The Royal Capital University wasn’t too far from the bank, but the short streetcar trip gave me enough time to think of a lot of problems with my plan.

First of all, how would I even find Dominica’s daughter? I didn’t even remember her name; the last time I’d seen her she had just learned to read. Not many people looked the way they did fifteen years ago, much less so if they were a child at the time.

Second, while she was the firstborn daughter and thus most likely in line to take over the family when her mother passed, there was no guarantee she was kept in the loop about her mother’s work. If she knew anything, it probably wouldn’t be useful.

Third, would she even help me? I was a near stranger asking her to divulge information about her mother’s work that could get her in a lot of trouble.

The first issue was solved immediately when I stepped onto the campus and I heard a woman say, “Mr. Dreadstone?”

I turned and saw a young woman in her early twenties. She had her mother’s black hair, but her skin wasn’t so sickly pale. I saw a partial sleeve of traditional Valerian tattoos on her left arm. She was tall, probably taller than her mother, and she was built like a soldier, with muscles that were clearly for function, not form.

“Sorry,” I said, “do I know you?” Best to feign ignorance, and get some plausible deniability if this came back to bite me in the ass.

“No, well, yes,” she said, blushing and trying to smooth out her uniform, removing the creases in her jacket and flattening her tie. “My name is Io Wellstone, we met when I was young once.”

I feigned surprise and pretended to think.

“Well, yes, yes, of course. I do remember you. I’m surprised you remember me.”

She blushed a bit deeper and said, “Of course I do.”

“What a coincidence,” I said.

“Oh, no,” Io said, shaking her head slightly, “I’ve been looking for you.”

What? I tried to keep my expression calm and neutral.

She blushed again and waved her hands dismissively, “That came out wrong,” she said, “I’ve just been wanting to thank you for what you did.”

I swallowed the lump in my throat and said, “Of course. It was my duty, I was more than glad to carry it out.” A feeling in my gut told me to get out of there, and if I’ve learned one thing being a Hunter, it’s to trust my gut, so I turned to leave, but Io grabbed my arm.

“Wait!” she said, desperation leaking into her voice. She immediately added, “Sorry, I just, I wanted to ask you so many questions. I study Hunters, but the Guild won’t let me interview any of them. If you could answer a few questions, I’d be very appreciative.”

What’s that about plausible deniability? I looked toward the clock tower. It was about lunchtime.

“Fine,” I said, “why don’t we grab lunch and talk over a meal? I’m starving.”

Io smiled and nodded vigorously. “Of course.”

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

I rubbed my chin and said, “I’m not dressed for a restaurant around here. Let’s head downtown, I know a couple of good places.”

She followed me onto the streetcar and we rode for twenty minutes downtown, where we got off and I navigated us through alleys and streets until we came onto a small but crowded avenue with dozens of food stalls, tables, and chairs. Io got a table while I went to order.

As I sat down with our food, I casually asked, “So you’re attending the Royal Capital University? I thought your family was out east.”

She took a bite of her sandwich and nodded.

“Yes, though my mother moved here with me, she works at a bank uptown.”

“Ah, good to be near family. I’ve been thinking about getting into finance myself,” I lied.

“Really?” Io said, pulling out a notebook and pen.

“Yeah,” I said, “do you know what kinds of clients your mother works with? Because I have connections in some industries but not others.”

“What kinds of industries do you have connections in?” Io asked, scribbling down my words in shorthand in her notebook.

“Oh, mainly railroad connections. I travel a lot. Does your mother work with those kinds of clients?”

Io tilted her head to the side, thinking for a minute.

“I’m not sure,” she said, “I think she mainly works with individuals. And maybe some weapons manufacturers. I’m not sure which specifically though. Do you know any of those?”

Interesting. Mommy dearest had some ties to the war industries.

“No,” I said, shaking my head, “Hunters don’t usually use weapons that weren’t made in-house.”

There was more furious scribbling from Io before she asked, “Why’s that?”

I tried to think if I was violating any Guild by-laws by telling this girl anything. The Hunter’s Guild was a secretive organization, for so many reasons, and it had only gotten worse as our work became more and more involved with the government. I decided I probably was but I didn’t care.

“Most of our weapons are specially made,” I said. “Our primary job is killing the things that go bump in the night, remember? A normal arms manufacturer is just trying to kill other people. Our swords are heavier than normal, our guns would break your arm with the recoil if you tried to fire it.”

“I knew that,” Io said, a bit defensively, “the Guild just doesn’t like to say where they get their weapons from. That’s all. You wouldn’t happen to—”

I raised my hands in surrender and she stopped.

“I just work here,” I said. “Like any good soldier, I don’t think about where the weapons come from, I just use them.”

Io kept writing, her face a mask of concentration.

After a few seconds, I said, “Your interest in Hunters, where does that come from? Your mother?”

Io frowned and said, “My mother doesn’t care for or about Hunters. I tried to apply for an apprenticeship and she threatened to disown me. She was very resistant to me studying them.”

That made sense, being a Hunter wasn’t exactly the glamorous profession a noble’s firstborn daughter should have. But at least it didn’t seem like Io was doing her digging for her mother, which was good in a way.

For the rest of the hour, I tried to get more information out of Io all the while dodging her questions in the most vague ways possible, giving up as little as I could. I didn’t get nor give much, so I’ll chalk that up as a tie.

The whole time, Io didn’t ask a single question about my Hunter’s Mark, which was a bit surprising. That was usually the first thing people wanted to know about, right after asking how much we got paid. I didn’t think much of it though, if she studied the Hunters and the Guild, she probably knew there wasn’t much information I could give in that department.

Eventually, she had to go and I was left alone to my thoughts. They quickly returned to the case.

Tallying it up in my head, not a lot made sense. We have Gerry Teralt, an employee of a sister location hundreds of miles from here, dying brutally, his ex-Hunter bodyguard useless. We have Dominica Wellstone, who supposedly had connections to weapons manufacturers, and she recognized Teralt’s name. She knew of him, at the very least. What could have killed those people so brutally? Was there a monster loose in the Warren? If so, it would’ve made a much larger splash than it did and there would be a lot more killed or missing. There had to be something I was missing.

I considered heading back to Char to see if she had dug up anything but something in the back of my head told me to check out the monster angle, just to be sure. Whatever had killed those people in the alley was strong and brutal. I don’t know how a monster would’ve found its way into the dense and urban Warren, but if it had, it would spell a lot of trouble.