I’m not sure how long it was before Renă arrived. When she did, the sun was well up, and morning light was pouring in through the gaping hole above us. Scarlett was unconscious, but I was awake, if feeling especially pathetic and meagre. Renă held out a hand to me and helped me to my feet. My head throbbed as I was lifted from the ground.

The masked girl explained that Scarlett had dropped the thing Stefan was using to control her on the rooftop, and once she’d gotten a hold of it, she was able to break his mind control with some magic of her own. When I asked where the sandman was now, she shrugged.

“I saw something that looked like him flying off into the distance. I was too weakened from my battle with Scarlett to pursue him.” There was a hint of irritation in her voice. “Without this though, he shouldn’t pose much threat to anyone.” She held up the red crystal between two fingers for me to see.

“Why would he discard it so carelessly?”

“Desperation. He must have sensed my presence during his first fight with you. He saw how powerful Scarlett was and quickly put together this plan, wherein we would be made to fight her. If he hadn’t done so, he would have stood no chance against the three of us. He almost did win, in fact. I practically killed myself and we only just managed to bring her down.”

I scratched at my chin. “Hmm, what now then?”

“Now? Now I shall return to my queen, I suppose.”

“You’re not going to continue after him?”

She shook her head. “My mission was to reclaim the Molniya Crystal. What happens to him now isn’t my concern.”

My fists clenched. “You don’t care if he kills more innocent people? More innocent young girls?”

I could hear Renă scoff under her iron mask. “As I said, it isn’t my concern. Of course, I don’t approve of such actions but am I to give my time for these people? They would surely shoot me on site if they knew who I was.”

I had no response for her.

“You’d best hurry away from this building,” she said. “The authorities are all over this area, and it won’t be long before they realise the battle moved to here. You’ll want to make yourself scarce before they arrive.”

With that she turned, her cloak aflutter behind her. A portal opened with a ‘fwoop’ before her, dust churning as the wind rushed out of the interdimensional crack; but just before she stepped through it, she stopped and turned back to me.

“Should we meet again, I pray it be under more pleasant circumstances, Sander.”

Before I could reply she had vanished, her portal shrinking away with a whoosh.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

***

“A vampyre, huh?”

Leo’s bionic eye examined us like a telescopic lens. Scarlett sighed.

“Something like that, yes. It won’t be bothering you or anyone else around here anytime soon though, we made sure of that.”

“Yeah, I heard something happened uptown last night, you wouldn’t have anything to do with that, would you?”

I grimaced.

“Ehehehehe.” I’d never heard Scarlett sound so awkward.

Leo looked at us thoughtfully. “Well then, I suppose I’ll fulfil my end of our deal. Give me a day and I’ll have those passes ready for you to get into the inner city.”

Of course, the whole sandman incident had been a detour from why we were really here. Hopefully once we were inside Babel’s silver inner city, we would find Alcandor, and learn more about the Chaos Sickness we’d seen the effects of back in the Tower of Delphi.

Leo had sounded resigned as he spoke. Tired. Something was definitely on his mind. Scarlett frowned.

“You’re not saying something, old man.”

Leo, who was about to leave, turned back to us, his eyes downcast. “Avi disappeared.”

***

“AAAAAAARGH!”

I winced as my fist slammed into the wood of the wall. My shoulders rose and fell with the heaviness of my breath.

“There’s nothing we can –”

“I know that goddammit!”

Scarlett looked wide eyed at me. I knew I was letting my temper get the best of me, but Avi? Why Avi? Why was it one thing after the other? My thoughts burned with images of the girl. Her laughing face. Her mischievous smirk. Somewhere along the way they got blended with images of Emilia too.

“Sander I know you liked her, but this isn’t why we came here.”

Scarlett’s cold words stabbed at my chest like a thousand knives. Liked – the past tense of the word. No, it was too cruel.

“It must have been him; don’t you realise that?”

Scarlett’s face darkened and her eyes fell to the floor. She knew that I meant Stefan of course. The sandman. Who else could it have been? Avi had been sickly; unconscious and pale faced under the bed covers in this room just yesterday. The old lady at the hotel reception downstairs said nobody resembling Avi had come down that morning, in which case she could only have left through the window; and who did we know that could fly? Ding ding.

I collapsed onto my knees, my head in my hands. Scarlett knelt beside me and placed a hand on my shoulder. We stayed like this for a while, no words passing between us. I hadn’t known Avi very long. I supposed I hadn’t known Scarlett very long either. But still, just for a while it had felt like I’d regained something, and now –

“I get it,” Scarlett said, interrupting my anguished thoughts. “I don’t know exactly what happened, but for now we must give priority to our mission. You remember what’s at stake, don’t you? All the Sky Cities could be susceptible to this Chaos Sickness if we don’t do something about it. Avi would understand that.”

I sighed and wiped at my face. I got to my feet and walked over to the window. Staring out through the grimy glass panes, I could see the rising towers of the famed silver city, beyond the filth of Kur. Something had been lit within me. Not by Scarlett’s words, but by my own frustration.

I put my hand to my forehead and felt the smooth area of skin where my third eye had been. If Avi was still alive, I’d make sure anyone who’d hurt her suffered tenfold.