In the busy market streets of Highden, all hours were peak hours. Even this rainy morning—especially so, by the looks of it.

The restaurants were reservation only. The book stores were standing room only. People browsed the Golem Store just to kill time before their shifts. A mass of people came to the city every single day, commuting from the outlying towns beyond the city walls. Most of them came right through Highden, and worked here too.

Amelia pushed past a kappa and a goblin flirting on the sidewalk and entered underneath a canopy-roofed walkway as quickly as she could. When a particularly slow human blocked her way across an intersection, she quite literally tapped on her shoulder to make her turn around, then slipped in front of her in the process, just so she could enter underneath another dry spot.

It was not that she particularly hated the rain, or getting wet. She loved baths, for example. The issue was that her own body disagreed with it. Half her body was... porous, and her rain coat was thin enough that she feared water would drip right through. Drying herself off was a task no glossal would ever envy, and if it detracted from the meeting she was heading towards, it would enrage Amelia to no end. She did not ask to be put into this body.

Indeed, Urgul had connected with his magical contact and had arranged a meeting between them and Amelia for this morning. A real stickler for good first impressions, he told her, so she went out and bought her first not-for-combat outfit in a long time. A waist-length white blouse, thin and soft, with a dark vest and bowtie over it. That, along with the trilby over her head and eye patch over her false eye, would hopefully help persuade the other person to join her in a mission that could see both their deaths with one single misstep. She was already fifteen minutes late, which was a poor sign, but she knew she could make up for it.

Also, it was the first time she looked genuinely nice in years. Possibly even since she and Ed escaped the Newpool research center, and that was nearly six whole years ago. Time really did move quickly. She honestly quite enjoyed looking at herself in the mirror when she was dressed this sharply. Her rain coat covered it all up, but that was a side effect of her least favorite weather pattern.

Finally, Amelia reached the coffee shop where she was scheduled to meet this person. Without a visual descriptor or any other information to go by, she had to simply hope that she could spot an obvious mage—

Oh.

Now, suddenly, she understood Urgul’s warnings.

Sitting on a barstool facing the window was one very familiar blue-skinned elven face: The very same man she met in Berryward several months ago. To whom she gave all the souls that Fourland wanted her to smuggle in.

A necromancer, sitting there drinking coffee.

He gazed upon her for a few seconds to confirm whether it was Amelia or not. When he recognized her, he smiled, waved, and motioned for her to come inside.

She entered and a coffee shop employee removed her raincoat for her. The barista came and asked for a drink. Only water, of course, which earned a grump reaction. She came around to the barstool next to the sun elf and sat down. The window showed the pouring rain and the many people on the sidewalk trying desperately to keep themselves dry. Now that she was not among them, she felt glad to see and hear the gentle, quietly humming downpour.

But the man next to her...

Korath Ondolinde, infamous necromancer and plague of Sunwell. Using the darkest magical arts known to the glossal races, he resurrected dead souls. Reanimated corpses. Grabbed from graves, crafted cadavers. What he did was no better, no more defensible than the horrific acts that the North Sunwell Company perpetuated with its own soul harvesting operations.

They had met once. And then, just like now, Korath presented himself with the utmost of prim and proper. His frizzy white hair notwithstanding, everything was trimmed and cut perfectly. His suit and tie made him look like a corporate executive, not a death-raising mage, and the single white earring on his right ear gave off the distinct impression of a man of culture. Amelia could have met him in a board room, at a music concert, or in a battle, and in each one of them he would not have looked out of place.

“Beautiful weather, isn’t it?” he asked, his voice as smooth as the sheen on his skin.

“I don’t like rain,” Amelia said, her mood souring immediately. “It’s wet, and slippery, and irritating, and it gets everywhere.”

“Mm. Not like here,” Korath said. “Not with you.”

Amelia narrowed her eyes. “You’re in Fleettwixt.”

“So are you.”

“How did you even get in the city?” Amelia whispered.

“I snuck in, just like you.”

“Every patrol in the city should be looking—”

“I’m surprised,” he interrupted, “that those pirates in Berryward didn’t end up nabbing you before you left. It’s fortunate. They didn’t take kindly to our interference.”

“It was pretty nice, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, yes.” He cocked his head to the side to get a better look at her face. “What’s with the eye patch?”

“It gets rid of unwanted attention,” she said. It also completely eradicated her depth of vision and made her useless in battle, so she hoped it would not come to that. “What’s with the necklace?”

Underneath his tie, so neatly folded, there rested a small chain, mostly obscured by the rest of his clothes. He tapped it and said, “Oh this? Just a keepsake. You remember, don’t you? The same as that glove.” He gestured down to Amelia’s right hand and the black glove she carried at all times.

“Yes, of course. We’re so alike.”

“And such good friends,” he added.

Korath and Amelia were not friends. They had been temporary allies for a very limited purpose. They fought together in one brief moment, and parted ways amicably.

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To be together again meant coming to terms with the fact that she had let a necromancer roam free without any retribution whatsoever. She had seen the way he raised an army of skeletons from a graveyard, had marched those creatures into the pirates’ lair, had devastated a city’s worth of people in a matter of minutes. They were barbarian scum, to be true, but that did not change the horrific power he held in his wretched hands.

“Knock knock,” Korath said, tapping Amelia on the shoulder. When she looked, he winked. “You were conked out there for a second.”

“Yeah. Sorry.” The barista finally set down Amelia’s cup of water, along with an oversized donut—and a bill. An “accidental order filled,” she was sure. She rolled her eyes and passed the donut to Korath.

“Why, I don’t mind if I do.” He took a fork and a knife and began eating the donut with the delicacy one might bring an extra rare steak. “It seems we’ve some unresolved matters to discuss before we can talk shop.”

“Seems so.”

“Why don’t you begin? Ah, wow, this donut is marvelous.”

“I don’t want you here,” Amelia said bluntly. “You’re a menace to society. Everything you stand for—I stand against.”

“Yikes,” he said softly, with a smile. “You really are laying into me, huh?”

“I don’t know why you’re in Fleettwixt. I don’t care. Leave this city.”

“You know, I do recall you telling me you were on your way here. And I do recall I said I’d be far away. Well, I wasn’t wrong. I went to the ends of the continent. North Keyway. You ever been?”

She did not feel like humoring his distractions-by-inquiry, and yet that was the only way forward in this conversation. “About a year ago, yeah.”

“Absolutely beautiful. I went out there to understand myself. To test my resolve and all that malarkey. Maybe you understand my innuendo. Needless to say, I made it out all right. The merfolk even gave me a trophy for my troubles.”

“I see.”

Korath dug through his jacket pocket and took out a whirlpool-shaped necklace. “A vortex amulet. Enchanted with powerful water magic that can plow an entire field of foes in seconds. Imagine a tornado of rain ripping apart a whole city block.”

“If you use that, I’ll kill you.”

He returned the amulet to his jacket and shook his head. “Ah, see, THAT’s where our connection is missing. You’re projecting some pretty powerful things on me, Amelia. Or should I call you Ms. Bluewood? You never specified.”

“Amelia.”

“Thank you.” He wiped his mouth gently with a handkerchief from his pockets. “I’m not your enemy, Amelia. We’ve very similar causes we’re fighting for.”

“We do?”

“In a sense.”

“I’m here to destroy the entire North Sunwell Corporation,” Amelia said. “I don’t believe that’s your mission.”

“I said, ‘In a sense.’ It’s not perfect.”

She knew he would specify no further than that. Playing coy to the very end, because that was always Korath’s game.

It was a terrible, horrible idea, and the Amelia of the past and Amelia of the future would likely curse her for it, but the next words out of her mouth were, “So you’re interested in working with me.”

“I didn’t know we were past the ‘resolving our differences’ part.”

“We never will be.” Amelia took her glass of water and gulped it down in about three seconds.

“Ah, very well then,” Korath said. “We know each other’s styles. I think we work well together in a fight.”

“We do,” she admitted.

“But I suspect fighting isn’t precisely what you need a mage specialist for.”

“Not precisely.” Amelia leaned in closer. “Did you hear about Fourland?”

“No. I don’t know what that means.”

“Then all I can say is, I have a path to the top of North Sunwell. A tree to shake.”

“A purse, right? That’s what Urgul told me.”

“What? Oh, yeah. Whatever. A purse to catch.”

“And if it’s caught...”

Amelia snapped, and suddenly in the palm of her hand there was a shiny purple soul gem. “A hell of a lot of these.”

“I don’t believe in any Hell, but alright. If it’s souls you want, I’m your man.”

Amelia spoke as frankly as she could: “I need power. I’m not strong enough to destroy the colonizers yet. But with more souls, I can become invincible. That’s my end goal.”

“Do you even realize how much you sound like a necromancer right now?” Korath asked.

She did not answer.

“I like it.” He smiled brightly. But not too brightly, or it might come off creepy. “An elf and a golem against the world, one last time. We split the earnings fifty-fifty, I assume? Money, if we get it, and souls, of course.”

“Seventy-thirty.”

“Also fine. I suspect we both need souls, but our purposes are not quite the same.”

“That’s what I think, too.”

All this talk of souls was exaggerated, for sure. Amelia’s real goal was information. Reaching closer to Ed and closer to revenge. Gaining power was paramount, but it was much more paramount to Korath, even if he pretended otherwise.

Korath stood up and straightened out his suit. He stretched his neck, and a faint glimpse of swirling tattoos appeared—but only for a second. “Well then, why don’t we get going? Let’s kill whoever we need to kill and get it over with.”

“Now?”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t tell you the plan.”

“Oh, right.” He sat back down. “I was just getting a bit too excited, is all.”

“Yeah, looked it.” She glared at him for a second, then said, “I have someone I’m looking for. I know his name, his employment, his position, and a few associates. But I don’t know a single detail about his whereabouts. If we can track him down, we’ll get what we need.”

“Excellent. If it’s a person, then I can track him down, easy.”

“Can you now?”

“Rather, I can track down the person who can track him down.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Korath stood up again. “Well then, are we off? Do you want a scone for the road? I’ll pay.”

“I don’t eat.”

“Ah, yes, I must have forgotten,” he said with a voice that betrayed that he absolutely did not forget. “Then we should be off. The early olm catches the soul.”

The early olm...

That was not a real phrase, not that Amelia had ever heard in her life. It alone struck more fear in her than anything else Korath had done or said thus far; if he had any knowledge of her home at the hostel or anything left unsaid about her true mission, that would compromise her utterly.

Nothing in his expression suggested he knew. But Korath was nothing if not inscrutable.

She had to trust this was the right choice, even if everything in her soul screamed that it was not. She had to trust in the untrustable.