Emah wiped the blade of her sword on a yellow City Watch tunic before sheathing it. She took another glance around the massacre in the entryway of Sami Suttar’s home: Two dead Watchmen, a beheaded cat-man, and Destiny unconscious and possibly dying. Dark blood pooled beneath the corpses and spattered the dusty walls. She grimaced and gently closed the front door. The last thing any of them needed was random, ogling passerbys, and she would prefer to fully assess what had happened and why before Inspector Calenta and the rest of the Watch descended upon them.

What had happened here? She’d been lying in bed upstairs when the screaming began. Maly and Destiny had disappeared at the first sound, with Kami close behind. For some stupid reason Emah had decided she needed her boots on to rush downstairs and so had fumbled with them and her sword belt before joining her companions. It was a ridiculous instinct, and one her mother would have cuffed out of her. By the time she’d finally arrived, the melee was already in full swing. Kami had been screaming at the knife-wielder, who she said was her brother, showing more emotion than she’d seen from the woman. The brother was ignoring Kami while he tried to kill Maly. Everything after that had been a blur, only half-remembered except in blazing, still images like paintings in her mind.

She ran through the details she knew. The two dead Watchmen had been guards, posted at the front door. Emah hadn’t met either of them, but Maly had. The two intruders, the cat-man and Kami’s brother, wore the red sashes and emblem of the East Bay Dragons, a notorious Oakton gang. It was the same gang that had kidnapped Maly, stolen her inheritance, and the reason Maly had ended up in prison and then disowned by her family. Indeed, the Dragons were the solitary topic that sent the otherwise-pleasant Maly into a rage. It was difficult to imagine that Kami’s brother might be part of that same gang, though Emah realized she knew little of the brothel-worker’s history.

So. Why did a pair of Dragons, one of them Kami’s brother, break into the house and brazenly kill two Watchmen? Was it to visit Kami, and a disagreement or misunderstanding had led to violence? Were they targeting Maly, here to assassinate her? As she’d been descending the stairs, Emah had heard Maly’s voice call out something about them being controlled, but that didn’t make any sense. Controlled by who? Emah frowned. The pieces weren’t fitting together for her. She didn’t like knowing so little.

The great black cat lay on its side, breathing slowly but otherwise unmoving. Maly lay draped across the creature’s flank, her head against Destiny’s ribs. Emah stepped around them and, as she passed, she heard her friend whispering to the panther. Perhaps it was a prayer, or perhaps the animal was communicating to Maly in her mind. Whatever the case, it felt like private time, one of those dreamlike moments of peace that follows battle. She would leave them to it, and not question Maly about what she knew just yet.

Instead, she moved into another part of the first floor, what had been Suttar’s shop. The whole floor was essentially one large, square room wrapping around a central staircase, yet each section was a maze of shelves, cabinets, and display tables, making the space seem cramped outside of the entryway. Most of the shelves were empty and dust-covered, but sporadic books and unsettling curios still littered the one-time occult shop. A burnished brass frog with four eyes, for example, stared at her from a high shelf, squatting next to a long purple feather that Emah couldn’t fathom belonged to a real animal. She shook her head.

“Kami?” Emah called out.

“Here,” the woman’s voice echoed nearby, around a corner and a towering dresser. Emah moved to find her. It wasn’t difficult to follow the trail of fresh blood.

In the narrow space between two shelves, Emah discovered Kami on the dusty floor. She had her feet tucked beneath her, with her brother’s body half-propped into her lap. One of her hands pressed against a wide bloody patch on his torso, while the other stroked the man’s black hair. Tears ran to her chin from one cheek and beneath her wooden half-mask. Emah noted that the brother’s chest fluttered up and down, his breathing a low rasp. Good. She hadn’t killed him, then.

“Are you hurt?” Emah asked.

Kami shook her head, her long hair moving like a black waterfall.

“How is he?”

The woman snuffled and let out a shuddering sigh. “I—I don’t know. You may have killed him.” Her voice sounded brittle and empty.

“I hope not, for your sake and so we can have answers. Here, let me take a look. I have some experience with sword wounds.” Emah knelt and pulled Kami’s arms away, which she did not resist. “Alright,” she said, eyes assessing. “It’s bad, but not the worst I’ve seen. Can you… tear away his pant leg here? So I have something to bandage his side?”

For the next half-bell, Emah worked on staunching the wound from her sword. He had another one on his thigh, which she guessed was from one of Maly’s daggers. That one didn’t look life-threatening, though, and the man wore frustratingly little cloth for her makeshift treatments. Kami, for her part, followed Emah’s instructions silently and competently, seeing clearly that Emah was her brother’s best path to stabilizing.

When they were done, the brother—who Kami told her was named Kura—lay on his back, two moldering books beneath his head to provide some support. Emah’s hands and forearms were slicked in blood, and her night shift was practically ruined. She excused herself to go upstairs to wash herself off and change clothes. On the way up, she checked with Maly, who mumbled something noncommittedly about Destiny needing sleep. The panther hadn’t taken any blade wounds… the damage was entirely from blows to its skull. For such wounds, the only remedy that Emah knew was rest.

By the time she returned, fully dressed, the cost of the battle had fully caught up to her. The ribs that had cracked from the bronze armor’s blow still ached terribly, and now her left shoulder where the cat-man had kicked her joined in. Though she’d begun to regain her strength from the past days of inactivity, the sudden battle had utterly exhausted her. She wished that she could crawl back into the bed upstairs and sleep for a week.

Instead, she found Kami at Kura’s side. “How is he?” she asked. “Any change?”

At first the masked woman said nothing and did not move. Then she blinked and exhaled. Only then did Emah realize that the woman had been utterly still, like a statue. “He… seems to be breathing more easily. Thank you. How did you learn your medicinal skills, Ms. Elmhill?”

Emah frowned at the formality but shrugged in answer. “Partly it comes from so much swordplay. You can’t learn a weapon without some mishaps needing attention. But mostly from my mother. She was… a remarkable person.”

“Mm. One of the Castellan’s own personal guards, yes? Before she unexpectedly left her post more than twenty years ago? I’m guessing it was because she was pregnant with you.”

Now it was Emah’s turn to blink. “How did you–?”

Kami turned to look at her, her full lips cocked in a sad, half-grin. “I did my research on who I hired, remember? Just as I know Ms. Wywich’s history with the East Bay Dragons. I know how much she hates them, and why. I don’t blame either of you for fighting Kura. But I do appreciate the care you’ve shown him.”

“Fighting him?” Emah scowled. “Maly and I were defending ourselves. Why was he here, Kami? And who was the one Kura brought with him? What was he?”

“I… don’t know the answer to any of those questions, particularly who or what his companion was. My brother and I do not speak regularly, and haven’t since we were children. Since I entered the Golden Heron, and he the Dragons.”

“You began at the Heron as… a child?” Emah swallowed, bile rising.

Kami looked at her, the wooden mask concealing much of her expression. The unmasked side of her face looked wistful. Sad. “Yes. Neither Kura nor I were ready for the life given to us when our parents were murdered.” For a moment she stopped breathing again, her eyes unfocused. Then she shook her head. “But enough of that. Maly believes Kura and his companion were being controlled. By the rat priest, or at least in the same way.”

Emah straightened, considering that piece of information. But why… ?

“Sent to get the box!” Emah concluded. Her tactical mind worked out the problem aloud. “She knew that sending more of her ratfolk horde likely wouldn’t work now that the bronze guardian was gone, and she probably didn’t know the box’s exact whereabouts. She’s finding agents to hit likely hiding spots in order to get it back. She’s desperate, but smart.”

“I wish we knew the limits of her power,” Kami pursed her lips. “Will Kuro awaken back to his own senses, or still controlled?”

“It’s a good question,” Emah agreed. “And what’s the range of the priest’s powers? Does she have to be close to maintain contr–” She gasped and unsheathed her sword. “Dammit!” Emah cursed as she suddenly turned away from Kami.

“What is it?”

“The priest! What if she’s here?” Emah growled, berating herself and calling out over her shoulder. “What if this was all a distraction?”

She ran through the maze of shelves to the stairs.

“Em?” Maly’s voice called out to her. “What’s going on?”

In her concentration and frustration, she didn’t answer. Emah’s boots pounded up the stairs, from the shop level to the living quarters where she’d spent the past few days. She almost continued on to the third floor, where Sami Suttar had once done research and kept his prize treasures, but then remembered: Kami had brought the bejeweled box down to her bedside, tucked beneath an arm. When they’d heard the screaming and Maly had dashed away, Kami set the box aside and followed. Emah could picture it there, on the floor, as she had quickly donned her boots and sword belt. Was it there when she’d gone back to change clothes and wash up? She honestly couldn’t remember either seeing it or not seeing it. She’d been too lost in her own troubled thoughts and had dropped her vigilance.

When she skidded into the now-familiar bedroom, the floor was empty. The gold and gem-encrusted box, a mummified human hand encased within, was nowhere to be seen. Emah’s eyes scanned the room furtively. A window was open, curtains fluttering in a slight breeze, which had once been closed. No other signs remained.

She screamed, then… wordless sounds of pure frustration and rage.

Next: The chase is on!

Emah threw off the blankets covering her, reaching for her boots and sword, but Maly didn’t linger to help her friend. Instead, she dashed out of the bedroom, running past a startled Kami, with Destiny loping at her heels.

Inside the house, the panther intoned the warning in her mind. But they don’t smell like rats. In fact… hm.

As suddenly as the screams had risen, they now fell silent. Maly held the railing of the stairs and vaulted down several at a time, landing lightly. There, on the first floor of Sami Suttar’s shop, two figures stood over the City Watch members still accompanying them, the front door still open wide. Maly hadn’t really gotten to know either of the Watchmen assigned to them. In their favor, they were both Stone Islanders like herself, and around her age. Unfortunately, when she’d met them she had been exhausted from her time in the ratfolk warrens and unwilling to make small talk. Also, both had subtly leered at her when she said she’d needed a bath, which was gross and made her instantly avoid them. Now both were dead, laying in pools of blood. Maly had never even learned their names.

One of the murderers was a handsome Kaizukan man in baggy pants with hair pulled back in a long, black braid. He was shirtless, with a bandolier of some kind crisscrossing his chest, and red ribbons of cloth tied around each bicep. He wielded a long knife in each hand, each stained scarlet with City Watch blood.

His companion made Maly pause and gasp. He also wore loose-fitting pants, yet only to his knees. There the similarities between the two intruders ended. The second man wore a sleeveless shirt with a stylized symbol on it and carried no weapons or obvious gear. His head was like Destiny’s, that of a large black cat, and his arms and legs appeared human but covered in fine black fur. A long cat’s tail whipped side to side as he looked up at Maly, and he settled into a fighting stance, fists raised.

Maly wasn’t sure what was more shocking: The impossible cat-man standing nearby or the symbol on the cat-man’s chest, a symbol she had come to both recognize and loathe. These two men were members of…

“The East Bay Dragons!” Maly sputtered.

There was something unsettling about the eyes of both Dragons, a pulsing light of dull green. Maly saw it briefly, and then it was gone.

The knife-wielding assailant moved in a wide circle around her while the cat-man coiled and leapt, leg outstretched to kick her. She dodged to one side, but then pain lanced through her in a burning line of fire. She stumbled, grasping at her ribs where one of the Kaizukan man’s knives had cut her. He flicked blood off the blade and advanced, even as Maly fumbled to grab a dagger from her belt. She would be too late, she realized in a rush. There was another flash of green in the man’s eyes as he raised a knife for the killing blow.

From the bottom of the staircase, Destiny roared. The cat-man’s head whipped around to face the black panther, but it was the knife-wielding Dragon who winced and shut his eyes in pain. It gave Maly the opening she needed, and she danced away from the man before he could finish her. Fury replaced shock as she moved. She would not be killed by the East Bay Dragons, damn them all to the Nine Hells!

Footsteps pounded down the stairs as Kami descended. She gasped.

“Kura?” she said, her voice was heavier with emotion than Maly had ever heard it. “What are you doing here, brother?”

Brother?! Maly and Destiny thought at the same time.

The cat-man used the momentary hesitation to knee Destiny in the head. The panther yowled in surprise and pain, jaws clacking shut. Its yellow eyes focused on the acrobatic Dragon and growled. Despite his light feet and easy fighting grace, the cat-man stepped back, wary of the panther.

Maly wanted to help Destiny, but the knives of Kami’s brother prevented her from doing anything but staying alive. She feinted to one side, then stabbed out with her dagger. Neither opponent could make contact, however, and she and the Kaizukan man circled one another. Now that Maly considered him, he did bear a striking resemblance to Kami. Could it truly be her brother?

“Kura, please!” Kami pleaded. “Stop! Why are you here?”

Another momentary green flash filled the man’s eyes, and he shook his head, like a bee was pestering him. “Give us… the… box!” he mumbled, the words seeming forced.

Realization struck Maly. “He’s being controlled!” she yelped, dodging another long knife. “By the ratfolk priest!”

Maly hoped that Kami had heard her words, but just then the cat-man yelled a battle cry, spinning another kick to the side of Destiny’s head. This time the panther went down, sliding several steps across the wooden floor. The great cat moved weakly to stand, and his assailant kicked him again. Destiny went limp.

“No!” Maly cried, then ducked below the wide arc from a knife. She wildly stabbed at Kami’s brother, but it was meant to move him back more than do damage. It worked, and Maly leapt protectively towards Destiny’s fallen body.

With a roar, Emah took Maly’s place. Her friend stomped down the stairs, boots unlaced and still in Sami Suttar’s overlarge night shift. Emah had her ancestral sword in one hand, however, and that was more than enough to tilt the battle. Murder in her eyes, her blade flashed. Kura, the brother, had been unprepared for Emah’s skill. He blocked one strike, but the second thrust caught his thigh. The man grunted in pain, blood blossoming from the wound.

“Emah! It’s my brother! Don’t kill him! Kura, listen to me!” Kami implored, but her words were lost, it seemed in the din of battle.

The cat-man was a whirlwind of feet and hands. His black-furred limbs spun and struck from all angles, and it took every bit of concentration Maly possessed to avoid the blows. She couldn’t focus on the inert body of Destiny at her feet, Kami’s desperate shouts, or the clashing steel of Emah’s sword and Kura’s long knives. Instead, she ducked and dodged and bent as a series of precise strikes whistled past her. The man’s fighting was beautiful, in a way, using a dancer’s grace and skill.

That grace stopped abruptly. The cat-man’s yellow eyes went wide, looking past Maly. Eyes flashed green for a moment as he yelled, “Kura, no!”

Maly jumped back, which gave her to room to peer at the others. Emah’s sword was half-buried in Kura’s stomach. His knives clattered to the floor from limp hands. Kami was shrieking, her voice more frayed and high-pitched than Maly had ever heard it.

“Emah, no! He’s my brother!! Stop!”

Kami’s arms elongated, reaching out like grasping vines. Before Kura had fully fallen, she had scooped him up, arms coiling round and round for support. In that moment Maly could only watch, fascinated. Tears streaked down the unmasked side of her face as she effortlessly lifted the man into the air. It was such an odd thing to see her arms wrapped so impossibly around a man larger than her, his feet dangling over the floor. Kami ran into the next room with her brother’s body, leaving the cat-man and Emah to clash.

Maly’s attention focused on this new battle. The acrobatic Dragon attacked more carefully against a sword-wielder, but no less efficiently. One furious punch slipped past, slamming Emah in one shoulder and knocking her sideways. Emah showed little care. She growled, her sword spinning in her fist, and she pressed her opponent backwards with brutal slashes, bloodlust contorting her face.

Maly pulled her second dagger from its sheath and, with a curse, leapt to help her friend before someone else got killed.

Two daggers helped Maly not at all, unfortunately. The cat-man from the East Bay Dragons was impossible to hit, at least for Maly. She felt like a small child in the midst of two adults, with the Dragon and Emah trading blows and matching each other’s attacks with parries and deft footwork while she stabbed ineffectually. Maly could hardly fathom how an unarmed combatant could match skill with Emah, but the cat-man was doing it. She’d never seen someone so skilled, and at least twice Maly was sure that one of Emah’s blows would strike only to be deflected away at the last instant.

Eventually, Emah’s mastery of the blade won out. She kicked the cat-man unexpectedly, catching him in the chest and sending him stumbling. He looked up, yellow eyes wide, and Emah swept her blade horizontally. The cat’s head and furred body parted in a fountain of blood across the entryway.

Maly didn’t hesitate. She scurried over to Destiny’s still form, eyes searching for how to help. His side, she realized with relief, was slowly rising and falling. He wasn’t dead, then, despite the pummeling he’d taken. She lay her head across his flank and smoothed a hand over his head gently, stroking. Though she’d complained constantly about the panther’s growled voice in her head, its absence now felt like an empty hole. She still had so many questions about Destiny’s presence, why he had chosen her… and she had almost lost any hope of answers.

Unlaced boots stepped close.

“Will he be okay?” Emah’s voice asked from above.

Maly shrugged awkwardly. “I don’t know, and I don’t know what to do for him,” she answered helplessly.

Emah grunted. “Stay with him. I’m going to go check on Kami and… the other one.”

Maly continued to stroke the great cat’s black fur. “Come back to me,” she whispered quietly.

The panther did not answer.

Next: Brother and Sister!

Kami stood sentinel in the darkened attic of Sami Suttar’s former residence and shop. It was a windowless room, its hearth and chimney long ago bricked over and defunct. Only one closed door provided entrance, though Kami had been hurled through one of the inner walls several days before, creating a second route inside. She had boarded up the resulting hole as best as she was able, though it would be an easy barrier to break. So she stood, arms crossed, eyes scanning from the door to the crisscrossing wooden planks and back again.

Dust covered everything here, showing footprints of her own slippers, countless ratfolk prints, and long furrows from ratfolk tails. A narrow table, also dust-covered, displayed a flickering candle and array of oddities—an empty brass birdcage, a thick ledger that she could not decipher, and various baubles. Most notably upon the table sat the chest she and her companions had ventured below Oakton to retrieve, candlelight dancing merrily across the jewels and gold decorating it.

Only days ago, she had fought the guardian of this room, an animated suit of bronze armor that had almost killed her associate Emah Elmhill. The armor now lay in pieces across the floor of the neighboring room. Kami had spent several bells idly examining each piece, but her only conclusions had been that they were ancient, ornately crafted, and now utterly lifeless. Whatever magics had created the platemailed watchdog had, apparently, disappeared.

The irony of the current situation was not lost on her. Now, it seemed, she had taken the armor’s place, acting as guardian of this small box whose origins and purpose she could not comprehend. It was clear that the robed priest of the ratfolk horde below the city wanted this prize desperately, for some ritual of power. Since her group had destroyed Sami Suttar’s armored guard, the job now fell to her. It was a situation she liked not at all.

Most disturbing to Kami, however, was her own body. She had, on some level, known that her transformation meant that she no longer required sleep, or food, or even to breathe. Yet almost every moment since her initial suspicion about this change had been spent reacting to threats or moving from one dangerous location to another. Now, for long days with nothing to do but stand watch, she could not avoid the unnatural lack of need within herself. She felt neither more nor less fatigued than ever, neither more nor less thirsty nor hungry. She was simply… fine, her body asking for nothing to sustain it. How long could she stand here, motionless? Would she never sleep again, or did she simply have an immense stamina that rivaled her newfound strength? Would she live forever? Was her now-pliant body even filled with organs and blood and bones anymore? Was she human now and, if not… what was she? Perhaps it was not irony that linked her with the ancient bronze armor. Perhaps she truly shared more in common with an empty helmet and breastplate than she realized. Could the magics that transformed her be the same that had imbued life into lifeless armor? Could the armor have once been a man?

Her grim reverie paused as she heard a noise upon the staircase, creaking footsteps moving from the second floor of the home to the third. The steps did not sound like Maly’s light-footed ones, or the heavy, confident stride of Emah. Could it be the panther? No, she was certain that the great black cat could approach without Kami even realizing it. So… a new visitor. Quietly, Kami padded to the closed door, opened it, and stepped into the next room. Light spilled into the room from the floor’s solitary window, a square pane of glass at the top of the staircase in the landing. It mildly surprised Kami that it was daytime, as she’d lost all sense of time within the dark coffin of her guard post.

Kami stood, feet wide and ready, arms folded, as someone grunted her way to the third floor. She was a stout, rounded woman, with tanned skin and black hair tied back in a green kerchief. The clothes displayed the yellow-and-green livery of the Oakton City Watch, though it was less garish and bright compared to most Watchmen patrols. As the woman reached the top of the stairs, using the railing to help pull herself up the last steps, she puffed and looked up at Kami. Her round face was pleasant and maternal, corners wrinkled from smiles and cheeks dimpled.

Kami tensed and frowned. “Inspector Calenta,” she said through clenched teeth.

Out of breath, the woman pulled a square of cloth from a pocket and dabbed at her sweaty brow. “Woo… stairs!” she beamed. “Not my favorite. Hello, dear. Maly said I could find you up here.”

“What do you want?”

Calenta examined the room before responding, her eyes roaming over the scattered pieces of ancient armor, the tracks in the dust, the dent in the wall. Estancia Calenta looked like a kindly mother on her way to being a doting grandmother, but her sickly-sweet demeanor and disarming smile were just a mask, like Kami’s own. The woman had risen in the ranks of the City Watch, taking posts that were usually reserved for Kaleen loyalists to the Queen, which meant that Inspector Calenta was both smart and ruthless. Kami trusted her not at all, though she was begrudgingly impressed both with how quickly her gaze took in the events of the room and how casually she then responded.

“Oh, just checking in, dear. I heard from little Maly what happened in the ratfolk warrens below the city and thought I’d get your account too.”

Kami’s frown deepened. “I trust Maly to provide the details. And she was the one who stole the box and interacted with the priest, not me.”

“Mm,” Calenta said noncommittally. “The box. May I… see it, dearie?”

Kami sighed and turned without a word, retreating to the “vault,” as she’d begun to call it in her mind. She heard Calenta picking her way across the room to follow. The inspector paused again in the doorway, eyes scanning this new space efficiently. Then she approached the long table, looking down on the ornate chest atop it.

“It’s fine to open, no?” she asked. Kami nodded once, and the inspector deftly flicked open the latch. Her eyes narrowed at the contents, a single severed human hand, dried and tightly wrapped in thin cloth.

“My, my,” she said. “Has anyone, ah… touched the hand?”

“We have not.”

“Probably smart, dear. Whatever do you suspect it’s for?” With one last lingering glance, she snapped the box shut and turned to look at Kami.

“I don’t know,” she replied, staring through her half-mask. “Do you?”

Calenta chuckled. “Why would I know, dear? No, no. These ratfolk are as new to me as they are to you, which makes their networks beneath the city all the more distressing, don’t you think? It seems like every day the city is changing, ah? Strange occurrences, talking statues, monsters in the water, people with unexplained powers…” her voice trailed off and she brightened, as if remembering something. “Say! We never had a chance to talk before, just you and me. When did your powers first show up, dear?”

Kami didn’t answer, and her eyes narrowed. She did not trust this woman, but it was a fair question for an inspector with the City Watch to ask. If indeed others were changing as dramatically as her, Calenta would want to know as much of the details as possible about how and why the changes had occurred so she could form patterns to help explain it. Perhaps even prevent it from continuing to happen, or providing answers to Kami’s countless questions. Even still, she hated that this highly political woman would continue manipulating her. After all, wasn’t Calenta the reason that she found herself as guardian to a mystical box in the attic of an abandoned house?

“Do you know, dear, it’s eerie when you stop breathing and don’t move like that,” Calenta half smiled, but Kami noticed that she had also taken a wary step backwards.

Kami blinked, then sighed, more out of habit than because she had been holding a breath. “When the Great Oak blossomed,” she said reluctantly, a twist of her lips. “At New Year. I was at a celebration in the streets with some of the girls from the Heron when the blossoms appeared.” Her voice became dream-like, remembering. No one had ever seen the enormous, mountain-sized tree blossom before, and having it occur at New Year felt like a miracle. The blossoms were bright white, laced with every color imaginable, truly beautiful. “Everyone looked up and pointed, cheering and laughing. I immediately got very dizzy, and had to be helped back to the Heron to rest. I stayed in bed for days, and when I woke, everything felt… different.”

She cleared her throat and uncrossed her arms.

“Mm,” the inspector nodded. For just a moment, her maternal mask slipped off. “That’s consistent with other stories we’ve heard. Not everyone who changed saw the blossoms, though, or were even outside. It’s just as likely that the Great Oak was responding to whatever was causing the changes as causing them itself. The mystery continues, ah? Well,” the mask returned, and she flashed a dimpled grin at Kami. “I do appreciate you sharing, dear. Thank you. I feel like we’re closer after this little chat, don’t you?” She stepped forward and reached a plump hand to pat Kami’s shoulder. “Now I’ll leave you to your guarding the, ah, gross hand there, confident it’s as safe as if I hid it away somewhere in the Keep.” She chuckled. “Safer, ah?”

Calenta turned to leave, reached the doorway, and then looked over her shoulder at Kami. “Say, when you’ve fulfilled your contract and taken care of these rats, let’s have another chat, just you and me, ah?”

Kami cocked her head, her black hair falling over one shoulder. “Why?” The word came out harsher than she’d intended.

Inspector Calenta’s smile stayed fixed to her face, but she repositioned her body to stand solidly in the doorframe, facing Kami. Her eyes twinkled in the candlelight.

“You don’t like me, do you dear?”

Kami stared a moment and then replied. “I do not.”

“But why?” Calenta blinked, looking wounded. “Is it because I know you went to the jail to kill Raffin Hothorp, that dead man in the cell?”

Now it was Kami’s turn to blink. Her mouth fell open.

“He’s the one that cut up your poor face, isn’t he, dear?” she shook her head in sorrow. “Terrible business, that, especially for a woman of the Rose Guild. Lady Brehill says you were the prettiest in the whole of Golden Heron. I can see how he took something from you. Makes sense you’d want to take it back.”

“You’ve been talking to Elyn?” Kami sputtered.

The inspector shrugged a shoulder. “There’s a lot going on in the city, dear. Mysteries everywhere. And you’re one of them. But don’t worry…” she waved a hand vaguely. “That business with Hothorp can stay between us. After all, you didn’t kill him, did you? Otherwise you wouldn’t be so mad every time I said his name. No?”

Kami leaned against the long table, one hand on it. She would later realize that her fingers left dents in the wood from the strength of her grip.

Inspector Calenta smiled, a note of sympathy in her voice. “But enough of that, ah? You asked why we should have another chat, and I have an answer for you: Because you can do a lot of good for Oakton now, dear. You’ve been given gifts that don’t belong in a brothel. I think you know what I’m saying is true, which is why you’re still here in an attic guarding a pretty box.”

“I’m here because you tricked me into a contract,” Kami said as evenly as she could manage.

Calenta tsked. “Really? Because I can’t see how I could stop you if you went back to Lady Brehill at the Heron and ignored me, ah? No, dear, you’re here because you care, about the city and about these two women you hired. And unlike Miss Elmhill, Miss Wywich, or any of my Watch members, you have the power to stand up to what’s happening in the city. They get killed or get their ribs crushed, but look at you!” She beamed. “Unhurt and ready for action.”

Kami stared back, saying nothing. She thought about Emah laying injured downstairs in bed, or the brief terror she experienced when Maly had disappeared into the crowd of ratfolk. She had come to care about those two mercenaries, and yet she knew that what Calenta said was true: They would die horribly going up against forces like the ratfolk priest or guardian armor, whereas she felt… invincible? Did she? Feel invincible?

Inspector Calenta watched Kami’s face closely, and nodded. “When it’s all done, come see me,” she winked. “May it be soon, dear! Oakton needs you!” she called behind her, and shut the door, leaving Kami in a candlelit room, alone with her thoughts.

Long after Calenta had gone, Kami remembered to blink. Once again, she sighed out of habit, or perhaps to feel like the person she had been, or even a person at all. Her eyes scanned the dimly lit room.

She did not want to be alone right now, she realized. Carefully hoisting the bejeweled chest and securing it under one arm, Kami strode to the door and opened it. She would check on Emah and Maly, so they could make a plan.

Next: Issue 4 Reflections

Emah winced, her face a mask of sweat, her breathing labored. Her damned ribs on one side lanced pain with every stumbling step, and now her shoulder burned and stomach roiled with whatever those robed ratfolk had thrown at them. Holding the torch aloft with that arm involved more effort than Emah cared to admit. All she wanted to do was stop… to close her eyes, drop to the floor, and curl into a ball.

Ahead, the black shadow of Destiny led them with loping strides away from the ratfolk temple. Occasionally the great cat would briefly pause, yellow eyes scanning the darkness and nostrils flaring. Emah thought the panther was scanning for Maly as much as finding a way to safety. At least she hoped that was the case, and hoped equally that the creature was helping guide and comfort her friend through whatever link they shared. Why had she jumped into the crowd like that? What could she have possibly hoped to accomplish?

“Come on,” Kami urged to Emah. The brothel owner maddeningly did not sweat at all, seemed utterly in control of her breathing as if on a leisurely stroll. Yet behind the wooden half-mask, Kami’s eyes were as wide as Emah’s, as furtively searching the darkness. “The crates won’t hold them long, and then they’ll be upon on.”

“I know,” Emah growled. She pushed herself off an earthen wall that she had gripped briefly for relief and, with a groan, willed her feet forward despite every muscle protesting.

It had all happened so quickly. The scene at what could only have been a temple was unlike anything she could have imagined; dozens upon dozens of the small, furred ratfolk swaying in unison to a robed figure upon a raised dais at the feet of an enormous statue of a man with a rat’s head and tail. In front of the leader sat a golden and jeweled box that sparkled in torchlight, stolen from Sami Suttar’s home and formerly guarded by an animated suit of armor. The ratfolk had all been participating in a ritual of some kind, Emah supposed, a ritual that somehow involved the box. Whatever the ratfolk leader upon the dais had intended, she and her companions had interrupted it.

Without warning, her friend Maly had disappeared into the crowd, pushing her way forward. Then the figure upon the dais had noticed them, pointing an accusing clawed finger. The entire room had turned, and a wave of… something had rippled through the mob. Ratfolk faces that had been surprised, frightened, and confused suddenly all contorted into rage. With a collective squeal, the swarm of the creatures had surged at them.

Emah could hardly remember the moments from then until now. Eerie green, throbbing balls of light hurled from the back of the crowd at them, arcing lazily like catapult stones and splashing as they struck the floor and walls. She had been focused on the crazed, frothing ratfolk at the front and ignored the orbs of energy, and one had hit Emah in her shoulder. A searing, nauseating pain throbbed through her, like a burn and punch in the stomach all at once. She’d doubled over, gagging, and then called for a retreat.

Destiny had stayed to fight, ripping at ratfolk with its white teeth and claws. Yet through tear-blurred eyes Emah had seen the mob engulf the black panther, and in a heartbeat, it leapt from the fray. As it pushed past her, Emah had seen its fur matted in blood.

Then they ran.

Through the ratfolk tunnels they’d fled, the echoing wave of chittering, screaming madness behind them. At one point they’d passed a stack of wooden crates and Kami had, almost casually, scattered the heavy boxes across the tunnels behind them. The wave of frenzied ratfolk had hit the obstacle, the lead creatures stumbling and becoming crushed by those behind them. The maneuver had bought them some distance, and Destiny had used that distance to find their way to smaller and smaller passageways, always sloping upwards. Emah thought that they might actually make it back to the Oakton streets alive… Unless the ratfolk had circled to another tunnel to cut them off. Unless the panther had mistakenly led them to a dead end. Unless her legs gave out to exhaustion and pain.

And where in the blazes was Maly?

Through her weary and pain-filled haze, Emah realized that whether her friend had made it out of the mob alive was, for now, irrelevant. Perhaps Maly had died, perhaps she’d been captured, or perhaps she was now finding her own way to the surface. The implications of the mad Stone Islander’s impulsive dash into the temple would have to wait. For now, Emah, Kami, and the panther must survive their pursuit, and it was Emah who most threatened their progress.

It could have been a full bell in time or several, she couldn’t be sure. Everything for Emah was a shroud of pain, sweat dripping off her chin, into her eyes, making the grip on the flickering torch precarious. Every muscle burned with fatigue, and every labored breath felt like someone stabbing her repeatedly. Kami pulled her forward, sometimes physically and sometimes with urgent words. Emah remembered no details from their flight from the temple, only flashes of Destiny’s yellow eyes, Kami’s harsh and urgent voice, and the constant, menacing echoes of the ratfolk horde.

At one point, Destiny growled and leapt forward, into the shadows. Emah was sure the mob had cut them off, that they now faced enemies from the front and back, that she would die in darkness and dirt. She would not see her father again, not see the sun and sky. A wave of resignation and weariness overtook her in that moment. Emah would not see her father, but she was eager to reunite with her mother. So be it.

Heartbeats later, Kami was gripping her bicep and pulling her ahead, yelling something, before sunlight broke above them.

A barrel’s top had apparently been tossed over a ragged hole. Destiny had knocked the barrier aside and disappeared above. Kami yelled something else to Emah, which she dimly took as some sort of instruction. Emah nodded and leaned against the tunnel’s earthen surface, panting and closing her eyes, while Kami wriggled upwards through the opening. Then unnaturally long arms, like vines, snaked towards her, pulling her up and into the light.

Emah briefly noticed the blue sky above and their surroundings, dappled with wispy clouds. They were in an alley somewhere, trash piled all around them between tall wooden walls. Kami held her, frowning behind her half-mask.

It was the last thing Emah remembered. She tried to say something, but her eyes rolled back in her head, sounds muffled, and then there was darkness everywhere.

---

The world blurred into existence as Emah cracked open her eyes and looked around woozily. At first, nothing looked familiar, and she frowned in confusion. She lay in a large bed, in a dark bedroom that was not her typical cramped room at the Heart and Dagger, its windows covered by curtains. No light shone through the windows, which meant it must be nighttime. Emah blinked, her mind working slowly. Then she rubbed at her eyes with a calloused hand and looked again.

Ah, she did know this place. She was back in the musty, unused bedroom within Sami Suttar’s house, on a lonely cul-de-sac street within the Coins. It was the same place she’d woken up the day before, after getting pummeled by the enchanted bronze armor upstairs. Was it yesterday? She had no idea. Yet, perhaps foolishly, then she’d pushed herself out of bed to accompany Maly, Kami, and the panther down into a hole in the home’s basement in what now seemed a mad pursuit of ratfolk. Their journey below came rushing back to her—the endless maze of warrens, the torchlit and pressing gloom, the bizarre temple scene, the flight from the frenzied mob to the surface. And Maly, missing.

Emah took stock of her own injuries. Her midsection had new bandages, and her ribs still felt tender and sore. She suspected that moving would again prove to be agony. In addition, her left shoulder was also bandaged, covering where the glowing green attack from the ratfolk faithful had struck her. Thankfully, she no longer felt the roiling nausea from before, though her shoulder throbbed dully. At the edges of the bandage, the skin showed small, dark, spidery veins that could have been signs of infection.

Someone had left a waterskin within reach of her good arm, and Emah reached for it, slaking her thirst with small sips at first, then slurping gulps. The effort of drinking made her dizzy, and she closed her eyes again. Her ears quested past the closed door, listening for any voices or movement. She heard nothing. It must be the middle of the night, she thought dully. Who was here, sleeping or keeping watch? How much time had passed? Was Maly okay? Had there been signs of the ratfolk’s pursuit? Emah cursed her injuries and fatigue, willing herself to stand and find answers. Yet her battered body refused, and soon she had fallen back into a deep stupor.

---

“So let me get this straight,” Emah said, shaking her head and spooning soup to her mouth between sentences. “The panther yells ‘Get the box’ to you, and you just… jump into a horde of ratfolk? What was your plan?”

Maly grinned, her freckled and pale cheeks flushing slightly. “I, uh… well, my plan was to get the box. Which,” she said with an upraised finger. “I will point out that I did.”

It had been three days of bed rest for Emah, and on the morning of the second day Maly had knocked at Sami Suttar’s front door. Kami reported that the young woman clutched the golden, jeweled box in her tattooed arms, and that she looked bedraggled and in need of a bath. By the time Maly had cleaned up and slept for a full day and night, Emah was close to being on her feet again. The two hugged awkwardly, Emah favoring one side, and wept. It seemed that neither Destiny nor Kami had wished to remain for the reunion, which left the two friends to chatter away.

“Where is the box now?” Emah asked, wiping her bowl clean with an end piece of bread.

“Kami has it,” Maly said. “In the attic, where it was before. She said that if the rats wanted it, she’d know they were coming that way. She’s sleeping up there, too. Though Emah,” she leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially. “I don’t know if the woman actually sleeps. Really. Oh, hey… more soup?”

Emah grinned and offered her bowl gratefully. “Yes, please.”

When Maly returned with the steaming bowl and a new hunk of bread, the black panther Destiny padded at her side. Behind them both, Kami entered the room. The bejeweled box, the size of a small backpack, was tucked under one arm.

Kami appraised her behind her wooden half-mask. “Maly says that you are healed?”

“Near enough to swing a sword, I suppose,” Emah nodded, and Kami nodded once back. “Does your question mean we have a plan?”

The Kaizukan woman paused, an expression on her mouth that looked almost pouty with her bee-stung lips. “We do not. It’s why I’m here. I thought we could discuss what happens next.”

While Emah slurped soup, Maly pulled a small chair from the corner to her bedside. Kami remained standing, and Destiny stretched out against a far wall beneath the only window. Maly had opened the curtains that morning, and the day outside looked sunny and bright.

“It seems obvious,” Kami began without preamble once Maly had settled into the chair. “that the ratfolk below Oakton are led by the figure upon the dais in the tattered robes, and that he…”

“She,” Maly corrected.

“Oh?” Emah couldn’t see it because of the mask, but she assumed that Kami had raised an eyebrow with the question. Otherwise the woman hadn’t moved.

“She yelled at me, in my mind,” Maly nodded, “the same way Destiny communicates. Definitely a ‘she,’ and young. I also don’t think she was leading those ratfolk so much as controlling them.”

Kami stared at Maly and Emah urged her on with a wave while she continued to eat.

“Yeah. She tried it on me, but either Destiny was protecting me or it only works on ratfolk or… I don’t know. Anyway, didn’t you notice how they all turned feral all of a sudden? That was her. I think if we take her out, we solve the ratfolk problem.”

“That is quite the leap of logic,” Kami frowned.

Maly shrugged a pale shoulder. “It makes sense, though.”

“What’s in the box?” Emah interjected, nodding her chin at the item beneath Kami’s arm.

“I did look, of course,” Kami said. “It’s… unnerving. I don’t know what I expected, but not this.” She knelt and placed the box upon a rug, its lid facing Emah and Maly so that, when opened, they could see inside. Emah stopped eating and the two of them leaned forward to see as Kami unlatched the chest and opened it.

Inside was something tightly wrapped in gray linen. It looked like…

“Is that a… hand!?” Maly squeaked.

“Yes,” Kami confirmed. “A severed and mummified hand. And not small and clawed either. It is a human hand.”

“Gross,” Maly winced.

“My thought as well.”

“So,” Emah wiped the last of her second bowl with the last of her second piece of bread. Before popping the bread in her mouth, she said, “the magical rat-priestess wanted the hand for some ritual, which we didn’t let her finish. Why haven’t they come and taken it from us? They certainly have the numbers, and I wouldn’t have been able to fight back.”

They all sat in silence for several heartbeats. Kami snapped the chest shut and stood, the box at her feet. “Perhaps they did not think we would come back here. It is a big city, and their warrens are vast. Or perhaps the priestess also needed rest, or to regain control of her people. I cannot say.”

“Maybe they took us being there as a threat to their home,” Maly offered. “A sign from their rat god, or something.”

“If that were the case,” Emah said, swallowing the last bite. “They would have spent these days fortifying their defenses. Maybe collapsing tunnels. That feels right… that we scared them as much as they scared us. Whatever ritual that priestess wanted to do isn’t as urgent as important as making sure we can’t just walk back into their domain unmolested.”

“I don’t want to go back down there anyway,” Maly said, and then her eyes widened with a thought. “Please don’t tell me whatever plan we make has us going back down there.”

“No, on that I agree,” Emah said, placing her empty bowl beside her on the bed. “Let’s figure out a way to lure the priestess to us.”

“With the box as bait? Interesting,” Kami mused.

They all looked down at the box, jewels glinting in the afternoon sunlight. Silence filled the room as their minds worked.

It was because of the silence that they heard the screaming from outside.

Next: Screaming!?