Nestor forced himself to take in a breath. His heartbeat fluttered against his ribs and his head spun so much he felt he would be sick.

Focus! He urged himself. He was encased in stone just past his knees and no amount of struggling had shifted it once the woman in red had left. Which left…what? What could he possibly do trapped with the buyer on his way for them? His shoulders slumped as he remembered Amos falling to his knees. Would the buyer kill him like that? Or would he turn Nestor into a crystalline husk like that poor woman?

Beside him, a dark shadow sniffed.

He turned as much as the stone would allow. Sylvie had ended up slightly behind him, which made that difficult.

She met his gaze reluctantly. A fine coating of white dust from the stone they were stuck in coated her face. It gave her an almost ghostly appearance, something that was not helped by the tear trails cut through the dust.

“I’m so sorry,” she said in a fragile voice on the edge of breaking. “If I had known what Henry…what he…Nestor, I never wanted you in this.”

He stared at her. Henry? Had she missed the artifact that had been used to crystalize a woman?

“I should never have gone with you to the ship, then he wouldn’t have caught us,” Sylvie continued, almost to herself.

“This isn’t your fault,” he tried, but Sylvie just gave a hollow laugh.

“Stupid, useless man,” she muttered.

She didn’t know. “Sylvie, this would have caught up with me eventually anyway.” The spinning torrent of thoughts in his head seemed to slow at those words, providing much needed relief, but Sylvie just blinked at him in confusion. “That woman has the skeleton treasure.”

“She what!?” Sylvie clamped her hand over her mouth as her words echoed through the long stone corridor. “You stole that?” she demanded in a hushed whisper.

Nestor glanced down at the stone that came just past his knees. Skeleton treasure indeed. What had it been doing in a remote village? “We didn’t know what it did. We were just hired!”

He could feel Sylvie’s gaze burning against his neck and made a pointed effort not to look at her. At last she sighed. “What are we going to do?”

For a moment, hope burst through his chest that they might be able to find their way out of this mess, but then the ever present reminder of stone against his legs brought him back down. “I don’t know.”

“What if you claim that you know more about the treasure than them?” Sylvie suggested tentatively. “That might be enough for them to keep you alive.”

The fact she had excluded herself was not lost on Nestor. Henry, terrible as he was, would want her back alive. That was some comfort at least. Maybe she could even still escape with the crew in the spring. There would be an opening with him gone.

The click of boots against stone began to fill the halls and he drew in a deep breath. So much time spent running only for it to end trapped like a fox in a cage.

Lantern light flickered across the mutated stones as two figures emerged. One was the woman in red, her cloak dusty and still with that crazed look in her eyes. Her companion was a tall man who stood with his arms neatly folded behind his back. He regarded Sylvie and Nestor with his head slightly tilted in consideration.

Nestor blinked, imagining a bizarre mask over those calculating eyes. He had finally found the buyer.

“Alaric Blackthorne?” Sylvie asked. Her voice held steady, but there was something just under her tone that Nestor couldn’t quite place. Then he remembered. This man had been on the lists he and Sylvie had compiled of all the major alchemists in the city. He swallowed back the urge to laugh. All that work just for the buyer to find them first.

“You’re the guardsmen’s niece, correct?” The buyer asked, watching Sylvie quizzically.

“So what if I am?”

The barest hint of a smile appeared over the buyer’s lips. “No need for such hostilities, we’re merely getting acquainted.”

Sylvie drew in a deep breath to retort that Nestor quickly cut off. “She doesn’t know anything,” he said with rushed words. “Let her go.”

The woman just behind the man glowered at Nestor, but the buyer just watched him, almost confused.

“Oh, Nestor. I’m afraid you have the wrong idea of what is happening here. No one is getting hurt. You’ll be free to go just after you hear what I have to say.”

The woman’s eyes widened at those words. “Alaric, these are the two that Henry was keeping down here, they’ve seen--”

“Henry, that’s his name! We really must thank him, I’ve been looking all over for this young man for months now.” He beamed at Nestor. “Mirmiam, this is Nestor Leventis.”

The woman turned her narrow gaze on him, appraising him. He tried to meet her gaze coolly, but his heart rate had already picked up. How could this man know a name that he himself had not used for 8 years?

“What?” Nestor laughed, hating the high pitched tone that pervaded it. “No I’m not.”

“What’s your name then?” the woman asked. Did she ever blink?

“Geralt,” he said immediately.

She raised an eyebrow. “No surname?”

“Street urchin. Me mum and dad weren't around to give me one.” And now he had a different accent to commit to. Perfect.

“Nestor,” the buyer chuckled. “You’re the spitting image of your father. I know your parents raised you better than to abandon their legacy.”

“I don’t remember my parents.” He pulled at his legs, but the stone held fast. “Do ya want money? I can get ya money.” Even to his own ears his voice was slipping into a character of the voice he was trying to imitate.

“Did you know Athera is in the city?” the buyer asked, his tone conversational.

Nestor froze for a second too long. How did he know about that?

The buyer grinned. “There it is. Come now, Nestor. You were always such a curious child, don’t tell me you aren’t the slightest bit curious about this.”

“Who are you?” Nestor asked finally. The fake accent slipped entirely.

“You really don’t recognize me?” the buyer sounded disappointed. “I am Alaric Blackthrone. Your parents and I were close friends and work partners.”

Blackthorne…that name was familiar. Fuzzy memories of dinners long forgotten and his parents and a few others gathered in their lab flooded his mind. Skies, did he know this man?

“Miriam,” Alaric said. “Would you do the honors?”

Begrudgingly, the woman pulled out the skeleton treasure. No glow came from it, but those twin gems still gleaned menacingly in the torchlight.

Sylvie’s breath caught beside him as the sapphire began to softly glow and the stone around them softened like butter left by the hearth. She shifted, trying to jump out of the stone, but just as before, any movement only succeeded in dragging them further down.

“Here you are.” Alaric took her hands and pulled her out with deceptive ease. He reached for Nestor next and Nestor couldn’t help but pull back. Alaric didn’t or pretended not to notice and grabbed him around the shoulders. A moment later Nestor was standing on his own feet, rivets of stone sludge streaming off his body.

“Now if you’ll just follow me,” Alaric said, taking off into the dungeon.

Nestor shot a glance at Sylvie and saw his own fears reflected in her eyes. They were close to the staircase, they had a shot of outrunning them.

Before he could gesture for them to run, Miriam cleared her throat. The sapphire had faded, leaving her face in the sharp cast of the torch and the stone beside them to rapidly solidify into a white chalky substance.

“Come on,” Sylvie said softly as she started after Alaric. Nestor followed.

Their footsteps echoed through the nearly silent dungeon. Alaric, despite not holding a torch of his own, seemed eager to go wherever he was taking them and walked briskly, nearly leaving the confines of the torchlight several times.

One staircase and a couple of turns later they were in a small room with a tiny window that opened into the streets of one of the lower districts. It was far too small to squeeze through, but Nestor took note. If they had to run, knowing which way the outside world lay would be invaluable. The room itself was nothing to boast about, containing only a table with uneven legs and several mismatched chairs. One of which carried a stack of books.

“Please, take a seat,” Alaric said as he busily rearranged the ancient chairs. “You too Miriam, you’re stiff as a board.”

The three of them slowly did as he asked and Alaric beamed at them. “You have questions I’m sure.”

“You work with Henry,” Sylvie said, her tone flat.

Stolen story; please report.

“Your uncle? Yes.”

“Why?”

Alaric looked taken aback and Miriam gave a short bark of laughter. “The man’s useless and the girl knows it,” she said as she leaned back in her chair.

“One shouldn’t speak ill of--”

“Oh, save it Alaric. We pay your uncle because he has his uses. Say what you will, but he’s strong and resourceful when he needs to be.”

Sylvie folded her arms and glanced back at Nestor. “And you say that you know him?” she asked, her gaze fixed on Alaric. A question for both the buyer and Nestor.

“Our boy’s grown into a man now, but I did know him as a child,” Alaric said, his smile back on his face. “We thought we lost him in that terrible house fire.”

Hot guilt washed over Nestor as Alaric’s smile slipped with the memory. “How did you survive?”

“Window,” Nestor mumbled. A lie. He had run out their front door without even thinking to save his family. He forced those thoughts back down where they belonged. He had seen this man kill Amos. A tiny, comforting spark of familiar anger flared in his chest.

“What do you want with us?” he asked, forcing his voice to come evenly.

The buyer’s eyebrows knitted together momentarily while a smirk started to spread across Miriam’s face. “I don’t--”

The buyer started.

“You mentioned yourself that you’ve been looking for me. Why?” Nestor folded his arms.

“As soon as I got word you were in the city, I started looking. I’m only sorry it took so long.”

“You left us in that cell,” Sylvie broke in, mirroring Nestor’s posture. “So you either didn’t know, or you just didn’t care until we got loose.”

“I like her,” Miriam said. Alaric shot her a swift glare.

“We did know where you’ve been for this last week,” Alaric admitted. “Certain things had to be arranged.”

“What things?” Nestor couldn’t quite control the outburst. “You could have killed us several times over by now. What do you want with us?”

“Oh, no, I would never harm either of you. We’re continuing the research your parents worked and I worked on back in Apolia. I need every Leventis I can get.” He gestured to Miriam who handed him the skeleton treasure. It lay dormant in his gloved hands, but those gleaming gemstones rebuked any thought that it was some simple trinket. “Do you know what this is?”

“A catalyst,” Sylvie said immediately. Well, that made one of them.

“Very good,” Alaric beamed at her and she shifted uncomfortably in her chair. He turned back to the device, oblivious to her movement. “So much of our nation’s power resides in being able to utilize these, but, as I’m sure you know, they break before long. It’s what’s held back our invested alchemy for so long. In theory, we’ve always known just how far we could push things, but the cost makes it simply ineffective. In Caprum, the royal guild has great gemstones reserved for war time, but if it ever came to using them, we would be defenseless after they shatter.”

Nestor swallowed, suddenly remembering the poor woman Miriam had turned into a solid hunk of crystal. “But you can recharge this one,” he said softly.

“Yes!” Alaric gazed down at the twin gemstones in the catalyst. “A marvel. Think of just what we can accomplish with such a device. Our borders would be secure, our people safe and happy.”

Nestor shook his head before he could stop himself. “No. There’s no way my parents worked on that.”

“Of course they did,” Alaric said. “The whole guild did. We didn’t have such a catalyst of course, but we got very close to developing one where we could at least partially recharge the gemstones…unfortunately, most of those notes were lost in the fire.”

A sudden wave of nausea gripped Nestor. Surely his parents hadn’t been murderers! No, he would have known that much. This--this was all some sort of horrible misunderstanding.

“I’m not an alchemist,” he muttered. “I can’t help you.”

“It’s in your blood. You’ve already proven extremely resourceful in--”

“In getting that thing for you?” Nestor snapped. Sylvie touched his shoulder, but he was already shaking with anger. “I saw you! You killed Amos!”

“Nestor,” Sylvie said softly. A warning. He drew in a deep breath, but it was already too late. Alaric was regarding them with his head slightly tilted.

“I was hoping you wouldn’t have been able to recognize me without the mask.” His tone was cooler, almost perfectly flat. “No matter. I’m sorry about your Captain, but you’ve seen what this catalyst can do! It was too dangerous to let anyone know about it. Not until we studied it thoroughly.”

“But I saw.”

Alaric nodded. “I thought I was seeing things, seeing your father staring down at me from that belfry. And then I realized, you had survived! Two miracles. I just had to find you.”

“What,” Nestor couldn’t resist a sarcastic laugh. “Didn’t want to get rid of all the pirates?”

“Of course not,” the buyer shook his head, looking horrified. “Your Captain was a costly but necessary sacrifice. The rest of your crew was fine so long as they didn't know. And you, my boy, you're no mere pirate, you’re the son of my dear friends. You have alchemy in your blood.”

Something began to throb behind his eyes as Nestor opened his mouth to tell Alaric that he was just a pirate, in fact.

Sylvie cut him off. “Nestor isn’t his parents. How is he supposed to help you?”

“Alaric is just sentimental,” Miriam broke in. “Of course there’s the hope that someone will have a better understanding of what those lost notes said, but we’re not expecting Nestor to remember.”

“And what do you think those notes said?”

Miriam nodded approvingly. “This catalyst, as remarkable as it is, is flawed. The energy conservation is only at about 30% of what we can measure. It makes charging it expensive. The Apolia guild had designs for one that could absorb and maintain energy at far greater rates.”

“His mother had a design for a catalyst that could recharge using the sun,” Alaric broke in. “Immensely effective, but volatile in execution. We never figured out a way to fully stabilize it.”

For just a moment he was back there in that dark room, looking at the softly glowing ruby. His wrist had brushed the delicate metal entraptings as he reached out to touch it, and the next moment fire had been everywhere and all he had managed to do was run away.

“What about this catalyst?” Nestor swallowed back the emotions that had risen with the memory. Skies, was that what the poor woman had felt when the catalyst had pulled the energy from her? He fought back the urge to inspect his burn scar for tiny crystals. “You can’t use it without killing people.”

Alaric glanced at Miriam who nodded. “They saw.”

He sighed. “Currently, that seems to be the only way to get the gemstones to accept new energy. We’re working on a solution.”

“And those people that you’ve killed are just unfortunate sacrifices?” Nestor asked coldly.

“They’re far from innocents. All were imprisoned with good reason. This way, they’ll be able to benefit society in a way they never could or would have had they been left to their own devices. It’s a noble death.”

Just like Amos had been.

“I’m not going to help you.” He hadn’t meant to say it, not entirely, but the words came strong and sounded right coming from his mouth.

Alaric’s gaze clouded. “Come now, Nestor. Reconsider just how much we can benefit the people of Ignis. Be part of the greater good.”

“You killed the man that raised me.”

The last traces of the smile slipped off of Alaric’s lips. “There’s one more thing you should know before you make your decision. Your sister is here and was ever so excited to see you. I would hate to see her disappointed.”

A jolt went through Nestor. “What are you saying?”

“She’s been a huge help with our research, but she could do so much more if she weren’t so distracted with you. Rejoin your family Nestor…I doubt I can hide the truth from her much longer, and as useful as she is, the greater good must be preserved.”

Nestor glanced at Miriam, some part of his refusing to accept this. She just nodded in response.

“I’ll leave the pair of you to think about it. Alaric rose from his seat, keeping a firm grip on the catalyst. He and Miram stepped out of the room, the click of a key in the lock following them.

“He has to be bluffing,” Sylvie said. “We saw your sister on the ship. She’s not with him.”

Nestor shook his head. His thoughts seemed almost tangible as they raced through his skull, as though they were pressing against the front of it and drilling their way out. “I can’t risk that, and we can’t risk being here when he gets back.”

Sylvie frowned and looked at the window. It was far too small for them to squeeze through. “How--” she stopped as Nestor pulled out his makeshift lockpicks.

“We just need to remember which way the outside is. A door or a window we can get through has to be around here somewhere.” He started on the lock, but his fingers suddenly felt stiff and he couldn’t get them to move the way he needed them to. Would Alaric go straight to Athera? What if he brought her down here?

“Nestor,” Sylvie said softly. She touched his shoulder but he shook her off.

“I’ve almost--” the pick snapped in the lock. What little anger he had left faded like a dying ember and he felt his shoulders slump.

“We need a plan anyway,” Sylvie said. “Saying yes might be our best option for now.”

Nestor glared at the broken piece of metal in his fingers. “He killed Amos,” he said softly. “Skies know when he’ll turn on us too.”

“Then we’ll just have to turn on him first,” Sylvie said. She tried to smile at him, but the exhaustion in her eyes didn’t quite let her manage it. The unspoken weight of everything weighed heavily over them. Alaric didn’t need them, skies, he might not even need Athera. How long could they keep an act up before they were discarded?

The door handle began to rattle and both Nestor and Sylvie took a step back. Already? He had thought they’d have more time than this!

The door creaked open, revealing not Alaric, or even Athera, but a familiar face smeared in coal dust. His clothes were also sootstained and he held a skeleton key aloft.

“I’m not sure who you’re betraying, but I hope it’s not me.” Geralt grinned at them.

Both Nestor and Sylvie stood frozen, then both erupted into excited chattering.

“How did you find us? How do we get out?” Sylvie asked.

“Have you seen my sister, Geralt? The one that came for the griffin. Where is she?” Nestor asked at the same time.

“Whoa, one at a time,” Geralt said, holding up his hands. “And come on you two, we don’t want to be here when someone comes to check on you.” He started out into the dungeon and Nestor and Sylvie were quick to follow.

“How did you find us?” Sylvie asked, she had to jog a little to keep up with Geralt’s brisk pace. The man was tall, and when he wanted somewhere, it showed.

“I followed the rumors. It wasn’t so hard once I figured out this place was here. I saw them take you past around where I got in. I just had to wait until they left to break you both out.”

“So you’ve seen--”

“Yeah,” Geralt stopped walking for a moment to check something scribbled on his wrist. A trick they had been taught as children. A makeshift map made while moving on a heist. “Let’s get far from here before they get back. Out of the city preferably. I can round up the crew in about an hour.”

“I can’t leave, Geralt,” Nestor said as his friend started down another of the winding passages. “I need to--”

“Your sister comes by the ship a lot. We can grab her too. Have a nice sweet reunion far away from this flea-bitten city.”

“Athera’s been staying you?” Nestor almost froze in his tracks with relief. Sylvie had been right, Alaric had only been bluffing.

“Not overnight, obviously. She’s been working with some fancy alchemist guild trying to find you from the legal end of things. After you left we--”

“An alchemist guild?” Nestor asked. His heart sank.

“Yeah. She’ll stop by the ship to visit the griffins though, don’t worry--”

“Those two were alchemists,” Sylvie broke in. Geralt had them going up a set of stairs that he was taking two at a time.

Geralt froze. “So the treasure is a catalyst.”

Nestor paused, wondering for a moment how Geralt knew about that. “If Athera’s with them…” he trailed off, unsure of where to even begin explaining.

“You think they might do something?”

Nestor nodded. “I have to warn her. I owe her that much at least.”

“Ok,” Geralt smoothed his hands over his hair. “Ok. I know where the guild hall is, but if you’re right, it’s too dangerous for either of you to get near it.”

“I can’t leave--”

“I didn’t say that. Nestor, listen to me. You can’t get close, but I can. I just need you to follow my lead, ok?”

Slowly, Nestor nodded.