Our first mission was a simple one. A flock of harpies had made a nest on the rooftops of a small city in Greece. Harpies have the body and face of a woman, but the wings and feathers of a bird. Their talons are scarp and their screech is so powerful it can stun you.

Normally harpies live hidden in the forest, but just like ordinary animals, they had lost their natural habitat when the city expanded and had made their way into the city instead. So far they had only been responsible for the disappearance of house pets, but it wasn't unlikely they'd move on to the homeless population next. It was our job to find them and clear them out.

I picked Loki up from Temple Hall. He was dressed in a black suit, white shirt and a black and grey tie. I had to admit it looked good on him. His guards removed his chains while I was given a bracelet. It was silver and engraved with runes. The runes allowed me to control the collar around Loki's neck that was now hidden by his shirt collar and tie, but as I had told him before, I had no intention of using it. Loki wasn't able to touch the bracelet or collar himself without getting tasered, I was reassured, so I didn't have to worry about him trying to remove it.

That first day was, well, it was something.

Loki stabbed me in the back. Five times. I was wearing a brand new shirt and it got completely ruined. After the fifth time making my way through the spirit world I was angrier than ever.

"That was a brand new top! Do you know how much it cost? It is ruined!" I was screeching at him as if I was a harpy myself. Loki, in the meantime, had been sitting casually next to my corpse while eating an apple he had found in my bag. Obviously, he had gone through my things while I was dead.

"It looked terrible on you anyway, it is ill-fitting and the colour makes you look sallow," he said.

Realising he wasn't doing much to help his case, he held up his hands. "I'm merely testing your remarkable abilities, is all. Is there a limit to how often you can pop back up like a Jack-in-a-box? Do you know?"

I didn't actually, I didn't think there was, but that wasn't the point.

"You can't just stab me in the middle of a case!"

Loki shrugged "It's not as if we were under attack or anything…"

That was true. We had not actually found the harpies yet.

"I have no idea where they are, we'll just have to search for them first, I had told Loki when we arrived.

I looked around. While the city was small, it was still a large area to search. The brief I had been given had not been very specific, this could take days.

Loki sighed. "Just use your brain for a minute. Harpies are birdlike creatures, where do you think they are most likely to be found?" His tone was condescending.

I ignored it and thought for a moment. Most birds like to perch.

"Up high?" I looked around. There were a lot of high buildings in this city, businesses, hotels and apartment blocks.

"Well done, you are smarter than you look!"

I glared at him.

"If there are reports of pets going missing then there is no use searching business campuses." Loki pointed out.

There were plenty of residential areas with tall apartment buildings, so while that narrowed things down, there was still a large area to search.

"Give me your phone." Loki held out his hand.

"No."

"Give me your phone!" Loki frowned and held out his hand again.

"No!" I looked at him for a moment, and then asked: "Why do you want my phone?"

He looked down for a moment, as if thinking, then looked up again.

"If pets are going missing, people will do two things: hang up flyers and call local animal shelters. Eventually, they might adopt a new pet. If I call the local shelters, I might be able to pinpoint the area where the pets have gone missing and thus where the harpies are."

I had to admit it was a clever idea. But I didn't trust him with my phone.

"I'll ring the shelters," I said.

"Do you speak Greek?" he asked. I shook my head.

"I thought not. Now, give me your phone."

Loki made a few phone calls rapidly speaking in Greek. He tossed my phone back at me, I barely managed to catch it, and then set off into the city.

"Wait!" I practically had to run to catch up with him.

Soon we found ourselves in a rich neighbourhood where the apartment buildings all had security. That wasn't been a problem for Loki, whose silver tongue got us access to the buildings in no time.

As we were searching the rooftops, however, he had stabbed me in the back. Multiple times.

And now we were on top of another large apartment building, with a beautiful roof garden.

Loki had spoken to the guard at the door rapidly in Greek. I had no idea what they were saying. Loki sounded apologetic, and both the guard and Loki looked at me multiple times, the guard's face turning more and more sympathetic as Loki talked to him. In the end, they both hugged while patting each other on the back and parted as good friends as we were let into the building.

"What did you say to him?" I asked curiously.

Loki shrugged and shook his head. "It's probably better if you don't know."

"Loki!"

"Trust me, you don't want to know."

Trusting him seemed a bad idea. And yet, I had to admit he had been helpful. Through misdirection or by using his charm he had gotten us access to buildings I would have struggled to get in by myself, and it had been Loki's idea to call local shelters which had pinpointed the harpies' location to this neighbourhood, they had to be near.

Working with him would have almost been pleasant if he could just stop trying to kill me.

Loki threw his apple core off the roof and wiped his hands on a handkerchief. "Well, no sign of harpies here, but that building over there seems tall enough to look promising, don't you think?"

I cautiously moved closer to the edge of the roof, I have a fear of heights.

"Which one?" I asked. He put a hand on my back as if to turn me around slightly. "The one there" he murmured, and before I could say I still didn't see it, I felt a push and I went sailing off the roof. I fell down multiple stories and landed on the pavement in an alley, face first. Loki landed gracefully next to me. "Well done, you can survive quite the fall, I'm impressed!" he said, reaching out his hand to help me up, "do try not to break your fall with your face the next time though."

I scrambled to my feet, ignoring the hand he was holding out. "Are you insane?" I yelled at him.

"Quite possibly", he admitted.

There was a roguish grin on his face, and it suddenly dawned on me that Loki was testing me. He wanted to see if I truly wouldn't use the taser on him. I gritted my teeth. "Fine, mister, have it your way," I thought, "I am far more stubborn than you think!"

He didn't get much of a chance for more mischief though, because the next building, the tall one he had pointed at, had the harpy nest on its roof.

There wasn't a garden on this roof, which was likely the reason the wicker-like structure on top had not been discovered.

"I presume you have a way to counteract their screech?" Loki whispered so as not to alert the harpies perching on top of the wicker structure.

I grinned at him and handed him two wireless Bluetooth earphones. I got my own ones out as well and then scrolled down on my phone to my favourite playlist. The first notes of Eric Carmen's "Hungry eyes" began to play.

Loki took one of his earphones out and said something. I paused the song.

"What?" I whispered.

"Are you serious?" he hissed back.

"It will drown out the harpies, trust me!" I winked at him, turned the music back on, and effigy in hand, began blasting the harpy nest with fireballs.

To my surprise, Loki was all business, there were no tricks or trying to stab me in the back. He fought by my side with his daggers, and he fought well. The Harpy Matriarch was powerful, but she was no match for the both of us, and once we killed her the remaining harpies fled as I burned down the nest.

We returned to London, and as we got closer to Temple Hall Loki's shoulders drooped slightly. I realised he probably thought I'd make good on my threat of locking him away forever since he stabbed me multiple times and thrown me off a roof.

I had no such intentions.

"Thanks for your help, Loki," I said.

He was walking slightly ahead of me, I was struggling to keep up with his long strides. He stopped and turned in surprise.

"I could not have done that as quick without you. Your idea to contact the shelters was brilliant, and I wouldn't have gained access to those buildings half as easy as you. And you fought well."

"I, uh, thanks?" Loki blinked in confusion.

"I'm looking forward to working together again," I added.

It wasn't a lie, I realised. We had worked well together and when he wasn't stabbing me he wasn't too unpleasant to be around.

Loki looked down, then looked back up with those startling blue eyes and he smiled, genuinely this time. "Me too."

He hesitated, then added, "And I should probably apologise for ruining your clothes."

"Don't worry, I'll just wash and return the shirt to the shop and say that it was like this when I bought it and that it must have happened in the shop. Your daggers are sharp enough that the holes just look like cuts from a Stanley knife," I grinned. "I'll get my money back."

"You'd lie?"He pretended to be shocked. "Oh, dear, who would have thought that from a good little Girl Scout like you? Be careful now, I might actually begin to like you."

His voice was mocking but his eyes twinkled.

He started walking again before I could answer, then stood still. He turned around again, his face serious this time.

"I am curious, however, how I did manage to stab you not one, but five times? You weren't this careless or unobservant when we fought in the past. I would have thought your skills would have been honed since then, but you were positively sloppy. And yet when we fought the harpies, you showed none of that carelessness."

So he had noticed. "I thought I'd better let you get the backstabbing out of your system on our first day. And you seem to be having so much fun, I didn't have the heart to stop you. Five times was enough though, don't you think?"

I couldn't help myself and winked at him, as his mouth slightly dropped open and he quietly gasped in surprise.

Walking past him I grinned like a Cheshire cat. Maybe this partnership wasn't going to be so bad after all.