Along streets lined by tall buildings of worn brick and time smoothed stone. Low rivers carved bright channels into the shadowed streets. Their clear sparking waters spanned by bridges wide and thin. States of river life dotted the water. Almost identical to the natural inhabitants. Betrayed only by their grey stone counterparts.

Igni walked on one such street slowly, and softly. He steps pattered on the floor. The curious crowd parted at his passage. Like shy children before a wonder. He smiled just as he intended.

They grew disquieted if he was silent. So he hummed faintly and added weight to his steps. A little effort to ease them. It was a ginger pace.

It gave him more time, to enjoy the city.

He watched the passersby as they watched him in turn. He understood what was behind their eyes.

A boy peeked from behind his mother’s dress. His eyes darted nervously between Igni and his mother. His fluffy fox tail was tucked between his legs. The hints of childish guilt seemed obvious now. He wondered what it was about.

Igni waved, and they darted behind their mother. Taking their secrets with them. Igni let his attention wander to the next interesting thing.

A collection of statues on a balcony drew his eye. Ancestral offerings, An immaculately carved rabbit and stout beetle. Three sculpted rabbit kits of various qualities surrounded them.

So the lines did intermix! The library had implied but he hadn’t been certain. It had been a wonderful suggestion. Much of its information had overlapped with the aviary’s records. Yet the perspectives were almost completely different. With so many small details, he’d never thought of.

It was like his eyes had opened to a new face of the world. He’d thank Two again. His smile widened, at the thought of her. She was good company, to think they’d almost killed her.

Yet they did kill one, his wings sunk. Such a waste. He let the thought pass and returned to sightseeing.

He spied a couple in the crowd. A man and woman both stared at him with gaped mouths. The man’s cheeks flushed scarlet. They jolted as someone bumped them. They scurried away as if stung. Igni’s gaze followed their retreat. There was still so much he had to understand.

He reaffirmed his grip on his aura. Keeping it close to dissuade idle conversation. He’d rather the opportunity to talk to the many interesting people in and out of the various buildings he passed. He wondered what they did inside. Unfortunately, he had somewhere to be. Hopefully, his brother had some insights.

***

He stepped through. Bowing to navigate the door. A cosy bar welcomed him. It was a quiet establishment in one of the city’s older buildings. Like most things in the city, it was made well. The floors were of polished wood. It hosted tables, and chairs of many makes and sizes for the city’s varied residences.

A few occupants looked up at his entry, only to shift their attention moments after. It was nice not being the focus. Lux’s energetic waving in the corner helped.

“Hello,” he said and sat beside his brother.

“Glad to see you! What have you been up to? How’d you find this place? Seen anything interesting lately.” Lux fired questions, he let their excitement wash over him. Like a cool wind on a bright day, Lux was never not a joy.

He replied in an even tone as the stream slowed.“I’m happy to see you too, and I’ve been exploring the city that’s how I found this place.”

“Details, please.” His smile was so bright and unrestrained that a mortal might tear something trying to replicate it.

Scenes from the past week jitters through his thoughts. He’d like to be exact. Dictate every face he passed in his exploration and discovery. All the quirks and thoughts that added pages to his book every day. For the sake of practicality, he compromises. “We needed a place to meet, and while we could have used one of our residences, or a place the governor recommended. I thought it would be more interesting to go somewhere in the city. As for this place, I stumble onto it with Two.”

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“The kidnapper,” his brother’s smile twisted with amusement. “Why are you hanging about her anyway?” was that concern in his voice.

A smile touched his lips, at the worry. Lux, ever the protector. “She is a competent guide and has a very different perspective than I’m used to.”

Lux’s ever present smile slipped. His sharp steel eyes looked pointedly at Igni. His iris glimmered with inner light.

“Control.”

Lux blinked, his serious facade shattered. The light vanished. Revealing mortal eyes and a shy smile. “Sorry, but my point still stands.” He tried again for gravitas but a smile spilled onto his cheeks.

“Okay, okay,” Igni said waving his brother down. While hiding his amusement with the other.

His brother huffed, abandoning seditiousness as they leaned into their chair. “But still, we’ve been on the ground for a month or so, and most of that time we were in a cartridge staring at plants.” Igni liked the plants. “Most people have perspectives we’re not used to and I’m sure some of them, would be glad to show you about the place. Why her.”

Why a criminal a kidnapper? Someone willing to hurt another to step forward. It was a question he’d spent many lines in his book exploring. Parting and examining the intermixed tissues of logic and emotion to find the answers that rang most true. He still wasn’t done.

“She is a survivor a child of misfortune.” He said slowly, taking each word, and gingerly placing them.

“Does that justify her actions?” His brother fired sharply.

He shook his head, a sigh escaped him.“It doesn’t, but it makes her understandable. Lux I’ve read the reports, I was there with you.” Lux opened the mouth but Igni raised a hand. “Please, let me finish. I think you see her as a selfish person who is perfectly willing to aid and ignore cruelty. Then throw her partners away the moment things get complicated. Is that right?”

His brother nodded reluctantly. Igni hid the smile his annoyed expression brought. He hated being read so easily, it was probably even more annoying he didn’t use his aura to do it.

“To an extent, I think that’s true but there’s a different side to it. One where she’s trying her best to escape from a harsh environment but stumbles deeper into it. Then she takes a risk a does the kindest thing she can.” Turn complete, he leaned back and let Lux stew in his thoughts.

The silence stretches. Interrupted periodically by the quiet murmurs of day drinkers, and the bartender going about the tasks.

Lux raises his bowed head. His sparkling steel gaze meets his soft grey.“I… tentatively agree, but I still don’t understand why you put so much effort in.”

“To help her of course.” Bafflement sweeps their face. It brought a smile to Igni’s. “Weren't you the one who wanted to help the mortal with all their many problems?”

Lux froze, then burst into restrained giggles. That thankfully only brightened the room in a metaphorical sense. “Your right! Thanks for the reminder, the governors had me in so many meetings and visits. I’d almost forgotten. It’s like she wants to introduce me to every vaguely important person in the empire and is settling for the city. I really needed the reminder” He shakes his head but a wide smile fills his cheeks.

“I’m always here for you Lux,”

“Same, Just be careful okay? I know you know the danger of attachment, But I worry.” Raw concern filled his voice. It struck deeper than the faux gravitas. Stirring old memories of so many missing faces.

“I will brother, I promise.” He said softly.

They sat in quiet interspersed, with motes of lighter conversation. Immersed in shared memories and parallel emotions.

Then, a faint knock jarred his thoughts. A sound beyond the physical. Ringing from inside his skull and all around simultaneously. Igni met his eyes.

With thoughts of invitation, he welcomed them. Then Guardian Curio was there, shrouded in a grey that hid all save his great steel wings. Rattling chains echoed from him though he stood perfectly still.

Igni glanced at the bar’s other occupants. As expected they were dumb to third angel’s presence. Though is hunched for was even greater than the brothers

“Hello guardian Curio,”

“Hey Curio.”

Igni nodded, Lux waved.

Curio examined them through them through the curtain of fabric that shrouded his face. He needed his eyes, to see. After a time they chuckled. The sound warm and haunting. As if it had crawled from the pages of a storybook in the dead of night. To comfort a child wrapped in blankets and chased by nightmares.

It was like nothing he’d heard from the denizens of Spes Nova, nor the many people they’d passed on their journey to the city. It was inhuman, it was comfortingly familiar.

“I am glad to see you two in good sprints. I’d had my concern seeing the start of our visitation.”

The pair winced, Curio had expressed ‘opinions’ about how they handled themselves. While he’d question the motive behind their decision it didn’t extend beyond ensuring they acted with thought. He had dissected how they’d enacted those derisions.

Prodding Lux’s caviler mass property damage and Igni’s obvious dissatisfaction with local’s laws. The critiques had been as numerous as they were pointed. Not even as a hatching had Igni seen Lux receive such numerous and varied chastisement

“I trust you Two have restrained the use of your auras.”

Such was the first of the meetings many dissections.