Jean started down the docks, hoping to return to the ship and find Sayed with his quarry captured. However, as he came to the end of the docks, he couldn't shake the sight before him. The docks that reached up into the sky were massive structures built from wide wooden bases into the night sky. The tower before him was damaged; however, a massive black line ran down its side across several levels.

  "Tsk." Jean shook his head as he followed the line to the ground.

  No grinning swordsman stood there with a captured man in his arms. However, it at least gave Jean an idea of where Sayed had gone. Like Jean, he hadn't caught his target immediately, and it had become a chase. The question was if he had returned yet.

  Jean started up the tower. If Sayed had returned, he would already be back at the ship, and it was best to start at the beginning. It didn't take him long to climb the ten levels and return to the ship. He did stop to inspect the long line carved through the tower from the inside. The line gave off smoke inside the tower, though only a few edges glowed hot with embers down the wooden structure. It had tried to catch, but the natural humidity of the area had chilled the fiery effect of Sayed's sword.

  The area was empty when he reached the ship, with no sign of Sayed. Jean approached the Nighthawk, stopping when he was sure Artur could see him. He waved up at the ship with one arm.

  "Has Sayed returned yet, Artur?"

  It took a moment for the prince's voice to crackle from the ship over the speakers.

  "He has yet to return," Artur said. "I last saw him on a downturn."

  "Right." Jean sighed, looking back down the docks.

  He had another problem: he could follow after Sayed and hope to find him, or he could stay on the ship and wait for Sayed to return. The safe option would be to stay. It would keep them all together and allow him time to respond if Sayed didn't return.

  However, Jean felt Sayed might face the same troubles he did when tracking down the foe. He doubted that the man was stronger than Sayed, but if he had some kind of trick, Sayed wasn't the most crafty of people.

  That settled the problem for Jean.

  "I'm going after him," Jean said. "Pull out of the docks if there's any issues."

  "I will do as you say," Artur's voice crackled over the speaker. "But I hope to stay."

  "Don't we all," Jean whispered, starting down the docks and reopening his gate wide.

  Power flooded through the crystal that hid beneath his robes. He drew in a deep breath, folding in more aether as a purple light extended from his body. A black portal opened beneath his feet, and a skeletal hand reached out from the void. It pulled itself up from the darkness, carrying the form of his beloved back into the world again.

  She crawled up his shoulders as he walked, wrapping her arms on his shoulders as her heir flowed behind him. Jean placed one skeletal hand over hers as he started back down the tower, and soon, he stood on the bottom of the docks again.

  "Eliza, I'll have you scout from above while I go below," he whispered, rending her invisible to normal eyes as he gave her flight again. "We must not let them surprise us again, so take care not to get too close."

  Eliza didn't respond because she had never responded to his words. Erin had told him once that she had spoken to her, but Jean was sure that was a hallucination. Part of her nature as a spirit made it so that she could not communicate. She nodded to him, floating up into the air and leaving Jean behind.

  A pang of doubt filled Jean's heart as he watched her. The man who had fled below the water had managed to dispel her. He hated to think that it would become common among the Military Police. Had it been the dagger that had cut his strings? If those became common, it would be a hard time for cursed people.

  He could summon her again, but summoning and dismissing her required him to open the second level of his curse. He normally kept her out because the cost of entering the second level would tire him. Doing it repeatedly would disperse the aether gathered to maintain her form and force him to gather and focus it anew. It was by no means a taxing process, but it would affect him if he kept having to do it.

  People with more powerful curses or potent second-level curses couldn't handle their curses cutting off like that. The woman on Dry Turtle, who had a watery form and transformed into a giant water serpent, was a good example. If her curse were broken, even once, she would have a difficult time bringing it back into form. The size and power of her curse had a reciprocating cost.

  While it wasn't always enough to balance out unfair abilities, it was something to remember about any cursed person—the more powerful the curse, the higher the cost of maintaining and rebuilding it.

  Sayed's curse was simple, and while powerful at the tip of his blade, it didn't fundamentally change the things around him—the same with most of the crew. Alex's second-level curse was a bit more taxing. If someone knocked him down from that, it would seriously drain his stamina.

  Perhaps, if there was a third level to curses, and the crew reached that, Jean could say that was a particular problem. However, as they were now, none of their curses were strong enough to fully experience that drawback.

  Once Eliza was up in the air, Jean started down the road, knowing that a chase involving Sayed would not be quiet. If there was one thing that Sayed always did, it was make a scene.

  Thump.

  "Oof." Sayed grunted as he landed on his feet on the next rooftop.

  He looked up. Ahead of him was the shadowy figure, always maintaining a step ahead despite Sayed's efforts to keep up. Never in his life had he found a foe so slippery as the figure. Nothing he did seemed to close the gap.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  "This is quite the test of faith." Sayed huffed as he sprinted forward, his legs burning with every step. "I fear I do not possess the skill to turn this around."

  Sayed looked ahead, but the figure hadn't moved. It stood on the edge of the last rooftop, looking out over the street below as it opened into a massive square. There were no more rooftops in the direction he faced.

  Sayed gripped his blade tight. Perhaps his fortune was turning around.

  "You have nowhere left to run. Give yourself up, and I will go easy on you!" Sayed stretched out his arm, bringing himself into a low stance with his sword above his head.

  A flash of teeth in a smirk crossed the figure's hooded face as he opened his arms and fell backward without a word—the fool. Sayed rushed forward. Sayed reached his hand out to grab the man before he fell to the ground below.

  His fingers grasped nothing but shadows as the man disappeared again.

  "A phantom." Sayed clenched his fist, pulling back from the edge and looking out over the square.

  There was no trace of the man, and Sayed knew now that he had to give up on finding him. He would have to return to the ship empty-handed. It was a sour end to the tale, but not every hunt succeeded.

  Ktsh. Clatter. Thud.

  Down below, a man crashed through a window and out onto the street. Sayed raised an eyebrow as two more men followed suit, flying out and landing on the ground with hard echoing thuds.

  "What is this?" he asked as a crowd gathered in the lantern streetlights below.

  Slap. Thunk.

  A door slammed open, and a large, dark-skinned man stepped outside, dressed in simple white robes. His head was covered with curly white hair that looked unkempt in the lantern light, and he had an oiled, curly beard not dissimilar to Sayed's own. He held up one hand, the flat of it facing the prone men in front of him. A long chain of brown wooden beads encircled his hand, hanging down from his wrist. They matched the larger wooden orbs that surrounded his neck.

  "I have no wish to fight you," he said in a low rumbling voice. "I have no desire to challenge the authority of the Military Police. I only want peace for all."

  As he said it, Sayed realized that the men on the ground were soldiers dressed in the red and black uniforms of the military police. That was a problem. He knew he should draw attention, but at the same time, he wanted to jump down and see what happened.

  Curiosity was a horrible beast.

  "Well, we don't get a say in that," the frontmost soldier said as he rose along with the other two soldiers. "We have to bring you in, 'Chosen One' Keita. That's our job!"

  Sayed raised an eyebrow at that. The man had the same kind of nickname that he had. Sayed was known as 'Sword Saint' Sayed on his bounty posters and by the Military Police. Sayed had to assume that the man also had a bounty.

  "I am sorry," Keita said, his mouth turning into a grim line. "But I do not engage in violence. I am a man of peace."

  "You're wanted for taking over Nine Hills!" the frontmost soldier said. "Then you go and disappear after the message. We figured you were up to something and heading to the Core."

  "I am not the only one," Keita said.

  Bang.

  The frontmost soldier seized and fell as a gunshot rang through the streets. Two men in black suits and ties stepped out from the doors and out into the streets, followed by a bent third figure. An old, tanned, and wrinkled woman with a large black jacket draped on her shoulders looked over the remaining two soldiers, leaning on a gnarled wooden stick. She bore no weapons, but her men had two pistols trained on the soldiers, one trailing smoke.

  "I'd kindly ask you younguns to step off from this bar." The old woman smiled toothlessly. "You're ruining my night out."

  "Is that—"

  "That's 'Green Tea' Kageken!" one of the people in the growing crowd yelled. "She's a gunrunner!"

  Sayed raised his other eyebrow. He wasn't the only famous person on the island. Seeing so many famous people in one place was strange, though he didn't know anything about them.

  "What do we do?" The soldiers looked at each other.

  "You have a solemn choice to make," Keita said, lowering his flat hand. "I suggest you preserve your life. It is the only one you have."

  The soldiers glanced between the two outlaws, and they didn't take long to decide. They reached down to check on their fallen soldier before picking him up between them and running straight at the crowd. The people parted around them as they carried the wounded man out of the area.

  Thump.

  Sayed could resist no longer. He sheathed his sword and jumped from his hiding place, landing on the street. He kept his balance by throwing out his hands and bending low, but the impact raced through his legs.

  "Why'd you have to go and cause all that trouble? " Now that the Military Police were gone, Kageken turned her eyes on Keita. We were out having a nice drink and keeping our heads down before we went to the next island, and here you are, going up and asking some soldiers for some information. Are you some kind of imbecile? Do you not know that you have a price on your head, the same as me?"

  Keita bowed slightly as he wrapped the beads that had dangled around his wrist more tightly with a second loop. Sayed, and the crowd watched them unmoving. It was like they were watching a play on the stage of life and couldn't interrupt.

  "They might have known where to find him," Keita said. "I will find the man I am looking for. That is why I set out on my journey."

  "You are on a journey as well?" Sayed couldn't help himself, his voice ringing through the crowd. "Where are you going?"

  The eyes of everyone in the crowd and the two outlaws swiveled toward him. The crowd parted around Sayed, leaving a clear lien into the tavern, and Sayed took the initiative. If it was his time out on the stage, then he would take it.

  "Whatis this, an outlaw bargain sale?" Kageken asked as he entered the circle. "That's the 'Sword Saint,' isn't it? Why are there three of us on a military island? Doesn't that defeat the purpose of hiding where they least expect us?"

  "You ask many questions but provide few answers." Sayed crossed his arms. "I was merely curious as to why you are also here. I am here because my crew is here and nothing more."

  "I search for a man," Keita said, smiling. "I am Abdu 'Chosen One' Keita."

  "And we were here as a stopover to the Core," Kageken said. "I am known as Ohime 'Green Tea' Kageken."

  "I am 'Sword Saint' Sayed." Sayed nodded. "It is good to meet you all. It isn't often I meet other outlaws outside of my group."

  "And why are you here?" Keita asked. "Merely because your crew stopped here, I supposed. But that is hardly an answer."

  "It is enough that our leader asked." Sayed smiled. "But more specifically, I am here because I lost the man spying on my ship."

  Crack.

  "Well, there are more than enough eyes on us now," Kageken said, standing and straightening her back with a loud crack. "We won't be staying for long now that those dogs have found us out. You younguns can stay and fight if you feel like it, but we'll be getting out of here."

  "I'm afraid I must do the same," Keita said. "You would be wise to do so as well, Sayed. Once they know we are so close to Tartarus, the Military Police will not be caught idle. I had thought they wouldn't recognize me, but my fame precedes me. We all should leave while we still can."

  Together, they walked past Sayed.

  "I wish you all fair travels, brothers." Sayed smiled as they approached the crowd, clearing more space to allow the groups to exit. "However, I cannot say the same for my crew. We have business inside Tartarus that our leader must handle before we can go."

  Keita and Kageken stopped at those words, both turning to Sayed.

  "What did you say, youngun?"

  "Your leader is inside Tartarus now?"

  "He is." Sayed smiled, facing the two.

  "What kind of id—"

  "Who is he?" Keita asked as the crowd around them whispered.

  "He is called 'Tin Man' on the bounties," Sayed said. "But I just know him as Alex."

  With that, the crowd erupted into whispers, and Sayed realized that he maybe should have kept quiet. However, what was done was done, and there was no going back on his words. He would just have to hope that everything was going okay in the infiltration of Tartarus.