"Oh, you're too forward." Camilla smiled cordially at Harman.

  "Oh do pardon me, but you're just so honest," The chairman said, his smile not reaching all the way."It's abnormal, putting it bluntly, for me to find someone with whom I may discuss things so plainly.

  It's like warm honeyed treats rarely sold in winters, but when you do find one it's oh so sweet."

  She laughed in a most lady-like fashion. "I'm pleased to have the honour to entertain one such as yourself."

  This pulled the edges of his lips fully up, turning them into a genuine expression of gratitude. "And I thank you for your company, Madame Arcwood."

  They walked through the mana-lit hallway on soft rose carpet, guided by Lilin. Camilla had been pleasently surprised this evening. At Lemont's invitation she'd attended a ball in the great chambers on the lower floors. Many of the city's great noblemen and merchants of great renown had come, giving Camilla a better understanding of the sociopolitical situation of the wealthy.

  But what had surprised her the most had to be Harman Kavinor Sublime, a chairman with eyes of stark copper. He smiled with the unnatural ease of a politician, but the way he expressed satisfaction and happiness was in how he spoke.

  Whereas Bermand Markaat held his tongue and skirted around the topic of the Theocracy seizing governmental control over the city in public, Harman was quite outspoken about his hopes for it to happen sooner rather than later. It was quite contrary to both the nature of his position as a city chairman, and as an Alloyed who moved out here to begin with.

  They neared Camilla's quarters and at the door, she turned to Harman.

  "I do hope this won't be a one-time thing," Harman straightened his back and coat. "You're an oddity, albeit an interesting one. And I do hope that we'll meet again. Of course, at your convenience."

  Camilla raised an eyebrow in mock surprise. "You really don't play with your words, do you, Lord Kavinor."

  Harman smirked and bowed. "I find that bluntness is oft the key to quick comradery. Conversation shouldn't be a challenge, it should be something to enjoy as a pleasure. An unfortunately rare one."

  Camilla raised her dress and bowed in return. "And this pleasure you have given me tonight, my lord."

  "Please, call me Harman."

  "Harman it is."

  He stood straight again, and gave a last smile. "Good night, Madame Arcwood."

  "To you too, Lord Harman."

  Harman grinned at the challenge in her voice. Then he walked down a hall to the left of the door, and soon was out of sight.

  Meanwhile, Lilin unlocked the door and stepped inside. Once she was sure it was clear she gestured for Camilla to enter.

  "I pray tonight was to your liking, Madame." She bowed her head as Camilla entered.

  "It was wonderful, Lilin. Do extend my thanks to Master Lemont, I couldn't for the life of me find him down there amongst all the people." She walked over to sit down on a plush chair.

  "Lemont had to leave early, my lady. Matters called to him that required his attention, he asked that I forward an apology on his behalf."

  "I see." Camilla didn't try hiding that she was displeased, although not for the reason Lilin would likely suspect.

  Lilin made to close the door when Camilla spoke up. "Wait!"

  Lilin stopped, looking at Camilla in both worry and expectation. "Is something wrong, Madame?"

  "Not at all," Camilla stood up and walked over to her. "In fact, I think I'll be fine from here on out, on my own."

  Lilin tilted her head, a confused expression on her face. "How do you mean, my lady?"

  "Take the rest of the night off," Camilla smiled down on her. "It's been quite a while since I've enjoyed some time alone, and I think I could use the solitutde. If there's one thing this city has showed me that I find somewhat frustrating it's that silence is a rare commodity. And I could definitely use some of that right now."

  The servant's expression turned nervous and she bit the edge of her lip. "Madame, are you sure? I could just wait outside if you need anything."

  Camilla put an arm on the girl's shoulder. "I'm sure, Lilin. Don't worry about me, I'll be fine. I Just need some time to myself tonight."

  Lilin looked down on the floor, her downcast expression betraying her usual confidence. 'Cute' Camilla thought to herself. 'If only she knew, she'd have no reason to worry about me.'

  Camilla squeezed her shoulder lightly, causing her to look up with her usual bravado.

  "Go on, enjoy the rest of the night. It'll be an eventful few weeks ahead, so you need all the rest you can get."

  Lilin sighed and nodded. "Good night, Madame."

  "Good night, Lilin." Camilla said as she closed the door and locked it. She waited a few seconds, for the knock she knew might come. She stood there for a minute before letting out a long-held breath. Then she dropped her costume.

  Her shoulders slumped just like her back, and the mask on her face died away to be replaced by a frustrated exhaustion. She walked over to the gramophone and grabbed a needle from a casket on the side which she inserted into the sound box. She picked out a record from underneath the apparatus— an older disc, dated back to before the siege of Oman. She placed the disc on the machine and positioned the sound box above it. She spun the wheel until she felt resistance, and when she let go, the sounds started.

  She walked over to her bed, kicking off her high heels to the sound of a mournful piano and violin. She reached under the bed and pulled out a large case half her length and dropped it onto the bed. Popping it open to nothing of note on the top. Clothes and perfumes. She took it all out and grasped for the rim of the panel beneath. Popping that one out too revealed twelve rectangular slots, each one with a bottle of luminescent liquid mana and similar bottles above but with a black tar-like substance. To the left of the slots were neatly folded black clothes with a cloak.

  She took out the clothes, a bottle with a coppery glow, and one with the black substance, then placed the panel back on alongside with the other clothing and perfumes before tucking the case back under the bed. Rain poured outside, pelting the window like thousands of pebbles. The thunder was muffled by the thick walls and was more like a light rumble. The music of the gramophone drowned out it all.

  As she began to undress, her thoughts floated away to the ball.

  Lemont had invited her to the ball likely to meet with all of the other auction attendees. A great many more had arrived since her, and she'd even seen a silver-eye, although with the way he looked at things with such obvious disgust, he probably wasn't here on his own accord. His presence was likely just to further drive home the Theocracy takeover.

  What she herself had been after was more clues as to who were in possession of auction items. She had precious little information to go off, and only knew of the location of one more after Markaat. Since Lemont had left early, she'd been left without anyone to tell her of people of interest. So it had become a wild goose chase up until the chairman had approached her.

  Harman interested her. For someone in his position to be advocating for the Theocracy, there would need to be some form of benefit . Perhaps he was a Theocracy plant, sent many years ago to provide information from the inside. Or had he struck a deal with the priests, and would gain a great amount of standing with the new regime and perhaps a dash of economical importance.

  She strapped on the cloak, her clothes clinging losely around her form. Walking over to the window where the rain beat and battered, she stared out through stained glass. The storm begged for entry. Outside and far down below she could see the dimly illuminated roofs of the city. Deep blue tiles glowed in the strong moonlight that pierced the clouds. The moon shone brighter down here than it did back home. Likely due to the pollution released from city factories.

  The music was now a hymn, a classical piece performed for the Crown. It was grand but also gentle and bewitching, telling of the care both given to the god but also bestowed from him. The violin took long strokes and the piano light and quick taps.

  She reached out with a hooked finger and unlatched the windows, then pushed the windows outward. They thwacked against the outer wall and the rain poured into the room. She stared out into the darkness, the music now muddled and inconsistent amidst the sound of the rain. She reached to her belt and pulled the whole-glass bottle with a copper glow. Uncorking it, she drank it down greedily.

  Almost instantly she felt the energy of mana pump through her body. The threading burned as it activated following a long dormancy. She gasped, feeling renewed as the heat spread through her limbs. Her arms ached and her legs wanted to run away. Her eyes refocused and every detail grew tenfold. She could see the slightest silhuettes moving in the streets. A woman and a man holding hands, walking back home. Three boys stumbling drunk through the alleys. She dropped the bottle, hearing a slight woosh, then nothing for four seconds, and finally her ears picked up the almost indistinguishable shatter of glass on pavement. She could pick up the bark of a mutt far down below, something that should be impossible.

  She raised the hood over her head and tied a rope around the front and back to keep it up, then lifted her mouth piece. She reached to her belt and grabbed the bottle with black substance, which she put behind a drape by the window sill.

  She looked up towards the clouds, past them, at the stars beyond of which the edges she could see.

  She reached her arms out to the side and felt the air and water flap at her cloak. Sucking in deeply, she filled her lungs. Then she moved her right leg out of the windows to hover there for a few moments, positioning it down and slightly bent back. Then she pushed out with her left. The cold air enveloped her as she fell with, then through the rain, and the music from the gramophone was left behind in the warm comfort.

  Most would feel terror, but she had long waited for this. She had long waited for the thrill to fill her again, the freedom, the absolute sensation that took over your entire body in the air, it was intoxicating. Her cloak flew upward but did not hinder her sight.

  Though it was but a short span, she relished the freedom of it. She stared out across the roof tops as her legs began to mimic running down the wall. When the moment came that she was about to pass below the buildings, she pushed against the wall and shot through the rain. She sped over the tiles, her legs moving at thrice the speed of a running horse. The bricks beneath her exploded as she wove between chimneys and skipped from roof to roof.

  Her black cloak flapped in the wind but her arms remained at her side in her forward leaning sprint. She became a blur in the moonlight as she had to go from skipping to jumping between gaps.

  This was the freedom she had missed. The feeling of the breeze hitting her face and her feet propelling her across the sky and through the air. It was freeing —like a bird that dove to catch the drift in its wings. Her cloak flapped to the beat of the salty gales.

  She came to the buildings where the tiles went from a oceanic blue to a faded clay red. The buildings started going down, and her jumps became light drops. From here she could see the ocean, the sea was dark with the night. Waves crashed upon the dock wall with angry bellows.

  When she reached the final row of houses she jumped down to the streets below. She landed with a light thud, the fact that she had just dropped six stories to solid concrete not even registering. She began to run alongside the railings that overlooked the harbor.

  After a short distance she found the archway. Guarded by four armed watchmen, she climbed to the top of a roof and peaked over the edge down at them.

  "Why do they have us guarding these stairwells at this time?" One of the guards with a grinding voice like rusted iron asked to nobody in particular.

  This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

  "Lots of fat rats arriving in the city this week." Replied another with a voice like his nose was inside of his throat. "My buddy a floor up tells me there's some kind of auction to take place in the coming weeks. Not sure how credible it is but it would make sense."

  "Is this buddy a floor up also the same one that told you The Crown was coming to visit last year?" A third one spoke up with the sound like a constant yawn.

  "That's besides the point." Said the nasal one.

  While the other three bickered, Camilla watched the fourth one roll his eyes and straighten his back. 'at least one of them took this seriously.'

  She reached her fingers to the tip of a roof tile and quietly snapped it off. Scanning below, she raised her arm and aimed at an open metal can that stood on a crate in an alleyway across from her building. Her muscles tensed as she flexed, and threw the tile piece right at the container hard enough to puncture it.

  The can shot into the alleyway, making clattering sounds all the while.

  "Quiet!" The fourth one said. He took a step forward, then signalled for one to follow. The other three had cut their chatter instantly at the sound, and followed his command, resulting in an gap on the rightside arch.

  Aided by the darkness of the now lanternless opening, she dropped down and landing like a feather, dashed into the stairway unnoticed.

  The rank smell of the ribs assaulted her nose the moment she was past the archway. She had to fight the sensation to gag as she got a clear view of the second floor of the industrial city. Many words could be used to describe the look of the place, but above all one single word contained all she thought of the place. Swampy.

  The stench of coal and sulfur permeated the enclosed city, not helping in her perception of the place. In comparison to the pristinely carved buildings on the surface, the houses down here were simply squares. Boxes, even. Few reached four stories and most sat at a mere two. All had the coloring of swampy green.

  Above shone the dim light of mana circulations; a network of mana pumps that were sourced by the mines below which kept up constant drilling. But not even the grand blue light changed the shade of the walls and buildings and walkways.

  She latched onto a pipe beside the stairway and slid downward until she reached the buildings. Then she pushed off the wall again and shot across the flat roofs.

  The idea that the object could be down here brought a revulsion to her. Nothing that held such value to the should be kept in a disgusting place like this.

  She made for the central fountain. Her intel indicated that the storage facility was located beneath a homeless shelter in the main square.

  She sprung past the many vertiginous spirals that brought the mana from the mines to the surface. The architecture of the citiy were ingenius, it was the work of the architects from the first generstion of the Crown's rule. While there were grander works in the dominion of the Theocracy, none were as purely focused on efficiency as the mining cities.

  The main square was dimly lit and sparcely wandered. She dropped onto the cobble street and walked up to the fountain, drawing the gazes of dreary drunks.

  She leaned over the water and saw her quivering reflection in the clear blue pool. 'At least they have drinking water.'

  She closed her eyes and the sound of flowing water out. Focusing on he surroundings she picked up everything. Laughing, snoring, crying, yelling.

  The snores concentrated in a single building fifty meters away and she ran away from the fountain and into an alley before climbing back on top of the buildings, then headed for the sounds.

  It was easy to spot from above. There were people laying outside the shelter. Against walls, on the curb, and some on the stairs. A great many of them were wrapped in tattered clothes that could barely be considered scraps.

  But some of them were not as they seemed. Camilla saw muscle on some of the forms laying there, not the kind that a mine or factory worker had, but the slimmer kind. The killing kind.

  She moved around to the backside and found a guard patrolling the slim alley. On his hip was a scraped steel blade, the shine completely scrubbed from the metal to better hide it. It didn't work on her.

  When the guard turned to rotate his patrol away from her, Camilla dropped below and slunk to the door he guarded. Grabbing the knob, she twisted it and heard the soft snap of the mechanism break. She slipped inside and closed the door behind her.

  It smelled of carrot and meat inside. The strong herb-rich scent no doubt a stew currently being distributed.

  The room was small and dank with the stench of rotting fruits and meats that sat in corners and on crates waiting to be disposed of. Along one wall ran a line of shelves stacked with jard of differing musk, and at the end of the row a dingy cabinet slightly shorter than herself.

  Before looking for the hidden passage she knew to be somewhere in here, she toppled a heavy crate across the only other door into this room. Then she stepped lightly to the cabinet and ran her hand alongside dry surface. Wood flakes dusted off and splinters scratched at her delicate skin. Her eyes roamed the walls and boards of the cabinet but landed on a spot on the frame that appeared less coarse. Her fingers flicked to the small bit of panel and she pressed. It slid back into a hollowed interior, and then down.

  Behind where the panel had been she saw an dark opening where the stone wall should've been. Putting her hands on either side of the cabinet she lifted it up effortlessly and put it down to the right of the opening, revealing it was about human sized.

  She ducked inside and descended a pair of stairs she could only see through her enhanced vision. It was total darkness, and while any amount of light would brighten it up, there wasn't so much as flicker down here.

  At the bottom of the stairwell was a hallway where she could finally see again. A dim green illumination basked the walls.

  Moving ahead she found the source. A steep stream of tepid green liquid coming out of a sewer grate flowing into another further down the chamber. She fought the urge to reach for her nose as she peeked over the edge of the sewage. While the fact that the sewer was glowing was only due to the likelyhood of excess mana leftovers, she had no desire to swim in it regardless.

  "Also, weren't you supposed to be stand guard outside the back today?"

  She grabbed the ledge and slipped below at the echo of a voice. Her feet were mere inches from the sludge.

  "Aye, but me wife always complains that I come home with shoes dirtier than a miners, so I made a bet with Roy and won."

  "Roy? That rat's half deaf and half blind, poor bugger can't distinguish between a knife and a nail clipper."

  "True, but twenty copper is twenty copper."

  The voices chatted as they passed by her hiding. She lifted her head above the ledge and saw them march into a tunnel beside the one she'd come through. Once their voices disappeared amongst the sounds of the sloshing sewage, she pulled herself up and ran crouched to where they'd originally come from.

  The green glow turned electrical as lights lined the ceiling. She hurried, knowing she was on a schedule.

  She came upon a three-way junction and took her time going through each one. The left took her to a room filled with barrels and boxes, the middle took her to a room filled with steaming pipes and gears. Taking the final tunnel to the right, she found her goal. A large grey metal door. It could almost be considered a vault door.

  Bending to her knee she grabbed a multi-tool from her interior pocket and carefuly inserted it into the lock. This was where her expertise lacked. She could hide, run, climb and much more. But she was no thief.

  She felt her tool snap at the end and pulled it back to see half a pin gone. In total it took four pins before a satisfying click announced the yielding of the lock.

  She pushed it open and slipped in, closing the door behind her. She stood straight and bent her neck left and right and felt the satisfying pops.

  She searched for any way to light up the room and found a piece of string hanging from the ceiling. Pulling it, the entire room lit up. Shelves upon shelves filled with boxes and trinkets amongst things she could not distinguish lined both walls of the hall. The ceiling was sloped to either side and the other end was a flat wall.

  She began to search the room. Lifting every lid off every box and crate, removing any drapes, and while she found multiple objects that were likely going to be sold at the auction, none of them were what she was looking for.

  She did find one thing thay piqued her interest; a black ingot devoid of any reflection or sheen from the lights in the room. It was a metal derived from the mines of the now ruined independant city of Oman, and it had historically been used to create weapons and armor resistant to string. The metal had been outlawed following the Siege of Oman, and possession of it could be considered treasonous depending on where the owner lived or their rank. It had earned the nickname "Black Gold".

  Feeling both disappointed and angry, she pulled the thread on and let the light die. She now only had one lead left.

  She listened for a few moments for anything through the door, but when her enhanced hearing didn't pick anything up, she opened it and slid out. But when she was about to shut the door, she felt the air around her speed up— the difference was slim and almost indistinguisable, but it was there.

  She ducked and pushed her legs off the door just in time as a blade cut right where her head had been. The door slammed shut with a metallic boom and the two men from earlier stood there now, scraped swords in hand.

  Her slide came to a stop and she pushed herself into a crouch as the men rushed her down. 'How did they know I was here?' she instantly wondered, but she the thought aside for the time being.

  The first one cut downwards but Camilla sidestepped to the right and placed one leg across his left then pushed him over with her left elbow. The second man thrust forward and she dodged to the left then chopped down on his wrists, causing him to drop the blade as her other fist punched square into his chest.

  The second man flew through the tunnel onto his back and slid to a stop against the metal door where he gasped for air.

  Hearing the shuffle behind she ducked and spun, her cloak flapping against the confines of the tunnel wall. A dagger passed above her and clattered against the metal door to the vault.

  The one that threw the dagger kicked himself up and into a weaponless lunge. His right arm angled into a hooked fist aimed for the side of her head. She blocked the hook with one arm, and seeing the left arm going for an uppercut, she caught the fist.

  They were fast. Trained. But she was faster. The man, who she could now see sported a face wide scar, looked at her masked face in astonishment.

  She kicked his shin and he fell to one knee in a yelp. Then she twisted the fist she held clutched and heard the squelch of breaking bone and flesh. He screamed in surprised agony, still held firm.

  "Over here, you rat bastard!"

  She let go of the scarred man and spun on the ball of her left foot, her right leg airborne and bent as she faced the second man, who came at her with a dagger of his own.

  With thread-made momentum, she unleashed the strength of her kick right into the chest of the man who never even got within distance to cut her. He slammed into the right wall to the sound of breaking ribs and the clink of the dagger clattering to the floor.

  She followed with a quick step and grasped him by his throat, pressing him up against the flat wall.

  The man squirmed in her overpowering grip. He struggled to throw a few punches at her arms. He strained to breathe in her clutch. His resistance grew weaker and weaker and his dirt eyes grew dimmer. She prepared to give the final squeeze.

  "Wait!" Came the yell from the scarred one who still nursed his broken hand. And with that one word, she remembered why she was here, and it wasn't to kill.

  She let go of the struggling man who gasped for air he had thought would never come again. In the blink of an eye she shuffled to the tunnel entrance where it met with the other paths. Once the two men had collected themselves as well as they could, they looked to her. She pointed to the metal door behind them. Then, she mimicked reaching into her pockets and pulled them inside out. Empty.

  The worse-for-wear guards exchanged pained glances, but both caught on quickly and nodded to her. Or at least they pretended to understand.

  She held up the flats of her hands as she backed around the corner and further up ahead into the tunnel before pressing up against the wall and listening.

  "Not a word of this to anyone. Not even Roy."

  "How will we explain, well, ourselves?"

  "Hmm. Are there any crates or piece of ceiling that's unstable enough to maybe accidentally fall on someone?"

  "Only if you're stupid."

  "Do you want to get fired for stupidity, or killed for negligence?"

  "You make a convincing argument." This came out in a wheeze.

  She continued her silent dash out through where she'd come up into the dark stairway. She stopped to make sure nobody had come in while she'd been down underneath, then she looked outside and saw the man who was supposedly Roy, singing an ugly tune and pissing into a grate in a corner. Knowing what she didn't before, she made little effort to be quiet, and just leaped up atop a building to make her way back, still without the object.

  The rain pelted her cloak as she ascended the walls to her room. Her mind fixated on the blunder she had almost made. She couldn't afford to raise suspiciouns amongst the rich, much less get caught so blatantly.

  But she was almost out of options now, that much she was sure of. Finding out where the relic could be now could depend on her interactions with the nobles, though, she was admitedly making quick strides in that department.

  She felt for the rim of her window sill and pulled herself inside. She grasped for the bottle behind the drapes and uncorked it, downing the tar-like substance which felt like slime in the back of her throat. She threw the empty bottle out into the streets below, then reached for the ropes attached to the windows and pulled them shut with a clatter, once again locking out the weather and giving way to the solitude of gentle patter against stained glass.

  The gramophone stood silent, and she didn't bother with it. She felt the black substance take effect quickly. The mana in her veins began to accelerate. It felt like she was boiling from the inside as it pumped. The pain diseappeared quickly and took her mana and powers with it. Her senses once again dulled and her body weakened. With the mana now gone, her exhaustion from before returned in full. So she made the obvious choice of grabbing her lounge clothes and heading straight for the bathroom and the tub inside.

  It hadn't been ten minutes of soaking in the calming warm water before she heard the soft knocks on her suite door.

  Her mind raced with possibilities. 'Have I been caught already? Did someone spot me leaving through the window or entering? Did the guards below notify authorities?' She shut out the irrational thoughts and reached for a towel that she tied around herself.

  Kicking the still wet black clothes and cloak under the tub, she left the bathroom and went to the suite door.

  "Who's out there? You better have a good reason for the disturbance as I was enjoying a relaxing bath." She put on her most pompous voice.

  "It's Lilin, Madame Arcwood. I'm here on behalf of Master Lemont."

  Camilla unlocked the door and peaked out at Lilin. She looked exhausted, her eyes half-closed and her fingers fidgety.

  "Oh Lilin, whatever does he want that forced you out her at this time. Especially after he failed to attend the ball he himself invited me to."

  "Master Lemont laments his absence earlier in the evening. A most urgent disturbance forced him to abstain the luxuries of the ball in favor of family and political matters."

  She took a deep breath, then continued with a slight hunch to her posture. "He wants you to know that he may be busy for the next couple of days, but that he will also be aranging a meeting of which the details will be explained when the time nears and, that he wants you to attend."

  Camilla's thoughts raced. Lemont invited her once, then didn't show, and now he wanted her to attend some form of important meeting? At least she assumed it was important. Otherwise, why would he be busy, and why send Lilin instead of telling her himself.

  Her churning thoughts stopped when she realized Lilin's eyes drooping further.

  "Ahem," She mocked a cough that brought Lilin back. "Go home, my dear. And please, get some rest. I think I'd like to explore around the city myself tomorrow, and you're just about ready to sleep for a day."

  "But Madame-" Lilin began, but Camilla cut her off.

  "I'll make sure to send for you if need be. But the last thing I need is a sleep deprived servant. Go home and sleep."

  Lilin nodded, probably too tired to object.

  "Good night, Madame Arcwood."

  "Good night Lilin. Sleep well, you've earned it."

  She closed the door and locked it again, listening to Lilin's departure before making her way to the bathroom.

  While she only had one lead left to the object, her fabricated influence opened just as many doors as she herself had shut. Now it was just a matter of waiting, watching, and listening. Actually that was tomorrow's matter. Tonight, the only thing that mattered was the warm water that awaited her.

  - Look back on older chapters and look for possible inconsistencies, contradictions, or writing errors to fix! I am also going to alter bits of dialogue or (unlikely) descriptions that I consider lackluster or inexpressive. All altered chapters will be listed at the start of the next one.