Hey everyone, the three of us who write this story wanted to let you know that we will be taking a break from posting for a while.

Our current intent to refill our back log of chapters and keep the story going, but the details (like a time line) are a bit foggy. At least for now. Luckily, as of our last check, there are around fifty chapters and 156,000 words of content available for any new readers who stumble onto the site during our hiatus.

Feel free to leave comments or reach out to us even when we’re not posting. Hope to see you all soon.

The parties were dispatched. The backup was in place. The game was afoot and Miller was wrist-deep in a potted plant. 

“Three sausages,” he muttered, digging his fingers into the dirt. “Or three per person? Stupid, stupid, Atalan. They have to cook them over a fire if they don’t get them from a dirty-aproned bartender. Obviously! You’ve read about this!”

“Miller?” said a slow drawling voice.

He spun around and hid his hands behind his back. 

“What are— Oh,” he sighed, “it’s just you, Hitch. That’s good.”

“Are you alright?”

Miller shrugged and examined his fingernails, hoping the dirt made him look less like a stay-at-home-can’t-get-a- date-and-reads-magazines-about- birds loser. 

“…why?”

“Cause he’s a bird. A real-life bird! Come on Hitch, use your head.”

“Ahh. Obviously,” the stout Aketsi said. “How does killing a plant impress him?”

“Cause I need to look tough! I need to look like someone who doesn’t mind getting their hands dirty for an investigation!”

“Dirty?” his partner said, taking the time to think through each word before letting it seep out like chilled molasses from a bottle. “Why literally dirt-y?”

“Cause, Jercash, he said that, like,  they go to doctors! They go to doctors if they get dirt under their nails!”

“Who?” 

“Losers!” he said, voice running together into one breathless tumble of anxiety, “Losers who can’t get dates, and embroider their underwear, and read magazine stories about birds!”

Hitch frowned. 

“Do you embroider your underwear?”

“No!”

The Aketsi gave him a look. 

“I don’t! Actually,” he paused, eyes losing focus, “Do you think I should show Jercash my underwear? But like, casually. Sag my pants, you know. Or bend down and show that I wear what a bird wears. Wait, what underwear does a—”

“Bye Miller, have fun,” his partner said, turning around at a pace that was (for Hitch) shockingly fast.

~~~

They left the Eyrie, and Jercash set off towards where his team had gone to eat.

“Miller, what with my delicate disposition and bird-like investigative skills, I wanted to ask; why the fuck are your hands covered in dirt? You trip into a plant or some shit?”

The diviner froze. 

Whoa. Jercash had deduced the exact origin of the soil just by seeing some particulate on his hands. 

What a bird.

“Uhhh?” What was a witty comeback? Fast, he had to be fast and snappy. And laconic (magazines always made them laconic). And tough. But mostly, fast. “Why don’t you have dirt on your hands?”

Jercash smirked from under the brim of his hat and shrugged off the blatant evasion, “Sorry son, only blood.”

They walked to a nearby place that had cheap food. While the raven gathered up his unit, Miller quickly ran down the street.

He came back to see the relatively small group huddled together in a circle. Altogether there were five of them, including Jercash. He was the raven, the leader, and he commanded three crows and one diviner. All of them were travel-worn, hard-edged, and looked ready to enact abrupt, jaded, and super laconic violence at a moment’s notice. 

One of them must have spotted him because Jercash looked over his shoulder before he made it all the way down the street. 

“What you got there, Miller?”

The skinny diviner hefted the twine-wrapped bundle of wax paper. 

“There’s a good butcher down the street, so I grabbed some sausage for this sausage party.”

Everyone went silent. Then, with the sort of eerie unity you only see in people who have spent years together, they all turned to Isa, the lone woman on the team, and roared with laughter.

Kit, their diviner, caught his breath just long enough to gasp, “What do you say, Isa? You getting enough sausage in your life? Or do you need what Miller’s packing?”

“Wha—”

Oh.

That moment. That exact moment, was when Miller realized that he had fucked up.

Isa snorted before grabbing at her trousers, “I’ve got more sausage than the rest of you combined.”

Oh no.

Sausage party wasn’t about the communal eating of greasy, meat-based products in a way that (Miller assumed) tough and/or rugged people did to bond. 

No. This was a sex thing. A genitals thing.

Isa pantomimed exactly how big her sausage was, with disturbingly evocative hand motions, and Miller felt his face heat up.

How had he not realized it was a penis thing!

Luckily, Jercash stepped in. He snatched the parcel of (obviously phallic) meat products from Miller’s hands and tossed it to Kit. 

The dirty jokes continued, though Miller stayed silent. Far to mortified to even look up. 

Was there an encyclopedia of sexual innuendos somewhere? He really needed to study. So he could curse like Crammerson, and to make sure something this embarrassing never happened again. 

Actually, they would probably call that sort of encyclopedia a dick-tionary.

Heh. Nice.

While he thought, they had passed by the Eyrie, dropped off the food, and headed to the part of town where their quarry had slipped away. 

It was right on the border between where the shops became expensive and where the poor people lived. The ones who stayed out of sight, and worked the unglamorous jobs that kept the wealthy patrons of these neighborhoods in peak comfort.

The last spot they had seen the suspect was in a confluence of alleys so overhung with awnings, laundry lines, and window boxes that the muddy gutters never saw enough sun to wholly dry. 

“This guy is Spring Court, right?” Miller asked.

“Yeah,” Jercash grunted as his team slowly stopped joking and wordlessly spread out to cover all the entrances to the alley. 

“What other types of magic have you seen him use?”

“Nothing much above the level of a control exercise. Float a knife behind his back sort of thing.”

They called the other diviner over. 

Despite being an egghead like Miller, Kit was the largest and most muscular of the whole team. He deep set eyes under a heavy overhang of bone that looked like it was meant for breaking through doors. He sat right on the edge of how fit a normal person could be without magical intervention. If his hair had been a strange color, or his eyes were at all unusual, Miller would have bet money that he had paid to have his body altered.

“How have you been tracking him?” Miller asked.

“I had a marker on him. Sort of thing a circle jockey shouldn’t have been able to sense.”

“Soul’s magic?” he said, thinking of the types of magic that the Spring Court and their spell circles tended to overlook.

“Souls?”

Miller’s mouth worked on auto pilot as he tried to imagine how someone could have slipped out of such narrow confines with a team of elite trackers after them. “Old word that the researchers like. It’s the soul bond, feeling-y, ghost sorta thing.”

“Yeah,” Kit nodded, “it’s that sorta.”

“Tell me more about him.”

“Short hair, had a beard, then shaved it. No one agrees on his height or voice. Steals new clothes all the time. People say he has a weird accent. Also—”

“Yeah yeah,” Miller interrupted, “but what does his magic feel like? How does he think?”

Kit just stared at him, but Jercash jumped in.

“He’s wrong in the head. His magic is smooth. Not technical, proper spell work, but advanced. Like Aketsi food. Recipe is all sorts of queer, but it still works anyway. But then, this guy, he deals with people and there’s none of that patience. None of the canny or willpower that goes into his spells. He just fuckin’ drains ‘em like a fruit and leaves the husks. At first, he cleans up, makes a den. But the longer he stays in one place, the sloppier he gets.”

“Is he getting lazy, or is he getting preoccupied?”

The raven’s face hardened, “It’s contempt. He doesn’t give a shit about people and doesn’t think anyone will catch him.”

From where he leaned against the mouth of an alley, Dentin, a crow with a missing tooth and the innocent, ruddy face of a farmer who just stumbled into town, said, “I’ve seen the bodies. Contempts right. Sick fuck likes the power.”

Miller nodded as all the information he had on their target swirled around his mind. The Bal DuMonte texts were supposed to be an innovative way to improve healing. But mixing healing with Night Court magic tended to make people go strange. The reality-bending beliefs you needed to change a person’s body could get poisonous. To have that level of conviction that you had the right to meddle in life and death, that you fundamentally deserved to control another person’s body… when it went wrong, it went badly wrong. 

A picture of who their suspect was as a person started forming like a collage in his mind. 

Miller reached for one of those holes he had drilled through his own sanity—a tunnel into the sort of fanatical, devoted belief that sneered at reality. 

He let himself remember that all the world was one. Everyone was one. And any two added together were, in fact, one. There was a brief moment of dissonance as the model he held in his head, the psychopathic convictions of their prey, clashed with the profound emphatic unity of the universe that his spell required him to believe in. 

If he had still been in classes, the clash of two worldviews would have made him lose the spell. But Atlan Johnson Miller was not in school. He was in the streets, chasing down a criminal. 

And he was a bird. A real-life bird. 

That trumoped everything. He summoned a massive surge of magic and threw it behind his convictions. For a second, the world resisted him. His own brain resisted him. But Miller clenched his hands and unbent his spine until it felt like he was physically growing larger.  

With a final flexing of will, a synesthetic trail of colors and patterns appeared in front of him. It told the story of magic—both as it had been in this location and as it currently was.

With his senses open, he immediately felt Isa with a painful sort of intensity. By far, she had the greatest amount of raw power. Also, she was an elementalist naturally dialed into a subset of water threaded with influences of fire. Being near her felt like a mist of burning, liquid flame dewing against his skin.

Jercash was also a powerhouse. So much so that Miller thought his skin must be buzzing to contain it all. Kit on the other hand was obviously a professional tier mage. Ordered, focused, and in possession of the sort of talent that brushed aside tricks able to fool ninety percent of the magic population. But, he was also clearly the weakest of them. And the enchanted items hidden underneath his clothes stood out like a beacon to Miller’s magically enhanced sight. 

If not for the feeling of purpose flowing through him, he might have stood and stared at the infinite complexities of magic for hours. But he was on duty.

Also, for all his evil training, and unnaturally long life, their target was about as subtle as a fire in the library. Which was a real bummer.

Miller had brought his ‘A’ game out. He was ready to tear through the ether. To  do complex analysis on every strand of power until he found one that matched their target’s personality and style. 

But he probably could have followed this guy (and Miller could taste that their target considered himself to be a guy) with his ‘C’ game. Maybe even his ‘D’ game.

Amidst the jumbled impressions of power like a burning river, and disappointment with their prey, Miller made a decision. Nay, a covenant. To never utter the phrase ‘D Game’ aloud. 

Not after the sausage party incident. 

Not again.

“Got him,” Miller growled, his throat feeling thick. Almost like he had just gotten over a cold. 

But, rather than getting an answer, he heard the sound of harsh whispering and someone spitting onto the street.

“Listen,” Jercash hissed to one of his people, “it’s a reality bender thing. Crammerson said he literally isn’t able to notice; even if we talk about it. So shut your mouth, buck up, and stop freezing him up.”

“It’s fucking weird,” Gordo said. He was their artificer and was one of those people who managed to both be skinny and have a protruding gut at the same time. 

“They’re all weird.”

Miller cleared his throat, “Who’s weird?”

Kit, who had been bent over in the corner of the alley, turned to face him while wiping something off his chin, “You! You with your kape kifting.”

“My hoop hefting?”

“YOUR SHAPE SHIF— ”

Miller put a hand to his head and winced. Something about his spell must not be balanced. He was getting an absolute beast of a headache. Also, he didn’t remember his jacket feeling so tight across the chest. Even his face felt weirdly stretched out. That was one of the reasons he didn’t like divine and detect patrol. When he was on the hunt, his civilian clothes always seemed so confining and claustrophobic.

“Sorry, what? I didn’t hear the last bit.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Jercash interrupted, glaring at Kit and Gordo. “You just, ahh, you get a different look about you when you’re on a trail.”

“I do?”

“Yeah,” Jercash grunted. “Just a whisker different around the eyes.”

“I don’t know what everyone’s complaining about,” Isa said, coming up and looping her arm through his. “This is a good look on you. The—” for just a second there was whining in Miller’s ears that made it hard to tell what Isa was saying, “ — process wasn’t the best. But maybe we can talk about that sausage party idea again.”

The diviner froze.

What?

What!

“But, ahh” he swallowed, throat suddenly dry, “you’re a bird.”

She grinned up at him, “I am. And do you know what a hawk eats when it gets into a chicken coop?”

“No?”

“The biggest co—”

Jercash probably saved the skinny diviner’s life. If he hadn’t interrupted then Miller’s might have died of a heart attack right there. 

Would have been worth it though.

“Miller! Move your ass!”

He blinked, trying to think past the shock and cacophony of magic around them, “I really need to go on more dates,” he muttered to himself.

“You had better focus on finding our man,” Jercash said, ”or you’ll have a date with my boot.”

“Your boot?”

“Yeah,” the wiry man gave him a smile that was not in the slightest bit kind or reassuring. ”You’ll treat it to dinner and wine, like a gentleman. ‘Cause if you don’t start moving, we’re gonna see just how far up your ass my boot will go”

It was such a bird thing to say. So much like Crammerson that Miller found himself grinning. It helped anchor him. Made him feel a little bit more grounded amidst all the intense sensory information benign channel into his brain. 

“Not the sort of action I’m into, sir,” he said, quoting a bit of dialogue from one of his favorite Rue DeLite stories. 

A quick glance showed him that their guy had used some ugly-looking magic to jump onto the roofs. Miller nodded his head towards the exit and took the lead.

With a sharp whistle, the raven summoned their team.

“Might not be what you’re into,” the man rumbled,, ”but you go empty-eyed like that again, and it’s the kind of action I’ll be ankle-deep in, you hear me?”

Miller shook his head.

Vulgar, threatening, snappy, and coarse. 

What. A. Bird.

Which made him more sad that this mage was so easy to track. He would have paid good money to watch a team like this scour the streets for a lead. 

They walked to the far side of the building. Miller could immediately see where their target had expended an (unnecessary) amount of his energy to jump to another roof before clambering down into the street.

“Sir,” he said, as they walked (no, stupid. They were birds. They stalked) down more streets, “why is it that Isa seems shorter?”

Jercash and one of the crows looked at him.

“You really don’t know, do you?” the raven asked.

“Don’t know what?”

The bird just shook his head and readjusted his wide-brimmed hat.

“Focus on this hunt. I want to be out of this town as soon as I can.”

Miller frowned, “You don’t like Istima?”

“Whole place puts my hackles up. Nothing about it is real. And the money,” even with his senses as wide open as they were, Miller could not sense emotions. But the hatred that the man next to him exuded was so strong it almost felt like he could. “Money means more than life here. And I can’t abide by that. This whole place is just a—” the man grimaced. “It isn’t right.”

Their team paused at an intersection and looked at him expectantly. 

To him the trail was so obvious it almost hurt his eyes. Really, considering how inefficient their guy was with his power, it wasn’t a surprise he needed to eat so many people. 

Sure, the specific types of magic the criminal used had switched, which might make it hard for other Diviners. But Miller could see the transition like a single ribbon shifting colors as it unspooled. It being red before and blue now didn’t stop him from seeing one long line pointing right at their prey as he had shifted from making himself stronger to moving his flesh around to look different. Which was clever. Most people assumed that shape shifting was the sole domain of the Night Court. But there were creative ways to get almost the same result with different court’s spells. 

Even so, despite the style of magic changing, the energy still had the same tainted flavor. And it still had the same odd mixture of complex structure with poor fundamentals. To him that was an easy trail. 

Maybe if the guy had the common sense to not use magic for every little problem like a first-year who just learned telekinesis, he would be harder to track. As it was, the only reason they had paused at all was to wait for a passing line of carriages.

Once they could cross the street, there were two options. They could follow a road on the left that would eventually lead into the Side Market, or go to the right down a pretty road full of successful and pristine-looking shops. 

To the right, people paid to keep the homeless away and for trash to never sit in front of their shops more than a few hours. It was where Miller’s preferred post office was. 

But, a few hard-to-spot turns away was the Side Market. Or at least one of the locations where the multi-headed market popped up. It was the place where you found less than licit goods. The people there provided for the fancy shops, gave them discounts on rare goods, supplied them with toughs when they needed guards for their shipments, and tried to hook as many of the store’s owners on wakefulness potions as they could.

“It just isn’t right,” Jercash sighed one last time, eyeing the opulence around them. Then the wide-brimmed hat tilted upwards just enough for Miller to see the Raven’s steely gaze. “But maybe you can change my mind, Miller. Impress me with what a fancy Istima bird like you can do.”

Impress him? 

The thin diviner clenched his fists and looked across the street. The trail very clearly went to the right, down the main avenue towards the beautiful shops and perfect restaurants. But they could, hypothetically, go into the Side Market and then exit right at the other end of the main avenue. Worst case scenario, they would walk back towards the intersection until he saw the trail again.

And Miller had studied the Side Market more closely than anyone else in Istima. There were so many raids, so much dark magic, and so many reports filed by his favorite birds in the Eyrie. He and Hitch rarely came this far, but after reading all those reports, he felt like he had lived here for years. There was hardly a shady shopkeeper whose name, business, favorite color, and preferred drug he hadn’t memorized.

It would be grimy, and tougher, and more bird-like. But it would take longer.

So, the question was, what would impress a real bird-of-the-streets? Demonstrate his skills with a fast, efficient, effortless hunt through one of the most beautiful parts of the city? Or show his street savvy and expertise with a drawn-out, tiring, dangerous crawl through the underbelly of sin?

“Well,” he said, eyeing the two options, “I don’t know about impressing you. But…”

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3.01

Another first-year student would be afraid of debating the price of tutoring with someone from The Winter Court. They were more amicable than any other faction when it came to inter-court tutoring. But their motto was, ‘Second to none but nature.’ That referred to the harshness of their lessons and the scale at which their anger made itself known.

Luckily, Yam Hist of the Ken Seekers was the very spirit of tact and social grace. 

“Without rancor or exaggeration, I can say that I have seen men sell their children for less. Your ego is big enough to serve as a local landmark. No second-year student is worth that many drams unless they shit silver, and piss liquid enlightenment. Make me another offer or I say you are a buffoon and not worth my time, let alone my gold.”

He felt a tremor go through the ground as the muscles in the young woman’s jaw flexed.

“Oh, truly now? You would call me that?” she said, the smile on her bargaining face laughably stiff. 

He nodded. 

“If you said that to a pyromancer, I’d hesitate to call you anything but an imminent burn victim.” 

“Luckily,” Yam grinned, spotting the game in her words, “I’m only talking to geomancer.”

“Only a geomancer?” she said, going completely still.

“Only a geomancer,” he confirmed, folding his arms and leaning back.

His potential tutor clenched her jaw and glared. 

They were standing in a small courtyard near the entrance of her court and Yam was finding himself grateful for the thick and layered spring court clothes he wore. All the trees lining the scenic, bench-lined nook between buildings were leafless. They did live in perpetual winter after all. But the Hibernal court refused to let something as simple as a supernaturally inhospitable climate get in the way of their aesthetics. The trees were barren but still managed to be hauntingly beautiful, branches swimming through the air in cultivated sweeps and elegant lines as they searched for a non-existent pocket of warmth and sunshine.

The pause in their conversation only lasted a moment before the elementalist mastered herself and summoned her own bargaining face. 

Again, her smile was amateur. It came across as wide-eyed and feral rather than politely interested. But Yam was becoming used to how unpredictable human social cues were. 

She tilted her head to the side, disconcerting smile still on full display, “You said you wanted tutoring in control because you had difficulty moving more than a fist-sized stone?”

“Correct. Tutoring in control and general geomancy. There is rock I need to be able to move and reform on short notice.”

She stared him straight in the eye, not responding to his words. 

“… ma’am?”

Her smile widened, becoming sharp as a butcher’s cleaver and even less forgiving, “First lesson then. A Winter Court classic.”

“We haven’t agreed on a cost.”

“Oh, this one’s for free.”

~~~

Two days before, Yam had left the meal with his roommate and found that a double dose of the wakefulness potion was potent.

Phenomenally, euphorically, manically potent.

The seller had given him several small containers. A glass bottles barely the height of his thumb. All filled with an unappealingly thick liquid and kept shut with small corks. He was advised that the doses were for large humans and that half a vial would be more than enough for him. 

But he had also heard the wakefulness pills would keep him awake better than any black tea could. 

Two full vials later, his bones held the same impossibly fast rattle that he had felt as a child when he would run alongside a fence dragging a stick down the slats. Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat. Going so fast his teeth seemed to buzz like a bee’s hive.

In some ways, his fervor had been enlightening. Yam felt like he was able to do anything. He was invulnerable, unstoppable, already a god, and seconds away from learning how to fly. 

Obviously, he had realized in a burst of inspiration, when a master craftsman took an apprentice they made them do hundreds of thousands of repetitions. They did not just read about how to weave, sew, or hammer metal. They did.

The way to be able to do something, was to start doing it. 

And Yam’s focus was unstoppable. He hardly had to think of a task before he found his body moving to do it.

If he had any idea how to make a familiar bond, then he would have run to the Understacks at that exact moment. With the amount of energy in him, he knew in his heart that he would have opened that whole doorway to the Flesh Ants in a single surge of magic. 

Unfortunately, he didn’t know how to make familiar bonds so he could start doing like a craftsman’s apprentice. And he couldn’t still the thunderstorm in his veins long enough to sit through a book on the topic. 

Instead, he cleaned and oiled the leather of his belt, sharpened his remaining knife, ran out into the moonlight to scrub all of his clothes in a fountain, and practiced control exercises ceaselessly. 

The control exercises were what gave him the idea. Yam had seen a  stubby building with stacks of crates piled against the wall. Immediately, he wondered if his work with Coach Combs had made him strong enough to climb to the roof. So he tried it. He had also picked up a foreign coin off the ground and known immediately he should practice control exercises. So he had. 

Doing both at the same time had been difficult, but he was unstoppable. 

Which resulted in him sitting with his legs dangling over the edge of a roof, fingers scratched and bloody, clothes still wet from washing, and using Autumn Court gravity manipulation so the coin would be lighter and easier to move with his geomancy. 

Then The Idea hit him like a horse’s hoof to the stomach. 

There were dozens of ways to levitate a coin. Hundreds of combinations of different court’s styles. That was the truth of control exercises. And realizing every combination he would need to master— it was so daunting that he actually cried. Right there on the roof, moons shining silver on his damp fur, he wept.

That was the truth about magic too, he realized. Like layering tissue paper until the overlap in the middle became dark and impossible to see through. That shape in the middle was reality. All these ‘natural laws’ falling unevenly, one over the other, until each individual factor had overlapped to make the shape of the world. 

The overwhelming massiveness of it bowled him over. The thought of confronting such immensity on his quest for godhood made his heartbeat so fast that he briefly thought he might be dying. Short of breath, chest aching, and dark thoughts whispered to him about his age, about how he couldn’t possibly master so many thousands of combinations, and about how his weak body would give up while he was still friendless and sleeping in a cave. 

It overwhelmed him. 

Until he leaped to his feet and started laughing so hard that the tears came even more heavily.

Because the truth about control exercises not only showed him his failure but the way forward. It gave him The Idea.

He could strain with all his might to fight directly against the shape of reality. Or, he could use the hundreds of spells, the thousands of combinations and the five types of magic to nudge all those different factors. To shift a few pieces of tissue paper and make the opaque shape in the middle of the pile one where what he wanted was easier: where god-like feats were almost natural. 

The key was to not tie himself to one approach.

Why just lift a boulder with nothing but telekinesis and raw power? He could reduce gravity to make it lighter, harden the air below it so it was rolled up a shallow incline, bend space so an inch of the movement shifted it a mile, and automate it all with mind magic. 

It would take a fraction of the power, and he would only need to be a passable novice at any of those skills, instead of being twenty years into the single-minded development of his telekinesis. 

That was the solution to the Flesh Ants. To familiars. To how he would become Aehp.

Under the effects of the potion, his confidence was as boundless as his energy. Mastering all of those disciplines was easily within his grasp.

The first step filled his focus like it was the only thing in the world: Flesh Ants. They would be his. The coin fell forgotten as he sprinted for the crates he would need to clamber down. It never occurred to him to look at the steep fall next to him as he skittered across the rooftop made slick by dirt and dust.

He would be, and with the potion still buzzing inside his skin he felt like he already was, Aehp the Eclectic Beast Lord. And obviously, Aehp was going to know every single way to make himself familiar. 

That was how he would learn the divine truth; how he would see all the ways of lifting a coin. One at a time put down a new piece of tissue paper and see the overlap. In this case, each piece of paper was a different approach to making a familiar. He would look at similarities and outcomes until he figured out the truest, most powerful, familiar spell there could be. All he had to do was find the best parts of each court’s magic, throw away the dumb pieces, and focus on the parts that were showed up repeatedly.

With that goal in mind, everything until the next morning descended into a single continuous blur of activity.

He woke up back in the underground cavern of his dorm, even though he had sworn not to go down there until he knew how to lock the entrance. The young mage found himself surrounded by nearly seven drams worth of paper covered in frantically written notes. Very few of them made sense. 

But, aside from learning that he really did only need half a vial of potion, he took one other important lesson from the experience. 

He was not going to let the Flesh Ants win. And he could not afford to wait and read until a teacher told him how. The time to learn by doing was now. If he waited until he was prepared, until someone cared about his tragic backstory and tears, then he would wait until he was dead.

~~~

Two days later, and after nearly an hour of silent meditation and harmonic resonance, Yam was able to recover from his first flailing attempt at geomancy. At least well enough for him to bend space again. 

 The ground of the Winter Court had slid almost up to his waist. Or more accurately, the geomancer had made the ground open up so that he fell and was swallowed up by it.

It was a particularly harsh first lesson made all the worse by how cold the Winter Court was, and how the stone leached away his body’s heat. 

Either way, the now solid-stone had constricted the opening of his money pouch and pressed it both wide and flat against his side, like a disapproving mouth. With the lightest spatial manipulation, he was able to increase the distance between the two lips until his fingers could slip inside. 

Ideally, he would have pulled out the small, stiff leather tube where he stored the gold shavings; the change he used when his sticks of gold were just a little too heavy or too light for whatever he was purchasing. 

However, the width of the spatially-altered opening precluded him from pulling out something so wide, and he was forced to bring a small finger of gold rather than the shavings. 

It would do. 

“Excuse me, excuse me sir!” he called out to a nearby student. A boy who was taller than he was short, more blond than he was brunette, and very loud. 

Solitarily, and without equivocation, loud.

The student was speaking animatedly to a young woman who seemed politely disinterested in what he had to say. When Yam called, she interrupted to point out the young Len hailing them.

Though Yam could not hear what the boy said, he could swear he saw the student’s mouth from the words, ‘can’t be talking to us’.

“No!” he yelled, ”I am very much am talking to you!”

The young man turned his back and tried to continue speaking with the young lady.

”YOU! You the human mage who gives off the energy of an earth elementalist! I am YELLING at YOU!”

The boy hunched his shoulders and gave a very insincere laugh to his conversation partner.

“Young miss! Ma’am! I will give you gold,” he waved his money and spoke very loudly and very slowly, “if you, yes you, bring the earth elementalist over here. Right! Over! Here!”

The pointing and arm waving seemed to do the trick. She excused herself. The elementalist started to follow before she blocked him with a hand and left at a very determined pace. 

“Now that you are unoccupied!” he continued shouting, ”Could you—”

“I can hear you!” the student yelled, scowling ferociously, “what is so important?”

“Well, my…” Yam almost said ‘good sir’, but he was not yet desperate enough to speak a falsehood, “my young and aggravated earth elementalist, as you can see, I am stuck. Would you help me?”

Before Yam could begin implementing any of the four B’s (barter, batter, bribe, or berate) the earth mage stomped his foot, and Yam was launched to his feet. 

Where he immediately fell and, after the minimal justified amount of swearing, began massaging blood back into his legs.

“Ahh,” the boy winced, his posture less stiff than when he had been talking to the young woman, “I’m sorry. Should have remembered. You alright?”

“I am deeply uncomfortable, attempting to be angry, but also overwhelmingly glad that I did not die of dehydration.”

“Dehydration? No, the stone would have reasserted itself. Permanent changes are hard.”

“Yes, I had deduced as much?’

“Deduced?”

The young Len nodded, ”Originally I was buried to my ribs.”

The boy winced, “I know the feeling.”

“You do?”

“Of course. This is the Winter Court.”

“I don’t understand.”

The other student shrugged and came to his feet, “I’m sure you will. But I’m afraid that I really need to be—”

“Please,” Yam said, forgetting his stiff legs as an idea took hold of him, “I owe you a drink.”

The earth elementalist paused, “A drink?” 

“Yes, and a conversation.”

“Ohhh. Yes. About that—”

“Two drinks, I meant to say.”

“Well!” said the elementalist, with the exact same forced laugh he had used on the woman, ”Like I was saying, my most fecund and furry friend, I’m famished and really need to find a place to feast!”

“Of course,” Yam nodded, as the student laughed at his own alliteration, “I know of a nearby tavern. Would you like to join me?”

“Most assuredly!”

“And what was your name? I’m not sure I caught it,” he said, managing to avoid choking on the barbarian’s introductions, even though it made him feel like a child still learning their letters. 

“I’m Neal!” The elementalist said, throwing an arm around Yam’s shoulders and steering him towards the center of Istima. “And you’ll have to tell me about how you ended up chest-deep in the literal court of the Winter Court. Ha! I’m sure it’ll make a great story.”

“Well, it happened like this—”

“Wait, friend. I hate to be rude, but perhaps this story is best saved for when we have drinks in hand and food on the way?”

“You are quite persistent about your compensation,” the young Len nodded, face serious, “I respect that.”

“Exactly right! That’s what they say, ‘Neal is all about wine, women, and wanton acts of wizardry’ they say,“ the elementalist threw his head back and barked out a short, strong laugh. 

“Yes,” Yam said, surprised that his smile at the barbarian equivalent of humor was more genuine than not, “I have heard a person say that. Quite recently too.”

“Oh really. Was the person me?”

“Yes.”

Neal clapped him on the back and laughed again, “Very nice! I’m sure we’re going to be fast friends. You said the first three rounds were on you, right?”

Yam nodded and found himself oddly touched. Honestly, he had thought the man too dumb to notice the small game in his words. He certainly hadn’t expected him to immediately call it out without any attempt at subtlety or tact. Combined with how bold-faced he was about up-selling him on the drinks and Yam was finding himself to be pleasantly surprised. 

Not quite Len, but better than most humans.

Also, it would be a lie to say he hadn’t noticed that this boy’s magical presence was substantial. From his limited understanding of this court’s hierarchical system, that could mean that Neal was rather highly placed. Perhaps highly placed enough to know about how the Hibernal Court bound their familiars? 

No matter what, the potential knowledge he could gain from an amicable geomancer was great.

All he had to do was play it cool. Summon the good old bargaining face, use his impeccable knowledge of human norms, and turn up the charm. 

Poor barbarian didn’t stand a chance.

Last Chapter                                                                                                          Next Chapter

~~~

Happy memorial day weekend, and thank you to all of those who served. Sincerely.

Here is a bonus interlude to celebrate them and because so many of you (like three people) seemed to love (have feelings slightly better than ambivalence towards) Miller. He will have a short run and a mini arc. We have a default release schedule in mind but let us know your preference. Or just leave comments in general, it really helps.

Speaking of; going to TopWebFiction and voting every week, or as often as you’re able, also helps a huge amount. If you would like to keep us in the weekly rankings them follow this link and click ‘boost’.

~~~

Atlan Jonson Miller was greeted at the entrance of the Istima Eyrie by a different person than usual. 

A quick glance showed an apprentice bird’s badge. One that sported a single feather design compared to the two on Miller’s. 

“Excuse me,” the sparrow said, trying very hard to throw his chest forward and seem alert, “are you Specialist Miller?”

He stared at the recruit and frowned. 

“Sir?”

His frown grew deeper. 

“Uhh, I’m sorry…”

“Don’t apologize,” Miller snapped, taking in the perfectly ironed shirt and total lack of grime under the boy’s fingernails.“Not right,” he muttered, “not right at all.”

The boy tried to interrupt, but Miller clamped a hand over the other man’s mouth. He leaned in close. 

“Shhhhhh,” he whispered, putting a finger to his lips.

The sparrow’s eyes went very wide.

Still muttering to himself, he guided them out into the street. Once outside, he threw a handful of dirt onto the sparrow’s perfectly shined shoes, snatched a pipe from a passerby, and forced it into the new bird’s hands.  

“Sir, I don’t smo—”

“Stop,” Miller ordered, rubbing his chin and evaluating the boy with a critical eye. “Stop saying ‘sir’. You’re supposed to be a bird. A hard-boiled, gruff, bird-of-the-streets.”

“Gruff?”

“Gruff,” Miller nodded. After a few more seconds, he took the pipe out of the sparrow’s hand and returned it to the irate man he had borrowed it from. 

“Roll up your sleeves and ruffle your hair,” he ordered. 

“Oh. Well, I mean, is this part of—”

Miller didn’t respond. He didn’t even blink until the sparrow had complied. 

But even then something was missing. He grabbed the boy again and dragged him back inside to the front desk of the eyrie’s lobby. 

“Howdy there, Atlan,” said the attendant. 

“Morning, Delores. Can I grab a jar of ink?”

“Will I be getting it back?”

“Yes.”

“Will most of the ink be in the jar when I get it back this time?”

“Yes.”

The older woman shrugged and gave him a stoppered jar with a faint smile. 

Miller immediately took the cork out and got a drop of ink on the index finger. He grabbed the straight-laced sparrow (even thinking those words made his stomach clench) and carefully flicked his finger until there was a fine smattering of ink on the recruit’s hand. 

“Hmmm,” Miller said, rubbing his chin. “Tomorrow, you will come in with stubble and red eyes. Understood?

“Si—”

“You may call me Miller, Hoss, Boss Man, or an expletive. Understood?”

“… yes?”

“Good. Let’s try again.”

Without waiting for a response, the diviner grabbed his bag and walked more than three minutes down the street so he could re-enter the eyrie like he did every morning. 

Atlan Jonson Miller was greeted at the entrance by a different person than usual. 

A quick glance showed a bird’s badge. There was no stylized icon to declare him as being in leadership or in a specialized branch like the owl on Miller’s did. The boy’s badge only showed a single feather compared to Miller’s four: so a sparrow. 

“Excuse me,” said the sparrow, a hefty lad with once nice clothes that had been ruffled by hard work and a long night writing reports, “are you Miller? The diviner?”

Miller sighed. The sparrow looked like a bird from one of the publications. “Yes,” he smiled. ”Yes, I am. You’re here to take me to the locker rooms?”

“I’m supposed to ask if you know the way there.”

“I’m fine today. But come with me anyway. I’ve got some pointers for you.”

“Really, sir?”

Miller frowned, his fingers twitching, “Don’t ever call me sir unless you’re being sarcastic.”

“Ah, yes. Of course.”

~~~

“But,” Mordakai, the brand new sparrow, said from where he sat on the changing room’s bench, “how does one grunt laconically?”

“That’s the million-dram question, isn’t it?”

Everyone had cleared out of the locker room pretty quickly after they entered. Which had given Miller plenty of time to start teaching Mordakai the important parts of being a bird. 

He, like Miller himself, was at an immediate disadvantage just based on looks. 

Miller was thin with boring hair. But not whipcord-thin or made-of-rawhide-thin. He was just reedy like someone who forgot to eat. The kind of thin that required suspenders because his body was naught but flat planes and provided nothing that a belt could catch on to stop his trousers from falling. 

Mordakai was suffering from the exact opposite issue. He had a surplus of curves and an unfortunately acute eye for fashion. Which made him look altogether too soft and well put together. 

A bird could be thin if it was hard-bitten and hiding the strength needed to sock a bad guy right in the jaw. And they could be fat, but only the kind of deceptive, ruddy-faced fat that hid the muscles needed to kick down a door or, better yet, sock a bad guy in the kisser. 

Sadly, neither of their bodies projected the requisite face-punching potential. 

But Mordakai would get there. He just needed a little help.

“One more time,” the diviner said, ”how will you be greeting Specialist Miller tomorrow?”

Mordakai stood so he could lean one shoulder against the wall and tapped a foot impatiently. “Miller,” the boy grunted before giving a tiny and reluctant tip of the head. “Can you make it to the lockers yourself, or do you need someone to hold your hand?”

“Yes,” the diviner whispered, eyes sparkling, “yessssssss. Now all you need to do is—”

Still frowning, Mordakai snorted through his nose and spit to the side, eyes fixed balefully on the imaginary Miller. 

“Perfect!”

“Really?” the boy beamed.

“……”

“I mean,” Mordakai quickly slouched back against the lockers, “blow it out your ear.”

“Blow it out your ear, what?”

“Blow it out your ear, sir,” he sneered.

The reedy diviner shook his head and snorted. That was just, like, such a hard-bitten bird thing to do. 

“Today really is a good day,” he said to himself, a smile warming his face even as he opened up his locker.

“Yeah?”

“Of course! Today is uniform day.”

“Like uniform inspections?”

“No. I’m not on divine and detect patrols today. So, I get to wear my uniform.”

Mordakai peeked over his shoulder as he started pulling out the well-polished shoes, a fine leather belt, and an undershirt.

“Do you have to—”

“Shush. This is the second-best part of the day.”

“Putting on your uniform?”

Miller didn’t say anything. Instead, he held up the trappings of a bird, a real-life bird, and felt something hot and fierce stir inside of himself. 

This was the uniform of a hero. This was the uniform of an Istima Bird. Rue Delite, one of his favorite birds from the publications, was written for the panels in a small-time newspaper’s illustration section every Saturday. Rue wished he came from an eyrie that was well funded enough to have a uniform. By now, Rue would already be walking the streets, chasing leads, and hunting dark mages. All so he could protect the world. And also so he would have enough money to replace his father’s failing pancreas. And to support his twin brother who had quit the League of Evil and was struggling with the curse they laid on him. And to pay for his dates with the local journalist. And to pay for his dates with the eyrie’s secretary. And really to pay for a lot of the other dates that he went on in the course of his investigations. It was his go-to information-gathering tactic.

Come to think of it, did Miller go on enough dates? He felt like birds were supposed to have grim attractions with dangerous women or beguiling men. Maybe he should go on a date? 

No. Stupid. He definitely needed to start dating. Someone who would ask him what he had been working on during all hours of the night with tears in their eyes. Then they could have a screaming match that resolved itself when an ominously bubbling potion was thrown through their window at the worst possible moment. That’s what real birds did.

And Miller was going to be a real bird if it killed him. 

Still holding up his uniform, he felt determination seize his heart. 

Atlan Johnson Miller was a screwup. He was a former Night Court student who had studied for a few years and jumped ship as soon as he thought he could try out for his dream job. He was a reed-thin, boring-haired, uninteresting shut-in who read too much. 

Specialist Diviner Miller was a bird. A real-life bird. 

Specialist Diviner Miller popped his neck to the side in a satisfying cascade of meaty cracks. 

Maybe it was his imagination, but he could swear he felt the pops travel down the entire length of his spine as a burning ultrabright sense of determination filled his skull— one so intense it was almost exactly like magic.

“Holy shit,” Mordakai gasped, his voice sounding oddly far away. ”Are you okay? What’s happened to your back…”

In a series of forceful motions, the diviner pulled his uniform on. The over-large shirt and pants bagging around his weak body.

But as the weight of fabric and responsibility settled over him, he felt that inner fire intensify.

He would be a real bird, no matter what the cost. He would not disgrace his uniform while he drew breath. 

Despite having just shaved, stubble rasped against the collar of his jacket, and as he cinched his belt, he felt like he was growing taller. Like his shoulders were filling out his uniform. Like his skin was writhing to settle on a new frame. The hard-boiled, grim-jawed, brooding-eyed frame of a bird.

He would not disgrace his uniform.

And suddenly Miller found himself fastening the last button and tugging his perfectly tailored jacket into place. He put his civilian shoes into the locker. They felt oddly small in his hands. Then he turned to Mordakai.

“Wha— hurp,” the sparrow gagged, “what happened to your body —”

 Miller blinked and found himself several steps further from his locker than he remembered. 

“What?” he rasped, throat clicking as the deeper and grittier voice of a bird issued from it.

Mordakai’s eyes went horribly wide, and his face paled. He raised a finger and pointed to the diviner. But, before he could speak, his eyes went dim and fluttery. Miller moved with the strength and surety of a bird, covering the distance between them in a few long-legged strides. He made it just in time to guide Mordakai to the ground as he fainted. 

“Don’t worry, pal,” he said, “I fainted my first day too. Same for most sparrows that I’ve seen.” He patted the unconscious apprentice’s shoulder and chuckled. “It’s just something about these locker rooms, about realizing that you’re going to walk into an eyrie full of birds. Burn me if every new recruit I’ve seen in these changing rooms hasn’t puked or fainted at least once.”

~~~

He escorted the pale-faced apprentice to a clump of birds that were waiting for them outside of the changing room. 

They took one look at the boy, and Al, a recently promoted crow, called out, “Puke or faint?”

“Faint,” Miller said with a grin. 

Half the crows started cursing violently while the other half whooped with joy and rushed forward to smack Mordakai on the back. 

“Good work Miller! You just won me five drams,” Al called.

“I didn’t do anything. Just caught him when he fell.”

Millie ‘The Machine’ yelled something rude about his body, but Miller couldn’t hear it over a sudden, inexplicable ringing in his ears. He checked one last time on Mordakai, who was too embarrassed to meet his eyes. Then he left the apprentice to the friendly ribbing of his new brothers and sisters in arms.

He kept his eyes on the ground so he wouldn’t get distracted by the eyrie and made his way to the first-best part of his day. A one-on-one meeting with his hawk. Not even a raven in charge of a team of crows or a heron. A full-on hawk of the Istima eyrie. 

He knocked on the man’s office door and was immediately called in. 

“What’s all the noise about?” said Crammerson.

His superior looked like what Mordakai should aspire to become. His hair was shorn short and steely gray. The man himself looked like he was made out of blunt-edged rectangles covered in a thin layer of clay. His forearms were so thick that he barely possessed visible wrists, and his stomach bulged out like a retired heavyweight boxer who had covered his muscles rather than losing them. He projected a constant air of annoyance and stubbornness that was complemented by blunt fingered hands, a neck wider than his head, and tiny eyes hidden under a heavy brow.  

Back in the day, they had called him the ‘Bloody Barber.’ And every once in a while, a contract would come out that required heavy-duty magic. When you needed the sky to open and a tangled knot of intrigue, criminal alliance, and dark magics to be cut out wholesale, the Bloody Barber would take wing from his office and answer the call. 

Miller had also found out, with some off-the-books extracurricular investigation, that Crammerson had a vegetarian husband, was something of a gourmet, and even with all his culinary exploits, the Bloody Barber was still the best in his recreational bowling league.

The diviner was thus, understandably, star-struck. The man could do anything.

“Oh, ahh,“ he said, still feeling a bit overwhelmed, ”well, the new sparrow passed out in the locker room.”

Crammerson frowned, “Did they have the new kid escort you in?”

“Yes?”

“Dammit! I told them to stop using your shape—”

Miller found himself sitting in front of Crammerson’s sprawling and chaotic desk without any memory of moving there, his ears once again ringing slightly. 

“I’m sorry, say again, sir?”

His hawk muttered something under his breath, but rather than respond, he waved the whole thing aside.

“Forget about it. You and I need to talk, again, about when a diviner should instigate a capture. So, Miller, tell me, do you know when a diviner risks confrontation?”

“When the honor of the eyrie demands it, sir!”

The muscles in Crammerson’s jaw clenched, “No, Miller. The answer is maybe, maybe, twice. Twice in their entire lives. Twice,” he said, voice rising into a tooth rattling bellow, “IN THEIR GOAT-GROPING, MOTHERF—”

Crammerson proceeded to describe things to Miller that would have given a healer night terrors. The sorts of things that involved sexually transmitted diseases you could only catch by carnally pounding a termite colony. He waxed poetic about death by office equipment and stupidity so profound that it may cause contagious illiteracy. 

Just like in the publications. 

In prose fit to traumatize a full-grown man, his hawk described sexual acts so explicit they would require alchemical lubricants, a complex series of pully’s, months of cardio training, and a crack team of priests willing to cover what was left of your body in salt, sage, and fire. 

Miller smiled the whole time and nodded eagerly. He took notes in his mind so that one day he might revisit and dissect the virtuoso display of profanity. 

Because, by all reasonable measures, putting that combination of words together should have just been a jumble of vaguely offensive sounds, not even proper language. But somehow, through sublime artistry, not only did Miller understand each sentence, he had a painfully clear mental image of what they described. That and a visceral understanding of just how weak his moral character must be for him to be capable of picturing such a scene. 

Crammerson really could do anything. What a man. What a bird. 

In a sudden crescendo of obscenity, his hawk slammed a fist on his desk, and Miller couldn’t help it; he leaped to his feet and started applauding. 

Crammerson stared at him, face red and veins popping. 

“Sir,” Miller said, mouth open and eyes wide, “thank you. I am honored. Just hearing that…” he shook his head. “I feel unclean. I feel like canceling my holiday plans, so my mother doesn’t have to look at me. I feel… I feel— Wow.” 

“Miller,” Crammerson growled, his voice dangerously soft, “would you happen to also feel repentant?”

“About being born?”

“ABOUT STARTING A FIGHT WITH STREET TOUGHS!”

The diviner put a hand to his ringing ears and smiled. What. A. Bird.

“I’m sorry, what?”

Crammerson deflated and fell into his seat. 

“You didn’t hear a word I just said.”

“I engraved each and every one of them into the vaults of my mind.”

Blink.

“Sir.”

Blink.

“Engraved?”

“Chiseled.”

“Of course. Tell me then, having chiseled, (‘chiseled,’ Miller whispered, clenching his fist) my words into your heart; are you going to do anything differently?” 

“Yes, sir! I’m doubling down. I’ll listen to more caravan guards. I’ll take notes on locker room talk and interview a courtesan so I can expand my cursing vocabulary. Also, I’ve started a new initiative in my training as a bird: I’m going to try to go on dates. Lots of them!

That way, someone will be waiting while I work deep into the grim hours of the night. And we can argue about how important my work is and if I’m taking care of myself. It. Will. Be. Fraught. And it will be dramatic. There will be multiple pauses with me staring out the window and plenty of desolate silences. Just like a real bird-of-the-streets.”

Blink.

Crammerson put two blunt fingers on the side of his massive neck and glanced at the Summer Court timepiece hanging on his wall. 

Miller waited in silence until the hawk spoke. 

“Now, I’m going to speak very calmly and very clearly. There will be no obscenity. I will neither bark commands at you nor tell you to extend a full measure of effort towards getting your SHIT TOGETHER!”

Crammerson closed his eyes and breathed deeply, fingers still pressed against the big vein in his neck, “I’m sorry. That was unprofessional. And this is purely professional. No drama at all. Just simple management of an employee. So, please, please listen closely.”

The diviner nodded his head eagerly.

“Good. Delightful. Wonderful, “Crammerson said, looking at the ceiling and taking a deep breath, ”Miller, you’re an owl, correct?”

“I prefer Specialist Diviner.” 

The grey-haired man just stared at him, so Miller took it as an invitation to continue. 

“I accept that slang is important. Very hard-bitten. Very streetwise. Very bird-like. I get it; I really do. But there’s this thing with thematic nomenclature schemes. You see, if A equals B and A equals C, then A isn’t effective in differentiating B and C. You can also think of it as a graph. The vertical axis is rank, like hawk, and the horizontal is specialization, like owl—”

~~~ 

They summoned Hitch into the office and tried again. 

“Miller,” the hawk said, “you are a specialist diviner, correct?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Now tell me, when has a diviner last executed a capture?”

“Oh wow, boss,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “That’s a big question. Do you want me to answer by year, region, or eyrie?”

Hitch raised a hand, and Crammerson nodded to him, jaw clenched shut. 

“Miller,” his partner said, speaking with the boundless deliberation of an Aketsi and his own slow drawling pace, “what’s the difference between crows and owls? Generally.”

“I really prefer specialist diviner.”

Crammer’s eye started to twitch.

“That debate,” his partner said, “is too long.”

“No, no. I’ve been thinking about it, and I think the crux of the issue is really—”

Before he could continue, Hitch lifted a finger, “Remember,” the Akestsi said, “a hawk is watching.”

“Damn it, you’re right!” With a conscious effort, Miller gathered himself back up. He made sure that he was slouching in his seat and put a hard-boiled scowl on his face— a hard-boiled bird scowl. 

In the publications, birds were always sparse with words when talking to their superiors. A real streetwise bird wanted to be pounding the cobbles, feeling the pulse of the town, and working over a suspect, not explaining their methods.

“Diviners, they’re the eggheads, amiright?” he said, using some hip new slang he had heard on patrol. ”And crows, they’re the muscle.”

Hitch nodded, “You’re an egg head. Correct?”

Birds, he reminded himself, did not frown petulantly, “I’m a bird.”

“A bird who is a specialist diviner. And a specialist diviner is an egghead. Correct?”

Miller’s only response was to scowl. 

Crammerson jumped in, “Crows capture dark mages. And even crows prefer to go in with a plan and research. Or with potions. Or with backup. Or with any actual combat training at all. Owls,” he continued, “are the ones who give crows the information they need so they do not die horrible deaths.”

“I’m not afraid of dying in the line of duty.”

“Yes!” Crammerson said, smacking his hand against the desk, “Exactly! That is exactly the problem.” He turned to Hitch, “Are you afraid of dying on a capture?”

Hitch barely paused at all, which for him meant he waited until a slow count of three before responding, “Yes.”

“Good. That’s reasonable. That’s downright prudent. But how often, when you’ve been with Miller, have you been able to calmly approach a target after doing the proper planning and preparation?”

“Not,” Hitch drawled, “very often.”

“I don’t see what the issue is,” Miller said. “Magic gets abused. Birds see the abuse. Birds stop the abuse, and then there’s less abuse.”

“Diviners see abuse,” Crammerson said. “Crows stop abuse, and then birds get paid because there’s less abuse. Do you know how much money we made on your street toughs?”

“Just desserts are the only payment—”

“Shut your mouth, you mud-munching illiterate son of a snaggle-toothed sheep fucker!” Crammeson roared, jumping to his feet and jabbing a finger at Miller. ”We need money! Holding your panty-waist, useless captures lost us money! Not to mention, you are the only person on divine and detect patrols who needs a crow assigned to them. Do you know why?”

Miller opened his mouth, but the light around Crammerson literally warped under the weight of his anger. Which hinted to the diviner’s well-honed and delicate magical sensibilities that interrupting the Bloody Barber at that particular moment was, perhaps, not the best idea. 

“Because,“ his superior growled, “the others spend their time divining and detecting. Then they spend their time reporting and going the fuck home. Not dicking around with half-assed pickpockets that wouldn’t be worth the guards time, let alone a vulture’s. 

So, here’s the deal, Miller. We have a raid and can’t spare you a babysitter. If you didn’t have the spells you do, I would shove a steel wool brush so far up your ass it’d get caught in your teeth. Then I’d grab you by the throat and use it to scrub off the Cage’s floor. Instead, you’re going to help someone. Their diviner will be in charge, and you will follow. Every. Single. Order.” 

There was a faint rattling conducted through the wood of Miller’s chair and straight into his eye sockets a the smallest hint of the Bloody Barber’s magic slipped past his control, ”You will learn from them,” Crammerson continued, ”and if I hear a word about you running off halfcocked, then I’ll find you a job with a horse breeder who needs a fluffer. Am I clear?

There was a lump in his throat, and Miller had to swallow several times before he was able to answer, “Yes, sir. Crystal clear.”

“Good. Jercash!” his hawk roared. “Get in here!”

The foreign raven walked in and said… something. Miller didn’t pick it up. He was too distracted.

Jercash looked like he had fallen out of the news sheets. He was thin like Miller wanted to be thin. The kind made of whipcord and sharp angles. The hollows under his cheeks complemented the shadows cast by his wide-brimmed hat. 

The man slouched into the office, a bare trace of magic wafting off of him. He wore loose civilian clothes, just wrinkled enough to seem like a working man’s outfit, and his skin was red from exposure to wind and sun.

Miller would bet money that he socked street toughs right in the kisser. But, like, on a regular basis. He probably called them pal and grumbled one-liners while shaking off his fist afterward. In fact, he probably did it often enough that he had to hide the bandages from his significant other(s). 

Yeah, Jercash was the real deal. He was a bird’s bird.

“Miller!” Crammerson yelled. “Focus!”

The diviner jumped to his feet and saluted, the lines of his arm so sharp they could have been used to cut fruit, or cheese, or maybe bread. Point was, he had a picnic’s worth of sharpness in the gesture. 

Bet you that Jercash’s salute was laconic and sloppy. 

At the thought, Miller collapsed into his chair and tried to keep his face from twisting in shame. How could he be so stupid! 

Now everyone was looking at him. Crammerson closed his eyes and sighed. Hitch considered for several seconds before electing to frown and tilt his head in confusion. Jercash, for his part, darted a glance at Crammerson and smirked at the man’s ire. 

“Miller,” the gray-haired hawk finally said, “I need you to kindly leave my office. I find myself disturbingly sympathetic to the plight of spree killers at the moment. And I have no desire to see how many people I could kill by mounting you on a coat tree and using your skull as a bludgeoning weapon in what, I absolutely assure you, would be the most prolific murder-rampage this city has ever seen.”

“Bigger than the Night of Screams?”

“Significantly.”

“Bigger than the Elementalist who got turned into a chimera?”

“By an order of magnitude.”

“Wow,” Miller said. 

What a bird. The Bloody Barber really could do anything.

“Are we clear?” growled his superior.

“Perfectly, sir. No coat trees in the office. Understood.”

Jercash let out a harsh-sounding laug. He clapped Miller on his shoulder and guided him to his feet. 

“Come on. Can you still recognize the signature of that life stealer?”

“The one who tried to hide a body in a wall?” he said as they exited Cramerson’s office.

“That’s the one.”

“Yeah, I mean, it’s real generic; everyone who finds the Bal DuMonte forbidden texts figures out pretty much the same thing. But that won’t be a problem.”

The raven’s eyes flashed, “Bal DuMoney what?”

Miller shrugged, “It’s an older healers’ text that talked about merging Night and Autumn Court magic. Effective, from what I know, but the method was forbidden.”

“Why?”

“The White Rose Plague.”

“What about it?”

Miller tried not to frown, “The Breath Stealer Cabal?”

The raven blinked at him. 

“It was about two hundred years ago. Everyone was dying, no one wanted to die, and enough hedge mages came together that they were able to crack two healing techniques that only the magic academies should have been able to teach.”

“Ahh,” Jercash said, nodding his head even as his eyes habitually scanned the halls around them for threats. “The two mixed and turned into dark magic.”

“Very dark magic. One that left bodies with similar signs of death as the White Rose Plague.”

“Which just so happened to be the plague they were in at the time.”

“Exactly,” Miller said, “they stayed secret for longer than most cabals do and were real trouble when the birds found them.”

“And you know all of this just from looking at the scene?”

“Of course,” Miller said carefully, not mentioning that Grim Noir, Rue Delite, and Mori Ennui had all stomped out long-hidden remnants of that cabal in their stories. It was one of the most common tropes in popular fiction. And, back when he had access to the school’s libraries, he had spent a good chunk of time reading into the backstory while he waited on new editions to come out.

“Miller,” Jercash said, a predatory smile cutting across his face, “you’re going to tell me everything you know about this, and we are going to nab this son of a bitch.” 

“Can I be there when you do?”

The raven laughed, “Oh, believe me, you’ll be there. We’ve been following them for the last two months, and I will be burnt if I’m letting them slip away again.”

“And Crammerson—”

Jercash patted him on the shoulder, “He knows that we needed someone to follow the trail. But if the situation is urgent,” thin shoulders shrugged from under a wrinkled jacket, “We may just not have enough time for backup. And our poor little life-stealer may end up with a few less teeth than he remembered having if he makes it to the Cage.”

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