Chapter 65 - Mistral - A Spark of Hope

Cover Art by Mi Chumi

[A/N] Sorry for the delayed chapter. First a freaking hurricane tried to kill us all and cut off power for almost a week (we made it through okay) and then FFN had DNS issues on top of that. So I'm just now catching up with life. Enjoy!

Days and nights inched past, and Selene fell deeper into depression, though everyone was doing anything they could think of to help. But she was… tortured by the knowledge that not only was her daughter out there somewhere, alone, it was due to Selene's misunderstanding that she'd run in the first place. And added to that was the guilt that Blackfeather also persisted somewhere in a deep dark place, awaiting her. And she could do little to save either one at the moment.

The day after her internal 'trial' and with The Lone Huntsmen's agreement, she and Garek had driven out to the woods east of Argus where there might still be small Grimm remaining. There she'd gathered what Nevermore chicks she could, and shown them images of Cinder, instructing them that she was not to be harmed, but that if seen they were to report to her. They would not be efficient, but they would be relentless in their search.

Garek had likewise taken steps to mitigate the longer-term damage of Cinder's disappearance, by notifying Sanctum that their ward had needed to travel out of the city for several weeks. If the staff at Sanctum were suspicious they didn't show it, but they were clearly unhappy that she was not going to be keeping up with her studies. The only saving grace was the fact that with the Vytal Tournament coming up, almost everyone would be off by November anyway.

Dealing with Blackfeather on the other hand would have to wait. She would have to enlist the assistance of Reggie and Crystal and utilize a Bullhead since he could not fly himself, and there were far more pressing needs for their presence in Argus at the moment. They, along with Garek, had taken to prowling the Docks and the rougher areas of Argus, showing pictures of Cinder in hopes someone had seen her.

The only hit they'd gotten so far was thanks to Sophia, who had found evidence of Cinder, as clear as day, on security camera footage from a business on the seedier side of town, stealing from a street vendor who sold knives and sundries.

Stealing.

They'd visited the vendor, paid him for the goods taken, and tried to pump him for any other information. They learned that he had not even bothered to report it to the police. 'Street rats stole, and you either caught 'em and beat 'em, or they got away,' he'd said.

That had made Garek's soul hurt. Cinder, a street kid.

Sarah Tourmaline's father, Police Lieutenant Mavros, had likewise found no traces of Cinder in the city, though his efforts had been quieter than usual by their request, for which they had been grateful, but that also meant less efficient.

And then Rhodes had arrived from Atlas, pissed off and looking to vent it on someone. He'd already verbally assaulted Garek by scroll after learning of Cinder's disappearance, because Cinder wasn't answering his messages. His arrival at the Grae residence midweek had culminated in an actual fistfight between the two friends, followed by them both getting drunk together and staggering home crying.

That night, Selene had isolated herself in her room, blaming herself yet again for everyone's suffering, while Visha tried to console her.

The next day, they'd had to tell Rhodes some of what had happened. That there'd been an attack, and Cinder believed that she'd used her Semblance when she shouldn't have done so. That she had then run away out of fear of everyone's reaction, and that Selene was tied up in it somehow, and couldn't leave Argus without an escort.

Rhodes made it clear he didn't appreciate being kept in the dark, but he trusted Garek would tell him the rest after Cinder was found. He'd hung around for almost a week afterward, assisting in the local searching, before he'd been required to return to Atlas by request of Dr. Polendina.

As the first week had worn on, Selene noted that Sophia began looking more and more haggard as well. Pete eventually confided in Garek that Sophia was spending every waking hour tweaking her search algorithms, the two of them reviewing the resulting hits. The problem was that as time passed, she was forced to loosen the parameters in hopes of finding something, and that was causing an exponential increase in false positives which had to be evaluated manually.

Realizing this, Selene volunteered herself… and then everyone else joined in… to comb through the images as well. That had initially improved everyone's spirits, as they divided up the work and scrolled through them. Until the sheer mass of it began to grind them down. The volume of hits increased faster than they could review them, not only because with each day the amount of real-time data increased and they still had no proof she was or wasn't still in Argus, but also because Sophia's broadening searches were digging more hits of prior days on top of that.

And each day, at least one of Cinder's friends would come by the Emporium and beg for updates.

It was soul-crushing to the point that when Summer called her late one evening, Selene barely lasted a minute before she dissolved into an emotional wreck.

If the adults were showing the toll the search and uncertainty were taking on them, The Grimmslayers were not doing any better.

Even the Teachers were starting to notice.

Sarah and Tomas had gotten detention three times during the prior two weeks. Either because they got caught checking scroll messages during class, or due to falling asleep during lecture because they'd stayed up too late doing 'investigation work' or trying to console Argent. Normally impish and bubbly Argent, who was being emotionally eroded just like Selene.

By the third week, things felt like total crap. Like they weren't the Awesome Grimmslayers, but instead were just a bunch of dumb kids. The White Fang hadn't come through, and the adults had started to look hunted every time they saw one of them.

And then The Letter arrived at Argent's home.

It had been hand-delivered, apparently, slid under the door where Argent had discovered it upon coming home from school.

A letter. An honest to gods paper letter with Argent's name on the outside envelope. Argent had called Sarah screaming and crying before she'd even opened it, and her friends had all rushed over to her house.

"It's… it's Cinder's handwriting!" Argent cried as she opened the door, waving it at them. They gathered around eagerly, Laurel hugging her friend closely as she re-read it out loud to them, only pausing when a sniff or sob broke through.

. . .

Argent,

I don't know how to say the things I gotta say. I know I hurt you. I know I hurt everybody. But I had to go. I had to go because I messed up everything, and I can't risk hurting you guys even worse.

I hope you can forgive me. I hope you can find someone who actually deserves you, who you won't have to be afraid of.

Please don't look for me. Tell the others I'm sorry. I just... I wanted you to know what I'm okay and not to worry about me. I'll be okay. I promise.

I love you,

Cinder

. . .

The room was quiet for a few seconds, other than the sounds of Argent weeping as she clutched the paper.

"Cinder, you… gods… you…. You… effing dummy!" Sarah growled, slamming her fists down onto the carpet.

"Sarah!" Laurel chided, covering Argent's ears and shaking her head no.

"Well, she… aaaahhhhhh!" Sarah yanked at her own hair. "What the heck was she thinking?!"

"We have to give this to the adults," Tomas said, trying to distract Sarah from being pissed. "Or at least tell them."

Argent pressed the letter, Cinder's letter, to her chest. "They can't have it. They can't have it. It's mine." She glared at the others through tear-filled eyes. "We can… send them a picture, but they can't take it." She shook her head, cheeks streaked. "It's all I have. Cinder…" And she turned and buried her face in Laurel's neck.

Laurel shooed the others from the room. "Give her a minute, guys. Okay?"

It took more than a minute.

The existence and contents of the letter breathed new life into the adults.

Both the fact that it proved Cinder was alive, thank the gods, but also was apparently well, if she was telling the truth. Which left the question of where she was. And for that they gathered at the TLH headquarters that evening to discuss.

"Thanks to Cinder and Argent, and the rest of the kids, we actually have a solid lead," Sophia said. Her face was lined but animated at the same time. "We know the letter arrived today between 9:00 in the morning and 4:00 in the afternoon. That gave me a very narrow timeframe to search." She pulled up a folder on the display above the table. "I hacked every freaking street camera and private security cam in a two-block radius. Most of the images are clearly locals and such. Except for this."

She opened a file to show a hooded young man, probably late teens or early twenties. She opened a second file beside that one to reveal video of the same person walking down the street hear Argent's house with an easy loping pace.

There was an envelope in his right hand.

"Got you, fucker," Pete breathed.

"We got better than that," Sophia said, rubbing her face tiredly. She pulled up another file. "With a much narrower time frame, and a clear shot of his face, I was able to run a tighter algorithm for him. And I got these almost immediately." A video clip pulled up, clearly from Argus Station, showing the arrival gate from the Argus Limited.

"He arrived yesterday," she said, pointing to the same man who had just exited the train. "And he left the same day with more bags than he arrived with. I'm thinking he's some kind of courier. I'm already running checks against public databases for him, but we know one thing—"

"Cinder is likely somewhere in Mistral, and not in Argus," Selene breathed. Knowledge. Progress. She leaned into Garek and felt his arm squeeze gently.

"Right," Pete said. "And better than that, if she's using a courier to deliver a letter using the Argus Limited, that means she probably used it herself to leave Argus. That means we can dump a buttload of the images we've been digging through."

"Approximately 85% of them," Sophia finished, "which I guess qualifies as a buttload." Pete rolled his eyes at her.

Selene collapsed against Garek in relief.

Cinder was alive, and well, and she was not in some far-away Kingdom. She was close. They would find her.

. . .

Sophia began running a filter on the images and video they'd already collected and redistributed them. Technically they could have all gone home and looked over them there, but there was something reassuring about being in the room together. They ordered food delivered and set up cots so people could take turns napping instead.

Thus it was that well after midnight, a bleary eyed Crystal blinked at an equally blurry image in front of her, frowned, and then blinked again. It was a still shot of a teenage girl wearing a thick wool cap and tinted glasses, sporting dark makeup. Her face wasn't fully visible.

But something about her, her posture or her frame, nagged at Crystal.

"Guys…" she croaked. She grabbed a bottle of water and took a drink, then tried again. "Guys… I… tell me this isn't Cinder…"

Within moments, the adults were crowded around her scroll, all babbling at once. Sophia yelled over the din, "Please guys, fucking slow down. Okay?" She copied the image over to the holographic screen above the conference table. "Okay… Selene, Garek?"

It took Selene only a second to react. "That is… yes that is her," Selene said, voice breaking, "I am sure of it." She looked to Garek, who nodded.

"That's her." The girl had taken great pains to change her clothes and had made herself appear… vaguely goth-like, which was not a look she'd ever used before. No wonder the algorithms had failed and had buried her in a sea of vaguely teen girl images. This wasn't even a high probability match.

"When was this?" Reggie asked.

"The day after shit went sideways," Sophia said. "Fucking hell she moved fast. But now I have a date, time and location. She was at the transport hub on October 3rd."

Pete spoke up, "Going to wherever that shady asshole who delivered the letter came from."

"Likely. I'm still running searches on him," Sophia answered.

"How about I pay a friendly visit to that ticket booth tomorrow," Reggie glanced at the time, and cursed, "or later this morning, I guess. Find out who was working that day? Maybe he remembers something."

"That sounds good, but… how about we all crash, and start fresh later in the morning," Pete offered. There was a chorus of protests. "Look, I know we're all pumped right now, but we're also running on fumes, and we don't want to miss something, right?" He eased over behind Sophia and rubbed her shoulders, earning him a grateful look, "and my girlfriend, bless her soul, is half-dead."

That was… difficult to argue, though no one bothered to go home.

By noon, all of them had gotten some sleep, but not a ton. Garek had taken the opportunity to notify Cinder's friends as well, and nearly lost his hearing over their verbal response. When they made it back to the conference table, Reggie and Sophia were reviewing a handful of images pulled up on the screen. Pete was pacing behind them.

"You found something?" Selene asked hopefully.

"We found a lot," Sophia replied, "Sit down, this is going to take a bit." She pulled up the first image that they'd seen yesterday, and Reggie began to relate what he'd managed. "I took this image to the ticket booth. The guy manning it today wasn't working that day, but he knew who was, and I… might have visited that guy at his apartment, and I may have gotten in his face a little." He looked sheepish. "But to be fair, as soon as I showed him her picture, he said, and I quote, 'I knew I shoulda called child services on that little git'. I almost punched him in the face."

"Your restraint is appreciated," Sophia said.

"But he still sold her a ticket?" Garek asked, slightly incredulously.

Reggie sighed, "That's just it. She wanted a ticket to Mistral City, but he wouldn't sell it to her because of her age."

Selene looked stricken, "Then she is still in Argus after all? Or she traveled elsewhere?"

Sophia shook her head. "No, she took the Express." The gazelle faunus pulled up a series of other internal camera feeds from the Station. "Once I knew exactly when and where, I was able to pull all the footage I could find."

She arranged the multiple feeds, letting them play one after the other as the girl entered the station, attempted to buy a ticket, was rebuffed, and then a short gap before the same girl was shown next to a stranger, a woman with blue hair and shades, as they walked away from the ticket booth. "They went to a different area," the camera feed switched, "and the woman bought two tickets to Mistral City."

Garek face tightened, "That makes no sense. Cinder wouldn't just go with some strange woman. Is it someone she knows?"

"Perhaps," Selene said hopefully, "she merely felt... pity for Cinder and wished to help?" Several pairs of eyes looked at Selene doubtfully.

"I've got the system running recognition on that woman," Sophia continued, "but she's… she's obviously doing the same thing Cinder is. Look at how she's dressed. Hat and sunglasses indoors? And that hair? That just screams 'I don't want my hair color to match public records' to me."

"So… you believe she is…"

"I have no idea what kind of person she is. But we're going to find out. I'm already cross-referencing her images here with Argus IDs as a starting point. Since that's a fixed database, and we have a good look at her face, we should still be able to get a reasonable number of potential matches based on height estimates and rough appearance." Sophia pulled up another image. "Which leads us to Envelope Guy. I got a hit on him as well in Mistral's law enforcement database."

Garek and Selene tensed. That was… not good.

A handful of images popped up on the screen. The man had multiple aliases and a handful of arrests for petty offenses, thankfully none violent. There were a couple of mugshots.

Garek's hands ball into fists.

"What is it?" Selene looked between the image and her fiancé.

"Malachite," Garek spat.

"Eh?"

"Spiderweb tattoo. That guy has Malachite's calling card on his freaking neck. He's part of her gang. Or was at some point." Selene watched as Garek's ears twitched and his eyes flicked back and forth, staring into the distance. Then he tensed. "Godsdammit, I'll kill her."

"Whoah there big guy!" Pete said, hands raised. "Let's not go killing people yet, okay? We've had…" he glanced at Selene and petered off. "I'm just saying that we can be calm about this. Right?"

"Fine. I won't kill her. But I'm going to call her and ask her what the fuck she thinks she's doing with my daughter."

"Garek," Reggie warned, "It's not a given that this Malachite knows for a fact where Cinder is, right? Maybe Cinder just… paid some underling to deliver a message?"

"We're going to damn well find out."

Sophia's scroll pinged, and she appreciated the distraction. "Possibly more than you expected, looks like I've got few potential matches on our mystery woman, too." She began cycling through ID images on her scroll, mirroring them on the larger screen as she went. "No. Nope. Nope. N—"

There was a collective gasp in the room, then silence.

"Fuck," Pete swore softly.

Sophia shook her head, "It's… oh shit it's her. It's very much her."

Selene felt like she'd been kicked in the stomach. Her mind spun.

It was the Huntress. Deedee. The one that had died in the Bullhead crash after…

It meant. It meant that one of the Huntsmen, the one that her mother had ordered killed as retaliation for the attack, had survived.

And that woman had Cinder. Had taken her away. The woman whose Teammates had tried to kill Selene. The people who Selene had killed.

No. Wait. Cinder had… Oh gods no. How can this be? What if… what if Cinder says something… the wrong thing… would this woman… harm her? The idea filled her with fear, and suddenly she understood, in a very tangible way, why her own mother reacted as she did when she feared for Selene. In kind, if not degree.

Sophia took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, then moved with purpose. "I'll start pulling images from the stations, including Mistral City, for them."

"We must go to Mistral," Selene said shakily, "immediately."

"You're not going anywhere, Selene," Pete objected.

"Dammit, Pete." Garek growled.

"No… Pete's right. Selene… it's too…" Sophia shook her head. "Reggie, tell them."

"Selene can't leave Argus right now, not even with you, Garek. Absolutely not. I know we said she can go with an escort, but only in non-hazardous situations. And we don't know what Cinder has gotten herself into. You're already suspecting a criminal gang is involved. What happens if things turn violent?" He sighed. "Garek, you can go, but someone has to stay here with Selene if you do."

Garek's emotions roiled. The desire to argue with Reggie, to tell him to go to hell, warred with the fact that the man was right, and they'd already frayed their relationships here. And along with that, the need to go there, to be there for Cinder, warred with the fact that Selene would be left behind in Argus if he did. In the end, he made the choice he had to. "Rhodes," he said. "Rhodes should be the one. Cinder trusts him. I'll stay in Argus." He felt Selene slump against him, and knew he'd made the right decision. "Cinder will listen to Rhodes."

"Alright," Reggie nodded, "Then it's me, Rhodes, and Crystal," he glanced back at Garek. "Do we let you call Malachite first, or surprise her?"

Garek chewed at his lip. That was a damn good question. Malachite didn't like surprises, but if she was hiding Cinder… "Maybe I can feel her out, but if she stonewalls us, Rhodes will be able to handle her thugs."

. . .

Things moved quickly after that. Reggie and Crystal flew direct to Atlas to pick up Rhodes, and then bypassed Argus on the return, heading directly to Mistral City.

In the meantime, Garek discovered it was literally impossible to get in touch with Malachite by scroll.

Li'l Miss Malachite hadn't gotten where she was by being stupid. She was the wealthy and above all still breathing head of a powerful underworld organization, one that sporadically warred with a dozen similar groups that coveted her territory or wanted her dead.

She also hadn't gotten where she was by passing up an opportunity to make some extra lien.

'Dania' had been a gods-send. The woman was capable, confident, and tough… as long as you didn't talk about Grimm around her. Oh, she'd balked initially at some of the jobs Malachite had sent her on, but she was fast coming to terms with her new reality, and Malachite had an interest in easing her into the criminal life gently. No sense in scaring such an asset away.

Hell, she'd already saved the Spiders several thousand lien, even after subtracting her upfront costs, by preventing two jobs from going sideways.

And on top of that, Malachite was aware, fully aware, that the little waif… Syrah or Cinder or whatever the hell she wanted to call herself, had been helping Dania on jobs by acting as an extra pair of eyes, and had helped indirectly by making sure the woman had a reason to stick with a stable job like the one Malachite offered. Cinder was incentive and leverage.

Now there was a kid with promise.

So, when one of her underlings informed her that a certain Huntsman Garek Grae was remotely nosing around and trying to get in touch with her… well Malachite could do math as well as the next businesswoman.

. . .

"You wanted to see me, ma'am?" Dania asked when she entered her boss's backroom office. "Got another job for me?" The woman these days sported dark purple hair shopped short, and tended to favor more muted colors.

Malachite let her face go all pleasant, though she was still evaluating her employee. Dania's demeanor had lost a lot of the hunted and desperate look she'd had those first few days and had regained what was easily recognizable as a little bit of Huntress swagger. That was fine. She wasn't one to look a gift horse.

"Actually, I got a warning." Time to put leverage to good use. "Some… people are likely to be nosing around about your 'little sister'." She watched Dania's expression flash to fear, and then go blank. She snapped open her fan and waved it around nonchalantly. "So, I thought… maybe she might want to take a little vacation somewhere, just for a li'l while, just to be safe."

Dania's relieved expression spoke volumes. "You got a safe house she can use?"

"Oh no, darlin' I wouldn't want to stick myself in the middle of your personal business. I mean… what if they come to me, demandin' answers? I wouldn't want to get a reputation for lyin'. Better that I have no idea at all." She gave the young woman a careful look, "In fact, you should do the same. Give her plenty of lien, and let her go off somewhere safe, and contact you later after things have blown over."

Dania considered the idea. "That… I'll ask her if she's got somewhere, but… Okay. Thanks ma'am."

"Just lookin' out for my employees, hon. It's good business practice."

Reggie, Crystal, and Rhodes didn't bother with subtlety, strolling up to The Laughing Widow in broad daylight only to find one of Malachite's toughs standing in the doorway. The man had an old scar through his hairline, but he didn't act like your typical brain-dead tough. He took in the demeanor of the two paramilitaries, but his gaze lingered longest on Rhodes and his maces. "Something I can do for ya… Huntsman?"

"We're here to see Miss Malachite," Reggie said, noting that the guy didn't seem to be overly intimidated by Rhodes, which could mean any number of things. Maybe he was a good actor. Maybe he had aura unlocked. Or maybe he really was stupid after all.

The man just nodded, never taking his eyes off the more obvious threat. "Got an appointment?"

"Do we need an appointment?" Reggie asked.

Hairline cocked his head. "Well that all depends on whether you're here for business, or planning on causing trouble."

"How about this," Rhodes said, cracking his neck, "I've had a shitty month. My friend here has money and I've got a shit-ton of pent-up anger. So, we can either pay Miss Malachite handsomely for some information, or I can save my buddy a lot of money and work off my aggression on your fine establishment here."

Instead of flinching, Hairline just laughed. And then in from his ear a tinny voice said something, and he laughed again. "I guess you can go in. Gonna have to leave your weapons, though." He held out his hand.

"No. I don't think we will," Rhodes said, and shouldered past him.

"Rhodes, you… uh… sure we can…"

"They don't want to piss of a Huntsman, and a dead Huntsman will call down Haven on them. Anything they do will be for show. Just don't draw any firearms unless you see me go for my maces."

"Aright," Reggie said, easing his way around the now-frowning tough. "Sorry about that, hoss."

They made it halfway to Malachite, the crowd parting before them, before she spoke up. She had a half dozen men and women, all armed, arrayed behind her, including one that looked very familiar, though she now had short purple hair.

"Well well, who are you to grace us with your presence, handsome?" Malachite drawled at Rhodes. "Isn't he just lovely?" she finished, glancing at the woman who stood slightly back from her right, who could only be the Huntress, Deedee.

"Little beat up looking, ma'am," Deedee said evenly, easing up beside her. Reggie could see little tells that the woman was tense. But she was also fully armed, and was tough enough to survive a Bullhead crash.

Reggie took a deep breath and eased out in front of Rhodes. "Miss Malachite."

The woman's blue eyes focused on him. "Oh, are you the good cop, darlin?" She looked him up and down, "Cause you have the smell of Atlas on ya, and I wasn't aware those Beringel-brains could even do good cop."

Reggie smiled thinly. This was familiar territory. "Disgraced special forces, actually. Private practice these days." He showed some teeth. "We're his bodyguards," he finished, tilting his head toward Rhodes, who stood still looking as pissed off as was humanly possible.

Malachite barked a laugh. "Well then, maybe you ain't a total waste of oxygen. But ya'll have some nerve, that's for sure," she glared at each of them in turn, "coming into my fine establishment armed and acting like you own the place. Yes I can spot the tells of shoulder holsters and such. Make sure you don't get excited and keep your hands nice and open."

Reggie's mouth twisted slightly. "Would it help if we apologized?"

"Maybe so. How many zeroes does that apology have?"

Better. "The apology has four zeroes, and we have a business proposition that might have some too." Reggie glanced at Deedee, noting her tense further, though the woman kept her face blank. "Might go faster if we could have a word with your… employee?"

"Ah, now that'll cost you, Atlesian. Tell me what kind of information you're looking for and then we can discuss the prices."

Reggie sighed. "I suspect you already know what we're looking for, ma'am."

"Maybe. Maybe not."

Hard to get it is. "Our friends had a… misunderstanding with their daughter. She's under the impression that they're angry with her, and we have reason to believe she ended up here," he glanced at Deedee again.

Malachite snapped open her fan with a pop. "Atlesian, if'n you don't stop making eyes at my employee, the prices will add several more zeros."

"Sorry," Reggie said, and forced his focus back onto Malachite.

"That's better. So… a runaway, eh?"

He sighed. She was going to play it this way. He carefully pulled out his scroll and showed her side-by-side images of Cinder both before and after disguise. "We're not here to drag her home. We just want to talk to her, tell her it's okay. Make sure she's alright."

Malachite eyed the trio. "You sure are bringin' a lot of firepower for 'just wantin' to talk'."

"Huntsman Rhodes here was her first friend and mento," Reggie continued by explanation. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Deedee start at that. "I'm the negotiator, cause he's kinda pissy right now. Crystal is just and escort," he smiled blandly, "big city can be dangerous, y'know."

Malachite laughed softly. "Oh, don't I just." She glanced at Deedee and then back to Reggie. "Alright. I tell you what. 5,000 lien will work as an apology. 50,000 lien, and I'll tell you what I know about your runaway's whereabouts."

Rhodes started to object, and Reggie held up his hand. "How about 60,000 lien, and your employee there tells us what she knows, too?"

"So, you are a businessman," Malachite frowned. "Done." Scrolls were cautiously produced and money transferred. "Good enough. Your little waif arrived here a couple weeks ago with my then-future employee here. Stayed here a while. Seemed fine last I saw her. I don't know where she is at the moment."

Reggie had anticipated that. Planned for it. He turned to Deedee. "And you?"

The purple-haired woman shrugged. "She said she needed help getting out of Argus. Wouldn't say why. I took her under my wing, took her in once we got here."

Rhodes made a quiet growling sound.

"And?" Reggie prompted.

Deedee cleared her throat. "She left two days ago. Didn't say where she was going."

"Fuck." Rhodes swore softly.

"I'll kindly thank you to watch your mouth. This is a quality establishment," Malachite warned.

"If I find out you're—" Rhodes started, hands twitching. Reggie saw Malachite's toughs tense and start to shift.

"And you'll not threaten my employees, either, Huntsman, if you know what's good for you." She set the fan down on her desk, and glared at him, then turned to Deedee. "Dania," she called her, "these folks paid for information, and you will give them exactly what they paid for, am I clear?"

Deedee blinked, glancing between her boss and the visitors. Finally she nodded. "Yes ma'am." She cleared her throat. "She head people might be looking for her, and she said she was going to lay low for a while. I'm not her owner. I couldn't force her to stay."

"See, all friendly here. You have her word, and mine, that your runaway left of her own accord."

Rhodes slumped slightly, hands going loose. "She… she was okay though, right? Did she have clothes? Money?"

Deedee realized with a shock that the reaction she was seeing was legitimate concern. She felt something in her chest shift. "She… yeah she's been doing well. She was pretty messed up when I met her but… she was happy with me. She… she packed plenty of gear and I… gave her some money. She didn't tell me where she was going. Didn't leave me a contact number." Sure, that all had been by design, but now Deedee was beginning to think that maybe her fears about these people might have been misplaced. "I'm sorry." And to her surprise, she was beginning to actually mean it.

"Isn't there—"

"Rhodes, hold it," Reggie put a hand on his employee's shoulder and looked at Dania. "Ma'am, you have my word that we aren't out to hurt Cinder. And we aren't going to threaten you, either. But we're desperate to make sure she knows that she didn't do anything wrong. That she's got people back in Argus who care about her. If you hear from her, can you tell her that? She'll know how to contact us."

Deedee looked at Malachite, who shrugged with one shoulder, "None of my affair, darlin', I got paid and delivered." But her employee just gave a questioning look. Finally, Malachite rolled her eyes, "Oh fine. No, I don't suspect these fine folk are the type to go beatin' on your little friend."

And that told Reggie and Crew something else right there.

Deedee took a deep breath. "Alright. I… yeah I'll tell her, if she comes back. I promise, I don't know where she went, or when she's likely to do that, though."

"But she might?"

"Yeah I… think so."

Reggie sighed. "Alright, that's the best we can do." He gave Malachite a long look, and she gazed back innocently. "It was an experience doing business with you, ma'am"

"Don't let the door hit your asses on the way out."

. . .

Back at the hotel bar, Rhodes refused to talk until he'd downed his first shot of whiskey. "We got played," he said flatly.

"You think?" Reggie complained, taking a swig of his beer. "Malachite knew we were coming and sent Cinder off somewhere."

"So, you think she was lying?" Crystal asked.

"No that's the worst and best part," Reggie said sourly. "I think she was telling us the truth. If she'd hurt Cinder or something, she would have been a lot more nervous. Rhodes could have wiped the floor with her." He took another drink of his beer. "They have no idea where Cinder went."

Rhodes raised his hand, ordering another shot. "So that means we're stuck here in Mistral, waiting to see if she shows back up." He grimaced. "I'm not going back to Argus empty-handed. You two can do whatever the hell you want."

[A/N]Extra SPECIAL thanks to Flariindaline, Rookie80, AtomicR4y, Shadowstorm-Vash, and Blooming Mind for your kind reviews!

Blooming, this was your next chapter! Hope you enjoy! Shadow, thanks for the positive vibes! Atomic and Rookie, yes we can all hope that Watts and Tyrian some day end up under Tsune's scalpel. And I haven't seen the scene you mentioned, Rookie, but I can imagine. And Flair, I see you are gradually catching up! We are well along our way to resolving this arc, so buckle up!

So things are progressing in the Search for Cinder, and The Lone Huntsmen are unfortunately one step behind. Looks like maybe they should have gone for the surprise after all, but really might not have made any difference. On the one hand, they know that Deedee aka Dania probably doesn't know Cinder's role in her Teammate's death, which means they apparently haven't delved into their pasts. On the other hand, Cinder's off again, and nobody knows where. Will she come back any time soon? Will she contact Deedee aka Dania? Will she send Argent another letter? Or will she get into even MORE trouble in the meantime? And Malachite just made a shit-ton of money off a situation she created. That's how she roll.