Oh. So uhhhh, we're going to die.

I glance over at Silvy who's lying on the bar, purring in her sleep.

I glance over at Cerulea who's staring at me with a confused, surprised look on her face.

I stand up from the bar and look into the faces of the patrons. All eyes are on me.

“April fools?” Just a joke. We’re joking. Ha ha. It's a joke. Get it?”

All of those sitting, stand at the same time.

“Oh.” I give everyone an impressed nod. “Did y'all practice that?”

No one speaks.

“Are there practices for when someone yells execution? You all stand up at the same time? What is it…” I glance over at Renald and lower my voice. “Is it a five count?” I look back at the crowd and mouth, “A ten count?”

No one answers. No one says anything.

“Someone throw me a bone,” I mutter.

When someone does throw something, it's not a bone. It's a mug. It sales right by my head and hits the bartender's right shoulder. He yelps and turns around, staring accusations at me.

I hold my own mug up as if to say, Look. Couldn't have been me. I still have mine.

“You're a witch,” he sneers. “You know the rules.”

“Clive,” I say. “I've been in here before. You know me. I pay well.”

Clive doesn't respond, just grins.

I look over at Renald. “Renald. I've seen you before. You know me. I beat your ass.”

And why is he even in here? Is he stalking me? What are the odds that we both end up in the same place so soon after our first meeting?

But that doesn't make sense either. If he'd already been in that booth at the back, then he’d been in here first. If anything, I was stalking him.

I look around at the room of casters. I didn't see any wizards who are clearly identified, but that's the thing about wizards. They look just like everyone else unless they chose to stand out.

I swallow. I could fight the room full of casters, but I would probably die and then who was going to help Pixie, or the dead witch girl whose name I still didn't have.

I glance over at the front door to Beckeldorff's. If I run, at least I'll survive. It'll be embarrassing, but I still might be able to help Pixie and the dead witch girl.

“Cerulea!” I call over. “We gotta go. Something's uhhhhh, come up.” I glance to Renald. “I'm sure you understand. We'll do this again. Promise.”

Cerulea stands up but seems oblivious to what's going on. Being as she's an adept, I'm kinda surprised at her lack of battle acuity and readiness.

I walk towards the door, but before I make it even two steps, something whizzes past the left side of my head.

I spin around.

At first I think it's another mug, but after failing to find who threw the object, I turn back to the door.

That's when I realize what the object was.

A thick stone slab now stands in front of the door, courtesy of the thrown witchstone.

“Right,” I say aloud, “so that's not helpful. Anyone have the magical, uh, de-stoneifying-the-door witchstone?”

Renald holds his hands up. “Fresh out. Maybe I can sell you one. What do you say? $20,000? You won’t find a better deal…”

“Oh,” I say, nodding, “so we’re quoting each other. Okay.” I grab my stomach with one hand and slip my other hand into my pocket as I give him a sad face. “Ouch, my tummy hurts. Hex, do you have a witchstone for diarrhea?”

There are some chuckles among the patrons in Beckeldorff's.

“I never said that!” Renald turns bright red and whirls around to look at the chuckling patrons. He addresses them this time. “I never said that!”

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Behind him, I nod emphatically with a grimace and mouth, He said that.

There are more chuckles and Renald whirls back around to face me. “She's a witch. Don't you all get it. She's a witch and she's a stick.”

My mind kicks into overdrive. I don't have any witchstones that will allow me to break the stone slab covering the door. My best chance would be to deflect an attack from one of the casters onto the stone. Not ideal, but it's my best chance unless Cerulea pulls her shit together.

I take a deep breath and let it out. Looking over at the bartender, I shrug. “Clive. I'm real sorry about what's going to happen to your bar.”

He looks at me, surprised. “What do you mean?”

“They’re gonna destroy it. I want you to keep a close eye on me though. I'm gonna be the one person who doesn't break anything in here.”

Clive spits on the ground and Renald shoots out a hand, pushing me in the chest. I stumble backwards and my arms flail out as I try to catch my balance against the bar. I hit a glass mug and it shatters on the ground.

I glance over at Clive. “One thing. I'm only gonna break one thing in the whole bar. You watch me. One thing.”

Renald's hands move to his pockets and I pull out the witchstone I prepared when I pretended to be Renald with diarrhea.

Before either Renald or I got a chance to use our witchstones on each other though, Cerulea shouts from the back of the room. “Hey!”

We all turn in that direction. Cerulea steps up onto the table she was sitting at and kicks her mug away. I grimace, glancing over at Clive and mouth the words, Two things. Just two things.

“Attention, casters,” Cerulea shout. “Let me have your attention. Everybody. Give me your attention.”

This might all work out if I can just get her attention.

I lift a finger. “Um, Cerulea—”

Everyone ignores me and watches Cerulea.

“I am from the Austerium,” Cerulea says and I slump. Things are not going to work out. “I am a licensed adept endowed with the power of—”

The room flips from quiet, rapt attention to chaos.

Magic spells fly at a rapid pace, most of them targeting Cerulea, but a few targeting me.

I crack the witchstone in my hand and roll to my left as magick flows through my fingertips. My hands suddenly feel heavy and my arms feel like rock.

I glance down at my fingertips, seeing the cracks in stone where skin had once been .

Perfect.

I'm already faster than most people in Beckeldorff's and now that I have fists of stone, I wanted to make a few people regret tussling with me. Especially if I caught them off guard.

Renald sent his first spell at Cerulea and isn't paying attention to me. I lunged forward, clipping him on the back of the head with my fists. He goes down on all fours, clutching the back of his head.

Blood pools on the wooden floor of Beckeldorff's.

Silvy licks her lips as she watches each drop fall from Renald's head.

“Go ahead,” I say. “You can have some.”

She pounces on his head, biting at the gash I'd put there and tearing away a chunk of skin. It hangs down from the front of her mouth.

Renald screams, his hands flying to the back of his head as he bats at the open wound, screaming anew each time his hand hits the raw flesh. Silvy's already back on the bar. She chews on the flap of skin she tore off his head.

“Not exactly what I meant,” I mumble as a spell hits me in the hip, knocking me to the side. I look down. My parka is singed.

I scan the crowd. One of the patrons smiles at me, and I smile back, pulling back my hood so the people in the room can get their first glimpses of my horns. The sharpened, magenta edges gleam in the yellow light.

The smile falls off the man's face and he tries to pull another witchstone from his pocket.

“That was a single use spell?” I ask, shaking my head in disgust as I close the gap. “You cheap, little man.”

I hurl my rocky fist into his chest and he flies across the room, hitting a wall and sliding down to rest in a heap. Several other patrons look in my direction, noticing the horns for the first time and the twisted smirk on my lips.

Beyond them, Cerulea fights off casters one at a time, her fingers tracing quick, surgical shapes through the air as she casts life magick spells. Tiny, glowing shapes fly in all directions, some missing their original target, but still hitting others beyond, knocking the new targets across the bar.

She's better than she looks. A lot better.

Cerulea and I are making progress handling the patrons until one of them decides that none of this is worth it. A man close to the bar cracks a witchstone that glows incandescent white.

Cerulea makes eye contact with me and I scream, “Hit the ground. Liftstone!”

What happens next happens in slow motion. Every object that wasn't isn't down in the tearoom, minus the man wielding the witchstone, lifts up two to three feet from the ground and then slams back down with the force of ten people pushing.

I'm already covering my head so the worst I get is a cracked elbow and a banged knee.

I can hear bones break and off in the distance I hear Cerulea scream. I struggle to get up as the caster who'd wielded the witchstone crumples to the floor with exhaustion.

I shake my head. Too much power for him. He probably shaved five years off his life with that witchstone.

Cerulea is already sitting up, but I see that her left arm twists away from her body at a grotesque angle.

She gets up and limps towards the front door, limps towards me. The other casters lie there, moaning in pain.

The only one who seems to be conscious of what's happening is Renald .

He glares at both of us. He slips his hand in his pocket and I mirror him.

But, before he gets a chance to pull out a witchstone, Silvy is there at his neck, pressing a fang against his jugular and purring.

Renald's eyes grow wide and Silvy smiles, keeping the fang firmly pressed against his throat.

“Go ahead,” I say to Renald. “Do it. No one will miss you.”

Cerulea and I continue moving towards the front door as more of the patrons grow aware of what's happening.

We're running out of time and if anymore become aware, it's over for us.

“Can you break that?” I ask Cerulea, gesturing at the stone wall blocking the entrance to Beckeldorff's.

Cerulea traces a quick shape in the air and flex it at the wall, grimacing as her broken arm swings slightly. The glowing seal hits the slab in the direct center and it shatters, falling down to rubble around the front door.

“Nice,” I say.

“Pedigree,” Cerulea correct in the most pinched way possible.

We make it through the front door and outside of Beckeldorff's.

Silvy appears on my shoulder.

I glance at the door and then down the long alleyway leading out into the Red Market.