2412, Strilaxis 26, Daleth

Rhys stared at another girl beside Xalim. This one had frigid blond curls pulled back from her forehead, freckles splashed across her golden brown cheeks, and round eyes the color of the walls around them. They showed up with a knock to his room late in the morning, long after his neighbors had gone to their missions. He doubted the foraging master remembered if he showed up or not, so he earned every right to stay inside for as long as he could.

When he cranked the door open, Xalim slipped inside. But not long after, another girl slinked past the diminishing space between the frame and the door. "Rhys, this is Bertha," Xalim looked up at him with a sly grin on her face. "She doesn't like to say her family name because..."

Bertha pushed past her friend and stuck a hand towards Rhys. "Kindreth," she said. Her voice was somewhere between shrill and squeaky. "Like...the day. Nice to meet you."

He knew what she meant. Being named by things people use in everyday life could be a source of ridicule. It's like being named after Rudik. Or a spoon. Or a boot. And by the looks of it, Bertha was used to it by now.

Rhys shook her hand, letting go as quickly as their palms touched. He turned to Xalim. "Don't tell me you used it on her," one look at the dark-haired girl told him otherwise. He ran a hand down his face. "You used it on her."

"It's impossible to do things with just the two of us," Xalim reasoned as if she thought her opinions matter in this dangerous business. "I thought we'd need more hands, and who better than a long-time friend?"

Well, it's not like he could do anything about it now. The secret's out. Might as well welcome Bertha in rather than have her tattle to the Sovereign out of sheer hatred about being rejected. One thing Xalim said piqued Rhys' interest though. " 'Long-time'?" he asked. "How long have you two been here? And are you both foragers?"

Bertha shook her head, moving further into the room, straight into the spread of brewing equipment by Rhys' cot. "I'm from the smiths department," she said. "I'm in charge of making spare blades out of Dwarven metal. And I haven't been here long. Just a month ago. I think."

Xalim sidestepped Rhys and crouched next to Bertha. The part who valued his personal space recoiled from within. He pushed the discomfort deep down. They meant well. They only wanted to help and learn. Nothing bad about that.

"I've been here for far longer," the dark-haired girl said. Upon analyzing their trails, it came to light they're both humans. From Cardina, then? Or in the hidden settlements around Asopus or Rabante? "Been here since I was twelve. I found Bertha among the latest intake. She's the only one who stuck to me after that."

Bertha bumped shoulders with the older girl. "You're the only one who was nice to me," she said. "Of course, I'd stick by you."

"Last intake?" Rhys asked. "Where does the Sovereign get her people?"

A dark cloud passed across the girls' faces. Xalim was the one who turned away from the equipment and towards him. "From what I know, she gets them through various ways," she said. "We're both taken through the purges."

Purges. A distant memory of her sister's words flashed from the back of his mind. Right. Cardina was known for them, conducting them from north to south because of a misplaced prejudice. But now...was it really because of prejudice, or something worse? The Sovereign needed people, and who fit the bill more than the people no territory wanted, the people shunned by both halves of themselves?

Rhys frowned and lowered his vision to the trail dimension again. The forms and colors of their trails resembled humans'. He didn't look hard enough, it seemed. Tucked beneath the sparkling colors, lay the subtle trait of keiju trails, thinner and somewhat lighter.

"I'm sorry," was all he could offer when silence reigned in the room after the revelation.

Bertha waved a hand in the air. She didn't seem past ten, but she's already acting like she's well into her adult years. Circumstance would do that to someone. "It is something, yes," she said. "Best thing we can do is to move forward. I need to go back to Mother too. The Disfavoreds isn't a good place to grow old."

He had half an inkling what most of Bertha's words meant, but he agreed with it. His boots crunched when he sank to the floor between Xalim and Bertha. At some point, he couldn't isolate his sister's face from theirs. It had been like this between them too, and now, they simply had grown up and were forced to take differing paths towards the same goal. Maybe he should link to Reeca as soon as he got out of here.

It's a thing to look forward to.

"All the more reason for us to hurry, then," he reached out and grabbed the half-filled vial from beneath the end of the press and slotted a crude cork into this lip. "I'm leaving it to you to figure out how to turn this into fumes. That way, we can cover wider ground with just a whiff."

"Smart plan," Xalim said at the same moment Bertha whirled towards him with her forehead creased. "Are you going somewhere?"

Rhys bobbed his head and pushed his orange locks out of his face. His wings itched for a stretch, and waiting for another foraging assignment wasn't the best way to go. Besides, didn't he have another organization to visit? Maybe they have a similar mind-control concoction there too. "I can't stay here long. The Sovereign may be on to me," he said. "I'm leaving the mission of freeing people from her influence to your capable hands. You two are crafty enough."

If they're touched by his sentiment, they didn't show it. "No one leaves Synketros," Xalim stressed, as if all three of them weren't aware of it and the fact wasn't hanging by a thin thread over their heads. "Kriachoria made sure of that."

Rhys sighed. "I don't know who this Kriachoria you speak of, but—"

"It's the Sovereign," Bertha explained, whirling back to the leaves boiling over the regulated lamp fire. "Kriachoria is her ancient name. The older members would sometimes use it to address her and talk about her."

"Oh," he cleared his throat. "As I was saying, we don't need to worry about that. We have the way out in our hands."

He jerked his chin towards the racks of vials. The dark purple liquid sloshing inside could have been mistaken for stale wine from Helinfirth. "I'll hand you the recipe, but it'll be up to you to procure and process them," he said. "Don't let the secret out. Protect each other. Lead those unwilling out of here."

"So, you're really leaving," Xalim sniffed with a hint of disdain. "When?"

Rhys picked on the frayed ends of the hem of his sleeves. "Tonight," he said. "And I'm going to need your help."

He crouched behind the crates by the lobby, pulling down the hood down his shock of bright-colored hair. Xalim once glanced at it and decided it's what's going to doom him some day. She disappeared into the halls and came back to the room bearing a bundle of cloth. When it hit him in the face, he realized it was a cloak.

While he could weave one for himself, he didn't want to risk going against the Sovereign's restrictions and announcing his presence to her. "Keep that over your head and don't move an inch from the crates until you hear our signal," Xalim had said, a hand on her hips and a determined look on her face. She wasn't the one escaping but she looked like she might have been. "We'll distract the guards from the platform. It's your job to distract the ones in the tavern."

Sounded about right. They couldn't do anything outside Synketros. The Gathering would have to witness the wildest brawl in its entire history.

As the plan formed at the back of his thoughts, he pressed himself closer to the scratchy wall of wood. Splinters poked through the threads of his cloak and tunic, tickling him in ways he didn't expect. He stood on tiptoes and stuck his head past the crate's top. Nothing happened in the space beyond. Xalim and Bertha were nowhere to be found. A nagging sentiment picked on his comfort. Maybe those two had betrayed him, leaving him waiting for something that wouldn't arrive. He shouldn't have trusted Xalim. Or when she brought in another girl without consulting him first.

Reeca's annoyed face flashed into his memory. She kept saying he worried about every little thing and refused to see good in people. Well, she also hasn't tried espionage. Every little thing deserved to be analyzed to the last detail, or else, he would risk his head. Or more. Besides, if she's as soft as she urged him to be, she wouldn't be able to do the harder things in life, such as, for one, betraying people for the sake of the goal.

Not that it's Rhys' first resort in every situation he faced. But if it came to that, he wouldn't hesitate. He couldn't. And that's why he couldn't see the golden side of people. Made it easier to turn them to their backs and stab them there.

But it didn't seem to be the case with Xalim and Bertha. They genuinely wanted to help, and the fact Rhys was still alive meant they held their tongue and honored their half of the deal. Also, he didn't come here to liberate people. He just needed more information, and for now, he collected plenty. Including the one he needed to crawl inside Cardovia.

As they're finalizing their plan, Rhys snuck a question in. "What do you know about Cardovia?" he asked.

Xalim had wrinkled her nose in response. "It's Synketros' enemy, the undoing of all it stood for," she said. "Personally, though, I think they're all about the same."

When Rhys asked how they're similar, Bertha interjected. "I keep hearing it from the senior smiths," she prefaced. "It appears Cardovia has been imitating everything Synketros do and ever did. There's even talks of a huge-scale trade of arms, much like the one the Sovereign pulled off not too long ago with the heathens in Dwanzeig."

Heathens, who apparently had been mining Dwarven metal all these years, and were now using it to gain some sad leverage against two of the strongest organizations in the island. Whether it's smart or dumb, Rhys left it to the gods to decide.

And if they're two copies of the same side of a versal, it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to assume Cardovia's people were also drugged beyond measure. At least, those unwilling and the Heiress couldn't afford to lose.

"Where do you think they're hiding?" Rhys ventured next when they managed to hammer how in Crozal's pimply face was he supposed to skitter past the maze without getting lost, cornered, or killed.

Xalim had looked up from her scrawled layout of the hideout. "Why are you so concerned about them?" she demanded. "Are you planning to go there next?"

The girl was sharp. Rhys would do well to not underestimate her. "Maybe," he conceded. "Well?"

She averted her gaze with a dissatisfied frown. Why was she keen on keeping him inside Synketros in the first place? Why, when he taught her and Bertha everything he could on how to survive without going back to being mind-controlled?

"All I know are rumors, whispers within the other workers," she chewed on her lip as she's debating whether to push Rhys to a cauldron of boiling fire or a pit of nimbas. "The most common mention is Desara. Within a border. Not sure which one."

A border and Desara? That's a lot to go on. Better than what Rhys expected.

He tightened the scarf he tied to the lower half of his face as he stalked forward, creeping past the rows of crates flanking the walls of his current path. Up ahead, less rod-light shone over the lobby's expanse, making it harder to see what lay a step ahead. At the back of his head, images of the Sovereign watching from her high seat of ultimate knowledge and laughing at him trying to be sneaky and resourceful flashed in his head. It took every drop of his willpower to flush them out.

Focus on walking. One foot in front of the other.

"I'm telling you, I saw them move this way," Xalim's urgent voice floated from a neighboring path. Her frantic footsteps matched the alarm and panic laced around her tone. She's a good actor. Rhys would need to be wary of her should they meet somewhere outside the tavern on opposite sides. "There! Oh, I see them!"

A disgruntled huff resounded from another pair of voices. The heavier thuds of their boots contrasted Xalim's nimble pattering. Those would be the guards in the lobby. "They went that way!" she screamed, louder this time. The signal.

At the last syllable out of her lips, he burst forward with his wings extended. His shoulder scratched against the crate on his way up, pushing the one atop it over the edge. Another violent crash resounded just in time for his crate to splatter to splinters to the ground. Xalim's gasp and panicked wails rode over the noise. "They're here! Oh, there's a lot!"

By the next signal, Bertha went on and shot more crates and kegs to splinters with her less-than-accurate aim with a stolen flintlock from the armory. The putrid smell of odian wafted through the air, almost making him sneeze out of turn. While the rest of Synketros' supplies crashed and burned, Rhys spread his wings once more and flapped them, using the wind to propel him forward. In the lights dimmed by Xalim, he looked like a passing laxon more than a fairy-sized intruder.

As the last of the angry wrecks behind him faded into nothing but Xalim's frenetic cries or falsity, he swung himself into the platform, yanked at the stick stuck to the wires, and started the platform's ascent. By the time a bell dinged when the platform reached the tavern's backdoor, the chaos below was the last of his worries.

The door opened. Rhys obliged Xalim's request and knocked out the two guards he had greeted a little too nicely whenever he saw them.

A betrayal of sorts.