Shadowguard

This time, when she entered, the safe house was barren. Gone were the tables and chairs, the shelf behind the bar cleared. During the past week, Osain and Arden agreed that Shadowguard needed a firm presence in the town; they'd relocated to the basement of the town hall, which remained untouched by the fire, a couple of days prior. The safe house now served as an unattended outpost and was the only teleportation point in the area until Leah set up the new one in town. Once that circle became active, the safe house would become nothing more than an abandoned hunting lodge.

Everna slipped through the door behind the bar and took the stairs two at a time. After a short hall, she stepped into the old wine cellar beyond. She glanced into the training room, where she'd spent many a day with Cian until Shroud forced her to return to the town. The mats lay on the floor, stiff and covered with dust. Empty racks hung from the walls, the shelves and hooks removed. Even the rickety table pushed against the far wall was gone.

Behind the furthest door at the back of the old cellar, she found the teleportation circle. It sat atop a low dais, a neat array of runes and crossing lines carved into the floor and endued with magic. Vina and Osain stood at the base of the steps, both agitated.

Instead of her usual extravagant dresses, and her absurdly high heels, Vina wore a set of drab, though just as revealing, leathers. Her lyre hung from her belt, a small knife clipped to the top of her knee-high boots. Only the glittering diamond choker looped around her neck, a gaudy and tasteless thing that wouldn't match even with a courtly dress, and a pair of equally loud earrings offered any hint of her noble status.

Perhaps Osain was right to send her off to Alund; she needed the reality check.

"You cannot just send me off to Alund! How dare you insinuate I need training! My father will hear about this!"

Osain rolled his eyes as he picked at his nails. "Get over yourself, Vina. No one gives a shit about your father and you know damn well he doesn't give a shit about you."

Vina's nostrils flared, and for a brief second, hurt flashed through her eyes. "I do not need training! I am perfectly capable, thank you very much."

He pinned her with a scathing glare. "You're a tone-deaf wanna-be who can barely shoot a pheasant out of the sky. You're not capable of anything but giving everyone else a headache with your attitude, and the sooner you get that through your thick skull, the better. The only thing you're going to accomplish at this rate is getting yourself killed."

Though every word he said rang true, Everna winced. Osain did not mince words. While she always appreciated honesty, it was a bit nerve-wracking. Her mother wasn't much better, though her smiles were deceptive enough to lessen the sting of her brutality. Even Cian, with his abysmal lack of social grace, wasn't that direct.

"You don't know talent when you see it!" she snapped. "They sent me here because I was making everyone else jealous of my abilities."

"They told you that so you wouldn't throw a tantrum when they kicked you to the curb. This safe house? They send their agents here to die, sometimes literally." Osain snorted and shoved her up the steps and into the circle. "Unless you want to end up like your brother, dead in the forest and your badge snatched by Shroud, I suggest you get your head out of your ass, and join everyone else in the real world for once."

Everna hand drifted to where the stolen badge sat beneath her leathers. When she spoke to him after she first woke, Osain revealed there were several more agents under his command prior to her arrival. Though a couple pulled through and moved on to better things, most met a gruesome end, either by Shroud or the other dangers of the realm. Vina and the twins were the only two left.

"You should've gone through this before they gave you the damned badge to begin with."

Huffing and grumbling beneath her breath, Vina snatched the bulging bags from the base of the steps and carelessly tossed them into the circle. When she turned back to Osain, she caught sight of Everna and scowled.

"Ugh, you."

"Me," Everna affirmed as she climbed the steps of the dais. The magic of the circle washed over her, as if she'd stepped through an invisible barrier. "I'm just as annoyed about it as you are. You're the last person I want to be stuck with for the next year."

"Then don't go," Osain said. "I'd be better off, anyway. Your mother's going to throttle me when she finds out."

Everna adjusted the straps of her bag, which sat heavy on her shoulder, and sighed. "She can blame whoever she likes, but this is my choice and I'm going through with it."

He studied her for a moment, his icy blue eyes narrowed with scrutiny. The look resembled the one her mother often gave an exceptionally annoying patron or a difficult puzzle. It wouldn't be the first time she thought they bore an uncanny resemblance.

He snorted and crossed his arms over his chest. "If I turn up dead in a week, know it's your fault."

"It may very well be my fault," she said after a moment, "and not because of my mother."

Osain threw her one last calculating look and shook his head. He knelt before the circle, his hands placed over two of the runes. A brilliant white glow shot through the groves carved into the stone. With a rush of magic, a shimmering barrier rose from the outermost circle, around which the runes tread.

"I expect both of you to come by in a year's time," he said, half smiling, "just so I know you survived."