The other guard had a fighting-cane, much like Fredrak’s, and he swung it at her. Saketa’s assessment had been right: He was a fighter. She evaded, but Tyroya came at her flank. The woman had drawn some sort of pin from either her clothing or hair. It was unimpressive enough that Saketa’s first thought was poison.

She hopped back, escaping the jab, but the guard kept up the pressure and came at her with cane-swings. He was too skilled for her to dart past his greater reach, so she whipped out her sword and parried. He didn’t flinch at being faced with a deadlier weapon; he just broke the contact and struck at her legs.

Saketa avoided it and thrust at his face. He reacted quickly, but it was a feint. Her real attack was a kick into Tyroya’s midsection as the woman came in for another jab. The smuggler was flung back, staggered to the tables and crashed into one.

The guard came back at her, but now he had her full attention and she landed a slash on his arm. He still kept up the attack, launching a big gamble that would completely take her out if it connected. But it didn’t. The cane swung past her head and the skull-cracking force was wasted on air. Saketa slashed into his other arm and then drove the pommel into his head.

It was his turn to stagger back. He regained his footing after a moment, but didn’t come at her for more, nor did she chase him. Because she had a brand new problem.

The music had been stopped, and either some employee or some automatic system had activated one of the lights in the ceiling. It shone right down on the scene, making her the centre of attention. There were shouts, and she could see people in uniforms come in from several directions, holding weapons. And Tyroya was making a run for it.

The smuggler didn’t go for the main door; that would have required going past Saketa. Instead she went for the eastern wall.

Saketa didn’t waste time questioning it. She just sheathed the blade and gave chase. She did a sharp turn to avoid contact with one of the security guards, or whatever they were, and hopped up on a table. She leapt from there to another one, eliciting yelps from the people sitting at it, and finally hopped to the sloping walkway that hugged the eastern wall.

Tyroya was already gone, squeezed out through another half-open window. The guards were coming, and the noise behind her was growing, but Saketa still took a moment to stand still and hunt down just a little bit of focus.

She Shifted through the wall and the chase was now truly on. The smuggler had already hopped down to the neighbouring roof, one floor lower than the window, and could be dimly glimpsed running across, down the length of the row.

Saketa hopped down after her, did a simple roll upon landing, and emerged into a run. Only a knee-high divide separated this building and the one that followed, and it was the same the next time. Tyroya had respectable stamina, it seemed, and Saketa simply focused on maintaining an even distance between them.

The fourth building dropped in height by another floor and Tyroya flung herself down again. As Saketa reached the edge the woman was already about a third of the way across. Saketa stayed where she was. Tyroya was visibly slowing down, but still had enough energy to move at a jogging pace. She glanced back. If there was a triumphant look on her face, then Saketa couldn’t see it in the dim lighting.

Tyroya reached the next building, but it was as tall as the rest of the row. She hopped up, trying to make it far enough up the wall to grip the edge, but failed. She looked back again, and decided she could afford a few seconds of recovery before making her second attempt.

Well, that is enough, I think.

Saketa Shifted, and emerged on that opposite rooftop just as Tyroya had almost finished climbing up. The woman’s eyes went saucer-wide for an instant before Saketa kicked her in the chest.

Tyroya dropped back down the way she’d come and slammed down onto the roof. It wasn’t a high enough fall for serious injury, but uncontrolled as it was it still knocked the air out of her. Saketa hopped down after her and landed smoothly.

“Talk,” she insisted. “Talk to me.”

The pained gasp that emerged from the woman probably didn’t have much to do with language, but it had the feel of profanity.

“Tell me about your smuggling, and I will leave.”

The next gasp had even more venom to it, and a lot more strength. Saketa kept a bit of a distance. It could be dangerous to approach downed prey too cockily. Moreover, she was simply fine with Tyroya getting back to her feet.

“I’m not telling you anything,” the woman hissed through barely-recovered lungs as she made it up on her knees. This time she didn’t draw a pin. She drew a knife.

“Hmm.”

Tyroya made it all the way up, and with that she wasted no more time before going on the offensive. She had skill, Saketa was getting the impression that basically everyone on Yvenna did. But Saketa had more of it, and the woman was simply too battered and fatigued to be effective. Saketa let her expend her energies even further with some missed blows, before delivering a kick to her leg.

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Tyroya didn’t go down the way some people did, but her next couple of attacks were even wilder, and then Saketa kicked the other leg. With that she was stunned enough for Saketa to grab her knife-arm, twist the weapon free, and then slam the smuggler onto her back.

“You cannot win, and you cannot escape,” Saketa told her as the woman went through a new series of gasps. “Talk.”

“Never… talked,” Tyroya spat. “Never… ever… talked…”

“Saketa.”

She turned at the new voice, and cursed herself in the same moment for such poor alertness. Standing a short distance away was the dancer from Black Flower Hall, clad in that dark cloak and bird mask. The macabre figure stood still and hesitant for two or three breaths, then reached up and snatched off the mask.

The face beneath was pale and youthful, just beginning to come into its natural sharpness. The hair braided around the head was black as night, and the eyes were almost as dark.

Maybe it was the dim lighting, or just sheer disbelief, but Saketa stood in frozen silence for a moment, much as the dancer had, before she felt certain.

“Vanaka?” she then said.

“Yes, it’s me!” the young woman said. “I saw you from the stage… that fighting… I thought for sure I was fooling myself, but here you are! I... ”

Vanaka looked back the way they’d all come, but there were no immediate signs of pursuit.

“What is… what is going on?”

She glanced at the stunned smuggler.

“You… need information?”

“I do,” Saketa replied.

“Just leave it to me.”

Vanaka carefully placed the mask on the roof and strode over to the smuggler, who was feebly trying to sit up.

“Not telling you dogs anything…”

Vanaka knelt down to straddle Tyroya and captured a flailing fist in her grip, all in one fluid motion. Saketa caught a momentary glimpse of extended fangs in the girl’s mouth, before she used her other hand to grip Tyroya’s hair, and with the smooth skill of a natural predator her lips went to the woman’s neck.

The smuggler grunted and thrashed for a couple of seconds, but Vanaka’s abnormal strength held her in place. Then the venom in her saliva kicked in. Tyroya went completely limp in Vanaka’s grip and her grunts changed into insensate groaning.

Saketa touched that spot on her own neck, and wondered if she’d just felt a tingle.

The feather-cloak covered both of them almost completely, but Saketa could tell that Vanaka was only taking tiny sips. She’d witnessed this once before. The point in this particular situation wasn’t to get much out of it, but to get as much of the venom into the victim as possible.

After a little while of this Vanaka took her lips off Tyroya. It was too dark for Saketa to see the tiny pinpricks that the twin wounds closed into, but she did see a very strange, feral look on Vanaka’s face. It only lasted a moment, and then she turned to face Saketa.

“What do you need?” she asked in a whisper.

“What she’s been smuggling.”

Vanaka shifted her position, and that of her… victim… subject… captive… partner… until the former was sitting cross legged and the latter was resting in an embrace.

“What have you been smuggling?” Vanaka asked gently, sweetly, into Tyroya’s ear. “Tell me. Tell me what you have been smuggling.”

“Wea…”

There was no awareness in the woman’s eyes. She was peacefully oblivious to any concerns. Saketa remembered the feeling.

“Weapons,” the smuggler mumbled. “Weapons, and plasma, and…”

“And what?” Vanaka insisted, coaxing the woman on with loving tenderness.

“And the spooky man.”

Saketa’s fists clenched. Vanaka looked at her, then back at her subject.

“Tell me about the spooky man.”

“Arrogant, creepy bastard. Just looks through you like you’re not there. Important on Ciinto Res. I don’t… know. They just… want him transported.”

“Name,” Saketa whispered.

“What is his name?” Vanaka asked.

“Avanon. His name is Avanon.”

“Where?”

It came out sharply, intensely, and Saketa did not care at all. She could barely hear Vanaka whisper the question into the smuggler’s ear, as she might do to a lover.

“The Purists,” the woman mumbled. “It’s always the… Purists.”

“Where?” Vanaka whispered.

“Compound. Twenty six… twenty six Sajakan.”

26 Sajakan. 26 Sajakan. 26 Sajakan.

Saketa repeated the words in her mind over and over, fixing them in place. After a few seconds she realised Vanaka was looking at her.

“Is that it?” the girl asked. “The effect doesn’t last for long.”

“That is it,” Saketa told her.

Vanaka got up and lowered Tyroya to the roof. Her fangs had retracted and there wasn’t a drop of blood visible on her lips or teeth.

It felt so strange to see her again. Vanaka’s thoughts seemed to be similar, but she was also clearly so excited that she didn’t quite know what to do with herself or what exactly to say.

“I like the cloak,” Saketa commented after a brief silence, and Vanaka laughed nervously.

“Thank you. I…”

The smuggler mumbled, and was showing early signs of recovering her wits.

“We should get off this roof,” Vanaka said. “If we don’t want her to remember us.”

“We should. And I shouldn’t go back there.”

“I saw a ladder that way,” Vanaka said, and started to walk to the back of the building, caught herself, returned for the bird mask, then started off again.

Saketa joined her. The girl looked over her shoulder, at Tyroya.

“Purists? Weapons? What am I getting involved with, here?”