The room was silent save for the dog’s snarling and Ji's labored breathing. She held her fists at the ready, prepared to leap into action even as she tried to puzzle out what he said. "How do you know my name?" she asked, voice hoarse.

Turantoc stayed still, hands still held up in front of him. "When Tsen told me to go looking for Blood Achali in Hilt, he told me I might run into a few people who'd be willing to help. You can stop now. She's a friend."

The dog ceased its growling, but Ji kept her eyes on the man. Sweat ran down her temples as the throb in her foot slowly faded. As she tried to figure out her next move, memories slowly pushed their way to the surface. Was this the man Tsen had been trying to summon with his bell? "Did you visit a pier the night before?"

"Yep," said Turantoc with a quick nod. "Wood storage. The Loyal One and I killed a Vao and an Achali there. Few days back, we rooted one out at a broken-down old sugar mill. Oh, and one in the breaker yards too."

Ji stared at him and swallowed. In this city of horrors, had she found an ally? "Why," she asked slowly. "Do you kill Blood Achali?"

"Because they do terrible things to people and should die for it," Turantoc said. "Fairly simple."

A smile flitted onto Ji's face as she lowered her fists. "Very simple. I only regret that you got to them before I did."

Turantoc followed, letting his hands drop to his waist as he walked past her to the desk. "I've got a lot more practice than you. And I had help," he said, patting the dog on the head as he bent down to pick up the sheaf of papers.

Ji stared, recalling bits and pieces of the story Yazwa told her as she looked him up and down. His hair was yellowish, combed straight back to hang down to his shoulders and his eyes were a bright, piercing yellow. His floor-length red coat had a multitude of patched holes in it and his knee-high boots had metal plates bolted to the front. He knew who she was, but he felt confident enough to take her own without bothering to draw one of his many blades. "Is it true you threatened Tsen to keep him away from Blood Achali?" she asked.

Turantoc looked up from the papers. "I offered to trade him a vast amount of knowledge too. But yes, I threatened him. I would kill him if I found out he started studying Blood Achali."

Something like joy filled Ji's heart as she hurried to his side. Tsen feared this man. Tsen, who believed himself able to smash an entire war fleet on his own. Everything made sense now.

She dropped to one knee. "I beg you, teach me."

"Teach you what?" Turantoc asked, setting the sheaf of papers aside and patting the dog again. "If it's about tracking these assholes down, I just follow his lead."

"Everything," Ji said, looking up with her eyes shining. "My path has been a long one, but now I know why En Chitei has sent me here. To learn from you. With your training, I will finally grow strong enough to hear En Chitei's voice."

Turantoc glanced at the dog. "That's not-" he sighed. "Just stand up. En Chitei definitely did not send you to me."

"Then why am I here?" Ji demanded as she leaped to her feet, pulling back her arms to show her scars. "En Chitei's winds blew me west through battle after battle. All that was to make me strong enough to learn from you! You, a man who can threaten a dragon and lay low Blood Achali in a single blow. Your student has arrived!"

Ji gasped for breath as she finished, her chest tight. She looked into Turantocs eyes to see realization and kindled passion, but his eyes were filled only with concern.

"If you were my student, what would you expect me to teach you?" Turantoc asked, taking a seat on the desk. "Physically, you're in your prime. If I were a normal human your first flurry would have shattered the bones in my arm. That kick landed right where my kidney would be too. You're already one of the more talented martial artists I've met in the last few hundred years, and I am certainly not an Esgan. What can I teach you?"

"I have learned," Ji answered, heart pounding in her chest. "That there are many kinds of strength. Strength that comes from silence and the mind. Strength that comes from knowing your enemy and knowing the ground you fight on. All that I have learned has pushed me closer to En Chitei's voice. You must hold the final secret."

Turantoc reached up and scratched the back of his head. "Once again, you're doing better than most. If En Chitei can be a mighty storm, then why are they a gentle breeze?"

Ji frowned. It was a common question, one she’d heard dozens of times in her youth. "The storm topples the trees and the breeze scatters their seeds. Every Acolyte knows that."

"But very few understand it," answered Turantoc. "En Chitei does not speak to the comfortable, but not all that are uncomfortable become Esgan. You are being spoken to, but you are not hearing."

"I am!" Ji bellowed, slamming her fist into the table. The dog began to growl, but she ignored it. "That is all I do! It is all I have ever done! I will not-!"

Turantoc moved so fast Ji hardly saw it. He clamped his hand over her mouth and held his finger to his lips. Over the noise of the dog growling, she heard heavy footfalls upstairs. "Are those your friends?" he whispered, slowly removing his hand and resting it on the hilt of one of his swords.

Tension rippled through Ji and she smiled, clenching her fists. "No, I left them behind. They must be other Blood Achali."

"Saves us the trouble of finding them," said Turantoc as the heavy footsteps moved towards the stairs. He drew a knife made of sickly yellow metal and shuffled towards the wall next to the door, gently pushing it shut. The dog followed with its teeth bared, silent.

"Now I'll show you what I can do," Ji whispered, hurrying to the opposite wall and facing the door. When he saw her fight, he would have no choice but to teach her. Once again, the winds of En Chitei were blowing in her favor. Once she cut down whoever came through that door, everything would fall into place.

The stairs creaked and Ji wiped sweat from her forehead as the footsteps drew closer and closer to the door. Whoever they were, they were neither hurrying nor trying to be stealthy. Their arrogance would be their downfall. The second the door opened, she would lunge and show Turantoc her true skills.

The basement window shattered and a massive, winged centipede flew in, making straight for Turantoc with its jaws wide.

A heartbeat later the door smashed off its hinges. A huge thing pushed its way into the basement. It stood on two legs, its whole body covered in overlapping leathery plates. It had two sets of arms, one bulky pair at the shoulders ending in big claws and one smaller pair coming out of their sides, ending in hands. There was no head atop its shoulders, but that didn't stop it from rushing straight at her.

Even in the dim light, Ji recognized the summon and knew how to beat it.

Darting forward, she dodged a wild swing from its clawed arm and launched a sharp kick at its knee. The joint reversed and the summon crashed to the ground, blocking the door. Another behind it rushed forward, struggling to climb over its twin through the narrow doorway.

With a bit of breathing room Ji shuffled backward, looking over to Turantoc and his dog. The centipede was coiled around him, but the dog had a death grip on the summon’s mandibles. The green-skinned man freed an arm and started to viciously stab anything he could reach.

A crack rang out as the first clawed summon snapped the doorframe and rushed into the room. Ji darted forward again, but this one kept its guard up, attacking with quick jabs of its claws. She danced backward, waiting for the summon to make a mistake. It tried to crush her with an overhead blow, but its claws got caught up in the ceiling beam. She tried to take out its knee again, but the summon lurched away just in time.

The summon stalked towards her again and her tail twitched back and forth as she shuffled backward. There wasn't much space left until she ran into the wall and she bet the summon knew it. It had a lot of reach, the only way out was to go through it.

The tip of a blade burst out of the summon’s chest. It only had half a second to twitch before it crumbled into dirt. Turantoc coughed, waving the dust out of his face as he slid his sword back into its sheath. "Good delay with the knee."

Ji looked over his shoulder at the pile of dirt where the second clawed summon had lain. "I know who sent these," Ji asked, picking up one of the dolls. "I've fought them before. These and that winged centipede are used by Azun's Navy."

Turantoc sighed and grabbed the dusty papers off the desk. "I wanted to clear all this out before they showed up. Now they'll take what they can and run for it."

"No, they won't!" Ji said gleefully, rushing to his side. "It's not just the Blood Magic they want. We know where Azun's shipyard is, and they don't want us to tell anyone else. They're probably going after the others now too!"

"Do you know where they are?" Turantoc asked.

Ji coughed, clearing her throat of the dust. "Aven is with the Vathlanri. Yazwa and Saiyun were going to try to get to the Embassy of his country."

Turantoc stuffed a bunch of the papers into his pockets and ran for the door, dog zipping ahead. "With the Vathlanri is one of the safest places you can be, so if our foes are going anywhere, it will be the embassy. Follow me!"

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Leaping over the piles of dirt the summons left behind, Ji strained to keep pace as they charged up the stairs and into the darkness of the early evening. When they burst out of the front door she stumbled as Turantoc took a hard right and jumped into the boat with the dog. "What are you doing?"

The boat trembled and rose up, floating above the ground as its sail unfurled of its own accord. "This is the fastest way to travel," Turantoc called, reaching out his hand. "Hurry up!"

Ji grasped it and hauled herself into the boat. The moment she landed, the ship rose higher and higher into the air, sail swiveling to catch a breeze as the keel cleared the rooftops. The sail snapped as the wind filled it and they lurched forward into the night.

-

Saiyun paced back and forth in his room, passing by Yazwa as she did her own circuit. A card game lay abandoned on the table, their last failed attempt to distract themselves from the wait. "We're running out of time," Saiyun said, pulling open the curtain and looking out into the garden. The trees were casting long shadows and servants were scurrying about the paths, lighting lanterns as night began to fall. "If we wait any longer we could miss our chance to find her."

"We should just go on our own then," Yazwa said, picking up her staff. "Pick one to stake out and hope we get lucky."

"That means we only have a one in three chance of finding her. That's too much of a risk," Saiyun grumbled, still staring out the window. The fragrance of the gardens drifted in and he took a deep breath. The breaker yards were too far away to reach before nightfall. The sugar mill and the empty house were closer but in opposite directions. If Ji went after one of those, they still only had a one in three shot at findng her. "Even if we stuck together we could run into something we can't handle there. We're good, but not that good."

Yazwa let out an annoyed huff. "Then what are we supposed to do?"

An ugly thought rose in Saiyun's mind: that they might as well do nothing. Ji was the one who split them apart and left Aven bleeding on a dock. They needed evidence of the Blood Achali to force Wabaro's hand more than they needed to find Ji. Rushing out half-cocked was a bigger risk than waiting patiently for one more night. Ji had made her choice.

A shadow flitted across the garden, and a cold dread took hold of Saiyun.

"We take what we can get," he said, letting the curtain fall and snatching his badge off the table. "The manor house is closest. We’ll take most of the guards and raid it first. The rest, we send to watch the sugar mill. If we don't find anything at the house, we go to the mill and raid it too. It's the best we can do now."

Yazwa followed him out, slamming the door behind him and racing down the stairs. "What if he says no?" she asked as they rounded a corner.

It was a good question that Saiyun couldn't find the answer to as they hurried to the Ambassador's quarters. He would. He had to. Time was running out. The Vathlanri would be leaving any day, and with them would go their only chance at involving Hilt’s navy in the raid. Shaoten would surely see the urgency.

As they rushed out of the main building Saiyun stumbled to a halt, staring at the Ambassador's quarters.

"Hey!" said Yazwa, lurching to the left to avoid crashing into him. "What is it?"

"There are no guards," Saiyun muttered, looking ahead through the fading light. Usually, the guards patrolled the grounds and stood watch at the doors all day and night. Now they were nowhere to be seen. Shaoten's residence was dark save for a handful of windows lit with feeble lanterns. "Where did they all go?"

Yazwa's eyes glowed gold for a moment before she blinked the shine away. "I don't see anything strange, but I can't see inside."

"Maybe," Saiyun said, slowly starting forward. "Maybe the loyal guards were the ones he trusted to guard his quarters. They could all just be inside."

"Yeah!" Yazwa said, rushing past him. "That must be it! Let's go!"

Saiyun hurried to catch up with her, wishing he shared the same optimism. Something was wrong, very very wrong, but he couldn't figure out what.

When they reached the front door his suspicions only worsened when he tried the handle and found it unlocked. No one came to greet them. No servants, no guards, and not even a sound came from anywhere in the house. It seemed abandoned. "Quietly," Saiyun said, taking a cautious step inside.

Yazwa nodded, holding her staff at the ready and looking around with her eyes aglow.

With each step he took, Saiyun's unease grew. A household like this required constant upkeep from servants. It would never be empty, yet it was. Saiyun followed a familiar path deeper into the house towards Shaoten’s office. The doors were closed and unguarded, but the dimmest glimmer of candlelight shone under the door.

Frowning, Saiyun shared a look with Yazwa and after a flurry of whispers agreed that he would creep forward while she remained behind. Reaching into his robes to take hold of one of Jado's summon dolls he slowly advanced, wincing every time he heard the floorboards creak. When he reached the door he ever-so-gently placed his ear against the crack and held his breath to listen.

The clink of coins made its way to his ears, followed by the Ambassadors' voice. "Forgive my caution, but I will count one more time."

"Four times isn't cautious, it's suspicious," answered a woman.

The blood in Saiyun's veins froze. He had last heard that voice through Jado's ears on the island of the Emerald Arrow. Everything fell into place as he hurried away from the door as quickly as he dared, beckoning for Yazwa to follow.

"What is it?" she whispered once they had rounded a corner.

"Shaoten is working for Azun," Saiyun hissed as he ran out of the house into the gardens. "I heard the woman from the Emerald Arrow, the Vao that commanded the Korav. She's here, and she's paying him off."

"But that means," Yazwa stammered, glowing eyes sweeping the garden. "That means...we told him everything."

Saiyun bit back a shout of frustration. He should have seen it. Shaoten was never concerned about the size or power of the Treasure Fleet, only whether it was intact. The man had almost panicked when he’d learned the Vathlanri knew the location of the shipyard. He had been so calm about Wabaro's lack of reply because he had likely never even sent a letter in the first place. "I know, I know. We have to get out of here, over one of the garden walls."

"Do you think someone is watching the front door?" Yazwa asked, narrowing her golden eyes.

"Someone or something," Saiyun said, hurrying towards the gardens and their lantern-lit paths. The tall tree loomed ahead, casting a long shadow. "Our only hope is to get back to the Vathlanri and warn them. After that-"

Saiyun gasped as something slammed into his back, knocking the wind from his lungs. He staggered, reaching into his robes and pulling out the Jado doll, searching for what had struck him.

Next to him, he caught sight of Yazwa swinging her staff at a shadowy figure. The enemy spun out of the way, landing two lightning strikes to her stomach. With a grunt, she tried to strike again, but a kick to her face made her stagger backward, struggling for balance.

Terror washed over Saiyun as he recognized the creature from a dozen bedtime stories and one encounter on the Emerald Arrow. It stood like a man but had three-fingered talons on its hands and feet. Vivid blue feathers covered its body and its face was a smooth blank.

A Korav.

Still fighting to take a breath Saiyun tensed his arm, ready to throw the doll at anything wooden.

The Korav closed the distance in the blink of an eye and swung a closed fist at Saiyun's hand.

He gasped with pain as he lost his grip on the doll and it flew backward. Another blow impacted his stomach, driving out whatever breath he had left in his body. He slumped to the ground, hitting the bare earth hard with the Korav looming over him.

Then it was gone as Yazwa's staff whistled through empty air. "Let’s go!" she shouted, grabbing his arm and dragging him deeper into the garden.

Saiyun opened his mouth to speak, but no sound came out. They had barely gone three steps before the Korav appeared again and slammed its fist into Yazwa's side. She collapsed and fell face-first to the dirt, wheezing as she writhed in pain.

As he fought for breath Saiyun rolled onto his back, staring up at the sky as the stars started to come out. The light of the path lanterns was just enough to make out the Korav, perched on a high limb above them. "It's not trying to kill us," Saiyun wheezed as he struggled to his knees. "It would have slashed us to pieces already."

"What's it waiting for?" Yazwa gasped as she tried to crawl onto her hands and knees.

"Us," came a cold, clear voice. A woman with short dark hair wearing a long black cloak strode out of the darkness. At her side was the scowling Ca Diro and the traitorous ambassador. "From what I've heard, you have a nasty habit of slipping away at the last moment. Pleased to finally meet you. My name is Captain Letao."

With great effort Saiyun pulled himself to his feet, chest burning with each breath he took. "How could you, Shaoten? You've betrayed the Emperor."

"I merely traded a losing Emperor for a winning one," Shaoten shrugged, looking over his shoulder. "Hey! All of you, back inside!"

Saiyun followed Shaoten's gaze to the main building of the Embassy. The commotion of the Korav's attack had attracted some attention. Servants were gathered in doorways and windows, though they quickly hurried away when the Ambassador shouted at them.

Of course.

Even now, he still needed to keep his betrayal a secret.

Yazwa lurched to her feet, a wild grin forcing the grimace off her face. "The other Blood Achali aren't doing too well, I hear."

"Do you have any idea how much damage you've done?" Ca Diro hissed. "Years of research, completely destroyed. I have to start from scratch!"

Saiyun's mind raced as Yazwa shot back a retort, studying Letao. She looked completely at ease, enjoying Ca Diro and Yazwa's back and forth. With the Korav perched above, they wouldn't be able to go two steps before it was upon them. The only way they could be more trapped was if it was on the ground with them with its claws around their necks. The difference, though, was academic. It was so fast, even hidden where it was….

Hidden.

Hope surged in Saiyun's chest. He looked around until he caught sight of the Jado doll. It had come to rest at the base of the tree's trunk. Plenty of material. There was a chance. "Enough of this," he snapped, trying to catch Yazwa's eye. "We get it, you're upset because we've driven you to desperate lengths to save your skins."

Letao chuckled, holding up her hand to silence a fuming Ca Diro. "I wouldn't go so far as ‘desperate’. You played right into our hands as soon as you came here. All it took was a little gold and a little patience."

"Don't flatter yourself," Saiyun said loudly, trying to draw Yazwa's attention to him. "You brought your Korav here. The officials and servants know what it is. If they saw it, they would all panic and-"

Yazwa's eyes widened, which was all the sign Saiyun needed.

He willed Jado to appear, and a chunk of the tree vanished to make its body. Saiyun looked through its eyes as it charged up the swaying tree, straight at the Korav. The sudden appearance of the summon and the unstable perch delayed the demon's response just long enough for Jado to close in. It leaped backward into the air to avoid disembowelment, but that was fine.

Saiyun snapped his eyes open and sprinted towards the main building with Yazwa right beside him. If they could get inside before the Korav hit the ground they had a chance to escape. On his right, he saw Ca Diro reach into his jacket as he scrambled to intercept them. Letao drew a pistol, only for Yazwa's curse to snuff the gunpowder when she pulled the trigger. With a bounding leap, Saiyun cleared the stairs and bolted into the Embassy as fast as he could go.