"The worst thing you can do is hestitate."

"You get that from a quote book, Elle?"

On a solitary mountain, far past the endless stalls of the Diyaflos Market, on a silent street lit by lonely street lamps and the dying sun, embraced by the fall’s winter, were Arthur and I.

In front of us, a pair of footprints stretching into the depths of the alley, still and dark, farther than either I or Arthur could see.

“Should…” Arthur’s voice sounded hesitant. “Should we check it out?”

I would really, much rather not, I didn’t say— I’d learned long ago to think before talking. My wand felt clammy in the chill, and I adjusted my grip.

Suspicious footprints, leading into a dark alleyway, filled with Angels-know-what, and Arthur’s got a shoddy sword and you, who is several elementary spells from Burnout. It was never a real decision, both my— admittedly— biased rationale and emotions wanted the same thing: namely, to have nothing to do with this.

“No—“ Clicking my tongue, I tore my gaze away from footprints, shoved my wand back up my sleeve, and began walking— “we should certainly not check it out.”

But Arthur did not follow, and his expression read much the same. Bare-faced hesitation, conflict— torn between knowing better and curiosity.

Curiosity killed the cat, an absent thought mused, but satisfaction brought it back.

Satisfaction is an emotion. Emotion has little place in magic, the rational part of my mind retorted, Satisfaction will certainly not be performing resurrections in any case.

“Arthur,” I coaxed, knowing the futility, “we should go, it could be dangerous.”

Arthur bit his lip, his eyes narrowing in quiet dismay. “But what if it is dangerous?” He glanced up to the alley, then back at me, before settling on the alley. “The person who left these prints could be dangerous. They could be hurting people.”

“We can let the Keepers know.”

“The Keepers would take too long to get up here.”

“Arthur—“

“Elle,” he cut in, eyes pleading, “please. We’re Seekers-in-training! We can do this.”

I knew from the first word that I wouldn’t be able to convince him otherwise. Arthur had always been like this, wanting to do good, leaping from problem to problem, no matter whose it was. The only problem was that he didn’t know moderation. He tried to help everyone and everything, no matter the severity of the problem. In some ways, it was nice— endearing, even, that he could naively kind, but sometimes, like this time, I found it a thorn in my side.

As my hesitation grew into frowning silence, his eyes turned solemn. “I’m… I’m gonna check it out, Elle.”

Whether you come with or not, was the unspoken bit, but it sat between us, lingering like a dare.

“I…“ my protest died in my throat, burned away but the sudden image of Arthur hurt, lying in a hospital bed, a cloth draped over him like Dmitri. I swallowed. “I’ll come with you.”

I shoved away the image of two coffins that crept into my mind.

“Okay— thank you.” Arthur smiled reassuringly, though it did nothing for my slowly heightening nerves.

After another wayward glance, he stepped into the alley. Tightening my cloak and my grip on my wand, I followed after him, descending ever deeper into the dark of the alleyways.

[][][]

As we stepped into the alley, buildings rose on either side of us, mottled snow-stained brick and peeling plaster embraced by a nest of snaking pipes that rose, hissing and plinking into the cloudy orange sky. The sharp, frozen gust had fallen away, leaving an eerie silence pockmarked by tepid breathing and falling snow.

The sound of our crunching footprints joined the quiet whines of the pipes, a sound further muffled by the isolating embrace of the aging stone and molting plaster around us. Occasionally, a pipe would let out a burbling hiss, accompanied by a sharp whistle of steam. Each time, I’d freeze and shoot it a wary glance before continuing after Arthur, my heart hammering and cold sweat crawling down my back.

Farther and deeper we crept, winding slowly, cautiously right, then left, left and right again, down and up soft inclines. Farther and further from the comforting glow of the street we’d left behind. At times, we were met with intersecting alleyways, but always, always the footprints would be there, easy to spot, conveniently guiding us down the next twist of alley.

Almost too convenient, murmured a small part of my brain, barely audible of the static fear that nearly strangled any productive thought.

When we’d first stepped into the alley, when I’d made that decision to accompany Arthur, my paranoia and fear had spiked, spinning into a heady mix of jumpy trepidation. But after tense minutes, among the dim isolation of the alley and the lack of a palpable threat, it had settled, chilled to a low, almost bored kind of paranoia. My breath had steadied, still faster than normal, but still steady. I stopped jumping at every little keening pipe or swish of steam or speck of deep shadow.

I did my best to watch for anything that could’ve pounced at us from the dark, but the frank amount of nothing that happened whittled that caution in too-long-stares into dark corners and contemplative glances at the sky. A particularly paranoid worry wanted me to stare above, reasoning that whoever we were following could and would jump down on top of us. Frustratingly, I couldn’t find a reason to refute it.

As time stretched on, minutes nearing a quarter-of-an-hour, and the footprints having shown no sign of stopping, the buildings took on a distinctive shift.

Gone were the residential homes that people lived in, formed of masoned brick and cracking tiling and clean-cobbled roads. Those old, well-loved homes gave way to the sleeker, smoother architecture of bright-eyed industry.

Their dark walls towered above us, reaching into a cloudy, smoke-strangled sky, and more than once did we spot a path onto a main street, drenched in trodden snow and dying street light. In the distance, jumbled calls I couldn’t make out, accompanied by the muffled burbles and bubbles of nearby alchemical factories. An acrid scent had filled my nose, burning faintly like live coals.

But the footprints continued, leading us ever deeper.

This feels too convenient— like a trap, a paranoid thought mused, no longer stifled by wide-eyed skittishness and fidgeting agitation.

“Arthur,” I whispered, “doesn’t this feel— I don’t know— wrong?”

“What do you mean?” He didn’t spare a glance towards me.

It’d been some time since we’d last seen a path towards a main street, and rather than leading us towards one, the footprints seemed to take us away from them. I couldn’t shake the faint worry that if I wanted to lure two people into an secluded alley, this would be exactly how I’d do it. Paranoia whispered to keep an eye behind us, at the possibility that we were being tailed. I swallowed the lump in my throat and turned back towards Arthur.

Just then, as I opened my mouth to respond, my eyes caught on a scrap of cloth, bright red on gray brick.

I immediately wanted nothing more than to leave. “Arthur,” I quietly hissed, eyes fixed on the cloth.

“Yeah— yeah—“ He turned, then fell silent— “Oh.”

The cloth was a dark maroon, about fist-sized, and torn along the edges. Even at a distance, I could tell it was a rich silk— textured nothing like wool or cloth or more commonly worn materials. That— and the clump of ripped fur at one end. The stretch of cloth was lodged on a jagged bit of torn pipe, around my eye-level— dangerously enough, and I made no move to get closer to inspect it.

Arthur moved to grab it, tugging once, then twice to pull it from the pipe it had ripped on. His face was one of consternation, lips tight, brows furrowed as he examined the scrap in his hand.

What if this is a distraction? reminded again that nagging paranoia.

Glancing around, I saw nothing. No displaced shadow, no additional footprints, no concerning marks on the wall, no scuffs on the tiles or pipes that’d appeared while we were distracted. The same old alley, a straight path behind and ahead of us, filled with footprints not our own, and a scrap of rust-red cloth that belonged to neither of us.

“I—“ Arthur quietly muttered.

“What?” My eyes remained fixed at the other end of the alley.

“I—“ he glanced up, ever-joyful eyes dim with sullen recognition— “I recognize who owned this.”

Bullshit, hissed the part of me that wanted nothing more than to leave. You recognize a bit of cloth.

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“Excuse me?”

His eyes lowered, almost shying away. “It— I know someone who wears like, the exact same thing.”

Inhaling sharply, I sent another wary glance around. Nothing had changed, and it did nothing for the spiking nerves that roiled in my stomach. I was beginning to wish that I’d had more than just coffee earlier.

“If it belongs to her— then it means we know the person who made these prints.”

“Who?”

“Clara— Clara from Practical Combat?”

I absently blinked at Arthur, searching for the name, and came up empty.

“Family name?”

“Eigenlicht.”

“… I don’t know her.” I took in another, chilling breath. “We— we should…”

We should leave, I wanted to say, but didn’t. I already knew convincing Arthur was a futile effort.

“We shouldn’t just wait here, then,” I ground out, swallowing my trepidation.

“Right.” Arthur put the scrap into his pocket, before beginning forward again. I started only to still once more, caught on… irrational fear.

I didn’t like this situation, and every little thing that kept popping up, from the footprints to the fact that we supposedly knew the person who made them, only added to my growing pile of anxiety. It tumbled around wordlessly in my chest, catching on conflicting thoughts and feeling like barbed static in my head, threatening to devour any rational thought.

Stop whining, a stubbornly arrogant part of me sneered, you’re here. You chose to go with Arthur. Focus— your petty little emotions have no part in this. Do not falter.

I swallowed, letting out a long exhale, loosened my whitening grip on my wand, and made to follow him, eyes peeled at the shadows around us.

[][][]

As we had skulked through the alley, carefully keeping track of time and both of us keeping a wary eye about, we’d noticed a detail concerning the footprints.

While they had stayed the same— medium-sized boot marks evenly set into the snow, like the person had been calm and collected— what had changed was the spacing. Where it was once evenly spaced, set apart from one another at an interval that seemed to denote a walking pace, it had slowly lengthened over the course of a couple of steps, becoming erratic and far. Like they’d begun running.

Something felt wrong, though I couldn’t quite place why.

“Eigenlicht was in Practical Combat, you mentioned?” I muttered, cautiously following the trail with my eyes.

“… Yeah,” Arthur replied, grave, turning back.

“Talon’s?”

“Same as me.”

“How skilled was she?”

“ Clara was… really, really good. Like, Professor Talon praised her, good.”

I made a hum of acknowledgment, before continuing after him. “Tell me about her.”

Arthur was silent for a moment. “Clara’s got light brown hair— like peanut light brown… and its straight— like really straight. Like— you know how yours is straight but also kinda wavy?”

I hummed along.

“Hers has no waves or curls at all, and she’s always got it put in a ponytail. And she’s always got a really rich cloak she wears— like it’s furred and stuff.”

“The torn strip of cloth?” I prompted, my mind wandering back to the scrap we found— maroon silk and tufted fur.

“Yeah.”

“What was she like? Have any enemies?”

“No— she always worked really hard— like always had some extra assignment she was working on. I’ve never seen her really relax.”

“And nothing else? No one who would chase her through an alley?”

“No…” Arthur turned a quizzical gaze back to me. “What are you thinking?”

I continued on, “And she’s not a mage, correct?”

“No…”

“Then there’s no reason she’d be up here. The Markets are geared primarily towards mages— sure— there’s some merchants who sell weapons and accessories and the like— but its all largely useless in combat— barring custom orders, of course—“

“Clara doesn’t use weapons— at least, she doesn’t have a standard one she falls back to.”

“She punches people?”

“Martial artist— yeah.”

“So even less reason to be around here— which brings us to the question of where she walked.”

“What do you mean?”

“There’s been twenty-something easy paths to open and populated roads— so why would she— assuming it is Clara— continue down the path she did? Another question is the spacing— why’d she start running?”

“Maybe she had to run from something?”

“Which introduces more questions than answers…” I mumbled, unable to draw a conclusive evidence.

Careful, rationality warned, look at everything and build the possibilities, don’t fixate on a single one.

Maybe Clara had had an order to place, and was on her way home…?

“Do you know where Clara lives?”

“I—“ Arthur sputtered, shooting me a befuddled look I ignored— “what? No!”

“Not even general area?”

“Well- she’s not a noble if that's what you’re worried about.”

Which eliminated the possibility of her just walking home. Which meant something caused her to go down that specific alley. Business? Or foul play?

The torn scrap suggests haste— as do the footprints.

But there was only a single pair of footprints— we hadn’t seen another set that she could’ve been chasing or been chased by. Paranoia dragged my gaze up, before rationality dismissed the possibility. The roofs were tens of feet up and weren’t level with each other, following someone from the roof would be terribly difficult.

Had we missed something? There was a good chance we had.

Unable to form a conclusive answer, I trailed after Arthur, still pondering the situation.

No blood— or sign of weapons. Neither the scrap of cloth we’d found had blood on it, nor had we saw any as we followed the trail. It seemed, at least, that if Clara really had made those footprints, she’d been relatively unharmed for much of it. Hopefully, we wouldn’t find anything, and this would be a false alarm. Though, fortune was never something I’d say was on my side. Maybe it’d prefer Arthur today.

Eventually, we reached a small clearing, a place where different alleyways converged, where the buildings weren’t as tightly cramped together, where the pipes no longer rasped steam into our faces, choosing instead to weave together into the blood-orange sky. Dumpsters lined the walls, a dingy, unlit lamp hanging above it. Here, where the alley met the opening, the footprints came to a stumbling halt, and across the small little area, were another set of footprints in the snow. At least five additional people.

In sporadic bursts, among the trodden, packed snow where the footprints all intersected and crossed and grouped, were splashes of rusty crimson. Blood. That was enough to confirm my nagging suspicion.

Clara was running from something, and had been caught in this alley. The presence of multiple suggested a group effort— maybe she’d been herded? The opposing sets of footprints coming from various other alleyways that ran adjacent to our own seemed far too convenient to be coincidence.

Though, why would Clara be chased by a group?

Just then, from an adjacent alley, came the sound of crunching snow. It was calm, collected, and faster than a single set.

Multiple people, my intuition answered. A subdued glance at Arthur, who had also jerked in surprise— but luckily hadn’t made a noise— led to the two of us bundling behind a dumpster, weapons at the ready. I shoved away the acrid, rotting scent that tickled my nose, biting down the quiet curses I wanted to say, did my best to steady my breathing as the crunching became louder.

One breath in— Angels— I stifled a gag— one breath out. Slowly.

Arthur glanced over, eyes laced with concern. I’m fine, I mouthed back. He nodded, gaze hardening once more as we glacially moved to get a view of whoever was walking in.

There were two men, one short and stocky, the other taller, lean and wiry, both bundled tightly within their puffy coats. The taller one looked tiredly solemn, face etched with a million little pale scars on half-burnt skin, while the younger looked vaguely irritated, disheveled hair short-cropped and missing patches. Both were gazing around at the scene. One carried snow shovels and the other buckets that sloshed and steamed with hot water.

I let my grip weaken when both their eyes passed over us.

“Can’t believe we’ve got stuck with this job,” the shorter one groaned, voice low and raspy.

“Better than than Gus, he actually fought the girl— y’know,” the taller one responded, sniffling. “All we’ve got to do is clear the scene.”

“Yea— whatever man— don’t change the fact that this sucks.”

“Just get to work.” The taller one moved forward, beginning to dump water on the spots with blood on it. The snow melted, and the blood stained the water as it soaked into the ground.

“Y’know— Scabs— yer never any fun.” The shorter one, sighing, moved to shovel the snow around— covering the footprints, and the spots of watery blood.

“So you tell me,” the taller one— “Scabs”— responded.

I was starting to regret my choice of attire for today. My skirt had been of the thin sort, easy and comfortable to move in, but despairingly useless against the cold— which usually wouldn’t be a problem, but my life seemed to have a funny way of contradicting me. When I’d rolled out of bed, I’d been thinking it’d be fine, but now, kneeling halfway into the frigid snow, my warmth charm did nothing to ward off the wet cold quickly seeping through my skirt and into my legs. Not that leaning against the dumpster did me any favors either, what with it being made of metal, and being ice-cold to the touch— my only options hiding behind it were either to brace myself against the damned thing, or on the ground, which was even worse.

I swallowed down my whining, doing my best to ignore the numbing cold seeping through my clothes. A glance Arthur told me that he was appeared to be faring better, if not the same, expression tight with focus.

“Aye— Scabs— c’mere for a sec, yeah?” The shorter one called, stopped in front of the alley Arthur and I’d come from. My heart leapt into my throat, and I urged myself to stay still. “Seems an extra pair of peoples came through here earlier, think we should take care of it?”

Scabs didn’t respond, staring down at our footprints, before following them to the scene they’d just cleared. “People come and go— if they were any smart, they’d leave it alone.”

“Ha! You’ve got that right— lets just finish up and head back, the colds killin’ me.”

The two moved back to their task, setting to it with a practiced, grimacing ease.

I bent back behind the dumpster, slowly exhaling, clenching and relaxing my hands to urge the simmering adrenaline down. Calm down, I urged myself, resisting the urge to pray— all the good that it never did. For several long minutes, there was simply the sound of shoveling snow, huffs, and our quiet, subdued breaths. Arthur had crouched back down, no longer intent on observing, but resting with his back to the dumpster, an odd look on his face.

“Done with yer side, Scabs?”

“Aye. Let us return.” Footfalls crunched against the snow, as they slowly quieted in the distance.

Arthur glanced at me, that same odd, restrained expression on his face. “Elle,” he murmured, almost casually, carefully peering at the two men. “We’ve gotta follow them.”

He quietly stood before I could respond, and silently made his way out from behind the dumpster.

In hindsight, I should have known better, but I dropped the worry, shelving it for later examination, and skulked after him.