EXPLORATORES

SEENA

“Ling?” Seena called, before remembering she was supposed to be in hiding. Best not to draw too much attention to her. Wait, if she was in hiding, then why was she having ice cream in broad daylight with Lizzy?

Ling seemed surprised to see her, but waved her over regardless.

“You should reconsider this,” the Mal spy warned Seena. He was the one who had led her here, and was now nestled in the boughs of a small tree planted to offer strategic shade. With his midnight-black skin, he'd stick out like a sore thumb otherwise. “There's something not quite right about that girl.”

“Thank you for your help,” Seena said. “I can take it from here.”

“Please—”

“You said you thought my friend was in trouble. You said you'd lead me to her. At this point, I trust Ling far more than I trust you.”

“That's not what I—”

Seena wasn't exactly being as diplomatic as she could have been, but she didn't care. She had just found out, not an hour ago, that her own subculture was spying on her by order of Abigor, the very warlord who had recruited her. That in itself would have been annoying enough. But it also turned out that they had sent out a list of her known acquaintances to all their spies in the field, so they knew who to keep an eye on.

How did Seena know all this? Because one of those spies had woken her up early to tell her that Akane's roommate—who she met a week ago—was seen running around with a couple aves and something the size of the toy box.

Seena sighed. She really shouldn't be so hard on the boy. He had already promised to keep this quiet from the Nobles, which was a pretty big risk. And the only reason he was even doing that was because he was too stupid to realize that Ling was running around with the freaking toy box.

Not anymore, it seemed. As Seena strode over to where the girls were enjoying their early-morning ice cream, she didn't see anything that could hide something so large. No suspicious loitering trucks, no stacks of crates...

Maybe she wasn't a complete moron after all.

“It's... Seena, right?” Ling asked hesitantly. “No, wait, it started with an L...”

“Seena Lancaster,” she said, shaking Ling's hand with a fake smile as she sat down. “I was, uh, in the area, and I spotted you. Figured I'd say hi.”

“Okay, sure.”

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Damn, how the hell was she supposed to bring up the toy box? Somehow, she didn't think “so I heard you've been dragging around a coffin” would go over well.

Lizzy smiled at Seena as she sat down. “Did you hear Ling here found the toy box?”

She almost fell out of her chair.

Ling spewed her ice cream across the table. “Y-you can't just go around telling people—”

“It's all right,” Seena said, her brain working frantically. “I understand, things happen. I, uh...” She bit her lip. “Have you told Necessarius you found it?” She specifically avoided broaching the possibility that she had been involved in the theft. That would just scare her off.

But Ling looked away. “No. I haven't told anyone but Lizzy. A friend of mine just...” She sighed. “An ave friend of mine got roped into something he shouldn't have, that's all.” She picked at the table. “And I really can't talk to Necessarius about it.”

“Yeah, Butler has always been a 'shoot first, ask questions later' kind of guy.” Seena said. “But Akane—”

Ling shook her head vehemently. “Definitely not. Can't talk to her, or Laura or Derek. They'd all go straight to Butler. They'd probably keep me safe, but Turgay...” She closed her eyes. “I'm not killing him.”

“Fair enough,” Seena said quietly. “So what's your plan? Anonymous tip?”

“We called Soaring Eagle!” Lizzy said cheerfully.

Ling looked like her head was about to explode. “Velvet hell, Lizzy, can you keep that stupid mouth shut?!”

Lizzy pouted. “That's not fair, I'm only trying to help...”

“No, it's...” Seena thought about it. “Okay, no, I actually need an explanation for that one. Why did you think sending it back to the chick that stole it would be a good idea?”

Ling rubbed her forehead. “I... it was... Turgay's my oldest friend, you have to understand, it was the only way to keep him safe...”

Seena placed her hand gently on her shoulder. “It's all right. I understand.” And she did. If Simon had been in the same situation, she would have done the exact same thing. Luckily, he wasn't that stupid. After Ling seemed to regain her strength, Seena nodded. “You know this is going to come back to bite you. But I guess you have no choice but to just let it lie. Pretend it never happened and go back to your normal life.”

She groaned. “Tezuka's shadow... Derek is going to kill me.”

“Just don't tell him.”

“No, there was this thing I was supposed to help him with...” She glanced at Lizzy, but looked away quickly. Almost guiltily. “I'm not going to be able to come up with a good excuse.”

“How important was this thing?”

“Derek important.”

Oh, okay, so something to do with monsters or whatever. Fair enough, shouldn't be too big a deal. Derek was just a big softie, he'd—

Wait.

Seena closed her eyes. “This thing. Was it a life-or-death situation.”

“Almost certainly.”

Seena sighed. Yeah. She was dead. There was a lot Derek Huntsman would forgive. But if someone died because you did something stupid or selfish...

Well. Right this moment, she was glad she wasn't Ling Yu.