At that, Ying suddenly shrank. “Wh-what? Why me?”

It had been noticeable before to the other two in the booth with her, but the pixiu-woman’s expression had grown nervous whenever one of the angels got nearer to their booth. Her adjusting of her headscarf got more frequent, and her fingers plucked at her own skin. Jemi, who’d only seemed to be paying half-attention, had noticed this too. After all…

“You have the best hearing out of us,” Jemi said. This was true as both Asha and Lochlan were water creatures, and Jemi was a human. A lion’s hearing was far superior. “Come on, I’ll look suspicious standing alone. We’ve been through pretty much everything at this point. Those half-birds are nothing to be scared of—how many of them did we kill together, just last week?” She flashed a grin.

…Ying had personally flown into battle alongside the Cockatrice, many, many times over. Out of the three, Ying and Jemi went way back.

“I’m not as good with stealth as I am with fighting,” Ying wrung her hands.

“I can help with that,” Lochlan mentioned. “I can put up some misting.”

The same ability that the mousy boy had once used on the jewel seller and Ennanis, back in the streets of Wataron. Lunaki misting—it worked by decreasing the attention of his enemies, thus making himself and his allies less noticeable.

Jemi smiled at him. “Thanks a lot, Nessie.” She turned back to Ying. “See, we’re a team. No matter what happens, we’ll figure out a way together. Alright?”

Ying looked back at Jemi, and swallowed a gulp. Bravely, she tugged on her headscarf one last time. “Okay,” she said, and the two got up from the booth, making their way to the back.

Lightning and thunder flashed outside, and there was a ceaseless whistling as wind squeezed itself through the seam of the door. The ruckus was enough to put anyone off, and Ying’s sensitive hearing only made her jitters worse. But Jemi gave her a reassuring smile, and so Ying did her best, breathing deeply and stretching her lion ears beneath her headscarf.

They stealthed towards their target: a group of angels standing against the far wall, opposite from the table of sparrow tiles players. Humans generally gave angels space, so in order to not look odd, Jemi and Ying tucked themselves into an adjacent nook and peeked out from there. Lochlan’s misting settled helpfully over them, warding off attention.

These angels stood in their distinctive blue uniform, gold belts wrapped around their waists. Not Graveyard soldiers, then—the ones that the two Beasts were used to fighting against at night uniformly wore grey belts. They were currently talking about their missions:

“So, what missions have you been on recently? Any interesting ones?”

“Eh… not really. Just same old border patrols between Wataron and Fenlin.”

“Huhh, you’re still there? Hasn’t it been a month already?”

“I know, right,” the angel huffed, “apparently there’s been an uptick in animal trafficking across that border or whatever, so Chief Marshal Atlas wanted more angels there… why, I haven’t a clue—no even cares about those creatures. The pay is good, at least. Some of my comrades just leave in the middle of it because it’s hard for the Brigadier to monitor those of us in the forest.”

“At least you get paid, dude,” another angel grumbled. “My mission’s to take care of children in the orphanage. Standing at a gate is heck of loads better than dealing with those insufferable kids, I promise.”

“Man, that sucks.”

“Yeah. I’m just waiting on my promotion at this point. Once I get to lieutenant rank I can choose to go on the missions dealing with criminals. I want to use Soleki to beat up thugs, not do magic tricks. With the Wing Marshal in charge now, at least, promotions should be faster.”

“Who’s the Wing Marshal now? Epimetheus?”

“Yeah, he was promoted last year. Because Atlas is on leave now, so Epimetheus is kind of the Chief Marshal in-standing.”

“Atlas is still on leave? Hasn’t it been a while?”

“Do you think something happened to him?”

“Eh. I hope Atlas stays away for as long as possible, because I love Epimetheus as Marshal. Apparently he’s a huge pushover. You can basically bribe him into doing anything. Don’t tell other angels, though, if too many people know I might not get promoted…”

“Your secret’s safe with me. Phew… that’d be such a welcome change from Atlas. You know, Atlas, he’s much too strict. He listens to too much human nitty-gritty. If he was still in the Marshal’s office, he’d probably be making us fix village buildings.”

“Right? Did some humans also stop you and ask you to fix the buildings? Good Prometheus, they’re just villagers and think they can boss us around. I really wanted to tell them to stuff it and do it themselves. No one cares that their shacks were blown away by the slightest breeze…”

There was a great deal of irrelevant conversation. But finally, they mentioned something useful:

“Yeah, speaking of Chief Marshal Atlas, does anyone remember Ennanis Zoleil?”

“Oh my god… not her. I used to be in her brigade. I had never worked so hard for a promotion—so I could get a transfer.”

“She was basically another mini-Atlas. Always wanting to do the right thing, acting all disdainful when some of us are a bit more pragmatic. She doesn’t get it, because she was born talented. She doesn’t have to get creative for promotions like we do.”

“And in the end, what a great person she was, right? Ended up in the Graveyard Division. Still don’t know what crime it was for. The greatest pity is that she didn’t just die, already. She’s a stubborn bitch to the very end, I suppose.”

“Oh, wait. Did you guys hear that the Graveyard Commander is in the undercloud now? Did any of you see her?”

“Oh, yeah, I heard she's with her old Brigade again, the 52nd.”

“You guys talking about the Graveyard Commander?” Just then, an angel from another table cut in. “I have the craziest news. She's going to the Soul Ball with the son from the Vabolt Clan. The maidservants at the noble clan I'm working at were whispering about it in the laundromat.”

“The Vabolts? Isn't that the bankrupt Clan?”

“I heard the son's a sunblood, but utterly devoid of Soleki.”

“Wait, did you say son? I thought Ennanis only slept with women?”

“Oh come on, she’s probably desperate. She was in the Graveyard every night. What woman could she have lain with? The chicken she was always fighting? Hahaha…”

“Honestly, though, I don’t believe they really fought for eight years and no one managed to kill the other. I say something was definitely happening between them.”

“You’re so funny, hahaha.”

“Hahahaha, what, are you saying that it's either the bankrupt son or a chicken for her? Ahahaha, if those were my only options I'd slit my own wrists.”

Ying gave Jemi a nervous glance, but Jemi didn't say anything. Her arms remained folded, her eyes shadowed in the lanternlight.

“Man, now I really want in on the ball so I can spot her.”

“Hey, you can go! Anyone's allowed in the Soul Ball.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, just turn up at the Royal Palace January the fifteenth. It starts at 1700 hours.”

“Oh nox, my patrol starts 1700.”

“What the hell, just skip it.”

“Hah, you're right. Where's the Palace again?”

“The capital of Wataron, obviously. Jadestone.”

“Ahhh. Yeah, it's been a while since I was in Wataron. So many places to be in, you know.”

The angels continued to talk. Meanwhile, Jemi hoisted herself off the wall, expression dark. “Let's go,” she muttered. “We got what we came for.”

~~~