I leaned my head back against the headrest, closing my eyes as we drove through the city.

“So. Tell me about this Elizabeth.”

Simon glanced over,

“What is there to tell?”

“I don’t know, that’s why I am asking. How well do you know her? Are you sure she will even be willing to see you?”

“Of course,” he seemed surprised. “She wouldn’t turn me away. If I say I need to talk, she’ll be there.”

“Really? Why?”

“I told you, she is my mate.”

“That means so little to me, Simon. That is why I am hoping for some clarification. The last time you mentioned mates, you gave me the impression that you were assigned your mate and didn’t have a real relationship with them.”

“Well, it is true that she was selected for me, but the relationship is an important one, if not a romantic one. How do I explain?” he searched for the words. “Our main intimate relationships are always with humans. We don’t actually spend a lot of time interacting with our own kind, usually. Don’t get me wrong, we meet up, we talk, but most of our time is spent with humans. But, no matter how close we are to a romantic partner, to uphold our part of the Pact, there is a part of ourselves we can never share. So, our mates are sort of like a… sponsor? That isn’t exactly right, but it gives you the idea, I guess. Someone we can talk to, about anything. It is theoretically supposed to be a close and trusting relationship.”

“Theoretically?”

“Well, there are obviously a lot of things I haven’t told Liz. So, I may not have been upholding the spirit of the arrangement, exactly.”

“Will you tell her now?”

“I think I probably have to, at this point,” he groaned. “I hadn’t really thought about that part, yet.”

“So, just to be clear, this Liz is a person you are very close to, with ties to the council, who other ubarae know you would turn to in an emergency. And we are going to her office, where everyone knows she works?”

“That covers it pretty well,” Simon nodded.

“Did you tell James all of this?”

“I told him she was my mate.”

“But you didn’t explain what that meant?”

“Well no, why?”

I laughed softly,

“James is going to be really pissed about this. At least he can’t blame it on me.”

“What?”

“It’s probably nothing, never mind. Let’s just… let’s just get there and see what we find.”

I reached down and checked the gun in my holster, making sure it was easily accessible. We pulled into the parking lot of a small office building, and Simon parked the car. He moved to open his door, but I shook my head,

“Wait just a sec.”

I scanned the lot, but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.

“Do me a favor? Pull up your hood.”

“Ok…” he did as instructed, adjusting his sweatshirt. “What is going on, Ray?”

“Probably just me being paranoid. Let’s get inside. Keep your head down and move quickly.”

We crossed the parking lot and entered the building without incident. My hand didn’t leave my gun under my jacket. Simon led the way to the elevator,

“We need to go up to the fourth floor.”

“How about we take the stairs?” I nodded at the door to the stairwell.

“Sure,” he gave me a strange look, but we took the stairs up.

Everything seemed quiet and unremarkable when we arrived at the floor. The only other person we passed was a janitor who was mopping the hallway. Simon led me down a corridor and opened the door, waving me into a small reception area. The only person in the room was a bored-looking receptionist, who was reading a book at her desk. Hearing me enter, she looked up with faint irritation.

“We don’t take walk-ins, honey. You will have to call and make an appointment, if you need to see the doctor.”

Then, she caught sight of the person behind me, and her face lit up,

“Simon! Where have you been? We haven’t seen you here in forever.”

“Hello Marge,” he smiled. “I’m sorry, I’ve been pretty busy, lately. Is Liz in? I was hoping to talk with her, just for a sec.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

“Well, I probably shouldn’t say, but since it is you…” Marge leaned in conspiratorially. “She is in her office, but she has cancelled all of her appointments the last few days. Today, she’s been on the phone all day. I think something might be wrong, so it is good you are here. Go on back. And don’t be a stranger, you hear?”

“Thanks, Marge. I’ll make sure to come back soon.”

We headed down a hallway to a closed door, the name plate read: “Elizabeth Ward, PhD.” Simon knocked gently.

“I’m sorry, I’m not taking patients today,” the response came through the door. “Marge can make you an appointment, if you just wait for her at the desk.”

“Liz, can we talk? It’s important,” Simon called back.

There was a moment of silence. Too much silence. I grabbed Simon’s arm and dragged him to the side, past the doorframe.

“Do not stand directly in front of the door,” I hissed.

“Why not…”

His question was interrupted when the door burst open to reveal a dark-haired woman with a pistol in her hand. She was expecting him to be standing right in front of her, and the moment of confusion as she looked for him, allowed me to grab her wrist with one hand and take the gun with the other.

“That’s why,” I muttered. “Well, that or they just shoot you through the door.”

“I wondered when you would come here for me,” the woman I assumed to be Elizabeth Ward tried to pull her wrist away, but I held it fast. “You won’t get anything out of me, Domini,” she spat in his direction.

“Wait, you knew?” Simon’s eyes widened.

“Of course I knew. That is why they assigned me to be your mate. The Council has been trying to get people into the Domini for a long time, to monitor your activities. You won’t get away with this.”

“Ok,” I brought her attention back to me. “I think we should move this conversation into the office, where it is more private.”

“You can torture me if you want, I won’t tell you anything.”

“No one is torturing anyone,” I sighed, pushing her ahead of me, into her office. “Close the door, Simon.”

He followed me in, shutting the door behind him.

“Now,” I pushed her down into a chair and raised her gun with my right hand, itching absently at the back of my neck with my left. “I am not planning to hurt you, but I do need to you stay very still for a minute while we clear up a few things.”

“Does it make you feel good, to have your human do all the fighting for you?” Liz continued to address Simon, mostly ignoring my presence.

“My human?” Simon looked confused for a moment. “No! This isn’t like that Liz. You don’t understand.”

“What is there to understand? You come in here with your thug and…”

“Ok, that’s quite enough of that. We don’t have time for this,” I pulled back my sleeve and revealed the tattoo of the sword and the eye. “I am not with the Domini, and neither is Simon. I have some questions I need you to answer, but first, can you please stop that?”

The itching at the back of my skull was starting to irritate me.

“Wait,” Liz stared at my arm. “You are from the Organization? You’re a Partial?”

“Yup.”

“We thought you were all dead.”

“Yeah, see, that is one of the questions I have. Because what you just said to Simon indicates to me that you people in the Council knew about the Domini this whole time. And I am now somewhat curious as to why you never told us.”

“We knew they existed, but we didn’t know they were this serious, not until it had already happened. Groups like this crop up all the time, they are usually all talk. So, there is no reason to involve the Organization and create… tensions between our groups. Not when we can deal with them ourselves, quietly.”

“Well, that worked out real great, didn’t it?” I muttered.

“But how are you…”

“Alive? Simon warned us. It is because of him that any of us are still here.”

“Really, but I thought you were…” Liz glanced to Simon.

“Domini?” Simon looked to the floor. “I was, but I had, well, second thoughts.”

“Look, we can get into all the details of this later. Can I assume I won’t be needing this for the moment?” I slipped her gun into my pocket when she nodded. “We came here because we need to know if any of the Council members are alive. We need their support, if we are going to find a way out of this.”

I moved over to her office window and gazed down at the parking lot below. A few people were passing through the lot, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

“When we got word that the Organization had been hit, the Council split up and went to ground. They are supposed to stay in hiding until the situation is cleared.”

“Well, this situation is not clearing up on its own. There has to be a way to get in touch with them.”

“There is, but…” Liz hesitated. “Truthfully, we aren’t sure which of them have been compromised. I have been looking into how this happened, and as far as I can figure, Omega has been working on all of them for a long time. Some of them clearly steered us away from the Domini, hid the severity of the problem. It’s part of why we weren’t ready for this. We were being undermined from the inside. If you reach out to them, it could do more harm than good.”

Down in the parking lot, I saw the someone get out of a car and begin crossing to the building. I almost didn’t pay them any mind, but something thing drew my eye. The woman had her arm in a sling and a bandage on her head. I leaned in towards the window, trying to get a closer look.

“I know of at least two we should be able to trust,” Simon spoke up. “Two that Omega couldn’t turn. And trust me when I say he wasn’t happy about it.”

As the woman got closer to the building, she looked up briefly and I saw her face. Shit, this was suddenly a lot more complicated.

“That might make this doable,” Liz considered. “I need time to think about it, though.”

“Well, we don’t have time, Doctor. We need to get out of here, right now,” I turned back from the window.

“What? Why?”

“They were watching you. Probably hoping that Simon would come to you, eventually. They’ll be here any minute.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I just saw Vicki Carter in your parking lot.”

“Wait, Vicki Carter? Isn’t that the woman who died a few days ago in a car accident? It was all over the news,” Liz seemed confused.

“Yeah, she was a rogue succubus, and I crashed her car. It’s a long story. Either way, she didn’t die, she was arrested. And if she is here now, it can only be because the Domini freed her. Which also means that she is certainly here for us. So, do you have a fire escape or a back exit from this place?”

“There are fire stairs down the hall. My car is in the back lot. If we leave now, we can drive somewhere safe and continue this conversation,” Liz grabbed her keys from the desk.

As we moved for the door, I heard a soft knock.

“Dr. Ward are you in there?” the man’s voice came through the door.

I looked to Liz and put a finger to my lips,

“Do you know who that is?” I whispered.

“I think it is Sam, the maintenance man for the building. I’m not sure though, we don’t talk often.”

“He about 5’10, grey hair, bushy moustache, human?”

Liz nodded.

“We passed him on the way in. My bet is he is the one who tipped them that we were here,” I motioned for Simon to join me and help push a large filling cabinet in front of the door. As it scraped on the floor, the knocking grew louder.

“Dr. Ward? Are you alright in there? Please open the door.”

I heard the jingling of keys, then the door handle jiggled as he tried to open it, but it jammed against the cabinet. I turned to the two ubarae,

“Ok, we are too late. Vicki and her people are already here. We can’t know how many thralls she has in place out there. So, looks like we are going to need to figure out a plan B.”