A dead woman once said that great opportunities only came once in a lifetime.

Isla reckoned that was only true for idiots and stillbirths, or true for everyone but irrelevant for those with a brain. The competent could make their own opportunities, as she was about to. Chances for that came rather more often.

A Have noble had summoned her, her, and she was not about to keep the Lady waiting. There was a spring to her step and she felt light as a feather on her way to answer the call.Isla stopped at a window and gazed at the work of art reflected upon it. Her skin was a lighter, brown thing, eyes as black as coal. Her noble blood was clear in her features, her rightful station declared to the world. And if the skin was sagged somewhat by starvation’s touch, or her eyes lightened a shade without the cosmetic maintenance she’d once enjoyed, it scarcely spoiled the visage.

Still looking good, even on my worst days. She grinned. Even on my worst days.

Her clothes didn’t match her complexion however. The coat had been vibrant and green once, but the years had desaturated its colour, and patches of grey cloth now spoiled the homogeny where they sealed tears and holes.

Still, it was the best she had and she doubted there was a single soul in Udrebam who could wear it better. Not even the Gemini, no, not even her.

Come on beautiful, we have work to do. Isla pulled her gaze away from the window and kept on ahead.

***

The rolling ox was a rundown, sorry excuse for a pub living out its final days in the outskirts of the city. It was held up by hope, will and perhaps a dash of spite. It was also where The Lady Yemisi had asked to meet Isla.Isla braced herself as she stepped inside. The wooden floors creaked and groaned under her weight, threatening to protest her presence with collapse. It smelt of dust and not much else, a stuffy, pervading air that seemed to smother all other scents. Isla opened the door with a care to its handle she reserved for holding toddlers, not wanting to snap the fucking thing off in its flimsiness. It didn’t break, thank the Goddess, and Isla made her way in. She could just barely discern the shape of a woman in the room’s far end, everything else had been consumed by the gluttonous night.

“The Lady Yemisi, I presume?” Isla asked, bowing.

“Isla Gorbachev? Else the eclipse must have my mind,” She said, a soft flow to her words and an amusement to her voice. She spoke in Yudre, fluency apparent with but that single sentence.

“That is correct, my lady,” Isla replied, keeping her head bowed until she finally received a reason not to.“Sit,” Yemisi ordered. Isla looked around, but despite herself couldn’t quite pierce the darkness in her search of a seat.

“Pardon me my lady but I would need to see the chairs first.”A light chuckle left the noble, of a kind that children might receive from adults watching them play. “Apologies,” She murmered, reaching into a purse and pulling out something that defied Isla’s perception with its incandescence. It banished the dark, illuminating the room and displaying the filth. Even that looked magnificent underneath its orange glow. Moreso, not less, for the slight pain it brought to Isla’s eyes with its intensity.

An arc light crystal. Isla had only seen a few in her days, so rare were the magic-trapping gems. She had never set her eyes upon one so bright, let alone one so bright without any stimulus at all. It was a display of wealth so casual, and so daunting, that it made Isla feel filthy in her thrice-restitched cloak.

“That’s much better,” She managed, trying to seem unmoved by the demonstration. Whether or not it worked, she would not find the answer in the woman’s face. And what a face she had.The Lady Yemisi was Isla’s senior by a decade, but someone had forgotten to tell her skin that. It radiated beauty with its night-darkness, the proper black she’d heard Haves tended to be blessed with. Her hair and eyes mirrored her complexion, with the former being threaded into itself like rope and drawn up into a round bun at the top of her head.She’d have it all one day, Isla knew. From the brightly coloured beads that sprinkled her dreadlocks, to the iro and buba that could feed a woman for months with their sale. It was her birthright, after all, and so it was only a matter of time.Isla sat across the table from her, wincing as the chair shivered beneath her, then relaxed somewhat as it proved able to take her weight. The silence that followed was uncomfortable, as much for its depth as length. The Lady Yemisi’s eyes made Isla feel naked, like all her secrets were laid bare atop the table between them. It was a test of some sort, and Isla was making her first impression whether she liked it or not.

With luck, it’s a good one.

She decided she wouldn’t be the one to break the silence. In that at least she would be victorious, and so she was.

“You answered my summons quickly,” The woman began, a hint of a grin touching the edge of her lips. Was it approval or amusement?

“I tend not to keep important matters waiting,” The lady nodded, approval then. “And what makes you think this is so important?” She asked, testing.Isla shrugged, pretending to think about it for a moment before speaking. “A few things,” she began. “You contacted me, an individual, directly, means you need a mercenary with a particular set of skills. You’re a Have noble which means you have a lot of resources at hand and a lot of mercenaries you can hire, ones you’ve depended on before and yet you come to me and arrange the meeting in the carcass of a building at the edge of town. Whatever this is, it can't be connected to you and yet you need it done quickly, so quickly in fact that the first thing you do upon meeting me is establish your wealth. Seems rather important if you ask me.”Isla knew she was right, she tended to be.The only variable would be whether or not the Lady replied with approval or scorn at being seen through so easily.

She’d have no use for the latter, such a person would make deliberate efforts to keep her beneath them in the best of scenarios, and she was quite sick of being beneath her lessers.The Lady chose right. “Fascinating,” She said, in the way a tutor might. Giving as little praise as they could get away with.To impress herself upon a Have Lady was a feat. Not one Isla had performed before, but one she always knew she could. There was a lot that set Isla apart from her heritage, much of it being wealth and the rest of it being an education. But one needed only hear her speak for her blood to make itself known.

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“Now,” Isla began, making a valiant effort to keep a smug grin from her face. “What can I help you with, my Lady.”The Lady began eagerly. “A lost item,” A stolen item, Isla pieced together. “I need it retrieved.”

“From where and from whom?”

“I can’t tell you.”“Ah,” Isla nodded . “That does tie my hands up somewhat, I..Do have my limits, you know.”

“I can’t tell you yet.” The Have rectified, not missing a beat.“That’s workable, what can I know?” Isla leaned in. The noble mirrored her. “It’s on the mainland, and you need to be ready to leave by early morning.”

“When will I know more?” Isla asked.

“My associate will contact you.”

“And how will I know it’s them?”

“They don’t look like they’re from around here,” was all she said, and that had Isla wondering. Still, there was one issue yet to be addressed.

“How many stars will I be expecting from this?” Isla asked, meeting the Lady’s eyes. Such a thing was more complicated than just the money itself, ask for too much and she might get it but prove herself short sighted, ask for too little and she’d make herself seem a woman easily taken advantage of.

She’d have to accept something that said she knew her own worth, and the worth of a longer correspondence with Yemisi. However she would go about it all hinged on how much the woman proposed first.

Your move-

“None.”What?

“What?” She caught herself. “Pardon me my lady, I mean… what?” Was she fucking with her? The noble didn't seem the type to play games, and yet here Isla was, moved around like a deicide piece. The Lady Yemisi maintained a cool, calm and slightly tickled expression, like she’d expected this reaction all along.

So, you’re not crazy, you know how insane you sound, what are you playing at?“Miss Gorbachev,” She began with a breath. “Much of my money is in Haven currency, and Unixian stars are...” Her lip curled. “Traceable.”

“And we’ve already established that you’d rather not have this tracked back to you,” Isla finished for her, expectant, waiting.

She nodded, “You see, you’ve missed something rather crucial Miss Gorbachev, a key factor in why I hired you was because our goals align,” She spoke as if certain Isla would agree, something about that unnerved her, there was more at play here than she once thought.

“Please, enlighten me, my Lady,” Isla replied, stiffly.

“Yelagin.” A word, all she needed to say was a word and everything in the world save from her vanished. It brought back memories of hangings, the smell of burning flesh, and the thousand-faced monster of pitchfork-bristles and axehead teeth grinning as it eyed her.

“Who told you that name?” Isla asked, realising only as she heard her own voice how murderous it sounded.

The Lady Yemisi seemed to barely notice “You’re the last of your family are you not? Born on the wrong side of the sheets, but still you carry your mother’s blood, and it shows.”

“What do you want?” She asked again, cautious now at the woman’s knowledge.“To give you what you want,” She breathed, as if it were the most obvious of things. “The Agha family is one of petty nobility, but nobility nonetheless, in the realm of Oken. The Lord Agha is in an interesting predicament, a recent family tragedy has left him the head of his house, a man doing a woman’s job. One would think the family doomed, but alas they had a safeguard.”

Isla was listening now.

“His great-grandmother had it written into law that in the scenario that a sole male heir remained the family assets would be frozen until he had suborned himself to a wife.”Devoid of any other tasks, Isla’s mind moved quickly. “You want to marry me into the family.”“I want to make you nobility again,” Yemisi’s words were sweeter than honey, than anything. “The Agha family doesn’t have much, and you would have to take the family name but-”

“I’ll do it,” Isla said. There was no need to think, no need to deliberate. Isla had done enough of that when she’d slept in ditches and woken in nightmares. It would be work, oh it would be a lot of work, but Isla was no stranger to work, as the family’s head she would make greater nobles of them in a few decades. From those decades would come wealth, from the wealth would come access to mystic rejuvenation treatments, and from that centuries more time to better her station.

It wasn’t where she wanted to be, but it would be a huge step in the right direction. It helped that Haven nobility were true nobles, they respected magic as well as wit and guile. There, a noble was made or broken by their competence, not how much money they had to throw around.Isla retreated from her mind. Her eyes settled on the Lady Yemisi. It all made sense now, Isla would do her job, travel to arcane, marry a noble, and then they’d never meet again. They would be unconnectable.

It helped of course that Isla was a mystic, that was something that had remained with her even after the fall. An advantage over most nobles, who bred their children to one another like racehorses in the hopes of replicating it.

Oh, you’re brilliant, almost as brilliant as I am.

The woman looked quite pleased with herself. “Lovely, now that that’s handled, you may leave, and let us hope we never meet again.”“Lets,” Isla concurred, nodding. She got to her feet and turned for the door. It was all happening, it was all finally fucking happening. All she needed was to get something from mainland Unix. She couldn’t take chances, she’d need help to make sure it all went down smoothly.

Isla stepped into the chill air of Udrebam, a quickness to her step.

She had to see an arms dealer, before anything else. There was something to attend to that couldn’t be ignored,

Whether or not he wanted to see her, however, was another matter entirely.