Guldenfel.

  It was the heart of trade in the kingdom, and nearly every major route passed through its ancient walls.

  Whether by boat or wagon, foot or horse, anyone going anywhere would eventually come through here.

  It would be the perfect place to seek out anyone who might have the answers I desperately needed.

  "Where is Diana?"

  "What's going on with my heart?"

  "Why can't I stop cycling my magic?"

  If you knew where to look, and had enough money, then it would only be a matter of having the time.

  "But I don't have any of that."

  I frowned, rubbing my temples with one hand and looking up from the expense report I was currently reviewing.

  Erika had always been the one to handle these sorts of questions. She had known where to go, and who to talk to. When we needed money, she had worked for it.

  As it turned out, working was harder than I had imagined it to be. Even training was a hundredfold more tolerable than this.

  I put aside Tor's expense report to look over Sybil's.

  Straightforward. Neat. Itemized, but not overly detailed, and everything added up. An easy stamp before returning to Tor's.

  "...I don't even know what I'm looking at. I'll have to check in with him later."

  The worst part was how alone I was, here.

  There were no other employees, as Alana had handled everything herself in between her own missions. Everything was trust based, here, and there was no formal system. Every Nightingale, the dozen or so that there were, knew how to read and write, but most of them didn't have any formal education.

  After this first week of employment with them, I'd had plenty of time to grow accustomed to the ledgers, and they looked nothing like the practice sheets Lady Ayda had given us. If it weren't for those extra lessons she had given me, I might not have been able to make sense of this at all.

  A knock came at the door, and I froze.

  We weren't open. Only Alana and the vice guildmaster, who I had yet to meet, were authorized to sign any contracts, and they weren't here.

  I held my breath, and hoped that they would move on.

  With a soft clicking sound, the door unlocked from the outside, and a tall, thin man with a long black braid stepped inside.

  He was wearing a Faraldi courier's uniform, and he had a warm smile.

  ---

  "...Yes?"

  I slowly dipped my hand underneath the desk, trying to slip my dagger out from the folds of my dress without alerting the man.

  "Ah, hello Killdeer. How did the wolves treat you?"

  I did my best to approximate the stoic expression that Erika had always worn when she was working.

  "Wolves..." I thought to myself. The Hiems' emblem was a wolf. Would the Faraldi use such a simple code? "And why bother speaking in code at all, when we're alone?"

  "...I'm sure you know how they treated me."

  The man laughed, closing the door and locking it behind him.

  "You don't recognize me, do you? You're not Killdeer."

  I stood up, brandishing the dagger in front of me, and keeping the point directly in line with his eyes as I slowly inched my way towards the back door of the hall.

  He held up his hands, looking offended, but somehow still smiling with his eyes.

  "Woah there, little branch. That's a bit uncouth, don't you think?"

  "...I hope you'll excuse my impropriety, Mister, but a strange man has broken in here and it has me quite on edge."

  He laughed, covering his eyes with his hand.

  "Ah! How true, little branch. Or may I call you Lady Printemps?"

  I reached out with my hand to hold the handle of the door to the yard, still holding my dagger in front of me.

  "You may not. My name is Miss Kynigos."

  "Ah, Miss Kynigos, then. I believe the last time we met would have been at the headquarters in Doromare?"

  I narrowed my eyes, searching his face. "Yes. I received a letter from you."

  He grinned wide. "See? Not so strange now, am I? Please, lower your blade, I'm only here to talk business."

  I kept my blade firm.

  "I don't believe I have any business with you."

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  He clicked his tongue, giving an exaggerated and theatrical show of reaching into his satchel to pull out a thick envelope.

  I didn't appreciate the theatrics. He wasn't taking the dagger pointed at him anywhere near as seriously as I hoped.

  "I just need you to sign this."

  He tossed the envelope onto the floor between us, but I didn't make any motion to pick it up. "There would be nothing to stop him from attacking me while I bent over."

  "No. Pick it up and read it out loud to me."

  I saw the frustration on his face as his mask broke, but he snapped back to smiling rather quickly.

  "Alright then... don't stab me, would you?"

  He bent over to pick up the letter, and with a quick flick of his wrist, slid a knife through the wax to reveal a highly decorated bit of parchment inside.

  "Ah... The undersigned, Sophia Printemps... or is that Sophia Kynigos now? We'll have to edit this..."

  "Enough. Just read it."

  "Alright, alright. The undersigned, Sophia Printemps, acknowledges and accepts an outstanding debt of five hundred lombardi gold coins on behalf of the late Erika Du Bump. Hah, is that really her name? Cute."

  I felt a flare of anger, and nearly stepped forward to attack him right then, but was startled by the impulse, and did not act on it.

  "...Is that all?"

  "Well, no, there's some more formal language here, but it's all rather standard. Are you willing to sign it?"

  "Why five hundred?"

  "I'm just the messenger..."

  "Bullshit. Who are you?"

  He gave an exaggerated, wide shrug with both hands.

  "I really don't have to tell you, do I?"

  "Then I don't have any reason to listen to you."

  His face fell serious, and his eyes lost their sparkle.

  "I'm the one who cleans you up if you don't sign it, little branch. That dagger won't stop me."

  My hand tightened on the door handle, and every muscle in my body tightened with the desire to flee.

  "Then, why five hundred?"

  "You should know that information doesn't come free from people like me."

  I dug into my pocket, and quickly tossed my first week's wages to the floor in front of him.

  Not even a handful of silver coins.

  He picked it up, laughing, but still without any warmth.

  "Good enough, little branch. I'll tell you, as your kind senior operator."

  He felt the weight of the pouch in his hand and put it into his pocket.

  "The math is simple. Your dowry was never paid out, and so her loan was only the three thousand gold coins she took as an advance. I think the higher ups managed to find an emergency buyer for your last job, because most of that's been written off, here. Five hundred's all that's left in order for them to recoup their losses."

  He put a finger to his cheek with a grin. "Or maybe it's just what they think they can get out of you. Either way, that's what you're on the hook for. The reasoning comes second to reality for our superiors."

  He tossed the contract on the ground in front of me.

  "Welcome to the Faraldi, Miss Kynigos. This is how they get all of us."

  ---

  Sybil quietly muttered under her breath as she counted the sum on her fingers while I helped Ruben change the lock on the door.

  "...It'll take you several years to pay off that debt, even at Nightingale rates. Alana runs this place pretty lean, so that we're able to get paid even when work is light."

  She looked at my copy of the contract with disdain, tossing it onto the desk in front of Tor.

  "Are you absolutely sure you want to stick with us, Soph? That Lady Ayda can't get you something better?"

  I looked up at Sybil, and kept my face still as I nodded.

  "Lady Ayda can't teach me to fight."

  Tor groaned, covering his face with his hands.

  "Soph, can ye show me again?"

  I stood up, leaving Ruben to click his tongue and fiddle with the door alone, as I walked over to look over Tor's shoulders.

  The expense report was still an absolute mess.

  With a sigh, and a smile, I picked up my pen.

  "Here, Tor. Just tell me as much as you can remember and I'll write it up for you."

  ---

  Alana sighed, holding my own practice blade against her shoulder as she looked down at me.

  I was supposed to be holding that sword, but somehow, I was once again unarmed and laid out on the soft grass. It had happened so fast.

  "Sophia, a swordfight is not a dance. We don't take turns, and we don't make wide sweeping motions like we're twirlin' a scarf."

  I watched her consider the heft of the blade in her hands, looking at it pensively.

  "If you want to make those sorts of motions, you might try a whip, instead. At least then you'd be doing something with them."

  I recoiled, and bit back. "No. Not a whip. Never a whip."

  Alana sighed. "Well, are you willing to bulk up to try a two handed sword, then? Building up a swing with one of those feels great and might satisfy that itch you're looking for while still keepin' it proper. Nothin' wrong with a gal with muscles, you know."

  I sat up, feeling the weight of the dagger I held in my left hand, blue and orange ribbons still attached.

  "No... I think I'll stick with the sword and dagger."

  "Then stop the twirling. Save dancing for when you're trying to get laid, and fight me like you mean it. Your dagger needs to stay pointed at me, not spinning your damn ribbons."

  ---

  After Alana left, Sybil patted the grass next to her. "Sit down, Soph. Let's have a chat about this... witch hunter thing."

  Mentally, I was exhausted, which was nauseating when contrasted to how stable my body felt. Ever since the pain in my chest had begun, my body had lost those sorts of sensations.

  But still, I was eager to listen to Sybil. She had avoided the topic for the whole week.

  As I sat down next to her, she passed me her waterskin to drink from, which I did, gladly.

  "Soph... I'm not a mage, like you."

  I looked up at her, confused. "Yes?"

  "So you can see magic, right?"

  I smiled. "Well... It's more of a scent, you know? I don't know if it's everyone, or just certain mages, but..."

  "But mine smells like home. Erika said so."

  Sybil sighed. "See, I didn't even know that much..."

  I reached out to shake her shoulder playfully. "And?"

  "Soph... The techniques I could teach you. The knowledge I could pass down. There are probably dozens of better styles that you could learn, and once you learn an art it can sometimes be a lot harder to learn a new one. You might regret it if you later find someone who can teach you some kind of mage-on-mage way of fighting."

  She looked out, towards the sun, as it set beneath the city wall.

  "So. Are you sure you want to learn from me?"

  "There's no one I'd rather learn from. We're family now, remember?"

  She smiled, turning her head so I couldn't see her eyes.

  "Yeah. We're family."