There was an all too brief moment, like the flicker of a tallow flame standing against the monsoon that blew in from the seas, in which Nyx thought he might have gained some understanding of his dream… thought, perhaps, Cay might have understood it, too, when, as she finally took his hand and allowed him to help her to her feet, her eyes met his and whatever fragments of their respective souls might have remained danced together in that sputtering light… and, bidden by that understanding, lost in that moment, he sought to kiss her the way he truly wanted to. Their lips touched for only an instant and they shared a breath that, to Nyx at least, felt as if the shards of his blackened spirit merged with hers and offered the promise of a completeness that had eluded him for what must have been forever…

A gasp escaped from Cay, though, and her head turned suddenly away just as Nyx allowed his own eyes to close and committed himself to the pure honesty that this kiss might have spoken for him. Fate or fortune, either one, had, once more, had it’s say in regards to what he might have wanted and reminded him that it was still and, likely, forever out of his reach. The turning of her head was the dousing of that flickering tallow and her gasp the zephyr that had extinguished it. In a protest that he couldn’t stop the fingers that had just traced a tender course along her neck tensed as his lips, expecting to meet hers, were granted only her cheek.

“We should be going,” Cay whispered, slipping her hand from his… moving away from him, “it isn’t safe here.”

As I have tried, over and over, to tell you, Nyx, a stinging voice stabbed at his mind just as the jagged edges of his soul cooled and stabbed his heart, She doesn’t want you. She knows to whom you belong and would prefer to leave you there. Even if she did lower herself to have such feelings for an elf, you know as well as I that it would never be you…

The mith’ganni tried to ignore that voice. Tried, instead, to glean some small satisfaction from that last moment in which he felt her under his fingertips. The voice was right, though, it seemed… just as it had been trying to tell him… and the warmth that he had hoped to keep in the breaking of that moment cooled all too quickly as his hand fell away from her shoulder and clenched tightly as it disappeared back beneath his cloak.

She seeks to be something, mith’ganni... to have a meaning to her life beyond what you could ever possibly hope to offer… to endure… How can you give her that when, every where you go, death follows? You think that enduring, to her, means living in death the way you do? You are death as much as I am… and dead, yourself, as much as you are my harbinger… The edge of my axe, Shyndyn… that’s all you are… to anyone…

Nyx finally forced his own eyes open as his hearing registered that her step was nearing the mouth of the alley and found himself staring into the same stagnant puddle which had held Cayrimsa’s gaze before. He blinked at his reflection a few times; waiting for the inner voice that actually belonged to him to offer a protest or at least a counterpoint to Prien’s rationale... drew his cowl over his head when none was offered… The assassin forced his faintly scorned expression into a mask of grim acceptance before finally lifting to find her stepping back onto the promenade. He drew in a long, slow breath… held it, watching the way she moved… and released the breath and the thought at the same moment that the alley’s shadows let him follow after her. Rounding the corner where side street met thoroughfare, his fingers passed lightly over the silver-worked skull that buckled his belt as his hand moved to keep the flare of his cloak from exposing the kukri at his hip.

There is work to be done… and preparations to be made… think on that… Prien whispered as Nyx’s eyes worked the crowd and the afternoon shadows of the street and he ghosted back into his “proper place” at her right.

As much as he hated to admit it to himself, Nyx actually found himself at least trying to heed his recently-forsaken god’s counseling as he followed Cay in silence out of the Imperial Quarter and progressively lower through the successive districts to the wharf. He tried. He tried by sorting the facts and details of this fiasco as he knew them in and trying to make those facts and details congeal into something that made sense. He tried by supposing maybe-facts and possibly-details based on things the he knew about both Bolstoii and Dmitrova. He tried by keeping his mind and his senses on their surroundings as they traveled. As much as he tried to keep his mind on the job, though, he failed… whether it was recalling some bit of information she had provided and losing track of that tidbit in the remembered sound of her voice or his gaze happening to fall upon her in his scanning of the streets and linger there for a second longer than it should have… his thoughts and senses invariably returned to her along the way. But he tried.

There is work to be done… preparations to be made.

When Cay led them, finally, into the dank, little quayside tavern known as the Salted Mermaid, Nyx had tried enough and was certain that his mind was back where it needed to be. When she slipped into a dimly lit booth in the back of the place, Nyx slid onto the bench on the opposite side of the table and, after seeking out and gesturing for a serving-wench, turned his gaze to the woman across the table and tried to feel nothing…

There is work to be done… preparations to be made.

Her eyes didn’t lift to meet his… a fact that made feeling nothing even more difficult… but she was quick to start the conversation and ensure that the subject remained on course.

 “So then,” she said, studying the tabletop, “what did you find?”

A hand moved beneath his cloak and extracted the stolen documents from one of the inner pockets of his coat. “Aelion… or those in league with the boy, for there are surely more than he involved… are not interested in what may be on those caravans,” he said, his voice measured as he slid the papers across the table under into her downcast line of sight, “They are interested in where those caravans are going and which routes they take to get there. They are interested in where they can go and what they can sneak into and out of the wagon trains’ stocks.” His mottled yet still pale finger tips tapped the papers meaningfully before the hand slithered away and disappeared from the table. “They are looking for something. Dmitrova’s gotten wind of it, I would imagine, hence ordering us after the half-moon’s lover, and either wants whatever it is for himself or wants to turn the whole thing into an embarrassment for Styopa Bolstoii of such scale that Vadim’s maneuverings on the Lords holdings would go unnoticed until it was too late…”

His gaze was drawn away from her then by the approach of the serving-wench.

“Oi, an’ wha’ c’n I get fer th’ two o’ ye, then,” the heavy-set and haggard looking woman queried, wiping her thick hands off on a stained and greasy rag as she thudded to a stop at the table’s edge.

“Wine,” Nyx ordered dryly. The alabaster fingers emerged from the folds of the cloak and slid two silvers towards the woman; “Good wine,” he added as the hand disappeared once more and his moonlight gaze flicked back to Cay, “and whatever the lady is having.”

“Aye, good wine ‘tis, luv,” the silvers had disappeared from the tabletop and into the wench’s cleavage even before her smoke and fume reddened eyes turned to Cay, “an’ fer ye, miss?”

He sat silently, watching her as she spoke to the waitress, and remained silent for a long moment after the human woman had trudged away from the table, his gaze still soaking the sorceress in as her own eyes, once more, failed to meet his and fell instead to the papers before her.

“This is all only my theory, yes,” he said after a moment, that characteristically self-assured, razor-edged grin finally fashioning itself on his lips, “We shall need to speak to this Aelion, I think… and I may need to get into Vadim’s, as well…”

“Lathon!” Cay’s voice boomed through the records room, “Lathon have you found what I require or do we need another lesson in what it means to disappoint your mistress?”

Nyx had managed to gather enough information from the bound ledgers as well as the loose sheaves of manifests to lend considerable weight to the theory he had begun to develop in regards to what interest the Bolstoii’s stable-boy might have in them. He had torn a few pages from the three bound tomes that would be useful in helping to illustrate his discoveries to Cay and, though he hadn’t pilfered any of the documents from the loose parchments that Trogden had supplied… it was unlikely that anyone would be reviewing the already bound manifests in the near future but a thorough review was sure to be performed on the others, allowing for modifications or updates to be made and final drafts submitted before they were committed to being covered… he had managed to memorize one or two of the manifests from that set. In particular, the one for a caravan of Bolstoii’s that was scheduled to depart Drasnia for Sethbrook in Avenon within the week; given the oddities in that invoice, Nyx was nearly positive that it was going to be the one that Kiki’s half-moon was most concerned with. Cayrimsa’s very-noble-like entrance into the room (and the rather contentious exchange between her and Trogden that followed) provided Nyx with the noise-cover and visual distraction that he needed to quickly fold and secret away the pages he had stolen and, then, quickly straighten the remaining documents before he finally abandoned the table.

“Yes, my Mistress,” he called as he scurried towards the front of the repository with all due haste as was expected of a slave, “Coming, Mistress.”

“Lathon!” She called out again, even above the pretended apologies and pleas for forgiveness he spieled as he neared the end of the bookcase that obscured direct line of sight to the door, “We have another appointment and we need to leave, now!”

His humbled gaze found Leo first as he came around the wall of shelves and noted, with no small bit of satisfaction, that the man now looked as browbeaten as the receptionist in the main foyer had earlier…

Of course, he smirked inwardly as he sketched what was supposed to be a grateful bow to the man, you shut up when for a ‘lady’ but your mouth runs like the Reyal for the slave-race… If you knew that elven blood ran in her veins, might you harass her with questions about her heritage and her people?

… His gaze tracked to Cay, then, instantly noting her flushed and somewhat disheveled appearance. The set of his features remained the carefully crafted mix of humility and fear that one might expect of a servant who had incurred his mistress’ displeasure but, inwardly, Nyx seethed… felt his stomach churn and his heart turn to stone and burst into angry flame… And you, the words hissed through Nyx’s mind as he took in the faint smudges on her skin and dress and the faint sheen that accompanied being near spent, Did you even bother with lunch and get a meal out of it or, mayhap, did you just let him mount  you there on the floor of his office?!… When, at last, his eyes slithered up to meet hers, though, and found something lighting them that he hadn’t been expecting, Nyx felt another churning in his gut and his mind, too, registered that the tone underlying that ‘now’ she had spoken wasn’t the demand of a titled Lady to her slave but more akin to the pleading of one partner to another.

Golden eyes flickered, the flames behind them dancing quickly away from jealous anger and towards a thing much like concern, as they locked to the amber ones that glared back… Something is not right, here…

“Forgive me, Mistress,” he bowed deeply, his eyes not tearing away from hers quite like a slave’s might, the sincerity of that plea going beyond the deception they had crafted, “I should have anticipated your arrival. Have mercy on a doddering point-ear, Mistress. Twas not my intent to delay you.” He was near enough to her, now, to smell the acrid tang of human sweat clinging to her and to read even more into the urgency in her eyes.

Nyx bit his lip in order to keep hold of his slave persona as he turned and offered another, short bow to the clerk; “Milady thanks you for assisting her unworthy servant, sir. You have been most helpful and my Mistress shan’t forget your kindness.”

“Your Mistress is quite welcome, Lathon,” the crestfallen Trogden, still wary of meeting Cayrimsa’s gaze but meeting Nyx’s somewhat easily, murmured in reply.

The mith’ganni turned neatly about, then; strode for the door ahead of Cay only for the purpose of holding it open for “his Mistress” and fell into the proper place behind her as she swept out of the repository, across the foyer, and out to the top of the Trade Bureau’s steps. An untrained eye might have missed the fact that her bearing and countenance, still full of the boorish self-importance that clung to most nobles, seemed a bit forced, as if the façade might crumble away at the first challenge… Nyx noticed, though…

Cay’s  step was purposeful and her posture was straight and noble, but while it may have been passable for those that glanced in their direction, to Nyx it seemed it was all the woman could do to keep her bones from forsaking her and letting her flesh drop to the ground in an uncontrolled flop. Even immersed in their roles as they were, she also seemed to go out of her way to avoid looking at him or anyone else for that matter; her eyes narrowed slightly and fixed straight ahead as if she walked in the confines of a featureless tunnel wherein the only thing to be concerned with looking upon was the end. Not as much as a glance did she cast in his direction or any other, nor a word did she utter, in character as Lady Dionlyspe or otherwise, as she led them down the Trade Bureau’s stairway, for a short distance down the promenade in the direction of the Church of Naxir, and, then, at last, off of the cobbled thoroughfare and into an alleyway that twisted away to the north. It was perhaps a dozen steps down the length of that shadowed backstreet that she finally let her illusion collapse.

Nyx had stopped when a faint trembling of her shoulders underneath the finely worked blue cape preceded the shuddering expulsion of a held-too-long breath. His gaze worked over the alley, insuring none had followed them off the street or were traveling their direction from the far end, as her own steps faltered and a small noise squeaked past her lips. And when her knees buckled ever so slightly and she turned, Nyx abandoned his role as Lathon the slave, leaving not a single step between them and discretely readying himself to catch her should she faint away… Something has happened…

Cay’s eyes fluttered closed and she did totter backwards a bit, her shoulders coming to rest against the wall behind her as she drew in a long, deep breath which was expelled with only a hint less shuddering than the last. Her eyes opened and turned downward, staying the alabaster hand that had already begun to move forward to support her, and she gave in to the demands of her jellied knees, sliding down the wall and crouching on her heels with her head resting on her knees for a long moment.

“Cayrimsa,” Nyx said softly, after having watched her for a long while as she tried to steady her breathing, “Are you… did Lemoyne…” He sighed, himself, then, cutting off both of the inner voices before either could interrupt. His eyes flicked up the alley and down once more and then returned to her again as he crouched down in front of her. “Are you alright?” 

She didn’t look up at him. Instead her eyes remained fixed on a puddle of sludge that had accumulated in the alley and, staring into that puddle, she muttered simply, "I assure you he's in a much worse state than I am... and I'm not done with him."

A faint smile crept towards the corners of his mouth and a similarly subtle nod accompanied it, drawing his gaze to where the slender fingers of one hand moved to touch the square of fine yellowed paper that was pressed into the palm of the other. He wanted to ask her about her ‘lunch’… wanted to know what had happened and how slowly and painfully Lemoyne needed to die as a result… because there is no doubt that he must die, now… but, at the moment, he couldn’t find the words to do so… he wasn’t particularly accustomed to being tactful with Cay, after all…

As if sensing the thoughts in his head, her eyes snapped up from the fetid little pool, then, and fixed on him with the fires behind them burning. "The last thing I need is your sympathy... concern or... lectures. I have the situation under control,” she snapped, “Just tell me it was worth it, that you found something...”

Nyx blinked, nearly scowled, then, with a snort that sounded more like the beginnings of a chuckle, rose to his feet and offered a hand to help her up.

Cay only stared at the hand for a moment, then sighed and leaned heavily against the wall again; head back, eyes closing. “Please, Nyx,” she said, obviously a little more than exasperated, “just tell me that you found something. I'm not in the mood to play games.”

“I found something,” he said, his hand disappearing back under his cloak as a razor-edged smile stole across his lips, “and I am not playing games…”

The mith’ganni’s eyes roved the alleyway, again, and returned to her once more before he turned and began to prowl towards the far end; “Come, let us find a more out of the way place to discuss it, yes?”

As they left Taellyn’s, Nyx fell almost too easily into the role of servant to Cay’s Mistress. The pale mith’ganni skulked along at the accepted three steps behind her and two steps to her right as she breezed confidently along Drasnia’s streets and guided them towards the Trade Bureau. The sight of them, now, in the eyes of any who should happen to look would surely bear out an appearance exactly as their ruse intended. Cay was positively gorgeous in the well-fit, sapphire-hued dress – sparse jewelry and ornamentation aside – and exuded a haughty and almost regal aire as she glided along the cobbled streets. If any didn’t believe her a noble, they certainly didn’t estimate her to be anything less than the wife of a well-to-do merchant, especially with the battered and bruised Twilighter shuffling along at her elbow. With his cloak carefully draped to conceal the few weapons that he carried and the clothing beneath still rather untidy and torn in spots it was not hard for the average Drasnian to dismiss him as little more than the slave he was portraying – likely a troublesome one or, perhaps, a bodyguard given the purple and blue contusions that marred the exposed alabaster skin of his face neck and hands.

 “I do not know what we are looking for exactly,” Cay offered, finally breaking the silence that had hung between them since leaving the seamstress’ shop behind, “He did not go into any further detail than wanting the manifests from Avenon…”

“A place to start is all we need,” Nyx answered, finding it difficult not to look at her overlong (which would be inappropriate for a slave to do). He forced his eyes from her and back to the cobbles at his feet; “And we have that. So long as we can get access to the manifests for those caravans bound to and from Avenon and especially those affiliated with Bolstoii’s companies we should likely find what it is we seek even if we know not what it is, yes?” He held his tongue as they passed a small group of humans (who all offered polite nods and greetings to Cay, he noticed) and waited for them to be out of earshot before continuing, again. “I am no merchant or wagon master,” he said, “but, given that there are only a finite number of things that could be on a caravan between here and there that would possibly be of concern to slaves, I imagine whatever it is will be easily enough discovered…”

Nyx fell again into silence as they neared the hustle and bustle that surrounded the Trade Bureau, his gaze discretely sweeping the crowd and chancing, on occasion, to linger on Cay if given the opportunity. Such an opportunity presented itself when the reached the foot of the wide, marble steps that climbed towards the pillared and domed spectacle of the Drasnian trade offices. To Nyx’s eyes, the place was like any other human designed thing – hard, cold, and garishly overstated – but to Cay’s it seemed, given the way she marveled at it for a long moment, it was a thing of beauty and source of pride perhaps. He wondered, watching the breeze toy with a strand of her hair, what thoughts played in her mind as she stared up at the edifice… and what she must have thought when she discovered the place that he called home…

She thinks that humans are far superior to your kind, Shyndyn, whispered a voice that had been silent in his mind for some while, and she wishes that her own blood wasn’t tainted by the blood of elves…

A scowl twisted the mith’ganni’s features then. Whether it was because it irritated him that Prien had deigned to speak to him at all or, rather, because the Executioner’s estimation rang of truth, though, Nyx couldn’t decide… nor could he decide whether or not to even acknowledge the god… and it began to anger rather than simply irritate him.

Look at you! Playing her slave once more after all it got you last time. I would have thought you would have learned from these last hours, my disciple, that this… these thoughts… these feelings that you have… or even her… none of this is intended for you. You swore your fealty to me. Your life is mine. Accept it and let us get on with our business…

His jaw tightened and eyes narrowed as Prien persisted and Nyx was making ready a reply when Cay’s playfully flashing eyes caught his. A bit of the tension eased from his features at that mischievous glance and the god’s voice was drowned out by her whispering voice.

“Let’s see how quick you are on your toes,” she said softly, assuming an even more confident posture, smoothing her dress, and sweeping up the steps.

He nodded, waited for her to be three steps ahead, and, keeping his eyes on her as she went, shambled along in her wake. Cay was playing her role well, Nyx thought, as they passed through the row of columns at the head of the stairs and into the main foyer. She paused here, unexpectedly, and he watched her survey the room with a hint of trepidation lighting her eyes. The glances and accompanying murmurs that met them threatened her impersonation, it appeared. Do not hesitate, Cayrimsa, Nyx tried to transmit the thought as his own steps mirrored hers, you must believe before any of these others will…

The flicker of uncertainty disappeared from Cay’s eyes as quickly as it had come… as quickly as Nyx’s last thought had sought to reach her… and she fell seamlessly back into the ruse. Once again, she affected a purposeful stride and led them a few steps further into the room, then, with a wink as sudden as the action it took to do so, she snatched the pillow from his hands and raised it high above her head. The deception she crafted next was as finely woven as the tapestry that hung over the palette in her rooms. In fact, had he not known who she really was, Nyx would have believed her to be the indignant and infuriated noble that she pretended to be.

There had been only one more, very brief flicker of insecurity in her eyes when she first began her tirade but that one passed even faster than the first. The crowd parted before them as, shouting her dissatisfaction, she stormed towards the center of the place. The clerk who attended the central desk met them and did his best to corral her with protocol and procedure but, true to the incensed aristocrat persona that she had affected, Cay was having none of it and easily cowed the skinny little round-ear. That, as she had no doubt intended, brought upon them the attentions of a Trade official with power sufficiently beyond that of the stammering little receptionist. The softened, almost flirtatious tone she took with the government man, then, gained them audience in his private offices ahead of citizens who had been waiting far longer and were certainly better-known.

There was a strange twisting in Nyx’s gut, though, when he glanced at the green-suited short-life and read more than concern for maintaining order in the man’s eyes as reason for the invitation he had extended to Cay. He told himself that it didn’t matter… that it was a common and typically very effective ploy to work the lusts and desires and weaknesses of a mark or informant in situations like this… Such things have never bothered you before. Was it not Sylla’s charms and wiles that got you close to Gracchus? You did not flinch at that… Different was it? …

“Come, Lathon.”

It was only then that Nyx realized his jaw had clenched tight enough to make the muscles in his face ache. He snarled inwardly, banishing the ridiculous thoughts that threatened to distract him and forced the tension from his visage before he turned his gaze to Cay in silent acknowledgement of her command. Well done,</i> he nodded faintly when his eyes met hers.

After waiting, again, for Cay to be ahead of him by three steps, ‘Lathon’ shadowed her to the man’s office and, after she entered and seated herself, obediently stood where she indicated he should. He kept his head lowered and his hands clasped before him as an accompanying slave would do in the presence of his ‘betters’ but when the man approached, asked again after the source of her displeasure and coaxed her for a name, Nyx found one of his hands literally itching to feel the hilt of his blade against it’s palm. And when, after ‘Lady Dionlyspe’ had graced the man with her moniker, the man’s lips lingered too long on the hand she had offered, the mith’ganni was grateful that his cloak concealed the movement of his hand doing just that...

“…I am Lord Reginald Lemoyne. Reg to those who carry such beauty as yourself.”

“Please…” she giggled at the man, tossing her head in a subtly-flirtatious dismissal of his compliment, “at any rate… Reg… it is these pillows. I’ve ordered…”

Nyx controlled the snarl that threatened his lips, ignored the thoughts that flashed like strokes of lightning in his mind, and even kept his eyes from so much as flicking in their direction, but his fingertips still lingered on the hilt of his weapon. He was grateful when she snapped her fingers at him and gave him something to do other than stand and fume…

“Lathon,” she demanded, “how many of these did I order again?”

Lord Lemoyne actually looked at him, then, and Nyx’s hard-glinting eyes held the human’s gaze perhaps a little longer than they should have. “2000, Mistress,” he answered flatly, lowering his eyes once again.

Cay kept him engaged, forcing his mind to come up with and keep track of numbers for the responses she demanded, and expertly wove him deeper into her tapestry of deception and kept him focused on that role. By the time the overtly coy exchange between ‘Eva’ and Reg had steered progress in the direction it needed to go, Nyx’s hand had even drifted away from the kukri, at last, and was once again clasped with the other as it should have been. Even better, he didn’t have to force it to remain there until…

“Eva, you know that this is a large endeavor. We’ll have to pull manifests for at least the past month and go through them by hand.”

“You can borrow Lathon to assist, and… if it takes a while to finish I suppose that leaves me stranded here in this city for another night.”

You know where this is going, yes?

Lemoyne leaned in closer to Cay; “Does it now?”

Nyx’s left hand clamped down on his right, the pressure of the grip shooting painful reminders of the needles that had been shoved under his nails the night before through his hand, up his arm, and into his chest.

“And I suppose you have no plans then for the evening?” Lemoyne’s hand stroked gently over Cay’s… Lady Dionlyspe’s… cheek and the pain kindled a fire in Nyx’s chest. He cinched down harder on his right hand with the left, keeping the jerk of his elbow from traveling further down the arm.

“None…” Cay shook her head and smiled softly up at the round-ear.

You see, Prien snickered over whatever it was his own inner voice was trying to whisper just then, More of a taste for the still living short-lives than for an already dead point-ear from an already dead people…

It was almost more than Nyx could bear and, when Lemoyne’s hand drifted from her cheek and traced down along Cayrimsa’s arm, almost more than the mith’ganni could do to keep from opening the man from crotch to craw as he had the Legionnaire just days before.

“Seems like you have your afternoon’s work cut out for you,” the government man said, lifting his eyes to Nyx’s once again, and, hopefully, missing the murderous fires that raged behind them,  “Two doors down to the left is the record’s office. Leo Trogden works in there, ask for him and tell him I sent you, he will help you gather the documents and go through them.”

The nod Nyx offered in reply was stiff and, perhaps, not as deferential as it should have been but, this too seemed to go unnoticed by the lustful bureaucrat and the man’s eyes turned, almost immediately back to Cay… Eva…

“I was about to head to lunch Eva,” Reg continued, already having dismissed the woman’s servant in his mind, “perhaps you would join me, we can return this afternoon and check on the progress…”

The mith’ganni’s eyes, also, sought out those amber pools as if to verify that his mistress concurred with the scarcely-veiled orders Lemoyne had just given him… and hoped that, when he looked at her, his expression would appear as it should when a slave sought its owner’s permission.

“Sounds like a perfect plan. You’ve been so very helpful Reginald,” Lady Eva cooed, smiling as her fingers delicately rest atop Lamoyne’s hand, “I shan’t forget it.”

Her eyes lifted from where her hand lingered atop Lamoyne’s, then, and found Nyx. “I expect something by the time I come back, Lathon.”

“Of course, my Mistress,” the mith’ganni replied with a compliant nod after loosening his jaw enough to speak the words, “worry not. I shall have what you need before you have finished your lunch.”

It took a scant second longer than it should have for his yellow eyes to peel away from the woman and turn to the Trade officer. “By your leave, my lord,” Nyx forced a short bow to the man before, at last abandoning his post at Cay’s right and moving stiffly for the door…

You should consider yourself lucky that the round-ear was too engrossed in Cay to have caught the thoughts in your eyes, Nyx, his inner voice rebuked.

Yes… lucky me… he grumbled in response as he stalked out of Lemoyne’s suite and found his way to the records office.

What angers you so about this? You have not slipped when it has been others playing the role that she plays now… No reaction at all when it was Tselika serving as your lure… none when Sylla donned that same mantle…

Neither of them were her. He retorted.

Prien, might have been correct in the estimation that your feelings are more trouble than they are worth where Cayrimsa is concerned, hm?

Nyx shut the voice out, then, and pushed through the door indicated by Lemoyne. A heavy-set but hardly fat man with thinning hair the color of sand and large, watery green eyes looked up at him from behind a tower of papers and ledgers that were strewn across the table behind which he sat; “Can I help you?”

Nyx bowed his head. “Yes,” he answered humbly, “sir, I am to review the manifests for all Avenon born and bound caravans in the past month, sir.”

“Is that so,” the man asked dubiously, setting aside the quill he had been clutching in one oversoft hand and smoothing his robes as he rose from his seat and peered curiously at the elf that stood just inside the door, “all by yourself?”

“No, sir,” Nyx answered, still not lifting his eyes from the floor, “Lord Lemoyne informed my Mistress Dionlyspe that a Leo Trogden would be available to supervise me, sir.”

“Lemoyne, eh?” The records clerk clucked his tongue, sighed, and, Nyx was sure, he actually heard the man’s eyes rolling in their sockets. “I’m sure he did…right after he wooed your mistress into joining him on a tour of the Bureau, I’ll wager, or a stroll through the financial district…”

“Lunch, sir.”

“Dessert, more likely, knowing him,” the man mumbled as he came out from behind the desk and approached Nyx.

“Sir?” Yellow eyes flashed as they lifted, reflexively, to regard the clerk.

“Nothing,” the man chuckled softly waving a hand as if to erase his last remark from the air, “nothing at all.” His advancing steps faltered when they met the elf’s eyes and took in the battered face in which they were set; “You’re a mith’ganni…”

Nyx nodded.

“Full blooded?”

Another nod.

“How curious,” the man was intrigued, it seemed, and, unlike the typical human, the smile on his round face appeared to be warm and almost sincere, “it’s not often that we see full-blooded Twilighters here in Drasnia. Half-bloods bred in the slave pits, every now and again, and the occasional dancer or whore in the more exclusive brothels but…”

“Yes sir,” Nyx muttered, trying not to recoil as the paunchy clerk invaded his space and studied him like some freak in a traveling circus, “my people typically do not adapt well to service, I have been told...” His fingers moved to touch the bruised side of his face but fell away before reaching it – it wouldn’t be appropriate for a slave to complain about his treatment, even passively, but the gesture aided in the ruse… “Please, sir,” he asked, mustering the appropriate humility and casting his eyes to the floor again, “My Mistress has demanded results ere she returns. Leo Trogden, if you please, sir?”

“Of course,” the man nodded, taking a step back as if he had suddenly realized that he was making the elven slave uncomfortable, “forgive me, my boy… I am Leo Trogden. Please…” he turned his back on Nyx, gesturing for the elf to follow as he tottered deeper into the room “…come this way. If you are to have results by the time Reg is, ahem, finished with your mistress I think we’ll not have long, eh?”

Nyx wasn’t sure whether he wanted to chuckle or snarl in response to Leo’s innuendo but, since the clerk seemed to find the jab at Lemoyne’s ‘stamina’ humorous, the assassin somewhat nervously echoed the round-ear’s laughter as he followed him past the desk and towards a long row of shelves and cabinets that lined the rear wall of the place.

“What is your name, mith’ganni,” Leo asked, tracing a sausage shaped finger over the spines of several ledgers that were arranged on one of the lower shelves.

“Lathon, sir.”

“Hmm,” Leo glanced back at him for an instant, then returned to his perusal of the bound volumes, “rather a longish moniker for a Twilighter isn’t it? All manifests bound for or from Avenon in the past month, you said?”

“Yes, sir. Please sir. My Mistress found my former name distasteful,” Nyx answered, watching as Leo pulled first one and then two more tomes from their places on the shelf, “and difficult to pronounce, sir. Twas one of my first tasks in her service to learn the name my Mistress preferred.”

 “I see,” Leo said, turning from the shelves and offering the ledgers he had selected to the slave, “Here you are, Lathon… there are several documents from more recent weeks that we have yet to bind. I’ll need to fetch those but this should give you a start…

What was the name you had before?”

“I am not permitted to speak it, sir,” Nyx replied, bowing shortly in thanks as he accepted the leather-bound tomes.

“Even if I promised not to mention that you did?”

Nyx affected a sheepish smile and lowered his head a bit more; “I dare not risk it, sir. At your command, I will tell you, of course, but…”

“Of course, of course,” Leo waved a hand and took on a rather embarrassed demeanor, himself, “I’ll not demand it of you, my boy. It seems you manage to get yourself into enough trouble without currying to a curious old fool such as myself, eh?”

“Yes, sir. I am sure you are no fool, sir. Thank you, sir.”

Another wave of the meaty hand dismissed the gratitude and gestured towards a smallish table in the corner; “No thanks necessary, Lathon. If you’d like to sit there and set to your task, I’ll go and find the remainder of the manifests. I can trust you here by yourself for a few minutes, can’t I? ”

“Yes, sir,” Nyx said, offering the standard bow of thanks again, before shuffling towards the indicated workspace, “I shall not move from this spot until you return, sir.” He deposited the books that Leo had already handed him on the tabletop and, without sitting in the chair that was provided for the purpose, opened the first and began to study the pages therein.

“You can sit, if you like, Lathon,” he heard Leo say over the rather heavy footsteps that now moved away from him, “Naxir knows that I couldn’t suffer through reading so much if I had to stand all day to do it.”

“No, sir,” Nyx murmured almost absently, “I cannot. Mistress says that luxuries such as chairs and beds are for real people, sir. Not for point-eared dogs, sir.”

“Of course,” Leo almost sighed, “Very well, then. I’ll return in a moment.”

“Yes, sir.”

When Nyx sensed that Trogden had finally left him unattended for a moment, he spread all three of the tomes out on the table before him and, abandoning the plodding, only-half-literate pace of reading that he had pretended to with Leo hovering about, began tearing through the pages of all of them at once. He wasn’t concerned with all of the manifests for all of the trains that ran to and from Avenon, of course, Nyx only needed to see those for any of Bolstoii’s caravans. So it was that he skipped most all entries in those volumes excepting those which were headed with the names of Bolstoii’s companies and teams and set himself to memorizing the details. Nyx scoured and absorbed each one of these he came upon, etching details of not only the loads of trade-goods that were documented there but, also, the lesser things such as teamsters, guard contingents, rations, equipment, animals, and slaves that were (both estimated and actual) that were appended to each. At first glance, there didn’t appear to be anything overtly out of sorts with any of the manifests individually but, taken as a whole, and compared one to the other, a curious pattern of discrepancies became noticeable… a wagon weight, here, that didn’t bear out the load that was inventoried and supposedly accounted for… additional equipment, there, that couldn’t possibly be required for a simple trade run across the continent… a tally of slave assets that had lost a name or two between departure and arrival with no accompanying death or sales records…

Heavy footfalls, muffled by a bit of distance, still, alerted Nyx to Trogden’s return and the assassin quickly closed the second and third volumes and flipped to a random page near the end of the first. He was feigning an intense interest in the manifest on that page when the stout little man came back into the room carrying a sheaf of loose parchments in his hands and a scroll case tucked under one meaty arm.

“Already near the end of that one, are you,” Leo grinned, apparently impressed with the elf’s ability to have made it through that much of one of the books, “Your mistress has provided you with some education, then, I suppose?”

I was reading before you were born, you pudgy, patronizing bastard! And in a tongue far more eloquent than this trade common garbage that you people call a language!

“Insisted upon it, sir,” Nyx answered, “Milady has not the time to be bothered with tedium such as business details and I would be loathe to let her tire her eyes with the effort of doing so, sir.”

“Of course,” Leo said again, depositing the stack of papers beside the two unopened volumes, laying the scroll case there, too, and then patted Nyx on the shoulder. The motion the elf made at the touch was mistaken by the human as a flinching at unaccustomed contact; had Trogden known that he had narrowly evaded having his neck snapped in that instant, though, he likely would have soiled his trousers. “I’m sorry,” the man said, withdrawing the hand and embarrassedly clasping it with the other…

The round-eared hwandi actually feels sorry for you, his own inner voice noted.

He wants to do to you what Reg is likely doing to Cay, right now, Prien’ sniped.

Pach him and pach you, Nyx growled back even as he nodded a faint acknowledgement of Leo’s ‘apology.’

“If you’ll tell me what it is you’re looking for, Lathon,” the clerk’s voice said next, “I’d be happy to help you find it…”

Eh… the Executioner’s voice made a retching sound, kill him before he kisses you…

Nyx shook his head and glanced over at Trogden, then at the pile of work the man had abandoned when he had arrived. “I am sure you have more important matters to attend, sir,” he demurred, “I shall manage, I think, but thank you.”

Leo looked a bit disappointed but nodded and backed away. “Very well, my boy,” he smiled, “should you need me, though, don’t hesitate to say so.”

“I shan’t, sir.” He turned his attentions back to the work in front of him as the other man drifted back to his own desk. For the next hour or more, even though he had begun to get a better idea of exactly what he was looking for, Nyx pretended to plod through the journals, gathering more information to support the theory he had begun to piece together… gave curt answers when Trogden asked over him… and tried not to think of what Cay might be doing while he waited for her to return.