A hall was hidden behind the fake darkness. Lights emerged like waterfall and illuminated the space he finally reached. Glass walls - made as mirrors - and shiny black dotted in white floor sparkled as the light from the chandeliers reflected on them.

The walls and floor mirrored his figure as vivid as a lake would. He noticed small spots of spilled drinks around the room and oddly dressed people pushing past each other to get from one side to another. He would have frowned upon this heavy taste if he cared enough to.

The party was blessed with loud music and sound of joyful laughter completely different from the deadly silent night outside. Men in white and black suits shuffled around the room, holding trays containing empty and filled glasses of crimson colored drinks. In the middle of the huge hall stood a white square stage, framed by two huge and thick pillars on each side and a cage glittered in-between them as it slowly rose with barely dressed dancers moving inside charmingly.

The most crowded zone was the bar on one side of the room, as people zoomed in there without any hesitation, completely obvious that this happened more than once.

Two men wearing white masks walked toward the male that looked like sore thumb between the well-dressed and noble looking people with his mud-covered clothes.

“How can we help you, sir?” One with heavy accent asked, he raised his arm as to block the scene behind him from the uninvited guest. His mask had a hole in the center with drawn eye around it.

“Carl.” One word was enough to stiffen up both of the bodyguards and slightly bow their heads to him as they made way and broke the crowd apart, keeping him away from people’s touch. He closed his eyes for a second as he sighed.

This was all a major headache.

They soon passed the caged dancers, passing the drunk crowd and the VIP seating and ran up a few stairs that were at the end of room, in an almost isolated corner, guarded by another staff with the same identical white one-eyed mask.

As they reached the upper room, the air smelled and felt completely different from downstairs. In fact, the sounds from the party didn’t reach here. The hallway itself felt more private and important than one would expect.

Rather than white, the people upstairs wore black masks with no patterns or anything on them - how they were able to see was a mystery. The suits were white and the contrast between the people who were leading him and the ones that stood on the side of the hallway was apparent; the former showed respectable attitude to each passing worker.

Finally, they reached a double door that was circled with designs of snakes almost biting each other’s tails. The staff’s gloved hand rose and knocked the door twice before stepping back at least few feet away. They instructed the blond man to back off to the side and wait.

Seconds passed slowly as silence was the only companion to the standing lot. Irritation began to rise in his chest and he tried to hold himself down, remembering his teammate’s words before he arrived here.

He must be patient and let this deal go through.

Time kept ticking and he was seconds away from telling the staff to knock once again. He didn’t have the opportunity to do so before the door opened by itself with a huge bang, hitting the wall behind it and a child was thrown onto the ground in a humiliating way. He wasn’t sure if he heard a bone break as he saw the poor child’s face hit the surface.

“Don’t come back if you don’t have anything interesting to offer,” The hoarse voice came from inside the room. It was low and intimidating. The staff glanced at the stiff figure of a man and instructed him to enter.

“Oh James.” the overweight figure of a man only acknowledged the blonde with these two words before turning his attention back to his drinking glass, consuming it as if it was water.

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The room was decorated in a grandeur manner. It had golds, silvers and blacks all mashed up together somehow. The heater in the room was warming James’ cold bones and for a moment, he felt relief before remembering that he shouldn’t.

This room had everything their people didn’t have. It gave the illusion of another world, especially since the windows were closed with layered velvet curtains, blocking away the reality

James felt his fingers itch. Bad habits were difficult to get rid off, especially ones you needed to use frequently. He rubbed his fingers against each other to contain himself. He wasn’t a crow to follow shiny things. You’re human.

“I don’t have all day, young boy,” Carl warned, he kept his eyes on his glass of wine. “I don’t have the patience too, so talk your little talks and lets get over with this.” Hearing this, James rushed toward the seat opposite of where Carl was sitting proudly behind his royal walnut desk.

He put his elbows on his knees and leaned closer while saying, “You spoke to me last week of a deal. A land will be given to me if I bargained with a task,” He tried searching for Carl’s gaze, but he wasn’t graced with a glance, so he continued, “You told me, if I did a job for you, you would give us our land back.”

“Which is mine now, right?” Finally, Carl looked at him with a reminding smirk - that almost made James rush toward him with his fist, had he not remembered what Mina told him - and pulled a contract and threw it at James

“Look at this and tell me what you think. I will give you twenty minutes, just in case you forgot how to read- do you know how to read?” James would have taken offence had he not felt that Carl almost hit the mark. He knew how to read, but it had been such a long time since he read long passages, and this complex looking contract would, most probably, take a lot of time for James to finish reading and understanding.

So he began taking in the words immediately, understanding complex ones by the meaning of the sentence and for a second, that took him back to the times when he attended school with his brother. The times they worried about their exams, papers and maybe the fights that awaited them outside their dorms if they weren’t careful.

How many days did he stay up to finish studying? How many punches did he take for his weak brother? How many words did he swallow and stutter and forget back then because of fear?

It was long ago, but at that second, it felt like it was yesterday. The sudden memory made James shake and close his eyes tightly to forget. He couldn’t be remembering all of this now, He didn’t have time for this and, maybe, the time was never for these stuff in James’ life.

After he finished - with a lot of effort - reading the whole contract, a deep frown placed itself on his face. His jaw clenched and he felt a little pale at what he read inside these papers. It was already a huge task to meet Carl, but meeting Carl and then taking this kind of a job? Yeah, that was pushing boundaries.

“Are you playing with us?” James tried counting to ten, maybe it will help.

Carl shrugged his shoulders and said, “It is your call, whether you accept it or not, i’m not the one losing here.”

Counting to ten was impossible, because James ended up slamming the papers on the table in front of him before he reached nine. He stood up from his seat and he heard the guards nearby the door prepare themselves to hold him down.

“This is suicidal! You are basically sending us to our deaths!” He wished he could implement his fist right in Carl’s big nose, giving him a little help with his haggard face. “We helped you days on end- no, years! and this is what you give us?!”

When the man in front of him didn’t say anything, James continued, “The witch would kill us before we step in her compounds. You heard what she does, and you have seen it! Bringing her here - if we were able to - much less, killing her is impossible. You just want to get rid of us.”

He must have hit the bull’s eye, because he saw Carl narrowing his eyes and standing up from his seat suddenly, leaving his wine glass to tatter on the carpeted ground. “Listen here, young boy,” Carl said, “This task is yours, and if you accept it or not it is your call. The land was yours, and is mine now. If you want it back then work for it!” Carl’s booming voice was afterward welcomed with silence.

Once again after so many years, James somehow felt small, felt weak. He felt that it wasn’t fair and this whole ordeal wasn’t on their side. They could die, or perhaps something worse than death could happen to them, and James didn’t know if they had any other choice.

But they also needed the land, their people found it hard to find places to seek sanctuary in without paying their blood and tears. Things were harder in winter when even the best inn in town couldn’t save their bodies from numbing.

“Go back and discuss it with your group. I will give you three days only to figure yourself out.” With that, he was ushered out of the building and into the chilly wind outside.