glorious lurch, the barrel tipped over the edge of the gangplank. It didn't just fall. It exploded.

  A wave of cheap alcoholic grog drenched Alistair Vane, his manifest, and half the sailors on the dock. The crate he’d been standing next to, now soaked, slipped from a worker's grasp and smashed open on the cobblestones, revealing not weapons, but… finely crafted clockwork components? Gears and springs glittered in the grog-puddle.

  Vane stood there, dripping, reeking of alcohol. He let out a roar.

  OBJECTIVE COMPLETE: THE CHAIN OF GOLD

  REWARD: +500 XP! LEVEL UP! SPECKLESS PEACOCK IS NOW LEVEL 5!

  NEW SKILL UNLOCKED: ‘SABOTAGE’ (NOVICE) - YOU HAVE A KNACK FOR CREATIVE, DESTRUCTIVE SOLUTIONS.

  Warm power flooded her. Level 5. It was a hell of a start.

  But the victory was short-lived. As she melted back into the shadows of a stack of crates, she saw him. Vane, wiping grog from his face, was now talking to a city guardsman and he was pointing. Not in her direction, thank god, but his description was probably "a really pissed-off, dull-colored bird."

  Time to go.

  She ducked into a narrow alley, her heart pounding with adrenaline and satisfaction and that’s when she saw her.

  At the other end of the alley, haggling with a fabric merchant over a bolt of simple, blue cloth, was Lana.

  Smiling, haggling, playing the part of a sweet village girl so perfectly it made Su’s doubt her own memory.

  The system flashed a prompt.

  OBJECTIVE: SELF-ACTUALIZATION - NEUTRALIZE THE AGENT.

  SUGGESTED METHOD: LETHAL FORCE. ELIMINATE THE THREAT TO HOST'S SURVIVAL.

  Lethal force? With what? My devastating charm? Su clucked. I'm Level 5, not John Wick. Piss off.

  Killing Lana here, in broad daylight, was impossible and missed the point.

  She shadowed Lana through the city. Lana bought her cloth, then some bread, then, interestingly, a cheap whetstone. For sharpening what, exactly? Su thought, an amusement washing over her.

  Lana’s destination was a house with a little garden. Su watched from a nearby maple tree as a middle-aged couple greeted Lana at the door with practiced, parental warmth. More actors in the Chancellor's sick play.

  Okay, Su thought, her mind whirring. Direct violence is out. Psychological warfare is in. It's time to make her job a living hell.

  Her chance came that afternoon. The "father" left. The "mother" was hanging laundry and Lana was in the back garden, kneeling in the dirt, tenderly planting petunias.

  Su’s eyes scanned the environment, landing on the neighbor’s prize-winning rooster, a preening bastard named King Cletus, and a bag of chicken feed leaning against the fence.

  She hopped over, tore a hole in the feed bag with her beak, and created a tempting trail leading directly to Lana's pristine petunia bed. Then, she turned to King Cletus and mimicked the specific, territorial crow of his greatest rival, projecting the sound from right in the middle of Lana's flowers.

  King Cletus’s head snapped up. His comb flushed crimson. He saw the challenge and the bait. With a screech of avian fury, he launched himself over the fence and charged.

  What followed was a beautiful, chaotic ballet of destruction. Flapping wings, flying dirt, shredded petals. Lana scrambling backward as the enraged rooster laid waste to her gardening efforts. The "mother" came running, screaming. Neighbors poured into the street.

  And from her perch, Su watched, preening.

  As Lana stood there, stunned and covered in a fine layer of soil, Su made her move. She swooped down, landing on the fence post directly in front of her.

  Their eyes met.

  For a split second, there was nothing but confusion on Lana’s face. Just a girl looking at a weird, dirty bird. Then, Su focused. She pulled the voice of the Keeper, Torben, from her memory, that dry and rustling tone. She wrapped a clear sentence in that voice and projected it directly into Lana’s mind.

  "The specimen has deviated. The asset is compromised. Report the anomaly."

  Lana’s face went blank with shock. The color drained from her cheeks. She stared at the dull, speckled peacock, her mouth slightly agape. It wasn't recognition—it was the system-shocking confusion of receiving a cryptic message from a source that made no sense. A bird had just telepathically given her a classified-sounding order in the voice of someone she'd presumably never met.

  "Wha…?" she whispered, taking a stumbling step back, shaking her head as if to clear a faulty transmission. "Who's there?"

  Su didn't wait. She gave a final, disdainful flick of her tail feathers and flew off, leaving a ruined garden and a confused assassin in her wake. She hadn't confronted her. She had gaslit her. She had introduced a chaotic variable into the Chancellor's neatly ordered plot. Let her try to explain that in her daily report.

  She found a quiet rooftop to roost on, a strange sense of satisfaction warring with the lingering pull of the Heartfeather. She'd dealt with Lana. She'd dealt with Vane. Now what?

  As dusk began to settle over Eldermount, the answer came from the most unexpected place. A scruffy, street-smart pigeon, its feathers ruffled and one eye permanently squinted, landed on the roof ledge beside her. It wasn't afraid. It cocked its head, studying her with an unnerving intensity.

  Then, it spoke. Not in words, but in a series of images and sensations it pushed directly into her mind, a crude but effective form of psychic communication.

  It showed her an image of the strange, celestial bird from her first timeline—the Sky-Dancer emissary. Then it showed an image of a specific, jagged mountain peak to the north, one that looked like a fang biting the sky. An overwhelming sensation of urgency, of summons, accompanied the images.

  The pigeon then did something bizarre. It strutted in a tight, ritualistic circle around her, cooing softly, before puffing out its chest and presenting her with a gift. It was an iridescent beetle, still wriggling.

  QUEST OFFERED: ‘THE PIGEON’S PLEA’

  A LOCAL BIRD OF LOW INTELLIGENCE BUT KEEN INSTINCT HAS RECOGNIZED THE ‘PEACOCK-SCENT’ ON YOU. IT BELIEVES YOU ARE CONNECTED TO THE ‘SHINY ONES WHO DANCE ABOVE THE CLOUDS’.

  OBJECTIVE: FOLLOW THE PIGEON’S DIRECTIONS TO THE FANGED MOUNTAIN.

  REWARD: ??? (PROBABLY BUGS).

  WARNING: THE PIGEON’S NAVIGATIONAL SKILLS ARE ‘QUESTIONABLE’.

  Su stared at the beetle, then at the pigeon, which was now looking at her with what could only be described as hopeful expectation.

  It's not a grand celestial summons, but a psychic plea from a rat-with-wings who thought she was some kind of feathered royalty because she smelled funny.

  She looked from the pigeon, to the distant, fanged mountain, to the beetle still wriggling pathetically in the bird's beak.

  "Fine," she squawked, snatching the beetle and swallowing it whole. It was crunchier than she expected. "But you're leading the way, you feathery little weirdo. And if this is a wild grub chase, I'm plucking you."

  The pigeon, seemingly understanding, cooed in triumph and took flight, heading north. Su followed, leaving the city of kings and assassins behind, chasing the most unreliable guide imaginable toward the source of all her problems.