Hello again, my dears! Look, a chapter that didn't take me a year to write. We did it!

I'm super excited to be working on this again - not that I've ever thought about abandoning it, life just gets in the way sometimes, you know? But I've been able to hammer out some details for my overall outline, and it's really helped me get back into the mood for this story. I'm really looking forward to some of the things coming up. Just have to get there first haha. Soon! Soon.

Shout out to my friends SaRan1999, Centurious the Azure, manouchan, and An Old Friend for reviewing! You guys keeo me going - I adore you all more than words can express.

Big thank you's to Amaterasu-Absol, Pocketful Of Stardust, DarkIs4EverInLight, HEGwen, Thrill-Pair-All-The-Way, Deep Sea Diver Man, QuillForGlory, ty1967, CrazyMarcher96, Xaoleus, and SaRan1999 for either favoriting, following, or both! So many new friends! Welcome, welcome, welcome!

And a huge thank you to Centurious the Azure for beta reading this chapter for me! You're a life-saver and I can't thank you enough for being a second set of eyes on this.

Also:

Just a small reminder that Is tends to swear. Like, a lot. You've been warned.

"You know," Karol pouted, crossing his arms, "I'm getting sort of tired of all of this rain. First in the harbor, then in Caer Bocram, and now here? It's almost like it's following us."

We were standing under the covered entrance to Heliord's Inn, Betelguese, watching the sky pour. Well, the others were watching it rain. I'd taken one look at the angry, grey sky and pulled my bag from my shoulders with a huff. I was now elbow deep in said bag, rummaging around for my hunter's cloak. If it was going to rain, I was absolutely going to be a diva about staying dry. Delta wasn't the only one who got sour when she got wet.

"Hey, don't look at me." I stole a glance up to see Yuri putting his hands up in surrender. "I don't control the weather."

Seeing him so nonchalant sent a flare of molten anger racing up my spine and I had to hide my sneer behind my shoulder as I shoved my arm roughly back into the fabric of my pack. I was still frustrated with him.

"Wouldn't that be something, though," said Judith. "Imagine all the fun you could have if you could make it rain whenever and wherever you wanted."

Pretty sure someone had done that and it hadn't ended well. For anyone.

"Oh, I would make it sunny every day! Just like springtime!" Estelle said, tone bright.

"She knows that it's literally spring right now, right?" I murmured into the abyss that was my bag. Why couldn't I find my stupid cloak? "It rains in the spring."

'She is quite sheltered, that one. Isn't she.'

"Sure, sure, but knowing her, she knows the history of every weather system on every continent on Terca Lumeris. She'll know that it rains in the spring. Freaking bookworm."

'I find her thirst for knowledge inspiring,' Khana sniffed, jabbing at the back of my mind lightly.

I just breathed sharply out of my nose, a mockery of a laugh. "Good for you. I just find it sad."

Khana vibrated, thinking. 'I suppose it is a bit sad. How many friends do you think she had in that castle?'

"Given that she's probably read, and memorized, mind you, every page of every book that she could get her hands on? My guess is not many."

The spirit went silent.

Oh.

Oh. Shit.

"That's rough." Books instead of people? That explained so much about our naive little princess. Maybe I'd start teasing her less.

"I once read that you can calculate the temperature based on a cricket's chirps!"

... Then again. Maybe not.

"Anyway, first things first," Karol said with a clap. "We need to go look at that blastia that went berserk last time."

This again? I rolled my eyes and finally raised my voice to address the group at large. "We don't, actually."

My fingers finally brushed the familiar, rough texture of my cloak, and I pulled it from the depths of my bag with a flourish and a happy exhale of breath rather than pay attention to Karol's squawk of a response. It had gotten buried under my little sewing kit from where I had been patching up a small tear in one of my shirts a few days prior.

I slipped the fabric over my shoulders, sliding my arms through the sleeves that were still just a bit too long for me. I rolled the tighter sleeves up so they sort of cinched cleanly at my wrists. The cloak was designed in such a way that even though I was essentially under a blanket, I still had the freedom to move my arms. There were slits down the sides where my arms could poke through if I wanted or needed them to.

I slipped them out now, clasping the elaborate silver hook at my throat closed. A quick check ensured that the hilt of my sword was poking cleanly through its opening at my shoulder. The last thing I needed was to go to draw my blade and have it get tangled in the fabric.

By the time I turned my attention back to the flailing ball of bright orange twelve-year-old, he was nearing the end of his tirade. Perfect timing.

"Of course we do! There could - it might have - We just have to make sure that it's alright!"

Estelle put her hand out to calm the boy, head cocked to the side as she looked over her shoulder at me. "It's alright, Karol. Just calm down." She was trying to play peacemaker. Cute. "Why do you say that, Isa?"

"It doesn't matter, we have to go check on it!"

I raised an eyebrow at Karol, who had actually stomped his foot at me, and waited for him to quiet down again. He wilted under my stare, and I crossed my arms. "No. We don't. The Commandant just had a whole team here to fix it. It was literally their job to fix it. If they're gone, the job is done. It's fixed."

And his head researcher, Genevieve, had made it clear that she would have her team get the job done right. She struck me as the type of woman who always got what she wanted. I suppressed a shudder at the thought of her small frame. There was something about her that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

Another logical thought struck me while picturing the small researcher.

"Alright, Karol, riddle me this," I said, face carefully calm. "Just how do you plan on checking on it? Gonna just walk up to it and ask it?"

Karol put a fist on his hip and sucked in a breath that puffed up his chest before his eyes went wide. Estelle deflated a bit as she started piecing together my line of reasoning. Judith and Yuri just stood back, watching with amused grins as I, once again, tried to cram logic into the unwilling brain of their guild boss.

I held my arms out to the sides, gesturing around us. "I don't know if you've noticed, but Rita isn't here right now. Do any of you have experience with analyzing blastia? Or their formulas? Know to read a diagnostic scan?" I huffed, tossing my braid over my shoulder. "Because I sure don't."

"Well, I - "

I turned my back to him and stepped out into the rain, flicking my hood up as I went. "But, hell, what do I know. Since you're a big-time guild boss and clearly the expert here, go ahead and check on it. Have a great time. I can't wait to see what you find out."

"But maybe Khana will be able to tell us something!"

I almost tripped over my own feet at Estelle's shout. Delta, who had been following closely at my heels, chuffed softly and tossed her head as she skittered around me. Her claws raked against the wet stone as we both barely managed to maintain our footing.

Anything that would have come out of my mouth would probably have reduced Estelle to tears, and I did not have the patience to deal with that. Instead I chose to be the bigger person and just walked away, hissing at the thing in my head as we went.

"Khana, if they ask for you one more time, I'm going to murder someone."

'Already checked that one off the bucket list, haven't you, dear?'

"Shut the everloving fuck up."

I stalked through town with a vicious scowl on my face, heading toward the stupid blastia. It was probably a good thing that it was so early in the morning, and that it was raining on top of that. There weren't any townspeople out and about to see me like this.

Not that there had been anybody around yesterday. No, they had to go and disappear. And now our princess felt obligated to play detective. Which made the rest of us feel obligated to keep her out of trouble.

"Stupid people's stupid disappearing act," I said under my breath. Coming up to the structure, I leaned up against a building close enough where I could see the barrier, but far enough away to look like I wasn't inspecting it. Because I wasn't. That would be stupid. I crossed my arms tightly across my chest. "Why can't we just make a stupid plan and stick to our stupid plan?"

'The other stupid plan was to chase a very large, very dangerous, talking monster into the desert.'

"Shut up, Khana."

It took the others a few minutes to catch up. In the meantime, I'd done my best to burn a hole into the faintly glowing rings of the barrier with my eyes. They hardly even noticed me standing in the shadows, save Repede, who sniffed at the air and tossed his head at Delta, who responded in kind. Instead, they walked right up to the structure to inspect it.

Judging by the way they were staring blankly at it, they had no idea what they were looking at.

I hated them almost as much as I loved being right.

'No, you don't.'

"I thought I told you to shut up."

She only laughed. She was right, after all.

Not that I would ever admit it out loud.

Time passed slowly after that. My companions were floundering uselessly at the barrier and I had nothing to offer by means of help. I wasn't a blastia expert by any stretch of the imagination, so it was probably best that I just stayed out of their way. Especially if someone who did know what was going on came around and got them in trouble for sticking their noses where they don't belong.

I smirked. Wouldn't that be something.

It wasn't until a few minutes had passed that I suddenly felt a weight slough off of my chest. I reflexively heaved a deep, shuddering sigh that shook my entire body. My shoulders relaxed from where I hadn't even realized they had tensed up into my ears. Eyes drifting closed, I shifted my head from one side to the other, letting my neck pop and crack as it, too, relaxed.

The emotions that had been running so hot and loud through my veins just minutes before were evaporating as I loosened tight muscles and continued to put some conscious thought behind my breath. There was nothing to fill the space left behind though, and the sudden shift in mentality left me feeling like I'd aged 5 years in the span of two minutes.

I was emotionally drained and it wasn't even 10 in the morning. Perfect.

Emotions and I had never had the best relationship. They were sort of an all or nothing deal for me - when I felt things, I felt things deeply. It was so much easier to just shut them out, to turn them off. It made things much more efficient. But something had been eating at me, and I'd let something in without meaning to.

Now, the sass I'd given Karol wasn't something I was worried about. I'd never gone easy on him, and I wasn't about to start now. Teasing and poking fun at him came naturally, and, honestly, sarcasm really was a staple of my personality.

But there had been an underlying anger in that today, and that was … new. Well, maybe not new, per se. But definitely unfamiliar. Sort of like flexing a muscle that hadn't been exercised in a while. It was strange. And though, now that I thought about it, I had a pretty good idea about where it was stemming from, the only question was what to do with it. I wasn't any good at dealing with stuff like this.

I stuck out my bottom lip and blew out a harsh breath that made my baby hairs flutter across my forehead. Delta whined at my side, trying to nose her way under my cloak to get out of the rain. The frown that had been affixed to my face softened a bit, and I swept an arm out to the side to let her in. She huddled into the space behind my knees, and I shook my head down at her.

"Man, I need to get over myself, don't I, Delta?"

My partner only blinked her large, yellow eyes up at me before burrowing her face into the back of my leg. Khana had the decency to keep her thoughts to herself.

I took another deep breath. I'd worry about it later.

"It seems like everything has returned to normal." Estelle's hand was up at her mouth when I turned my attention back to where the others were still trying to inspect the blastia.

Karol was still staring at the blastia, tongue out, brow furrowed in concentration. "Yeah," he said after a while. "It looks like it hasn't gone berserk since the last time we were here."

Khana scoffed. I could almost see her crossing her arms and turning up her nose at his analysis. 'He can't possibly tell that just from looking at the thing.'

My lips twitched in the barest hint of a smile. Obviously.

Karol had moved away from the barrier blastia after he and Estelle had come to the miraculous decision that it was alright. I moved to fill the empty space, placing a hand on the wooden railing guarding the base of the blastia. Moving slowly, I ran my hand along it, steadily making my way away from the others while looking absently at the body.

"He might not be able to tell, but can you?"

'Stooping a bit low to ask a parasite for help, aren't we?'

Even though I could tell she was teasing, I forced myself to take a breath. I'd only just put the anger back in its nice little box. No sense in pulling it out again so soon. "Look, I am the last person who wants to ask you for help with anything. But I feel like I am also the only one who has any right to."

She hummed. 'True enough. Though, I will have you know that I am not infallible. I don't know why they keep asking for me.'

I bristled slightly. The box rattled. "I don't know either. But here we are."

'And why, exactly, are you asking? Are you truly concerned for the state of the blastia?'

"Not for the blastia, no," I sniffed. Fuck that thing. "The last time we were here, this thing pumped out a ridiculous amount of aer, and I don't get along with that stuff. If it's going to start doing that again, I'd like a bit of a heads up so I can start running in the opposite direction."

'Ah. Self-preservation. I approve.'

I shook my head lightly. "Yeah, well, somebody in this group has to practice it. Figure it might as well be me."

She hummed again, then fell silent. I traced idle shapes along the railing as I waited, Delta sitting dutifully by my side. Though, to the outside observer, she was probably just an extra lump under my cloak. My favorite lump. The best lump.

'The core has been stabilized, though the formula is still in its … altered form.'

I nodded. "Awesome. Great. What does that mean? It's not the first time that you've mentioned a blastia with a weird formula." Nor Harbor and Ehmead Hill came to mind, as did the blastia at Caer Bocram that the Dragon Rider had destroyed.

Actually, all of the ones I could think of had been destroyed.

I'm sure that wasn't a coincidence. Not at all.

'How much time do you have for me to explain the delicate intricacies of formulae and their impending effects on the aerological cycles of the entirety of Terca Lumeris?'

I peeked around the edge of the blastia to see Estelle on her knees, hugging a small child. The adults -

'The adults?' Khana cut my thoughts off with an uncharacteristically hearty laugh.

"Yeah, Yuri and Judith. You know what I mean."

- the adults were talking to a woman. Presumably the mother. Hopefully the mother. Otherwise Estelle had kidnapped a kid and we'd have a whole 'nother situation on our hands.

"They look distracted, so about 2 minutes." Their short attention spans were both a blessing and a curse. "Can you give me the dumbed down version for now?"

'For now, I will say this,' she said after a moment. 'There exists a very delicate balance between the flow of aer and the life on this world. The formula that this blastia utilizes, though stable for now, will grow to upset that balance.'

"Okay, so how do we keep it stable, then?" I nudged Delta with my foot and pushed off the railing. "Balance sounds like it would be a good thing to keep."

There was a long, drawn-out sigh. 'We don't. Or, rather, we can't. We destroy it.'

I had already stepped around the side of the blastia when she casually dropped that bombshell on me, and I had to scramble to right myself when my foot slipped on a wet stone. I forced out a smile as Karol and Estelle snapped their attention in my direction and tried to act normal.

"We're putting a pin in this conversation," I said through my teeth.

Destroy what? The balance or the blastia? And why? I was approaching the adults, but this was a conversation that needed to be finished. We'd add it to the fucking laundry list of other important, yet interrupted conversations that Khana and I had started but never finished.

'Another time,' she agreed breezily. 'There is much to explain.'

"Scout," Yuri greeted with a raised eyebrow. What gave him the right to be so judgy? I narrowed my eyes, remembering all the times he'd gotten on me for sneaking off. I'd literally been ten steps away the whole time. He could calm right down. "You remember Kellas?"

I quickly took stock of the woman in front of me. Shoulder length, thin brown hair. Tired, but warm face. Well worn clothes. She looked like a number of commoners we'd seen around in the past few weeks of traveling around the northern continents. She could be anyone.

So no, Mister Social Butterfly, I had no idea who she was.

But I smiled hesitantly at the woman. "Yes, of course. It's good to see you again."

If he knew I was lying, which he probably definitely did, Yuri chose not to comment on it. Instead, he ducked his head down a bit, purposefully drawing my attention to meet his dark eyes.

"Her husband, Teagle, has been missing for a couple of days," he said pointedly.

Now that name sounded more familiar, at least. Where had I heard -

I was still slowly puzzling together names and faces and places when the second half of his statement sunk in.

Ah, fuck. So those rumors really were true.

"After all the trouble we had with Magistrate Ragou in Nor Harbor -" I felt my body tense up at the mention of the councilman. Is that where we knew her from? Fuck. "- after we almost lost Pauly, we thought that moving to a new town would be best for us. But now Teagle is missing and I just don't know what to do!"

Well. There was one question answered, at least.

Kellas looked to be on the verge of tears. I looked over at Judith, who moved closer and put a delicate hand on the woman's arm, rubbing gently. I could feel Yuri's eyes on me, and I met his stony gaze with a question in my own.

Just what was going on here?

"You've been through too much already." He hadn't broken eye contact with me when he spoke, and I started slightly before I realized that he was addressing Kellas again. "We'll see what we can do."

"Brave Vesperia is on the job." Karol had a determined look in his brown eyes.

Kellas thanked us, then ushered Pauly off somewhere. We watched them go in silence.

"Alright, what the hell happened?" I shook my head, already correcting myself. "Is happening? Just - what the hell?"

"Kellas said that the magistrate here was promising to make people members of the nobility if they worked hard enough building up the city," said Karol.

That was … not quite how nobility worked.

Estelle seemed to be on the same page as me. "The rank of nobility is typically reserved for those whose service has earned the Emperor's confidence," she said. "But …"

"But with Cumore being a captain in the Imperial Knights, as well the magistrate of the city?" Judith was hugging her elbows, expression more down than I had ever seen it. Even the tips of her pointy ears were dipping toward the ground. "Why wouldn't the people believe him?"

I could see how that could be misleading. With Heliord being such a new city, there would be no standing nobility - no old families with claim, no retired knights granted a higher class for their services. It wouldn't be too hard to convince the more common people, people who may not be familiar with the nuances of nobility, that they had an equal opportunity to work their way into the class they desired.

But why did that name sound familiar?

"Cumore as the magistrate, huh?" Yuri's eyes darkened. "First Ragou, now this? Damn, why can't they just put someone good in charge for once."

"Do you know him, Yuri?"

His nose scrunched up at the question. "Unfortunately. You've met him too, Captain - remember at Caer Bocram?"

Ah, so we had met him. Good to know.

"Oh, wait, is he the creepy one with the purple hair and the weird voice? I didn't like him much. He was mean to Estelle."

My eyebrows raised in spite of themselves at that. Forget all the other fucked shit he might be doing - what kind of person did you have to be to have purple hair? That was so unnatural for a human.

'Estelle's hair is pink.'

"But Estelle is normal," I said with a half-hearted shrug. "I'm sure there's a reason for hers."

Well, wait - was Cumore human? If I was correct, most, if not all of the Imperial Knights were human. He probably was. Not that I remembered much about the knights that had kindly escorted us out of Caer Bocram. I'd been a bit busy bleeding out of my eyes at that point to pay much attention.

Actually -

"Okay, well, wait - who appointed him as magistrate? I thought the Imperial throne was empty." I spared a glance over at our princess. "Estelle?"

If memory served, the only person with the authority to appoint a new magistrate was the Emperor. The Council and the Knights could make recommendations and bring forth candidates, but would not be made official until the seal of the Emperor was on the documentation. But a city could operate perfectly well on its own, and have in the past. Halure had no appointed magistrate, but an elected mayor, and we were just fine.

My expression dropped. At least, I hoped they were alright.

I hardly noticed when Estelle nodded at my posed question. "As far as I know, yes, the throne is vacant."

Karol giggled suddenly. "Imagine if they made you the Empress and forgot to tell you!"

Estelle laughed along, though it was strained. She didn't like the thought any more than the rest of us.

And it was … a possibility. Though unlikely, thank goodness, given that we had just seen Ioder, and he hadn't given any indication that someone had been named to the throne. But I wouldn't put it past someone to pull something as shady and underhanded as that.

The implications of having an absent Emperor or Empress were not good. Since the Council had more sway in political matters than the Knights, it meant that they would be running the show unchecked. Not that I thought the Knights should be running things, but Alexei and his ideals were far more trustworthy than any of the old bags on the Council. The trial in Dahngrest proved that.

"Well, anyway," Yuri cut in gracefully with a smirk, "if it is just Cumore up to his usual stunts, we'll just go slap him around until he stops."

Karol's smile dropped immediately, big brown eyes widening in horror. "We can't do that! He's the magistrate - we'll get in trouble! You remember how badly things ended with Ragou, right? That'll just happen again - or worse!"

As I fought to maintain my composure and not choke on the air that was suddenly caught in my lungs, Yuri waved a hand. "Justice will come for Ragou. We're just going to speed Justice up a bit with Cumore."

I blinked slowly, and a fist closed around my heart. Khana groaned softly in the back of my head as it squeezed.

Was he - was he implying what I think he was implying?

'I certainly hope not.'

Oh fuck, were we going to have to kill Cumore?

Estelle looked determined, which meant she was going to Get Things Done. Which translated to all of us Getting Things Done because like hell we were going to let her Get Things Done on her own. "The knights exist for the protection of the people. If Cumore really is behind the disappearances, he'll have to answer for his actions."

The tightness in my chest loosened a bit at that. We couldn't have a repeat of Ragou's "Justice" with Estelle so close by. Right?

'Not that it stopped you last time in the slightest.'

Okay, well. Whatever. I had to turn my head to the side and speak out of the corner of my mouth to respond. "Dahngrest was a big city. There are less places to hide here."

'You mean less places to hide a body.'

"I mean there's a river literally right there, so -"

'Please stop.'

"Hey, it worked fine the last time."

'If you aren't going to stop, could you at least pretend you don't want to commit murder? Again?'

The tightness returned, this time moving to my throat. I hadn't meant to, but playing devil's advocate for this had been so easy. That was a person's life we were talking about. Sure, maybe he wasn't a great person, but he was still alive. Didn't that mean he had the right to be alive?

I stared vacantly at my feet. If Yuri wanted to kill Cumore, I'd need him to convince me that he deserved it. That it would actually be for the greater good. That this justice couldn't be served another way.

My hands balled into fists. But had Ragou deserved that? We'd tried to do things the legal way - The Don and Grand Captain Harlock couldn't touch him while the Council still backed him. There had been no other way to bring him to justice. Right?

Right?

This felt like the exact argument that Flynn and Yuri were trapped in, and I was having it with myself. I could see both sides so plainly. Was there actually a correct answer? A good solution?

"Let's just be careful, okay?" It sounded like Karol had made a decision. "The Knights could squash our little guild if we aren't careful."

"As you wish, Cap."

"Alright, well, let's go find him." I could hear the smile in Judith's voice.

Now was not the time for an existential crisis. I'd deal with it later. And maybe it wasn't going to be a Thing after all. Maybe this had nothing to do with Cumore. Maybe he was a good Captain and a good Magistrate and this was all a big misunderstanding. Nobody needed to die.

Karol and Estelle put on their detective hats and started debating where to look for the Captain first.

I hugged my arms a little tighter to my chest and glowered at the cobblestones. I just wanted to get out of the rain.

Apparently my 'fuck off' vibes needed some work because they did nothing to stop Yuri from moving to stand next to me. The nonchalant set of his shoulders was almost too casual, the expression on his face too calm. While I couldn't tell what he was thinking - Yuri was still too difficult to read sometimes - I could tell he was forcing something down, bottling something up for the sake of the others. His emotions were wrapped neatly in a blanket of tight control.

"Hey."

No.

"What," I said instead. Because if he was talking to me like this, he had to want something. He always wanted something.

"Notice anything weird about that?" He nodded sideways, over to where a Knight was standing. He was clearly on duty, going by his posture.

"He's a Knight," I said slowly. "It's a military town. I'm not sure I'm following."

With a rolling shrug, Yuri answered, "Sure, but he's guarding a lift."

He didn't look at what he was talking about - in fact, his eyes were wandering everywhere except toward the knight in question in an attempt to not draw attention.

For the sake of subtlety, I knelt down to scratch at Delta's neck, pretending to be very interested in giving her praise while looking up through my eyelashes at the place just beyond where the Knight was standing. Sure enough, there was a little lever off to his right and a platform that appeared to be rigged so that it could move up and down the side of the building. Because fuck stairs, apparently.

When I hummed, acknowledging that I saw it, Yuri continued. "But he says we can't go past. It leads to the laborer's camp, and it's off-limits to everyone except the workers."

… Which meant someone was probably trying to hide something down there. Else why not let others past?

"It's a little suspicious, is all," Yuri finished.

Khana sighed in the back of my mind. She knew where this was headed. So did I.

"What, just because it's off-limits?" Maybe it was nothing.

Yuri just looked at me. We both knew better.

"Especially because it's off-limits." He tilted his head away from me, smirking down at me from the corner of his eye. "Think you could find a way down?"

I lazily drew myself back up to standing with a barely-concealed scoff. "Just who do you think I am, Lowell?" Of course I could get in. I didn't particularly want to, just because he was the one asking, but I could find my way into anything if I tried hard enough.

"You're Scout," he said simply.

I shifted my stance and crossed my arms. "Yeah, and Scout isn't part of your guild." They'd made that much clear already. "She has no part in this."

Yuri turned his head a bit at that, so I could see when he raised an eyebrow.

But I was just as curious as he was. And if it turned out that Cumore was up to something, if he was hurting people and still above the law like Ragou had been, and Yuri was justified in his dispensation of Justice, I wanted to see it with my own eyes first.

Of course I'd go.

"Not officially, at least." Besides, I was the best option to go snooping, didn't it? If I got caught - and that was a pretty big if. I was good at the whole sneaking thing - if I got caught, there was nothing that really tied me to Brave Vesperia other than the fact that we knew each other. They'd be safe. "I'll find my way down there, see what's going on."

He smiled, then nodded his thanks. "Sounds like a plan."

"What about you guys?"

An innocent sort of confusion flashed on his face. "What about us?"

I raised an eyebrow. "It might take me a while to get down there, look around, and come back to you. What are you going to do in the meantime?"

He shrugged. "We can be patient."

I shot him a knowing look. "No, you can't."

"Well, then, we'll just have to find something to occupy our time until you get back." His gaze shifted toward the guard and the corner of his mouth lifted ever so slightly. "We'll see you, Scout."

I took the dismissal for what it was and nudged Delta with my knee before disappearing to find my own way down. There had to be a flight of stairs that someone was overlooking or something. The lift was a recent addition to Heliord, and if Core was both as prissy as Yuri made him out to be and the one in charge here, I found it hard to believe that he'd scaled the mountain every time he wanted to get down there. If there was an easy way down there, I'd find it.

'You know, you give into him too easily,' Khana teased in the back of my mind. She had been relatively quiet over the last few hours, choosing only to make idle comments on the passing landscape or an errant creature. She did helpfully point out a few plants with foreign flowers for me to pick. I'd picked them with care, then pressed them into a journal to look at closer later.

"Yeah well, fuck Yuri and his passive-aggressive manipulation." Fuck him for always getting what he wanted. Fuck me for letting him.

'Is he manipulative or are you just a pushover?'

I glared up through my eyebrows. "Excuse me." Rude.

I could feel the spirit shrugging in my mind. 'You are a bit of a pushover, is all.'

"I am not." Was I?

'Why are we here, then?' she pushed back.

"Because all of the stairs were also being guarded?" Because of fucking course they were. Nothing was easy. I couldn't have anything in this house.

Khana smacked the back of my head. 'Sass is unnecessary.'

I sighed, frustrated. Fine. "We are here because something is going on in this town. And because I'm curious."

'You mean you're nosy.'

I pushed another low hanging tree branch out of my way. If the gradually leveling topography was any indication, we were nearing the plateau where the laborer's camp should be. Thank goodness for that. I'd been struggling my way down the side of the mountain for hours now, and was getting irritated. I'd almost fallen off a cliff, been eaten by giant bugs, and it was still raining, so I was wet. I was more than unhappy.

I just wanted to be there already.

"I am not nosy," I argued hotly. "Estelle is nosy. Rita is nosy. I am curious."

'Different word, same meaning,' she sang.

"So I'm either a pushover or I'm nosy. Are those seriously the only options you're giving me here?" Because while I would much rather be one than the other, both labels sucked.

Khana seemed to consider this for a moment. 'In this instance, yes.'

I rolled my eyes.

"You can't honestly tell me that you aren't at all curious about this Cumore guy." I knew Khana, whether I wanted to or not. She hoarded knowledge. Not having all of the information about Cumore had to be driving her up a wall.

'I have no need for your mortal curiosity,' said Khana. 'Everything I need to know, I do.'

I shook my head at her dramatics. "Sounds fake, but whatever. Anyway. I just- If Yuri wants to repeat what went down with Ragou…" I trailed off, not wanting to say it out loud. Why couldn't I just say it out loud?

Delta's ears pricked up, catching something I didn't, and I thanked her for the distraction. Following her lead, I stilled, listening closely to the woods around me and tuning out the sound of the rain.

Snap.

There. Something was rustling in the cover of the large bushes nearby. With a sharp nod to Delta, she moved to flank where the sound was coming from.

I drew my blade as quietly as I could, sinking low to the ground as I moved toward the source of the disturbance. One step, two steps closer. It was only about 15 feet ahead of me now. The large bush rustled, and I stilled. Through the branches, I could just make out two beady, red eyes.

I gave a low whistle to Delta, who growled in response. While I held its attention, she pounced at the creature, sending it scuttling out of the bush toward me as it tried to get away. It was one of those mutated mantis things that we'd come across on the way to Heliord, and one of the creatures that I was sick of fighting.

"Let's make this quick," I growled.

I channeled aer into my bodhi blastia, then guided it to the blade of my jian. The blue stones embedded in the steel lit up, and I grinned wolfishly as I slashed toward the bug with more force than I was usually capable of.

"Brilliance!"

As soon as I made contact with the thick exoskeleton of the mantis, the aer from my blade seemed to explode into a rainbow of colors as it forced itself into the creature's body. The thing screamed out in pain, a high pitched whine that made me wince, before bringing its sharp front legs down.

I dove to the side as they hit the mud with authority, and rolled easily back to my feet, already preparing my next attack. From a distance, I cut out Vibrance at it twice before it got too close and I had to catch one of its bladed arms on the flat of my blade before it severed mine in half.

From there, I took a step even closer, sliding its arm off my sword with a hiss. Whirling around, I slashed at its lower legs. I grit my teeth at the contact, and powered through the resistance I met until I'd scored a deep cut through them both.

Delta lept on its back and started tearing at its neck with teeth and claws. It reared up at the sudden pain, providing me the distraction I needed to land a few more hits on its sofer underbelly before dancing back out of range. Didn't want to push my luck and end up gutted because I'd overstepped.

Good thing, too, because the thing finally managed to shake Delta off not even three seconds later. She landed gracefully on her feet, sliding a bit in the mud, before baring her fangs and circling back for another attack.

Beady red eyes flicked back and forth between me and my partner. Trying to assess the greater threat. Its mandibles clicked angrily. I readied Brilliance again with a huff.

It made the critical mistake of leaving its gaze on Delta for a fraction of a second too long, and I took my opportunity to strike. Sprinting forward, I fell to my knees to duck the balded arms, relying on the wet terrainto allow me to slide far enough forward to get back into melee range. I felt a rush of air above my head as it swiped and missed.

Once close enough, I rose to a knee and drew back my sword with two hands before aiming at that same deep score I'd cut when I'd drawn first blood. Where..? There.

With a shout, I plunged my sword into the belly of the creature, aer-charged blade cutting through internal organs with ease. Brilliance shook the thing from the inside.

It twitched twice, violently, before falling still. I slid it off the end of my sword. It hit the ground with a wet thud. Delta trotted up and nosed at its face. She chirped back at me, confirming that it was dead.

'You were saying?'

Idly, I wiped the blood off my blade before returning it to its place at my shoulder. Fuck this. Of all the interrupted conversations, this is the one she pushed? We'd been working our way down to the laborer's camp for hours now, and she'd studiously ignored any attempt I'd made to broach any of the other topics.

Why couldn't I just have things my way for once?

But it had been a bit of a day. I wanted someone, something, to talk to, and a conversation about something I didn't know how to talk about sure as hell best walking in silence.

"About Ragou, yeah. I don't -" I cut myself off, still struggling to find the right words. "I just think I should know who Cumore is for myself. I don't want to just take Yuri's word as law."

'Mmm.'

Though her response was neutral, I rushed to keep explaining myself. "I need to make the decision for myself. And to do that, I need more information about him."

I'd had all of the information I'd needed to make my choice about Ragou. He was a piece of shit, both as a magistrate and as a member of the Council, and he had made choices that put people in danger. He'd kidnapped that kid. He'd built a blastia that fucked with the weather on the continent so bad that we'd felt it in Halure. People had died.

Plus he was an arrogant prick. He'd needed to be taken down a peg.

That thought was still in the back of my mind about an hour later when Delta, who had run a ways ahead of me, reappeared at my side. I could see a break in the trees ahead, and the outlines of what looked to be tents. We'd reached the camp. Finally.

Okay. Game plan.

Get in. Look around. Avoid knights. Find people. Ask what's up. Get out.

That sounded simple enough.

'And terribly well thought out.'

I shrugged at the sarcasm, but didn't respond. It didn't have to be more detailed than that. If I tried to make a more detailed plan, it would all go to shit anyway. Might as well keep it simple from the start.

It was almost alarming how easy it was to slip into the camp unnoticed. There were no guards posted along the outskirts, which was troubling. They'd been consistent in the guard placement to keep prying eyes like mine away from this place - where was that caution now?

But apparently no one was concerned about people coming down the side of the mountain. Lucky me.

The tents looked like they were built without sides, but someone had strung up long sheets of burlap to keep the rain out. It made it easier to sneak through unnoticed. Stacked all around them were bags and boxes containing different foods and supplies. Nothing was particularly interesting. It just looked like a normal camp.

There were, however, a couple of stacks of crates by the entrance to one of the tents that caught my eye. There was a strange symbol painted in purple on the outside - it looked like a manta ray crossed with a bat? It was weird. There were two other, smaller ones, one to each side, and their tails all crossed toward the bottom.

It looked like a guild emblem.

Ghosting up to the piles, I slid the lid off of a crate.

'Nosy.'

"Curious," I corrected, peering inside.

Lightning flashed overhead, illuminating a handful of metallic … things. I had no idea what I was looking at. But it definitely wasn't food. There was a stone embedded in each of the structures, near what looked to be a trigger..?

'That thing is a blastia,' Khana supplied. 'I can feel it pull at the aer, even now.'

Which wasn't good, given that these things were clearly turned off. Blastia usually only channeled aer when told to.

"These look like … I don't even know what these look like," I breathed. Reaching in, I ran a hand across the metallic surface. Nothing remarkable happened, thank goodness, but I could feel the pull of aer the closer I got to it. I pulled my hand back with a shudder.

'They do look familiar though.'

I slid the lid shut as quietly as I could. "Do they?"

'Mmm, similar to those that the head of the Blood Alliance once had.'

Shit, that's right. Barbos and his lackeys had had guns that fired aer the last time we'd fought him. And hadn't he said he brought in another guild to help him? Maybe this was that guild's symbol.

But if these weapons had come from a guild, what were they doing in the laborer's camp of a military town? Were the Knights working with the guilds? While that wouldn't be surprising, given the new treaty, that hadn't been signed that long ago. Whatever was happening here looked like it had been in the works for a while.

What was really going on here?

Shaking my head, I forced my questions to the back of my mind for the time being. I had more scouting to do. Maybe I'd find answers somewhere.

The rest of the camp wasn't particularly exciting. Just more supplies and crates full of those strange weapons. The river I'd more or less followed down the side of the mountain ran flowed along the back side of the camp, effectively boxing it in. Surrounded by woods on two sides, stopped by a river on another? The lift was really the only viable way back to civilization for the common folk that worked down here. They really had been trapped.

But speaking of those common folk, they weren't here. At least, if they were, I couldn't find them. There were hardly any knights around either. Khana told me they were probably all out working, which I guess made sense. It was the middle of the day, after all. But everybody? All at once? This place was a ghost town.

Those I did come across, however, were all donning the unfamiliar colors of pastel pinks and purples. I couldn't place the name of Captain of these guards, but hadn't Yuri mentioned Cumore's position with the Knights?

'If they do belong to him, it wouldn't surprise me,' Khana said softly, listening to one of the nearby guards say something particularly crass about the people of Heliord. 'They are rather rude.'

"Yeah, well, emulation of leadership and all that." And if Yuri's descriptions of Cumore were correct, he wasn't the kind of leader that would leave a legacy of compassion. And from what little I remembered about our treatment at Caer Bocram, I wasn't too keen on going toe to toe with him. He sounded slippery and sure of himself - a dangerous combination. I wasn't confident that playing my hidden Ace, my Legacy card, was going to work here.

I slowly eased the lid of another crate open as Khana sighed warily. 'So long as we can avoid him, I think we'll be fine.'

"If it's all the same to you, I'd like to avoid everyone." Ugh. Just more of those blastia looking things. I carefully slid the top of the crate back closed.

Khana didn't respond, only vibrated at the base of my skull. I didn't know how to take that.

Glancing around, there really wasn't much else here. Still no commoners, no laborers. Even the occasional guards seemed to have disappeared. Delta was trotting toward the across the camp, paws slopping wetly across the dirt and mud, leaving wide prints in her wake. I'd have to be more careful where I stepped - I wanted to be as invisible as possible. It wouldn't do to be followed.

The faint grinding of gears drew me out of my thoughts, and I instinctively crouched down behind the nearby crates, all senses on high alert. Slowly, as if that would keep me from being seen, I raised my head just enough to eye the now moving lift. It was on its way down - already too close to the ground for me to make out details - and the rain hadn't let up any, making it even more difficult to see or hear anything.

I could just barely make out a flash of lilac purple and the passing silhouettes of two figures before I lost my line of sight.

Okay. Just two guys. I could handle hiding from two guys.

Maybe they would do me a favor and not come this way. I was about 50 yards from the bottom of the lift - there were a lot of tents they could duck into to get out of the rain before closing in on my position.

"With the money and weapons I now have at my disposal, everything will soon be within my reach," came a sudden, rich voice. The telltale squelch of boots on mud was growing louder. Whoever they were, they were headed this direction.

Shit. So much for avoiding everyone.

And this man sounded important. Or at least he sounded like he thought he was important.

I made myself as small as possible against the crates and just hoped to everything that I did and did not believe in that they wouldn't walk past my hiding spot. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Delta fold herself into the shadows until I almost lost track of her across the way.

Good girl.

"And I trust that you will remember and appreciate all of the work that Leviathan's Claw has done for you?"

"Yes yes - you will be taken care of, Yeager."

At this point, the voices stopped getting closer, instead moving to my right - I assumed toward a path that I'd seen lead out of camp. The tension in my jaw eased slightly at the realization that they would pass harmlessly by me. I just had to wait them out.

The second voice, Yeager, apparently, hummed. "You will attack the Union with these weapons I've sold you, yes?"

"Ha. I'm afraid I have my sights set on much loftier things than just your precious Union."

"Ignoring the Don is a big no-no. He is a wonderful man, ja? Don't go forgetting that." There was a warning in the second man's light tone.

"Now now, Yeager, it almost sounds as though you respect the man."

"Respect him, I do. Anyone would be a fool not to. But Leviathan's Claw always gets the job done."

The first voice was smug. "Such dedication. That's just what I like about you."

'I don't like either of them,' Khana chimed in. Unhelpful.

"Either way, I wouldn't worry about it. You are looking at the future Commandant of the Imperial Knights."

Oh, that was not good.

That was really not good.

"That fool, Alexei, telling me to watch the Union while he signs friendship treaties with them." Cumore was growling. "If it was up to me, I'd crush them all in the blink of an eye with all of these beautiful weapons."

Yeager was quiet. I wondered what was going on in his head.

"Either way," Cumore continued. Man, he really liked to hear himself talk, didn't he? "The Union can't hope to stop me, and once the rest of the Knights realize what a favor I've done by wiping out those pesky guilds, Alexei's position will fall to me."

The squelching of their boots and the silky tones of their voices faded back into the soft pitter-patter of the rain on the ground. Once I was sure that the two men were truly gone, I let out the breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding.

Okay.

So those long blastia things that I'd seen in those crates were weapons. I'd gathered as much, but it was nice to have the affirmation. On the downside, there were a lot of them. Enough to outfit an army and storm the Union and actually put up a decent fight.

This was … turning out to be much bigger than we'd thought it was. People disappearing off to a mysterious labor camp? Being tricked into working to build up the city? Sure, that was sneaky and underhanded, but it was nothing compared to what was actually going on.

And say we did manage to find the workers. What then? Try and tell them they'd been tricked? We were nobody. Brave Vesperia was nobody. They wouldn't believe our word over the word of a Captain of the Knights. Over the Magistrate of their city.

The other option was to tell them the truth. That Cumore was trading on the black market for weapons to overthrow the Don and take down the guild Union. But so what? These were Imperial citizens. The odds of them caring about the guilds were slim. If anything, they'd cheer for Cumore as he waged war.

War.

Did we really want to get in the middle of another war between the Imperial Knights and the Union? Again? Because that's what it was coming down to. It would be us against Cumore, here and now, trying to stop him before he gained any more traction in his mission.

Delta whined at my side, pressing her wet nose into the palm of my hand. As I blinked myself out of my spiraling thoughts, I caught the sound of grinding gears over the sound of the rain.

Fuck. Not again.

I ducked back down behind a different stack of crates - ugh, there were so many of these weapons, weren't there - as another group boarded the lift, but this time, I made sure I could still see this new group of people.

Squinting through the rain, I struggled to make out details. They were still too high up. I placed a hand on the back of Delta's neck to steady myself. It was probably nothing. If Cumore and Yeager were the Big Dogs in Charge, the worst had already passed. I could handle whoever these guys were. Delta shuddered under my touch.

The gears shifted. The lift lowered. With a deep breath, I focused on the figures.

A small figure, a child. A woman with blue hair and a pair of long, feathery antennae. A dog. A man in black.

Khana sighed.

You've got to be fucking kidding me.

I rose from my hiding place and crossed my arms as I watched my companions descend. With a click of my tongue, I called Delta to my side, and we made our way around the tents, skirting around the edge of the camp to approach the lift from the side.

Karol and Estelle were chatting loudly, and I bit my lip as my attention flickered back to the quiet camp. While I was fairly certain that there was still nobody nearby, I wasn't really sure where Yeager and Cumore had gone or when they were coming back. Or if they were coming back alone.

Those two would draw the whole city guard of Heliord if they weren't careful. And I didn't want to have to deal with that. Especially if they were Cumore's guys.

I seriously needed to give them a lesson or two in the art of sneaking.

Once they were all off, I slid up behind Yuri, arms still crossed tightly. "Did you guys just come down the lift? Just like that?"

If Yuri was surprised to see me so soon, he hid it well. His eyes gave me a quick once over before he flashed me a grin that was a little too innocent and shrugged easily. "Just like that."

Oh, I didn't trust that look at all.

'Nor do I, but there are more pressing matters at hand.'

I huffed in response to the entire situation, sulking a little bit as I pulled my hood down to hide my eyes. "If it was that easy why'd it take you so long to get down here?"

And why did I have to scale my way down the side of a fucking mountainto get down here first?

'At least you don't have to go back up that way.'

If she jinxed that and we had to climb a mountain, I was going to kill someone.

Yuri only shrugged again, eyes darting around, taking in his new surroundings. "We got a little held up by that guard so decided to go run some errands in the meantime."

Alright. Sure. I crossed my arms, watching idly as Karol, Estelle, and Judith started poking around the camp. "So how'd you get past him?"

"We seduced him!"

My mouth fell open in spite of my best efforts to stop it. I half-turned toward the sound of the princess' voice, but waited for the man in front of me to clarify first. "You seduced - you what?"

Yuri only nodded over to where Estelle was smiling brightly back at me, waving a delicate hand. I cocked my head to the side at the sight of her - that was not the dress she usually wore. But there was someone standing next to her that stole my attention before I really got the chance to look more closely.

"Is that - is that Rita?"

"Yeah, we found her up there."

Okay..? I turned my focus back to Estelle. What in the name of..? "And what the hell is Estelle wearing?"

Judith blinked innocently. "Just some new clothes we got made for her. Doesn't she look nice?"

"Sure, she looks -" I cut myself off as the pieces clicked into place.

'Surely not.' Khana sounded scandalized. 'Most certainly not.'

"You let Estelle seduce the guard."

Oh no.

"Hey, guys," Karol called, waving frantically. "You gotta come check this out!"

Judith nodded, smiling brightly at me before gliding over to where the boy was elbow deep in one of the crates he and Rita had been rifling through.

"Wait, wait, wait." I waved my arms and quickly stepped in front of Yuri to stop him from going to join them. I was still trying to wrap my head around what happened.

He paused, a faint grin on his lips as he watched my mind whirl. I pressed the palms of my hands together and held them up to my lips for a moment, taking a breath to gather my thoughts. "Let me see if I've got this right."

Khana was vibrating in the base of my skull. I couldn't tell if she was angry, impressed, or just laughing. I, for one, wasn't laughing. Not right now.

"You," I pointed my hands at his chest, "Yuri Lowell, who only just got all of his 'adventures' pardoned and his bounty waived, let Estelle, the Imperial Princess, candidate to the Imperial Throne," I pointed my hands over to where Estelle was standing, bouncing lightly on the balls of her feet, twirling around in her new outfit, "seduce an Imperial Knight in a town controlled by the Imperial Knights."

He pursed his lips, following my train of thought. After a second, he winced lightly before nodding down at me.

"Yeah, that sums it up pretty well."

The laugh that snuck out of my chest was breathy and hopeless. I ran my hands through my hair. "Dude, I couldn't have been gone for more than 4 hours."

He shifted a hand to his hip, raising the other in a half shrug. The guilty look melted into an easy grin. "Come on, Scout. You know that you're like, 80% of our impulse control. We get into a lot more trouble when you're gone."

That was… not exactly comforting. Not necessarily wrong, per se, but not comforting. I wasn't used to being the voice of logic. Or the adult. "Clearly."

His smile faded a bit as he smoothly changed the subject to more pressing matters. "So what'd you find out?"

I took a deep breath, letting my gaze wander over to where the others were still poking around in the crates.

"Nothing great? They're gathering balstia, I know that much. And apparently the people down here are being used for labor. I don't know what for, but I haven't seen much of anyone down here except for a few guards. They're being worked hard, whatever it is."

Yuri kept his expression impassive, listening to me while watching as the others continued to poke around. "What else."

"I'm pretty sure I met Cumore and it's…" I trailed off, shaking my head. "It just doesn't look great, Yuri. He wants to become the Commandant, and is planning on attacking the Union. Overthrowing the Don. And it looks like he has the weapons to do it." I waved a hand absently at the crates as I turned my gaze toward them.

Rita and Judith had pulled out one of the blast that I'd been looking at earlier. It looked even meaner now that it was out of its case.

Yuri ran a hand roughly across his face. "Damn, that is not good. Where did he get all of this in the first place? I know he didn't get it from the Knights - they hardly hand out bodhi blastia, let alone these things."

"Does the name Leviathan's Claw mean anything to you?" I asked sarcastically, gesturing at the purple emblem on the side of the crate Judith was leaning on. "I'm pretty sure they're working together."

"The red-eyes?" I nodded. "I guess it's not surprising to hear they're working with someone like Cumore. But going to war with the Union? That doesn't sound like the best idea for a guild like them."

I sighed. "I don't know, but it seems to me like they're gunning for Altosk in particular. Getting rid of the Don means the guilds will lack a leader. They're probably waiting to step into the power vacuum."

"And you're sure this is Leviathan's Claw?"

"Pretty damn sure," I said. "There's some guy walking around with a weird accent who I think might be the guild boss. I heard Cumore talking with him about their plan to attack the Union."

That said, I still wasn't sure if that was Cumore. But he fit Karol's description and gave me a creepy vibe, so I felt pretty confident in saying it was him.

Yuri nodded slowly, accepting the information in stride. "We've got our work cut out for us, then."

He took a few steps toward where the others were, still poking around the camp and waiting for us to join them. My heart caught in my throat, and I reached out a hand to catch his arm as he moved past me.

"Hey, Yuri," I said quietly, tugging on his sleeve. He paused and turned, glancing down at my hand, then up to meet my eyes with his head cocked, waiting. I dropped his sleeve and wrapped my arms around my waist. "Are we sure this is something we should really be getting involved with?"

The whole scenario was turning out to be so much bigger than we had originally thought - Cumore wanted to, effectively, go to war with the Union. After we had literally just avoided, quite narrowly, a war with the Union.

I almost wanted to go hunt the big bird in the desert instead.

'No, you don't.'

I rolled my eyes. "I said almost," I breathed between my teeth.

Yuri took some time to mull the situation over, staring blankly at a spot over my shoulder. I shifted my weight from my right foot to my left as he processed, trying to let him think in peace and trying to keep my own mind from wandering to how we might go about stopping Cumore.

A flash of movement.

A soft exclamation of pain.

A hot liquid dripping sluggishly down steel.

"Shut up already."

A push.

A splash.

An understanding.

His eyes refocused after a moment and he lifted his shoulders briefly. Khana nudged me out of my own thoughts in time to catch his level response.

"No. But if we don't, who will?"

I appreciated the honesty in his simple answer. He sounded so confident, and there was a conviction in his eyes that put the little bit of anxiety in my heart at ease. We weren't going to do this because it was going to be easy - we were going to do it because it was the right thing to do.

But fuck did I just want to leave it be.

"I hate politics," I sighed, moving past him.

He chuckled, then made use of his long legs to walk in stride with me.

Estelle looked up as we approached, eyes clouded with worry as she explained what they found.

"Rita says that they're gathering hoplon blastia here."

"Yeah," I confirmed, stepping closer to look at the thing. It was about two and a half of feet in length and looked so much more complex up close. It looked sleek and mechanical, with a deep red core undulating gently with a soft glow. "There are boxes and boxes of them around the whole place. What exactly do they do?"

Again, I was no blastia expert. I could hardly tell the difference between the various types of blastia, let alone what they did. But this thing didn't like anything good, if the size of the core was anything to go by. Each one was bigger than the size of my fist.

Idly, I put a hand on my bodhi blastia, which fit snugly in my palm. If I could do a lot of damage with something this size, it was easy to imagine what could be done with something as large as that.

"They are capable of drawing in massive quantities of aer, compressing it, and then shooting it out," Rita explained, distracted. Her brow was creased with a frown. That wasn't good.

"You mean like the things on the Heracles?" Those things were cannons. Of aer. Even for the Imperial Knights, their use seemed a little excessive.

'It is a warship,' mused the spirit.

That ... was a fair point. Even more reason for Cumore not to have them.

"So they're like, big aer guns," I said aloud. And Cumore had how many of these? That couldn't be a good thing.

Rita rolled her eyes. "They're much more complex than that, but yeah, that's the idea."

Estelle clasped her hands at her chest, brow furrowed. "But there are so many of them. What could they possibly need all of these for?"

I went to answer, but my voice caught in my throat. I didn't want to be the bearer of bad news this time around. We had just narrowly avoided a war between the Union and the Knights - it would crush Estelle to hear that one of the Captains was trying to start up that trouble again.

I looked pointedly at Yuri, then down at my feet. He could do this.

"Whatever it is, it can't be good. This is a lot of firepower right here, and Scout just said there's more where it came from."

Or we could just not tell them. Let them try and connect their own dots. That worked too.

'Until they come to the wrong conclusion,' Khana said. 'Why not just tell them the truth and avoid the incorrect assumptions?'

"With this many weapons, it looks like someone is getting ready for war," Karol said. His hand was up at his chin, his face troubled. "And if Cumore is with the Knights..." He trailed off, but we all knew where his train of thought was heading. The Union.

Estelle's brow furrowed even further. "But we - the Empire just signed a peace treaty with the guilds. Why would they attack now?"

The corner of my mouth twitched. "Seems like she connected those dots just fine, if you ask me."

'This time,' she allowed with a huff.

Judith had a thoughtful look on her face. "Maybe it's this magistrate working on his own," she said with a small frown.

Yuri was shaking his head. "Judy's right. It's not the Knights. It's gotta just be Cumore. He's after power. There's no way he intends to keep any promise made to the guilds."

He let that sink in for a minute. It hung heavy in the air, and I shifted my feet, uncomfortable with the silence. Eventually, everyone continued poking around the camp again. They didn't believe me when I told them they wouldn't find anything more interesting than those weapons. They continued snooping anyway.

Estelle started giggling out of nowhere a few minutes later.

"Ugh, what is with you?" Rita threw up her hands at the other girl as she shout-whispered. "First you're panicked, now you're laughing?"

"You're pretty moody yourself, Rita," Karol teased. His eyes widened as the mage whirled around, eyes on fire. Thankfully just the eyes. Her hands were mercifully empty of her favorite element. For the moment. He yelped, moving to try and hide behind me. I planted a hand on his forehead and steered him away.

"You're not really one to talk, Karol," Yuri quipped, all smiles. Even with everything going on, he seemed to be in a chipper mood.

Estelle just giggled behind her hand again. "I'm just so glad that we found you here! I gave up on going back to Zaphias, so even if you had come to visit me, I wouldn't have been there!"

Rita's cheeks turned a very faint shade of pink as she opened her mouth to respond.

"Oh, that's sweet, Rita," Yuri said slyly, cutting her off. "You were gonna go visit Estelle."

The dusting of pink turned a shade darker on the mage's face. "That's, that's stupid. I wouldn't go all the way to the capital just to visit someone. I have to report my findings about the aer krene, so I'd be there anyway. I just thought I'd stop in and say hi."

I crossed my arms, letting my eyes roll just a bit. "Sure, Rita. You keep on trying to convince yourself. You'll get there eventually."

"That sounds like an excuse for a visit with Estelle to me," Judith said, smiling innocently.

"Oh!" Rita clenched her fists and turned to snap at the krytian and myself. "You two stay out of this."

Judith and I shared a knowing look as Yuri swept back into play peacemaker.

"Aw come on." He slung one arm around Estelle's shoulders and used the other to gesture at the group. "Look at us. We're all together again! Let's just be happy about that."

Yuri's good mood suddenly made a lot more sense.

I rolled my eyes fondly. What a sap.

Smack.

I turned my head sharply toward the sound.

"Is?"

I blinked quickly, glancing back at Judith's raised eyebrow before turning my attention deeper into the camp. I did my best to tune out Karol and the others and strained my hearing, trying to figure out if I had just imagined it. Had someone wandered back into camp? Sure, we were stronger as a group, but that also removed the deniability I'd given Brave Vesperia by coming down alone. And I still wasn't keen on being seen here.

A few moments of tense silence passed. I was still on edge from snooping around. Maybe I was just hearing things.

Smack.

"You damn slacker!"

Well. Definitely hearing something. Probably a bad something.

I waved Judith off and ghosted away from the group in the direction of the sound of the voice. Sticking to the shadows cast by the tents, I wove my way between the supporting ropes until I could hear the rhythmic sound of a stick cracking against something soft.

Crouching low to the ground, I peeked out from around the canvas flap of one of the tents.

"Ah hell," I breathed.

In the middle of the path ahead stood a knight donning the pastel pinks and purples that I had seen on the man I'd assumed was Cumore. He held a spear in his upraised hand, parts of the shaft stained a darker burgundy than the rest.

Prone on the ground before him lay a man, quaking in what looked to be a combination of fear and pain. He was panting loudly, though his voice was quiet and broken as he pleaded to the man above him.

"Please… Please … No more…"

I felt more than saw the others coming up behind me at this point, and I held up a hand to stop them. If we just rushed in, there was no telling what more the knight would do to that poor man. We didn't know if anybody else was around. We didn't have enough information yet.

My vision went red as he brought it down on the man's back with a sharp crack.

'Satisfied?'

The poor man curled in on himself and let out a pained whimper.

"There's no time for rest!" the knight shouted.

"No," I whispered back to the spirit, seething. I wouldn't be satisfied until someone knocked his teeth out. "But I have all the information I need."

And I wouldn't feel any guilt about unleashing hell on this guy.

"Hey! What the hell are you doing?"

Hell came in the form of a tall, pissed off drink of water by the name of Yuri Lowell.

His eyes were alight with righteous fury, katana already unsheathed in his left hand as he stalked forward. Lightening streaked across the sky as the rain continued to fall, painting an even more intimidating picture of the man I'd come to know.

Ooh, he was just itching for something to hit, wasn't he. This would be quick.

"What, are you gonna disobey orders too?" sneered the knight, turning to face him. He raised his spear and puffed out his chest, trying to make himself appear larger as he readied himself to dispense another beating.

I sighed deeply. This knight was clearly blind to the fact that Yuri wasn't one of the common folk that he'd had control over. Yuri could wipe the floor with him within a minute.

"Yeah, well, I've never been great at following orders." What would have been a flippant retort in any other situation came out as a growl from Yuri's gritted teeth, making my skin crawl. Traveling with him for long enough made it easy to forget just how formidable of an opponent he could be.

I didn't envy this knight.

I caught Karol's arm lightly as he went to join the fray and pulled him back to stand beside me. When he looked up at me, confusion clear on his brow, I just shook my head. Yuri needed to let off some steam, and this was just one man. He could handle this. My anger could wait. He didn't need our help.

I'm not sure if he understood, but he seemed to trust my judgement enough that he didn't make any other moves to join. Either that or he didn't want to get in the way. Which may or may not have been my reasoning for not joining him too. Getting in Yuri's way during a fight was not my idea of a good time, even on a good day.

When he was this pissed off? Not a chance.

I was right, though, and it was a quick fight. In fact, to call it a fight would almost be too generous. Yuri kicked the absolute shit out of him in about 15 seconds, and was currently towering above the defeated knight as he groaned in the mud.

Estelle moved forward, the aer already shifting and singing around her as she prepared to heal the poor man on the ground. First Aide rang out, and the green light I'd come to associate with the arte flowed into the man's chest. He wheezed for a moment before catching his breath with a gasp.

"Thank you," he rasped, clutching at Estelle's arm, "so much."

The princess smiled. "It's alright now." She rubbed soothing circles on the man's back until he could sit up on his own.

A silky voice dripping in venom rang out through the following stillness. "And just what is going on here?"

A man with purple hair and pink armor stood next to one of the tents, eyes bright and sharp and his hand on the hilt of his sword. Another man, this one dressed in a deep blue suit, stood just behind him with a razor sharp smile.

Shit. Cumore and Yeager were back and we were still here. That was not part of the plan.

I carefully maneuvered myself so I stood between the two men and Karol. Even though the kid would probably end up behind me anyway. If this ended in a fight, I wanted a direct shot at caving someone's face in - Cumore or Yeager. I wasn't picky.

"Seems you have been discovered, ja?" Yeager had his elbow placed delicately in his other hand as he watched us with an unconcerned grin. "Terrible manners. You'll have to teach them."

When I'd take time to reflect back on this conversation, it would be interesting to note the degrees of separation Yeager placed between himself and Cumore. Almost as if he was telling Cumore it was his own neck on the line - not the guild's. But not right now. Right now, I wanted to fight them both.

I could feel the anger rolling in waves off of Yuri's tense posture, and I had to take a breath to get a handle on my own. Having a clear head would get me much farther than if I allowed my judgement to get clouded. I was a lousy fighter when my emotions got in the way.

Estelle rose to her full height and glared at the Captain.

"You have no right to call yourself a knight." Estelle had pulled her shoulders back and straightened her spine to admonish the Captain. "Brute force is no way to honor the prestige of the empire. You will put down your weapons. Now. You will also release the people you have tricked into working down here!"

She spoke with such an air of authority that Cumore actually took half of a step back in surprise and shame.

'Now that,' praised the spirit queen, 'is how a ruler speaks.'

But Cumore, for all his shock, recovered remarkably quickly. With a sneer, he said, "All of this would get markedly easier if a certain, naive little princess were to simply disappear. Yeager?"

The box in my chest burst open. Anger, white and hot and all consuming, seeped back into my lungs, and I drew my sword sharply with a snarl. It settled around me, and though it was molten liquid in my veins, the anger turned cold in my head. Cold and calculating. Cumore had crossed a fucking line, and I was going to make him pay for it.

"No right to call yourself a knight," I echoed Estelle quietly through my teeth.

Maybe he should die.

"That's not something someone with the delusion of becoming the Commandant of the Knights should be saying." Yuri's katana had also found itself free of its sheath, light glinting harshly off of its razor edge.

There was no way we were getting out of this without a fight. Good. I wanted to rip his fucking throat out.

Cumore didn't even seem fazed by our display. Instead, he turned up his nose and waved a dismissive hand at the guild boss. "I don't have the time for this. Yeager? Get rid of them."

As he turned to leave, Yeager gave a sharp nod. "Ja, milord."

No. No, he didn't fucking get to walk away from me.

WIthout really thinking about it, I launched myself across the space at Cumore's back. Bad form, I know, to attack someone when their back was turned. My father would be disappointed. But I just wanted him to hurt.

As it turns out, I didn't have to worry too much about the moral implications of injuring an unarmed Imperial Captain. Yeager had slid quickly into my path of destruction, pulling out what looked like a scythe from somewhere - seriously, I needed that pocket dimension formula everyone seemed to have. It was so handy - and intercepted my attack.

My blade rang out harmlessly against his own, and our eyes locked for the briefest of seconds. There was almost a flash of an emotion that I couldn't quite place before they darkened. He suddenly whirled around, throwing me off with more force than I was expecting.

I flew back a few feet, but managed to land on my feet, skidding to an eventual stop in the mud as Yeager twirled his scythe around in his hands like it was a toy. Lightning streaked across the sky, flashing angrily in the reflection of the blade.

"Nothing personal, you see," he called. "Just business!"

Oof, lots of anger in my child this chapter. I'm sure that won't come back to bite her in the ass. Not at all.

If you thought for even a second that Is was going to seduce that guard, I am terribly sorry to inform you that you are dead wrong. Even if she hadn't gone ahead. There were very few scenarios that I could come up with that would end up with her in that position, but they were all just a bit too farfetched. And believe me, guys. I tried. Blame her, not me.

Biiiiiiiig fight scene coming up next chapter though! I hate fight scenes. Should be fun though.

See y'all then!

-Han