There were no assassins for the entire night. Not a single one. Kind of a let down after all the preparation that Alyssa made. Disturbing Fela and Kasita to have a slumber party in a filthy jail cell—there was a vacant room opposite from the intelligencer that Alyssa had asked to use for the night—had been entirely unnecessary. Not that either of them seemed to mind. Really, it was just Alyssa who had been grumpy about it all, despite it being her own idea.

The intelligencer hadn’t been all that chatty either. Alyssa did learn her name. Claire. But that was about it. No more big drops about Yora. The mild panic that had led to her spilling all the beans she had spilled went away with Alyssa’s assurance that she would be fine for at least one more night. That wasn’t to say that she had been completely silent. Just mostly.

And most of what had been said had been between Kasita and Claire. In fact, as Alyssa woke up from her light sleep, she found them still talking, making her wonder whether or not Claire had even gone to bed.

“I think I understand,” Kasita said, nodding with her arms crossed. “But did you have the network of contacts built up before entering the city? You had only been in the city for a short time when you… borrowed Princess Irulon’s notebook. Yet that came from one of your contacts? I don’t know that I could build up such a network of contacts fast enough to have people willing to barge into private chambers of the guild—ignorant of the status of the occupants or not.”

“No. No. They didn’t just spontaneously pop up. A little coin to the right people can get you far, but something like that requires a loyalist. The particular individual who got me the book moved here from Yora on orders a long time ago. He had just been living normally, but still retained his loyalty to Yora—sometimes after long stays in a foreign city, they will switch loyalties, can’t really help that. When I arrived, I just sent out the word that I would be interested in knowing more about the monsters at Illuna. He thought he had something related and brought me that damned book.”

“But then you had him killed? Not a very nice way to reward your loyal contacts.”

“Killed?” Claire blinked twice before shaking her head. “No. He is still alive as far as I am aware.”

“No? But I thought I heard…” Kasita trailed off with uncertainty lining her features. “Hmm…”

That’s right, Alyssa thought. She had forgotten until just now, but back when they first heard about the missing book, Kasita had mentioned that they had the man who delivered the book killed. Now that she was thinking about it, it didn’t make much sense to have the man killed if the intelligencer didn’t actually know the value of the book. Irulon had been the one who decided that Claire hadn’t been lying about that. So either she had fooled Irulon and killed the guy or hadn’t killed the guy. In the latter case, Kasita must have misheard or misunderstood.

Was all that relevant? Probably not. Just another item to note about the intelligencer and, possibly, her trustworthiness if even Irulon couldn’t detect the truth.

A long yawn overtook Alyssa before they could continue their conversation. That combined with a long stretch made both of them stop to look in her direction. She didn’t care and, in fact, only stretched harder. The cot she had slept on was perhaps the least comfortable thing she had ever used and that included hard ground out in the middle of the desert north of Lyria. She had just woken up, but she could feel a knot in the base of her neck that would be there for days.

It certainly didn’t help that Fela, as per usual, wound up half on top of her in the middle of the night. The dumb hellhound tossed and turned more than a toddler. One of Alyssa’s legs was so prickly and tingly as she tried to move it out from under Fela’s heavy paws that she actually sucked in a hissing breath of pain.

“Having problems?” Kasita asked with a soft giggle.

“Dumb dog,” Alyssa mumbled. It was a pain deciding whether to move her leg or not. Just bending it was painful, but she had to get her blood flowing again. “She’s going to give me permanent nerve damage one of these days.”

“Aww, but she likes sleeping with you.”

“Yeah, well, she’s a lot heavier than I can take.”

“Ufu~”

Groaning through clenched teeth, Alyssa started to worm her way out from under Fela.

Despite all the movement, the hellhound didn't wake. Her eyes were closed and her face was slack. If not for the hot air coming out with every breath, Alyssa might have worried. As it was, she was only mildly annoyed.

“This happens every single night.”

“Not a very good guard dog. We would have been dead if someone showed up.”

At Claire’s comment, Fela’s large ears twitched. A narrow column of flame sprouted from the corner of one of her eyes as she glared directly at the offender. Claire immediately shrank in on herself, drifting away from the bars of her cell where she was having her conversation with Kasita. She scuttled back even further as Fela opened her mouth in a wide yawn, showing off those sharp canine teeth.

“We would have been fine,” Alyssa said, patting a hand between Fela’s ears. “Even if Fela slept through an attack, I’m a Rank Six arcanist and Kasita is pretty close to that.”

“I had an ear open,” Fela said as her yawn came to a close. Shutting her eyes and extinguishing her flames, she dropped her head onto Alyssa’s lap. “But it’s so early… Let’s sleep some more.”

“No. No time. Things to do. Got to get up and at ‘em.”

“What do we have to do that can’t wait until later.”

“Knowing you, later would be mid-afternoon. By the time we actually got started, night would be setting again.”

“I don’t see a problem with that,” Fela said after another long yawn.

“Of course you don’t. Come on,” Alyssa said, poking Fela in the cheek. “Up.”

After just a bit more grumbling, Fela finally got off Alyssa enough for her to stand. The tingling in her leg still made her grimace, but she ignored it. Her leg would wake up sooner if she got up and moving.

“Kasita,” Alyssa said. “Would you mind keeping the intelligencer company for a while longer?”

“Gladly.”

Hesitating, Alyssa had to wonder if they were getting to be too good of friends. Claire wasn’t to be trusted. Kasita knew that… Shaking her head, Alyssa decided to ignore it for now. Kasita was just gathering more information. Maybe trying to figure out how to be a better spy judging from their conversation the night before and the trail end of their conversation that Alyssa had woken up to. “There probably won’t be anything major happening. Assassins wouldn’t attack during broad daylight… would they?” she added with a glance toward Claire.

Who shrugged. “I wouldn’t. Guards are generally at a higher level of alertness during the day and it would be harder to escape. Poison is still an option.”

“I’ll pick up some food while I’m out.” Trying to avoid limping as she walked out—Fela, with yet another long yawn, shambled behind her like a zombie—Alyssa headed out to the main room.

A trio of guards were playing a card game with each other at a small table. The actual game was something Alyssa was passably familiar with. It was a common sight around various taverns, playing something like the game of Hearts. The cards were completely different—there were no kings, jacks, or queens and there were only three suits, none of which aligned with the versions Alyssa was familiar with. The few times that Alyssa had tried to play wound up in a miserable failure. There were too many rules to the game, not all of which had been explained to her. For instance, there was a card barring the symbol of the elves that essentially instantly devalued the hand. That it was such a bad card was such general knowledge that nobody bothered to mention anything. There was a way to get rid of it in some kind of Old Maid-style bluffing part of the game, but that had its own rules and regulations.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Alyssa had taken to simply watching when Oz, Catal, and her own mother decided to play the game. How her mother learned to play was a mystery that she had yet to figure out.

“Morning,” Alyssa said. “Anything strange happen since you men got here?”

“No assassins, if that’s what you’re asking,” one said with a small chuckle as he laid down a card in the middle of the table.

The wrong card, apparently. One of the others grabbed it, added it to his hand, and added another five bars to the pile of coins on the table. Both of the others looked a bit miffed at that. One stared at his cards for a few seconds before collapsing the entire hand and dropping them on the table. As he stood, he offered a nasty look at the first guard who spoke—who quickly copied his action of folding his hand—before turning to Alyssa.

“There was something strange,” he said, pausing slightly as he took in Fela’s appearance. For a moment, it had looked like he was going to walk right up to them. Now, he simply stood next to the table, not coming even a single step closer. “When I got in for my shift, found a man leaning against the wall out there. Shooed him away and he left without complaint. Thought I’d mention it since you got all worked up over some assassin.”

Alyssa raised an eyebrow. Had there nearly been an assassination during the night? Could it have simply been a coincidence? “I take it there aren’t normally random people hanging out around the jailhouse?”

“Wouldn’t bring it up if it was normal.”

“I see.” Very possibly something had happened then. Or had been about to happen. Perhaps the would-be assassin caught wind of Alyssa having a little stake-out with her friends.

Perhaps it would have been better to have hidden, ready to apprehend the assassin when he showed up. Alyssa didn’t honestly have any questions to ask him—from Claire, she already had a good idea of why he would be here and who sent him—but it seemed better to have an assassin in custody than not. Would Yora just get another assassin to do the job? Would they try to assassinate the assassin?

If Alyssa captured a dozen assassins, all trying to assassinate their predecessors, would Yora keep trying?

Despite the severity of the situation, Alyssa found herself mildly amused with the thought. It sounded like some Pink Panther shenanigans. But… if this suspicious person was an assassin…

It meant that the intelligencer had been correct. People were trying to kill her.

Sighing, Alyssa watched as the winning guard collected all the coins on the table, dragging them to a small pouch. I need a vacation. Unfortunately, knowing her own luck, any vacation she took would end with angels or demons or just regular mortals causing all kinds of problems. Shaking her head, Alyssa could only wonder how the world had managed to hold itself together before she came along.

“I’m leaving one of my associates here,” Alyssa said with a gesture back down the hall she had just come from. “I’ll be back shortly as well. Keep your guard up and let me know if anything strange happened while I’m gone.”

“We know how to do our jobs.”

“I’m just…” Alyssa pinched her eyes shut for a moment. “Sorry if it feels like I’m ordering you around. It’s just a slightly stressful situation that I would really rather not deal with, but still have to deal with it.”

There were only so many hours in a day and far too many things to be doing during those hours.

Maybe there was something to the idea of hiring on Claire. Or maybe not Claire, but someone else who could help out with doing things. Delegation was apparently an important skill. There were some things that only Alyssa could accomplish. Namely, things involving angels and true demons. But angels, for as much as they affected Alyssa, didn’t even register on the top one thousand problems that an average inhabitant of this world would have. Same with true demons. They were almost literally non-entities to everyone but her. The Astral Authority were slightly more of a concern, but Alyssa was still hoping that they were gone permanently.

Babysitting a prisoner? Anyone could do that. Anyone mildly capable, anyway. Any highly ranked arcanist or even capable fighter could have sat by as a guard. Oz, Catal, or anyone else from the guild could probably have taken watch. Bringing Fela and Kasita along had probably been overkill, but… it might have also frightened off an assassin so Alyssa wasn’t complaining about that too much.

If they were still worried about an assassin popping up tonight—or any other day—Alyssa might just submit a quest to the guild. They could handle it easily enough.

There were other things aside from the intelligencer that could have been handled by other people.

Like delivering supplies to monsters. That could easily be done by just about anyone with a little discretion to them. The oasis could still be kept secret if there was some kind of dead drop method of delivery. Then they wouldn’t need…

Alyssa blinked twice. “Ah shit.”

Fela perked up, glancing around the room, eyeing all three of the guards. “What is it?”

“I forgot the stupid supplies. The intelligencer managed to distract me.” She quickly glanced out the front window. Volta had said daybreak. It was early enough that the light hadn’t quite crested the horizon yet, but it would be close. Less than ten minutes. Could she get there in time?

Even if she could, the supplies she had purchased were all just sitting around, unorganized and haphazard. She meant to go through it all and collect the easier things to carry.

Alyssa did not have any Accelero cards on her. If she had, she might have used one. As it was…

“Come on. Let’s hurry.”

“We’re getting food? I want meat!”

That was another thing. She had said she would bring food for Claire. That was certainly something that could be taken care of by someone else. “We’ll eat at the guild,” Alyssa said, already out the door. Maybe there were some things Volta could take that wouldn’t require a lot of work to gather up. And while there, maybe she could pay Oz a few coins to deliver breakfast to Claire.

“Guild again?” Fela asked, clearly despondent. “I think their usual cook spits in my food.”

Alyssa continued walking, mind racing about all the ways she could delegate if she had more people that she could actually trust. Kasita was great, but couldn’t do many physical things. Fela was great too, but Alyssa didn’t like the idea of leaving a monster alone in the middle of a human city, even one seemingly as nice as Illuna. Brakkt and Irulon were both trustworthy, but Alyssa couldn’t exactly order them around. Brakkt would probably agree to do some things she asked, but he was busy with his own things most of the time. Irulon wasn’t even worth considering for things like watching the intelligencer. She was far too…

Her thoughts ground to a halt as Fela’s words finally registered with her.

“He what?” She whirled, glaring hard enough to make Fela’s ears flatten against her head. Alyssa had to take a breath. It wasn’t Fela she was angry with now.

“I mean…” Fela started, suddenly timid. The tips of her claws clacked together as she averted her eyes from Alyssa. “Lots of human food smells a lot like human, but the guild food is always the worst. Like I’m eating a person… or part of a person.”

“But you keep eating it?”

“Yeah. You bought it all for me and it is still good food.”

“Fela…” Alyssa, sighing, reached out and patted the hellhound between the ears. “I see I’m going to have to have a word with the cook.” Especially if Fela was right. If he was putting stuff in Fela’s food, who knew what he was putting in hers.

“You aren’t mad?”

“Not with you. Never with you.”

“Then…” Fela’s ears perked up again as she started grinning. “Do you think you could get more of that smooth stuff?”

“Smooth stuff?”

“From your world? I had a whole bunch at your house.”

“Ah.” It took Alyssa a moment to remember. “Peanut butter? That’s…” Not something they had in this world as far as Alyssa was aware. She hadn’t even seen any peanuts. If there were peanuts in this world, they didn’t seem to grow in the Lyrian kingdom. She had seen almonds and walnuts—or close enough versions of them. But she hadn’t seen ‘butter’ variants of either. “Maybe someday I can try getting food from home. But that would probably require Tenebrael’s help.”

“And with what do you require my help, Alyssa Meadows?”

Alyssa turned around to find black feathers slowly drifting down to the pavement. High overhead, a figure stood, illuminated by the sun just barely cresting the top of the distant horizon. The light cast her already darkly-dressed figure in a deep shadow, leaving only a pair of luminescent white eyes staring down at Alyssa. Four black wings were spread wide, casting a shadow over the street outside the jailhouse.

The imposing scene lasted but a moment before Tenebrael lowered herself down to Alyssa’s level.

Alyssa just crossed her arms. “If you heard that I mentioned getting help from you, you also heard what I wanted help with.”

“True,” Tenebrael said, mimicking Alyssa’s pose. It was a motion that drew attention to her arms. Normally, they were bare. Today, a single black glove adorned Tenebrael’s left hand, one that extended up past the elbow. Her other hand still showed off her black fingernails, making the glove stand out all the more. “But I always like to hear that I am needed from the mouths of my loyal subjects.”

“I thought you found it irritating to have people relying on you,” Alyssa said, lifting her eyes from the glove to Tenebrael’s face.

“It is annoying to answer prayers. Listening to them is passive entertainment.”

“Uh huh…” Alyssa said, eyes flicking around. No square portals opened up. That was a good sign. “Are we free to talk or are we going to get interrupted by life or death battles in a few minutes?”

A wide grin spread across Tenebrael’s face. “We have all the time in my world.”