“Okay boys and girls… This is our assignment…”

The others were already gathered around a big round table by the time Tilia and Ferran arrived in the small closet-like space. The walls were covered in hand-drawn images of impressive detail and liveness. Connecting the various images were threads tied to small needle-darts upon which hung a sizeable stack of paper in places.

“Fashionably late again Tilia? Please Ferran, don’t let her tardiness rub off on you… Anyway, have a seat.” Rein sighed and resumed his briefing.

“This time, we’ll be swapping out a file inside the Imperial Archive… To do this, we need to first forge a file that we’ll be replacing it with… That’s where you come in Ferran.”

“Huh?”

“You’ll lead us through the sewers, back to your former home… We’ll get the so-called priest there to make it.” He pointed to a map, apparently of the sewers and drew a line along one of the popular entry routes.

“We know how to get this far, but you’ll be leading us.”

She froze. A lingering doubt began to fill her mind. She had been taught to never lead any strangers to the hideout. Her words stumbled for a bit around in thinking sounds. A great many possibilities began to open up inside her mind. What if her parents had returned without finding her? Would the group kill them too if she led them there? And if they hadn’t, what about the priest?”

“I guess I can? But…”

“Hm?”

“Why?”

With a sigh, Rein cracked his neck and pointed at a long line with a big x on the map. Clearly, he needed the door to be accessible and not closed. She remembered the sheer weight of the door and quietly nodded her agreement. After sharing the lesser details and handing out assignments, Rein called off the meeting and told everyone to remain on standby. She remained behind in the room, looking at the maps and trying to snap up every little bit of information she could from the jungle in her hand. After throwing a quick glance over her shoulders, she swore under her breath that one day she should learn to read. Her deep thoughts were suddenly interrupted by someone poking her back. She turned around to find Indas standing behind her. The little boy looked at her with quiet blue eyes.

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“Hi Indas, right? I’m just looking at the maps…”

She looked on as the boy took out a small crumpled note stained with ink. With surprising deftness, he scribbled down a response and held it up for her to look at.

“D… Ne… Ke… Sorry, but I can’t actually read…” Her earnest reply was met with a ridiculing grin from the boy who immediately proceeded to put away the piece of paper and wave his hands in a certain way.

“Huh? What are you doing?”

“Simple Ferran, he’s asking you if you’d like him to teach you how to write.” Carys appeared in the doorway carrying a wooden lockbox under each arm.

“I’d be very grateful if you could teach me…” She replied, a strange feeling of shyness overtaking her.

“Tsk, look at him when you speak, and enunciate…”

“Enunciate?”

Carys sighed and put down the boxes on the map table with a sigh of disdain.

“Speak clearly… Move your lips more and look right at him. He’s not deaf, but his hearing is pretty bad on the right.”

“O-oh… I am sorry, I will do my best to be clear…” She tried to make herself clearer, and from his expression, she had completely overdid it. He waved his hands a little in Carys’s direction. The woman rolled her eyes.

“Too much, he said, and that’s all I’ll help you with… Honestly, why are you even investing time in that little squirt?”

With a frown, Indas began gesticulating furiously, and even Carys appeared to have to concentrate to catch every word of his sentence.

“That’s not why! He’s got nothing to do with…” With a rough chew, Carys bit her tounge, and a small trickle of blood soon appeared in the corner of her mouth. She threw her another angry look before marching out of the door. As soon as she had gone, Indas took out a small folded piece of paper and showed it to her. Depicted with incredible detail was Indas, Carys, Rein and Tilia together with another six others. In turn, Indas pointed to the other six in turn and made a gesture of a throat being slit. Arriving at the last one, he paused, pointed at Carys and puckered his mouth.

“Eww… They were…” her sentence as interrupted by his quick unpuckering and putting a finger to his lips before making another gesture of having one’s throat cut.

“She’ll… Kill me for saying it?”

An affirmative nod followed quickly. He put the small piece away and gestured for her to follow him.