Petunia

There was really no disguising that the brand new Tenebrae P.R.A.N.C. Centre was in fact two hastily-cleared warehouses, a security checkpoint, and a car park which still hosted two of the skips into which the warehouses had been cleared. The corners of the warehouses needed dusting and cleaning, the offices were flimsy chipboard boxes with rickety lights, and instead of a proper heated floor for Soot to sleep on, all they had were a bunch of space heaters. Not that there was any need for extra heat just now, but later in the year it would be a problem.

Still, they'd been able to get commercial-grade fibre-optic cable laid to the site on a week's notice, there was room for the team's growing piles of gear, a good site security system, and, most importantly, a dedicated room with table and chairs for team meetings. Petunia stood in that doorway, not quite daring to lean on the rickety frame, checking her watch. Phoebe and Cy were late.

Behind her, the harness team were discussing stirrups again. She wished they'd wait until the meeting started, there was a whole agenda item for that. What really mattered was Phoebe's account of what had gone wrong, so the debate was pointless at the moment, but there was no shutting Stefan up once he was in an argument he thought he had the right of.

The security barrier's closure warning beep sounded from outside the warehouse, and dimly Petunia heard behind it the low growl of a parking car. She looked over her shoulder into the meeting room and called, "They're here," but no-one paid much attention. She took a deep breath and psyched herself up for Cy's entrance. The PR manager was significantly worse than Stefan, even if he didn't talk as much.

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Phoebe entered alone, closing the door behind her. She glanced over at the sleeping mound of her dragon, ran a quick hand through her bangs – which only made them scruffier – and hurried over to Petunia. "Sorry I'm late."

"Isn't Cy with you?" Petunia noticed as she spoke that Phoebe's face was pale.

"Cy isn't coming." Phoebe kept her voice low, and her eyes went quickly over Petunia's shoulder to the squabble round the table behind before she continued. "They just dropped me."

"Dropped?" Petunia's voice squeaked before she could get it under control.

"Yeah, they're not going to represent me anymore, they've cancelled all my ad deals and appearances."

Petunia's brain turned to ice. It felt like her skull had contracted. She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, resisting the urge to shake her head because it would inevitably make it ache. "What about our sponsorships?" Cy hadn't been involved in the team's finances. Had he? She couldn't remember the contracts.

"I don't think so, just the deals they cut for me." Although her tone was even, Phoebe was describing several million Royals of lost personal income. "I don't think they can get Lexor to pull the commercial I already shot, but everything else…"

"But why?"

Phoebe shrugged, eyes wide and a little hunted. "I wish I knew, I had to try his phone like seven times this morning before he even picked up."