The Astralla City underworld included people Jair had worked with more than a few times in the past. Tyros and Meldi had been running the place for many years now and were quite predictable by now.

Unfortunately, Jair didn't have time for the subtle approach. He walked straight into their main headquarters, slammed the door open, and announced himself loudly.

"Meldi! Tyros! Come out you two! I need you, and I need you fast."

Needless to say, neither of them appreciated being called out quite so aggressively. They sent angry looking thugs to firmly escort Jair and Yast from the premises, preferably with a few extra bruises for good measure, but Jair adeptly dodged their attempts to grab him. Yast was less fortunate, the elf much better suited to espionage and infiltration rather than direct physical conflict.

"I need to hire Desrin, and I'm on a tight schedule. I can pay up front, but I have an appointment with the Hyperion in about a half hour, so I would really appreciate it if you'd hurry."

This didn't go particularly well, being flippant and demanding tended to rub certain people the wrong way, and Meldi and Tyros were people you particularly didn’t want to have rubbed the wrong way. They took the money and pointed him to Desrin, but they’d definitely be less likely to help him in future - at least without overcharging him at an exponential rate.

That wouldn’t be a problem for long however. Jair wasn’t planning to stay in this loop for long enough that a pair of disgruntled criminals would be more than a mild irritation to him.

They would be ruder about things, more likely to sell out information about him to his enemies, etc, etc. None of which were more than a passing threat when you could reverse time.

It cost him significantly more than it should have, but let it never be said that Meldi and Tyros would turn down a chance of profit. Their disguise specialist had plenty of cosmetic facial features on hand for everything from elf to beastkin to vampire.

Getting Jair set up as a slightly overweight Zakvari elf in under twenty minutes was not an easy feat, but it was far from impossible, and Desrin was very good at what he did.

The disguise wouldn't stand up to extensive observation, but Jair didn't need it to stand up to extensive observation. He just needed to be convincing enough that the Hyperion sent for their interpreter before they brought in Larenok.

Eight minutes before the deadline, Jair and Yast departed the underworld workshop, looking more like brothers than Jair could've hoped.

He and Yast proceeded to wander through the market district, chatting casually the whole time as though they were ordinary tourists and not a pair of criminals.

The Hyperion wasn’t fooled by their tourist appearance, but didn't even look twice at Jair as they tried, much more politely this time, to escort the pair of them to the holding.

Apparently, looking like a foreigner got you treated better on arrests than if you were an obvious student of the local academy. Who knew?

They were separated and both interrogated, but since nobody in the Hyperion had bothered to learn Zakvari, that came to nothing. Yast didn't have to feign confusion as he was as ignorant of their language as they were of his, while Jair had playing dumb down to an art. His baffled incomprehension would have fooled even his mother.

They did search both of them for weapons and contraband, but didn't bother to check for fake ears. You see a pair of elves chatting away in their elven language, no reason to assume that either is anything but what they seem.

It was another day before the translator arrived.

They took Yast first, which made sense since he was the one they had been actively tracking. Jair was left alone in his holding room to wonder what exactly they would be asking, and what Yast would tell them. They had briefly gone over a handful of topics to either focus on or stay clear of, but Yast wasn't nearly the actor Jair was so he tried to keep the list pretty simple to allow room for improvisation and consistency.

The whole time, he couldn't stop wondering.

His heartbeat quickened without his permission at the thought of finally learning something more about his Veor nemesis. He’d narrowed down enough factors, he was all but certain he was right, but there was still the chance he was wrong.

If this was Sekir, then he'd have a whole new set of parameters to work with. He’d always known that Sekir’s rebirth power allowed him to change form, but there had never been a way to find out if he'd used a different shape than the ones Jair knew, or how to even begin to track those down.

This was the closest thing he'd ever had to a solid lead on Sekir prior to his appearance as royal advisor.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

The wait felt interminable.

Jair couldn't concentrate. He kept trying to tell himself to work through the plan, think of something to say, some way to react, one way or the other, but his thoughts just kept circling back around. What if, what if not, what if…

He heard Yast’s door open first, the elf deposited back into holding. Jair stopped still. Tense, he listened, waiting.

Silence. Too long silence.

Footsteps. Slowly, oh so slowly, approaching his door.

Jair schooled his face into calm, allowing a little trepidation to show, but crushing down the intensity of his excitement.

This was it. After weeks of trying and failing to draw out their interpreter, he’d finally learn the truth. One way or another.

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Sekir Lifekeeper had better things to do than play translator. But he also had better things to do than search an empty desert for someone who wasn't there. As long as he was going to waste his time, may as well at least have some fun with it.

Playing interrogator wasn't his preferred role, but that wasn't to say that he didn't excel in it.

The first elf was not a good liar.

He continually said things that didn't quite match up, completely oblivious to the fact that he was giving away far more than he realized. Sekir only nodded with calm and measured speech, never breaking from his persona as a simple translator.

He read off questions from the sheet of paper in front of him, wrote down the replies, and added more than a few questions of his own to clarify things.

It may not be his preferred job, but if he was going to do a job he was going to do it right. It was a good thing for the employer that he'd been brought in, because he was the only person in this entire organization who knew how to get things done properly.

If he didn't have his sights set on a much higher target than simply ruling the Hyperion, he could've risen through the ranks quite quickly and become someone ostensibly very important. But he hadn't come to Veor to play at climbing the employment ladder.

The first elf was dismissed, and Sekir sat for a few minutes of peace, filling out a few of his personal observations in the margins of the report. Even if whichever incompetent idiot had ordered the investigation would never read half of it, it gave him a sense of pride to do the job better than they had any right to expect.

The second elf came in, and Sekir immediately spotted the incongruities.

"You wear a disguise? Why is that."

The elf tilted his head. "I'm surprised you noticed. No one else seems to have."

Interesting. His expression and tone gave away nothing.

Sekir liked him already.

“What is your name?”

“Yex Jenor.” An obvious falsehood. Sekir wrote it down dutifully.

"I understand you are familiar with Yast Mebort?"

The elf nodded. "He is my cousin. We have just come to this fine city because we heard there was work for us."

Sekir nodded, giving nothing away. "What kind of work do you do?"

"Constructs. We create and maintain constructs for the highest bidder." The elf put on a smile. "If you're in need of our services, we happen to be between jobs at the moment."

"Your most recent job was to adjust the security settings for Dalin Larenok?"

The elf frowned slightly. “No? I do not know this name. I was hired on behalf of Lian Teretho."

Sekir narrowed his eyes. There had definitely been a hint of amusement when he said that name. He made a notation.

"And your job for this ‘Teretho’ was to adjust the security on the home at 72 Upper Storm Street?"

The elf nodded. "If you appreciate our work, you should know we have very reasonable rates for constructists of our quality and experience. The language barrier makes it hard to find work, but we’re willing to travel."

This man was not giving anything away. Yast had been perhaps a little cryptic, but practically an open book. He was more likely to evade than lie, but Sekir could tell when he was doing either. This man, though? This man was inscrutable.

Unconsciously, Sekir found he was leaning forward.

It had been such a long time since anyone gave him a proper challenge. Even the whole business with King Farshen was more of a hassle than a proper challenge. Time-consuming, yes. Difficult, no.

"Are you aware that the home you were adjusting did not in fact belong to this Teretho?"

The elf frowned uneasily. "It didn't? Are you saying he lied to us?"

Hm. Much smoother. Sekir would have almost believed it, except for the fact that Yast had definitively confirmed that, yes, they had known the house into which they were breaking was on behalf of someone not the owner.

"What are you smiling about?"

Sekir realized he had in fact been smiling. "You entertain me in a way I have not been entertained in some time, ‘Yax Jenor.’ I would advise you, though, if you're going to engage in criminal activity, you should hire a better accomplice."

That elicited a startled chuckle from the prisoner, face creasing in what appeared to be a fully legitimate smile as he relaxed his posture. "He does have a way of blundering into things. I still don’t know how they tracked him. I don’t suppose you could shed some light on the matter?"

All pretense of this being anything other than what it was had completely dropped. The prisoner leaned forward, eyes bright with interest.

Sekir was intrigued. The man's demeanor very closely matched how he himself would have behaved in such a situation. Knowing he'd been found out, and that denying it would be of no use, all that remained was to see what fun could be had with the situation.

But first, there were formalities to go through. Sekir glanced down at his list of questions and began to read them off one by one. The elf grinned, clearly aware of the situation, and gave a bland, dishonest, and an entirely truthful appearing reply to each.

Sekir could have used his soulspell if he truly wanted the answers, of course, but that would ruin the fun. It would be so uninspired to check the cheat sheet before filling out his own guesses. And this man looked able to keep him guessing for a long time.

Why skip to the end when there was so much game to be played in between?

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