Chapter 1

  For two weeks they had been arguing. The same subject, over and over.

  Aïlen had finally come up with a solution.

  It had started with intelligence missions, asking Selene to collect as much on the Corbis clan as her team could manage. It wasn’t easy, stranded as they were in a dilapidated village.

  But the spy master had come through.

  Aïlen just had to get the other two commanders on board, including her father who had stayed mute in horror.

  “Clans are the enemy, Aïlen. Have you lost your mind?!” Whiliam finally exclaimed, staring into his daughter’s eyes.

  Aïlen held his gaze, offering a neutral face in opposition to the angry twitches of his mouth, his drawn eyebrows. She had crossed her arms on her chest, in this defiant way she always had whenever he tried to contradict her.

  She knew she was right. And her father banging his fists on the table wouldn’t change her mind.

  Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Selene twitch, waiting for what Aïlen would say next. She drew a breath; a small smile tugged at the corner of her lips.

  “I’m perfectly sane. Next you’re gonna say that they’re still cannibals.” Aïlen had trouble hiding her growing smirk at her father’s exasperated sigh. “Anyway, the discussion wasn’t on what they did a century ago. Point is, crossing their border would help us greatly, it’s not like we have the time or resources to go around all the clans’ territories. Banham?”

  “Me?” the man startled like he hadn’t expected to be brought into this conversation. Like it wasn’t a meeting they held for the future of their group.

  He looked in turn at his fellow commanders before giving a sigh; Aïlen bit the inside of her cheek, raising an eyebrow at Banham’s expression.

  Like hell she wasn’t going to drag him into the argument.

  “I hate to admit it, Whiliam,” he finally let out, side-eyeing Aïlen, “but she’s right. Don’t look at me like that! If we don’t find a way to move soon our men are going to be the ones eating us! And jokes aside, we’re going to have a mutiny on our arms if we don’t act.”

  Aïlen’s smile dimmed.

  They had been arguing since they had landed in the abandoned village. Their soldiers had held still for a few days, convinced their commanders would find a solution.

But now they were growing restless.

  One of their generators had broken down without any way of fixing it. The radios were dead too and they had no way of contacting the part of their group that had been left behind the mountains. And since the local clans weren’t known for running and maintaining phone and telegraphic lines through this part of the wastelands, their hopes for reinforcement was non-existent.

  “We’re supposed to fight those monsters, not make alliances with them!” the old man gave a desperate shout, a last useless cry before he would admit defeat.

  Aïlen stared at her father, exasperation taking over. How great they all looked, babbling like children.

  They led the Brand New Light, one of the most powerful militias of the peninsula but weren’t even capable of settling on a simple solution without it turning into a shouting match. She wished her father would admit they had no other options already. Without his approval this would go on for far too long.

  It had already gone for far too long.

  Banham could say he didn’t like her plan all he wanted; at least he understood it was their only hope.

  Since the attack in a Pyrenees’ pass two weeks prior, they had no means of getting back to the half of their unit that had been left behind. They couldn’t go back themselves, except if they all wanted to die in another attack. And with most of their equipment, food and fuel being stolen from them and their generators breaking down, rendering them unable to charge their weapons properly, even the thought of going back was ridiculous.

  Aïlen’s plan was their only option: creating an alliance with one of the most powerful clans of the region, the Corbis clan. Because without an alliance, they wouldn’t be able to move North like they had wanted to. Without Corbis approval steamboats and airships were not an option anyway; they controlled all the Atlantic’s shoreline on this side of the mountains.

  It was out of the question to go East with as little fuel as they had; they would be faced with the Aschilea clan, the Corbis’ neighbors and rivals. But their intense rivalry was no secret to anybody: Aïlen had planned to use it to get their group across the Corbis’ territory.

  “As I said,” she started again, “an alliance. The last reconnaissance operations weren’t for nothing, Selene gathered for us plenty of intelligence confirming what I had previously heard,” she nodded at the ginger woman who had crept up against the wall until she found herself standing back in a corner. “And now we even have our own rats in the city, but I digress.

  “The Corbis depend on the Aschileas for most of their food and the prices keep on rising, which will render them incapable of paying for what they need in a few months. And with winter coming, we can be sure that the Collector is thinking about it.

  “The Corbis are known warriors but they’ve lacked an actual army apart from their city guard since their rebellion. Otherwise they would have marched onto their neighbors’ territory a long time ago, knowing the Collector’s reputation. So let’s go to them, offer our help, give them an army to march on their rivals and in exchange we’ll ask for safe passage through their territory. And maybe some resources we are lacking. That sounds reasonable to me.”

  Silence followed Aïlen’s speech; the men’s expression showed them finally adding up everything she had said. She had never been more sure of herself. They knew she would never suggest such a plan if she wasn’t nearly sure the odds were in their favor.

  “Let’s imagine for a minute that your plan works,” Whiliam conceded, “are you planning on negotiating with the Collector yourself? She’s more dangerous than all the mountain clans we had to face reunited, this is madness!”

  “I said I was perfectly sane. I’m not going to let this opportunity pass and I can’t send just about anybody, it would be disrespectful. Plus, I’m the one with the plan.”

  “I’ll come if that reassures you,” Banham sighed, visibly not pleased at the prospect of journeying to the Corbis city. “Selene, go fetch us a messenger to ask the Collector for an audience. The faster the better.”

  Whiliam didn’t try to stop her as she exited the room without a sound, almost running. That was approval enough for Aïlen. Whiliam was soon to follow Selene, defeated but no less angry than before, if the tightness in his shoulders and his scowl was any indication.

  Aïlen stayed the longest, sitting on the camp table once the others had departed, feeling the sun coming in from the ruined windows as it warmed her skin, turning it a golden brown and toying with her white locs the way she always did while deep in thought. She scratched her shaved side.

  She had heard the legend of the Collector and her rebellion so many times during their travels, of course she wasn’t going to miss an opportunity of meeting her in person. She needed to see who was the woman who had upturned her entire clan at barely seventeen.

  Even if Emra Corbis rejected the Brand New Light’s offer, Aïlen would learn a lot from even seeing her.

  When Aïlen finally left to rejoin the rest of her group, Banham was handing a roughly written note to a messenger. Whiliam still hadn’t voiced his approval out loud but neither did he object when the messenger left with enough silver coins to pay the fee to enter the Corbis’ walled territory.

  They hadn’t expected much. The answer came back faster than any of them had hoped for: the messenger was back before sunset, sporting a creamy envelope with a black wax seal etched with the clan’s emblem. It was written in a very delicate handwriting, the hand of a well educated lady.

  It asked them to present themselves at the city’s southern gates in two days’ time; a good omen if Aïlen had ever seen any.

*

The village they had set their campsite in was a typical sight in the wastelands: houses in ruin with their stone walls crumbling down and tiled roofs falling apart, overgrown plants creeping on any piece of rotting furniture left behind.

  It had probably been abandoned a long time ago like many others, when its inhabitants finally decided to gather behind a clan’s great walls or form larger communities in the hope of surviving longer against the incessant fights, the raids and other catastrophes that had plagued the wastelands ever since the Great War.

  The group had set their tents inside the crumbling houses with the hope that what remained of the walls would at least protect them from the harsh winds of fall. Hopefully they wouldn’t have to be around for winter.

  Aïlen was once again walking through the old streets, making her rounds before she would leave with Banham for the city.

  She could imagine the place had been quite pretty when it had been inhabited, with its small river coursing through it and the wrought iron gazebo overseeing it. She still found a lot of beauty in those crumbling houses, in the way the changing leaves coated the ground, covering the overgrown pavement.

  Sure, for her father this was just another testimony to the clans’ ruthlessness and yet another reason to hate them. But for her it was something more, a glimpse of the past, of how things were before the Great War.

  As Aïlen and Banham got into the military-grade steam car, all the soldiers of the militia had gathered on the village’s main square, rows of people anxiously waiting. Two of their commanders were leaving on their own, for what could possibly be a deadly mission if the Collector wasn’t as welcoming with her guests as Aïlen thought her to be.

  Despite the coolness of the wind, the air felt thick and hard to breathe as hands twitched in anticipation, the tension more palpable with every passing minute.

  Banham turned the key in the ignition, heating up the fuel tank that then quickly raised the temperature of the water tank until it boiled, sending hot steam through the car’s pipes. In a few seconds they were going, headed as fast as the car could manage down the roads that would lead them to the southern gates of the Corbis city.

  The village quickly disappeared behind them between puffs of steam. Aïlen was left gazing out of the window, admiring the landscape that unfolded before her, daydreaming about what life could have been before the Great War more than two hundred years ago.

  The war at the beginning of the twentieth century had lasted for more than fifty years, seeing the world collapse in continuous fights, countries disappearing one after the other. Clans rose on these ruins, small communities of warriors led by one leader and their descendants. They had later grown and evolved to be their own form of government, safe havens in the middle of what was now called the wastelands. It was the war that had created the world they were living in today and, ultimately, it was the reason why they were headed towards the gates of one of those clans.

  The tall walls of the Corbis clan appeared in the distance and, beyond them, the great industrial city that formed the majority of the clan’s territory.

  The walls were an impressive thirty meters tall work of engineering, all gray stone and metal reinforced every few meters, a straight cut line in the landscape around them. Aïlen had often wondered how life could be beyond those gates, how people lived in a city that big, bigger than anything else she had seen before.

  As the thoughts passed through her head, the gates got closer. Making a clear cut into the walls, they were adorned with the giant crow wings that were the symbol of the clan, a display of wealth and power visible from far away.

  Banham stopped the car, ignition still on, next to a smaller door fitted directly in one side of the gates.

  Aïlen got out to knock on it.

  She didn’t have to wait long for the knob to turn and the door to open until it caught on a deadbolt. Behind it was a young blond man in a ponytail, the long sleeves of his white shirt rolled up over his elbows revealing a pair of worn leather gauntlets. He quickly examined Aïlen from head to toe before speaking in a voice that seemed too deep for his juvenile face.

  “Who are you and what do you want?”

  “We are Aïlen and Banham, commanders of the Brand New Light,” she replied with a calm that contrasted with the man’s hostile tone. “We have an audience with the Collector.”

“Oh it’s you we were expecting!” he smiled, his demeanor taking an unexpectedly friendly turn. “I’m Jedharia, gatekeeper in chief. The Collector told me you could enter without paying any fee. Please go back to your car, the doors will open.” Aïlen did as she was told, puzzled by the man’s sudden change of attitude.

  The moment she got back to her seat, the sound of the heavy machinery working the doors’ mechanism filled up the air. Cogs caught into each other, the hydraulic machines worked as the gates parted, revealing the road ahead leading to the city, making way for the car.

  With the doors now fully opened, Jedharia came to them once again to give them directions to the city and the Collector’s headquarters right at its center. He wished them a safe rest of their trip, waving them off.

  Aïlen watched him getting back into the small shack that was probably his office as the car started once again down the long road. The commanders heard the loud sound of machinery being reactivated as they neared the first buildings of the impressive city.

Chapter 2

They followed the main road, immediately finding themselves in the middle of the bustling city life. All around them were multiple stories tall buildings with their balconies and windows decorated with intricate wrought iron patterns, stone facades alternating between darker shades and stark white.

  Sidewalks were full of people going on errands, going on about their day, barely looking at what was happening around them. Long skirts swooped around the pavements, the click of heels and canes filling up the air along with all kinds of chatter and the sounds of steam powered cars slowly making their way up and down the crowded streets.

  The air smelled of smoke and grilled food; stores’ merchandise were spilling up on the sidewalks as sellers were yelling about how great their deals were. Aïlen’s eyes were wide open; she didn’t want to miss any of it.

  She was fascinated by the life around her.

  Taffeta and silk gowns were displayed beyond the great windows next to well tailored suits, intricately crafted corsets and many different styles of hats. And it wasn’t just clothes or accessories: house decor, wallpapers, toys, kitchen utensils and the most grotesque knickknacks caught her attention as they slowly made their way through the crowd.

  They passed armories and their dreadful but amazing array of weapons on display, guns ranging from the standard electricity-powered blaster to the old bullet gun, the Corbis clan being one of the only manufacturers of those and their ammunition left on the continent.

  But guns weren’t their only field of expertise: one of their trade partners owned a large amount of metal mines and so they had taken to the making of blades of all kinds, to the point that it had become their second biggest export.

  When Aïlen had received Selene’s first report on the clan, she had familiarized herself with their industry and how, while the guns and blades made for export were all mass manufactured in the factories at the North of the city, the weapons sold by armories were all independently made and were the pride of the clan.

  Everything in this clan had seemed to revolve around death, wealth and power in Aïlen’s mind. But now she was faced with another reality: its inhabitants were so full of life, the city itself vibrated with it. Even just passing through those streets, she felt thrilled; the amount of life was like nothing she had ever seen before, it was captivating and slightly dizzying.

  She couldn’t wait to see the Collector, to meet the leader of this all.

*

  The city’s main square was a large plaza where the city’s main streets converged. Apart from the center stood a massive building entirely made of off-white stones, richly decorated with wrought iron sculptures and adorned with the mechanical crow wings that took up half of the facade, partially covering up some of the windows with their massive black metallic feathers.

  It was the Collector’s headquarters, the center of the administrative and political life of the clan, where the leader lived and gave her orders.

  Aïlen faintly heard Banham swallowing his saliva, his anxiety showing ever so slightly in his shallow breaths. Of course he wasn’t as crazy about this whole plan as she was. He wasn’t excited to know what lay behind these walls; he hadn’t been the one to come up with this mad idea to start with.

  Guards in dark uniforms were standing in front of the massive oak doors, rifles in hand, ready to take aim at any moment. Aïlen walked up to them while keeping a respectful distance.

  “We have an audience with the Collector in the name of the Brand New Light,” she said.

  The guard in front of her looked her up and down before nodding to his colleague.

  “Wait here,” the first guard simply replied as the other man disappeared inside the building.

  Aïlen gave at first a polite smile, quickly giving up in front of the guard’s impassiveness. Thankfully the wait didn’t last long; soon enough, the second guard got out again.

  This time he was accompanied by a tall elegant man in a black and blue suit with a top-hat perched upon the black locks of curly hair that framed his tawny face. He wore the same worn leather gauntlets as the gatekeeper, the same goggles on his hat.

  “Welcome commanders,” he finally said. “I’m Kebel Makel. Please follow me inside, the Collector will see you soon.”

  With a smile he showed them past the guards into a beautiful entrance with a carpeted floor and a great staircase leading to the upper floors.

  They followed him to a richly decorated private room, hung with tapestries, where gold and red couches were arranged around a glass and gold coffee table. Those were the sole furniture in the room but, considering the rest of the decoration, it was more than enough.

  Aïlen felt like a child, bewitched by the amazing decor around her, surrounded by more riches than she had ever witnessed before. It wasn’t an easy task in that moment to keep her composure in front of Kebel; thankfully, he quickly excused himself, leaving the commanders alone to marvel at the room.

  The tapestries depicted peaceful rural scenes of a time long gone, a time that no person alive could remember anymore. Now they only knew war and the stories that came with it, including that of the Rebellion which had made the Collector a living legend.

  The story of this bastard teenager leading her men to overthrow her father, destroying and reshaping one of the most powerful and ferocious clans on the continent the way she wanted was told often and in great details, embellished to the point that no one knew where reality ended and legend started anymore.

  It made it hard to actually imagine what the Collector would be like. But if Aïlen was sure of something, it was that this woman was a fierce warrior, a merciless killer and a great leader admired by all who knew her.

  A maid entered without a word to place a tray of tea and cookies on the coffee table, bringing her back to reality.

  She left as she had entered, making way for a short woman in her early twenties with short hair dyed gray and a scarf tied around it. Goggles held the fabric in place; she too wore leather gauntlets. A black fabric mask hid away the lower half of her face.

  The Collector hastily walked to one of the couches before indicating to the commanders to sit in the one opposite hers.

  She was squeezing a piece of paper in her hand, the broken wax seal indicating a letter from the Aschilea clan.

  Aïlen smiled.

  “Hello commanders, I am Emra Corbis, leader of this clan and Collector of Corpses. You’ve already met Kebel, my most trusted adviser. What can I do for you?”

  Holding herself very straight, she looked down at Aïlen like a queen looking at her subjects from her throne. She was in her home, part of the riches that surrounded her; they were the strangers.

  Even though her clothes were simple – a black corset atop a white blouse with puffy half-sleeves, long white skirt with brown overskirt, buckled shoes and a belt with bag and gun holster at her waist – they were of the best quality.

  But now wasn’t the time for Aïlen to marvel at the woman’s attire; a question had been asked and she needed to answer it.

  “Hello Collector, I am Aïlen and this is Banham. We have an offer for you. We are asking for free passage through your territory and that you provide us resources, in exchange providing you with the help of our men.”

  The Collector raised an eyebrow and scoffed.

  “And for what reason should I accept such a deal? We are in no need of any help. If you don’t have a more serious offer than that I will ask you to leave. I have more important matters to attend to.”

  She started rising from her seat, looking bored and annoyed they would waste her time like this. Was she not going to let them continue? Did she really agree to see them just to laugh at them? Had Aïlen been too confident in her words?

  The shadow of a doubt started to form in her mind before Banham rose, staring into the Collector’s eyes.

  “We know what’s happening with your food supplies! We can help you right the situation with the Aschileas!”

  Emra stopped, looking off-balance. She stared at both Banham and Aïlen, her eyes widening in a flash before she had time to compose herself again.

  She slowly sat down, clutching the letter in her hand a little tighter.

  Her reaction was all Aïlen had hoped for; her doubts vanished as the shadow of a smile appeared on her lips again.

  “From what information we’ve gathered,” Aïlen continued, “your relationship with your neighbors has been degrading so much that they keep inflating their prices and won’t let you buy for less. You’re the only clan they do that to. And without any agriculture of your own, in a year or two you won’t be able to feed your people anymore. Against shelter, resources and safe passage we offer to lend you all of our men to take control of the Aschilea clan. No need to worry about supplies anymore if you control where they come from. And I guess it’s also an opportunity to reassess your dominance over the region.”

  “And what tells you that we can’t do this on our own? Every person in this clan receives military training at the age of sixteen,” Emra replied, her voice colder, more brittle than before.

  “Because your clans are of equal size and despite what you tell me, since when do you not have a proper army anymore?” Aïlen asked, prodding where she hoped it would hurt. “All our men are well trained soldiers who excel in their field and know how to use all kinds of artillery.”

  The Collector frowned before rising up from her seat, turning around to face the tapestries; Aïlen and Banham couldn’t see her expression anymore.

  A wise move for her to think through her options.

  Both commanders found themselves leaning forward, staring at her in silence, waiting to see what her reply would be. Hands held behind her back, she looked deep in thoughts, contemplating the scenery in front of her.

  Taken by surprise, she didn’t seem like half the absolute monarch she had been seconds before.

  After a few minutes of complete silence, the air was so heavy that Aïlen felt like her limbs were weighted down with lead. The commanders glanced at each other, doubt creeping in again when the Collector finally turned around, her skirt swishing around her.

  “This does sound appealing. But you can imagine that I can’t take this decision right away. I need time to think of an agreement and calculate what it’ll take us to welcome your men, if I accept. Come back in a week, I invite you to the celebration of the Rebellion so we can discuss further. And please, bring your third commander, I’d be delighted to meet him.”

  Aïlen nodded, trying really hard to hide her growing grin.

  The commanders rose for Emra to show them to the exit. She opened the door for the two commanders and, as she waved them goodbye, said:

  “Whoever informed you of our situation, I’d be glad to meet them. That kind of information doesn’t easily leak past our walls.”

  “They’d prefer to stay anonymous, for safety reasons you see,” Aïlen replied ironically.

  “Of course, I wouldn’t expect less,” Emra let out a scoff. The shifting of her mask, the spark in her green eyes hinted at a grin.

  She closed the door behind them, still clutching the Aschilea letter in her hands.

Chapter 3

  Emra was pacing up and down her office, breathing heavily, reading again and again the letter Inés Aschilea had sent her. Everything had happened at once; what had started with a routine assembly of the clan’s merchant guild had accumulated into a pile of urgent concerns.

  The assembly had originally been to finish the last details of the following week’s celebration. But upon the letter’s arrival, it had quickly devolved into a shouting match about the rising prices and the ever growing debt of the Corbis towards the Aschileas.

  The letter had been yet another ultimatum of the Aschilea’s high priestess. If the Corbis hadn’t paid their debt in full by the end of the following year, the Aschilea clan would cease all commerce with them.

  It could only mean that one of their new business partners was offering them the necessary transportation that the Corbis usually supplied.

  Or that Inés had lost her mind thinking she could ask anything and the Corbis would bow to her.

  The question of calling off the celebration of the Rebellion to save up on food had come up but it was too late already. It had cost the clan too much to put everything in place and canceling their most decadent celebration would only show how weakened and vulnerable they now were.

  Even within the clan, the amount of the debt wasn’t common knowledge.

  Emra wished to keep it that way.

  For the seven years she had been in power, it had been extremely delicate to keep the balance of the clan and nobody needed to know that behind the prosperous facade they showed to everybody, problems kept accumulating.

  But maybe the solution had now come to her.

  She had granted the Brand New Light an audience so quickly because of a convenient hole in her schedule; she hadn’t expected anything to come out of it.

  She wasn’t so sure anymore.

  Their offer was intriguing and, while housing an important amount of soldiers would cut into their resources even more, the success of an operation such as taking control of their neighbors would make sure that all their food related problems would be gone in the future.

  A small investment for great results.

  But going into such a deal blind would be ridiculous, she needed to know more about them before she agreed to anything. And she needed to learn how they had known so much of the secret doings of the clan.

  Her thoughts blurred as she became hyper-aware of her surroundings, of the carpet muffling the sound of her shoes, of the great bookshelves covered in dozens of books and trinkets that she collected, of the paintings on the walls, of the massive oak desk where piles of paper were waiting to be examined and finally of Kebel silently watching her from a corner of the room, comfortably seated in one of the cushioned chairs.

  Emra’s senses were overloaded with the ticking of a clock, Kebel’s breath, her own footsteps, the pounding of her heart in her ears.

  She stopped in the middle of the room.

  With a scream she ran back to her desk, gripped the dagger she always kept close to her and violently threw it at the door, letting out all her frustration at once.

  She felt like the whole room, the cabinets full of oddities and the great copper chandelier over her head shook at once as the blade embedded itself in the wood.

  “Destroying your door isn’t gonna help anything, Emmy,” Kebel said, looking at the dagger. His voice was too damn calm.

  Emra swore under her breath before walking around her desk to sit on her chair, holding her head in her hands.

  “I know how much Inés wants to see us fall apart but I won’t let her, I’ve been trying too hard to keep this clan together to see her win over us like this.”

  “So you’re really considering their offer.”

  “Yes, yes I am. Because that woman, Aïlen, was right and taking control of the Aschileas would save us a lot of worries in the future. And this would show everyone how powerful we still are, that I’m not less of a leader than Mordhred was,” Emra spat out, acid in her voice.

  Seven years and she still couldn’t help but compare herself.

  “Stop it. You’re not your father. Nobody wants you to be like him,” Kebel told her, staring into her eyes. He had stopped reclining, focusing all his attention on her. “But if you want to take this opportunity to establish our power again, give the order to rebuild our army. We’ll need them to keep the Aschilea in check once we’ve taken over them. You have the city guard, the industry and the merchant guild behind you. Give the order and they will follow.”

  Emra rose from her chair, hands firmly planted on her desk, fire in her eyes.

  Yes, she would take this opportunity to finally get rid of the image of her father that haunted her. She would be a better leader than anybody before her.

  For seven years she had kept the clan together after nearly destroying it. Now was the time to bring it back to its former glory.

  At seventeen, she had done the impossible. At twenty-four she could do better.

  The Crows were gone but they had everything else on their side. They just needed a bit of help to push through their main obstacle and defeat their enemies.

  Emra smiled under her mask.

  “We need to find the spies that gave us away to the Brand New Light. They have to be here, close enough for us to trust them. They are traitors that will be faced with the consequences of their actions. Let’s add a new main attraction for next week.”

  “Sparing you was the best decision I ever made,” Kebel said with a mix of pride and amusement in his voice. “Should I get my sister?”

  “Yes, I’ll need Azan to gather information for me. Tell her to find me at the manor, I’ll be there for a while.”

  “You shouldn’t,” he replied too fast. A worried wrinkle had appeared between his brows.

  “Kebel, I need time to think.” Her voice had grown soft, almost painful. “Don’t wait for me for dinner, I don’t think I’ll be back on time. Just ask the cook to keep my plate warm.”

  “As you wish, Emra.”

  He rose from his chair, tipped his hat slightly before exiting the room, leaving Emra alone.

  She passed her hand over her mask, feeling the bumps underneath.

  She needed to think, she needed to remind herself that she hadn’t done all of this for nothing. The guilt clutched her insides tightly.

  She had done this. This was her fault and she would assume this responsibility until the end.

*

  The tavern bell rang as Kebel pushed the door. He was greeted by the warmth of the place and the loud chatter of patrons accompanied by slurred songs about some girl and her lover.

  Of course Azan would be here, she was the only one out of them who still came.

  The tavern hadn’t been the same anymore since Emra’s grandparents passed away. So much had happened there, it was hard to go back without being assaulted with a flood of memories now.

  This was precisely why Azan was still coming that often: to keep those memories alive, so that nobody fully forgot the work it had taken.

  He saw her at the counter, the jacket of her two-piece suit on her chair, her top-hat and goggles on the countertop next to her, a glass of gin in her hand. She had the same black wavy hair as him, albeit way longer and the same tawny complexion; they really looked alike.

  Kebel sat next to his twin sister.

  “How did it go?” Azan asked without even looking at him.

  “They had a good offer. Emmy’s interested. Pissed, though. They know more than they should. She has a job for you, meet her at the manor, she’ll be there for a while.”

  That ticked Azan off. Of course it did.

  “She should stop going there, it’s not good for her,” she swallowed a big gulp of alcohol. “Fine, I’ll go in a few hours. She’ll want to be alone before that. “

  Kebel’s brows knitted together.

  They were thinking the same thing.

  But they all had their demons; while Emra didn’t want to let go of hers, neither did Azan.

  He sighed, put on an easy smile he could hide behind and looked at his sister. He got up, reached his hand to the ribbon that was holding together her ponytail and pulled on it to undo it; the best way to annoy her. He left the tavern as Azan was shouting at him, a soft sigh escaping his lips.

  Life went on.

*

  The campsite had been effervescent since Aïlen and Banham’s return.

  At the first signs of the car coming back to camp, soldiers had gathered in front of the least ruined house of the village, the one the commanders used as headquarters, anxiously waiting to hear about the result from the audience.

  Whiliam had been the first to welcome his fellow commanders back and after quickly waving off their men, they disappeared behind the house’s rotten wood door.

  The soldiers’ relief at seeing their commanders safe and sound clung to Aïlen and Banham’s skin. Whiliam’s was the heaviest, he who had thought from the beginning that this was a suicide mission.

  Once they were alone, he hugged both of them tightly, like he didn’t quite believe they were really there. Aïlen laughed.

  “Father, you’re gonna suffocate us!”

  “I couldn’t bear the thought of what those monsters could have done to you,” he said, voice cracking.

  “It wasn’t that terrible, they served us tea and cookies,” Aïlen replied, rolling her eyes. “The Collector isn’t all that bad.”

  “She isn’t that bad? She’s extremely rude, you mean,” Banham contested.

  Whiliam furrowed his brows. Of course Aïlen would enjoy any form of hospitality, even if it came from the enemy. His daughter had excellent manners. She just shouldn’t start thinking this clan could be anything but a rival.

  It wasn’t like he’d ever let that happen.

  “Anyway,” Banham continued, “Lenny’s plan worked. That Corbis lady was about to throw us out without listening to us when she realized we knew way more about than she expected. Her shock was priceless. She invited us to their little celebration, next week, to further discuss the agreement. We got her.”

  “And she wants to meet you, father. You have to come with us.”

  “Of course I’ll come,” Whiliam replied, not bothering to hide the disgust on his face. “I always want to know what our enemies are capable of by myself.”

  “Come on, they’re gonna be our allies!” Aïlen said. It was a miracle she hadn’t strained any facial muscle from rolling her eyes so much. “Plus you’ll love the city, I can’t wait to see more of it.”

  “This is a mission Aïlen, not vacation. Don’t try to get too close to those people, don’t put yourself in more danger than needed.”

  Why she would willingly go there was above Whiliam’s understanding. Aïlen had always had silly fancies. It would pass.

  In the meantime he would protect her the way he had done it since he had found her. He wouldn’t let her get too close, the militia was her family and her life; he’d make sure this mission or the Collector herself wouldn’t change anything.