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Summary: Zaun is free—and must grow into its unfamiliar new dimensions. So must Silco and Jinx. A what-if that diverges midway through the events of episode 8. Found family and fluff, politics and power, smut and slice-of-life, villainy and vengeance.

AO3 - Forward, But Never Forget/XOXO

FFnet - Forward, But Never Forget (XOXO)

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Chapters: 1| 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |8 | 9 | 10 |11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 | 46 | 47 | 48 | 49 | 50 | 51 | 52 | 53 | 54

CH 13: Silco and Mel Medarda renegotiate the Peace Treaty. A blood bargain is struck.

Mirror, mirror you're so vain Would you sell yourself for fame? Are you the vulture or are you the dove?

~ "Dirty Pretty" – In This Moment

The night drains from the edges of a paling sky.

Piltover's yacht is anchored at the edge of the riverside shipping district. Against the surreal landscape of pipes and twirling smoke, it gleams with the shellacking of cold currency. Massive intramodal cranes bisect the skyline. They haul cargo from a docked procession of vessels. The river stretches out in cascading shades of pure cobalt enveloped by putrid browns.

The demarcations where Piltover ends and Zaun begins.

The shipping district is the oldest part of the Undercity. Known formally as the Ironworks—and more slangily as the Black Minge—it is a gigantic orifice hidden beneath veils of smoke. Its womb is Factorywood, ensconced deep in the fundament of the Fissures.

From its fount issue marvels of manufacture: textiles, brassworks, crockery, canned goods. They are hauled, day and night, by freight vehicles: steampunk behemoths adorned with spiked hubcaps and canted headlights. They trundle along rough tracks laid out like railway lines across the steep ravines. At this hour, five thousand logs of Ionian teak from the Ironworks are being hauled belowground to be cut into furniture at Factorywood. In exchange, a yearly export supply of thousands of metric tons of Zaunite steel is being carted from the bowels of the chem-seams to fill the cargo hulls of Ionian tanker ships.

A constant flow of trade keeps the wheels of business turning, and legions of Zaunites gainfully employed. In turn, their social shadows in the criminal underbelly—fences, procurers, forgers, smugglers—keep the channels open for Silco's private network to do business beyond the red line. The web of dark and light is at once impenetrable and vital to the city's survival.

From the smokestacks, red effluvium spews. The whiff of coal hits Silco's nostrils.

The perfume of progress.

He stands at the yacht's bow pulpit, arms laced behind his back. Six blackguards are behind him, wielding chem-fueled crossbows. They are mirrored by six Enforcers, each at an angle from Silco's security team, a hexagonal target with himself as the bullseye.

Over his shoulder, Silco tips them a half-smile. One Enforcer's shoulders flex; a muscle in another one's jaw twitches. They seem poised to fire—or flee.

A gilded voice says:

"Busy night, Chancellor?"

"For both of us," Silco replies, and turns on his heel.

Mel Madarda ascends the stairs from the cabin belowdeck. Her hair is upswept with a heavy golden pin, its curling enamel petals inlaid with glittering rubies. Her dress is a brocaded black-and-white two-piece with matching fingerless gloves, and a sarong-like skirt slitted along the sides so her shapely legs flash out of the swirling fabric.

Shanks like hers are best described in equine terms, especially if one plays the horses, and Silco does. But the question remains: is she a show pony or a mudder?

He keeps his eyes—mock-respectfully—on her face.

"You chose a good time," he says. "Get a late start, and the harbor fills up."

"Indeed." Almost within arm's reach, Medarda bestows a smile. "How fortunate that I am an early riser."

"And I, a late sleeper."

They shake hands, black and red gloves interlocking.

A place is laid for them at the canopied outdoor bar. It is a monochrome oasis: pearl countertop, ivory swivel seats, alabaster fittings. It offers a view of the riverside stretching beneath the green-gray dawn. Silco and Medarda sit side-by-side. Their entourages remain at a distance. No need for a show of force; they both have already been stripped of the smallest accoutrements, from smoking-cases to switchblades.

More's the pity.

Even empty-handed, neither one is unarmed.

The table is laid out with an array of canapés ranging from sweet to savory. The smoky breeze flows over an ice bucket filled with gleaming bottles of beverages.

"Care for a drink, Chancellor?" Medarda asks.

"At six in the morning? Best time for a tipple."

And the remainder of the twenty-three bells, but who is counting? Not Silco. Gods, he'd like a smoke to go with the drink. A smoke, and three-quarters of narcotic mixed with one quarter of Shimmer, to deal with the throb in his ribcage, where Vi's blow has blossomed into a blue spiderwebbing bruise.

It hurts like hell. Yet he almost admires the girl. The odds were stacked against her, but she'd taken the gamble and attacked him anyway. A futile attempt, but that's no fault of hers. It shows perseverance. And stubbornness. He thinks of the punch she threw. The blow resonating through his ribcage. A strong will; as strong as Vander's.

Silco will use that strength for his own ends.

And when the time comes—devour it.

Meanwhile, there are satisfactions to savor. Like checkmating the Council by snapping a collar of leverage around their necks. Like making them comply with his demand to collect Vi within a two-bell span. Like Medarda's private yacht sailing to his waters rather than him traveling to their borders with Vi in tow.

The haste is one more sign of the old superseded by the new. A playful havoc as the status quo tips in his favor.

What we need here, as Jinx sings, is a little bit of panic.

Not that it's all fun and games.

He hadn't lied to Violet. Not about the sham Peace Treaty, nor Piltover's setup. The dead blackguard? A few details embellished there. The man hadn't died in the throes of violence. More because he hadn't received timely medical care.

A deliberate delay on Silco's part? On the contrary. His first priority was to order the injured men sent to a medick. The news of the blackguard's death was shocking, moreso because it was an outcome Silco hadn't planned. There are always mishaps in battle. But that doesn't mean Silco revels in the casualties. Zaun has suffered enough bloodshed.

Zaun has suffered enough—period.

The death was a setback, but Silco has people looking to him for leadership. One of the necessities of leadership is prioritizing the issue itself, rather than one's feelings about it. One dead blackguard is workable if it maintains his upper-hand over the Council. There is business, and there is business. Silco has always enjoyed dishing out a nasty seeing-to for those who get in his way. Likewise, he's lost men in the bargain and understands that the loss, like his own gain, is part of the mission.

Zaun's safety is paramount.

(Like yours, Jinx.)

(Always.)

A liveried barman emerges from the cabin, ready to serve drinks. "What would you prefer, Chancellor?" Medarda asks, "Champagne?"

"Champagne is for celebrations."

"I gather you're not in celebratory spirits?"

"Far from it."

"My, my." A coquettish pout. "Perhaps we can remedy that. What are you in the mood for?"

"A robust red. Hits like a punch to the ribs. Yourself?"

"A dirty martini. Burns at first sip. Then it mellows into intrigue."

Silco quirks a brow. "A tall order, that."

The barman serves their drinks—a slim stemware of Syrah and a frosted V of martini—then withdraws. Medarda tips her glass up and back in a languid swallow. Silco settles back with his own drink, one leg folded over the other, wineglass balanced between spread fingers to warm it up. Sunrays cut through the low-lying clouds. They hold no warmth, but he has always found the sinewaves beautiful as they ripple across the gasoline rainbows at the harbor.

Fit for a painting.

In the glow, Medarda could be a painting herself: all flawless harmony of Art Deco to Silco's sharp-cut irregularity of Art Noveau. The combination is no centerpiece, except as an unconventional slap to épater la bourgeoisie. But in the tug-of-war for balance, Silco has witnessed stranger unions and shakier bargains.

Idly, he asks, "How is Peacekeeper Violet?"

Medarda doesn't glare. But something shifts beneath the silken surface of her poise. "The medics are tending to her. The gash on her cheek needed stitches."

"Unfortunate to hear."

"Then perhaps you should not have cut her."

Silco turns the winegless in his hand, slowly, sunlight striking off the vibrant reds. "What makes you think I did that?"

"She told me."

"And you believe her?" He feigns a sigh. "I'm not allowed the benefit of the doubt?"

"As you pointed out, Chancellor, my family hail from Noxus. I've known my share of hard men. Men who will act without mercy if they are threatened." Medarda's gold-edged eyes lock on his. "Although I hoped you wouldn't so thoroughly be the type."

Silco takes a musing sip of his wine. "The same way I'd hoped your Peacekeeper wouldn't be a Shuriman Horse."

"I assure you—"

"Too late." He sets the wineglass down. "You see, that's the problem with dealing with foxes. So many lures to sidestep."

"I am not sure what you mean."

"Aren't you? That girl you trained is no Peacekeeper. She is a rabid dog who'll bite anyone in range. As you planned, she went rogue. Except she's bitten off more than Topside can chew. She attacked me. She spied on my headquarters. She killed one of my blackguards. Now she's persona non grata in Zaun, and a bureaucratic headache for the Council—unless we keep the news quiet between us." His smile gleams like an unsheathed razor. "Tell me, Councilor. How do such overtures bode for mercy?"

Medarda is too well-seasoned to flinch. She already senses how coiled he is. Silco wants her to. He wants to see what tricks she'll use to calm him down. That's why she's here. Since their first meeting, she's been trying to manage him, if not manipulate him, into a chess sequence of her choosing.

Keep him close; keep Zaun in line.

"I can't help but notice…" she says.

"What?"

She rests her chin on her locked hands, the pose of an angelic Cupid firing off a devilish arrow.

"You describe Violet almost like a jinx."

Silco doesn't miss her emphasis on the last syllable. His notched lip curls. So that's how she wants to play it, hm?

"Jinx," he says, "has nothing in common with Violet."

"Are they so different?"

"As different as the doleful shades from the fiery deluge."

Medarda crosses her elegant legs, the martini balanced in her fingers, "...Such place Eternal Justice has prepared/For those rebellious," she quotes. "Here their prison ordained/In utter darkness…."

"…As far removed from God and light of Heaven," Silco finishes.

Medarda blinks. Perhaps she's under the impression that Trenchers are unlettered. Or that Silco is. Or perhaps she's unaccustomed to quotes from her favorite poets being delivered with the deadpan of a rally slogan.

But that's a former unionist for you. They even hurl poetry like bricks.

She begrudges a smile. "You've cracked open your share of classics, Chancellor."

"Only the pornographic tomes."

"They must be literary giants."

"You're too kind."

"What I am is curious. Especially about Jinx." She sobers. "For instance, I hear she's prone to bouts of violence—"

"Teenaged moodiness."

"Her hobbies include arson, thievery and torture—"

"She also knits."

"She kills in the blink of an eye—"

"And steals hearts in half the time."

Medarda's eyes go vivid. "And that she is your lover."

Silco's temper flattens to icewater. Lover. The gall of these people. To spend a lifetime courting corruption, then to dole out judgement like alms. Except he understands Medarda's game. It's the same she'd played during their first meeting. How better to bypass a supercilious persona than to root out, through deft probing or shock-tactics, the secrets it stubbornly conceals?

Except the reverse is also true. If Medarda pushes hard enough, he'll learn more by opening his jaws rather than snapping them shut.

Let's see what she reveals once she's off-balance.

"Your source is a fool," he says, "and you another to believe her."

"Then enlighten me."

He affects distaste. "Tsk, Councilor. We barely know each other. Familia Supra Omnia, as the Shurimans say. Do oblige my reticence."

"Your reticence? Yes." Medarda's serenity squares into steel. "Your obfuscation? No."

"Whatever do you mean?"

She drums her nails along the stem of her glass, a series of chiding clinks. "Officium praecedit familiam, as the Shurimans also say. Your family matter threatens to catalyze regional instability. As such, I must know about the relationship between you and your charge."

"My adoptee, rather."

"You've acknowledged her as yours?"

"Four months into Zaun's independence."

Medarda falls silent. It is clear she hadn't anticipated this turn of events. Wresting Jinx away would've been easier if she was a foot-soldier on his street, or a concubine in his bed. Progeny is different. She is now Silco's sole issue; political royalty. Spiriting her off in the dead of the night could spark a cross-border catastrophe.

Medarda's expression goes inward. Silco recognizes the look. Reassessing the chessboard with a cool eye, before strategizing the next course of action.

"I confess," she says, "you did not strike me as the type."

"To safeguard what's mine?"

"To ascribe it value in plain sight."

Value.

Somehow, that's as insulting as Lover. As if Jinx has a price tag attached. In truth, her value goes beyond any generic noun. She is his. His child, his confidant, his continuity. He'll not see her trounced under Vi's fists, nor imprisoned for Piltover's politics. He'll keep her safe, until she pushes through the burnt-over field of tragedy, a blue sapling reaching exuberantly towards the future.

Like Zaun.

Medarda's expression shutters. "It seems we are at an impasse."

"Is that so?"

"Like you, Violet also values Jinx."

"Her actions suggest otherwise."

"She only seeks proof of her sister's safety."

"Become a solicitor since we last met, Councilor? Since when are you the mouthpiece for sump-strays?"

"Perhaps I feel a measure of sympathy. An émigré cast off by her homeland…”

“She chose her own path.”

“A path in direct opposition of yours." Her eyelashes dip. She regards Silco through them with a beguiling sincerity that conceals the elicitation at its heart. "To hear Violet, you are a shark from the stygian depths."

"Do you believe it too?"

"It's in the cards. Mostly, I believe she sees something in you. Something dangerous. It's the same thing you see in her. Why else go to such lengths to play the monster?"

"Even monsters guard their legacies."

"And Jinx is yours?"

Silco tips a wry smile. "Jinx is a virtuoso. She shines on her own merits."

"A virtuoso? She has music in her blood?"

"And magic in her bones. In another life, she would be an alchemist from the Shuriman epics. As it is, she's an artist." His mouth twists, rueful. "Turns rot into rainbows."

Monochrome verbiage wrapped around a multicolored riot. But with Jinx, Silco can never find the right words. His reactions are instinctive; his impulses tactile. Everything real sits underneath.

Medarda's scrutiny deepens. "I'd scarcely imagined you partial to rainbows."

"I am partial to anything she does. And I will do anything to ensure her safety." The doting expression recedes from Silco's face. Something else splits through. Dark and bladelike as a shark's fin. "So stop this fishing expedition for my weaknesses. Whatever your Peacekeeper insists—Jinx doesn't rank among them."

Caught out, she demurs, "I meant no offense—"

"Your line of inquiry suggests otherwise." The smokestacks spray fire. The glitter refracts in his bad eye. "Fortunately, I am willing to keep this debacle quiet. Provided Vi never re-enters our borders."

"Let's not be so hasty..."

"Then our press goes public with the attack. The Peace Treaty is forfeit. As is Zaun's willingness to play ball."

"Now Chancellor," she cautions, "There are better ways to mitigate this situation."

"How so?"

“'Peacekeepers are a new division. They have yet to hone their diplomatic acumen. Unlike ourselves." She smiles, a smile to make even a blind man stumble in its radiance. "We could, between us, deflect the blame elsewhere. An inquest with a foregone conclusion, perhaps? Meanwhile, your blackguard's family would receive compensation from Piltover. We would also work behind the scenes to address our Peacekeeper's misconduct. Suspension, followed by rigorous retraining."

"That seems more bribe than mitigation."

"Are you so ardent for a pound of flesh?"

"My appetite is fobbed off by little else."

Her lip curls at the corner. "I daresay you enjoy making double-entendres."

"On the contrary. I prefer explicitness."

Under the table, Medarda's gloved palm drops to his knee. The gesture comes off as effortlessly natural. Her smile is eye-to-eye; an enticement.

"Shall we be explicit now?" she purrs.

Silco says nothing. On Zaun's streets, the overture would earn her a slit throat. In the brothels, she'd be put through her paces, and put in her place. Here, she gets no reaction at all.

This isn't a seduction. This is gamesmanship.

To her, he is no different from the scores of fools she's finessed in the Council. She knows exactly how to wield her wiles, to leave a man witless, and herself victorious. That's how they are, these Topsiders. All lesser beings are public domain to be exploited for personal gain.

And the Medardas lead the pack. In Noxus, their wealth is as legendary as their greed. A dynasty built upon bloodshed; a family name synonymous with warfare. All of the Council's holdings in total would likely not be worth a jewel on General Medarda's dagger.

Her daughter is no different. She is steeped in her family's heritage of ruthlessness, even as she envelops herself in the diaphanous costume of goodwill. In Piltover's gilded halls, she plans her conquests like military strategies, cloaking them in the sublanguage of alluring glances and elusive promises, followed by the tactical precision of bold decrees.

Going against Topside's ethos of never instrumentalizing magic, she'd finessed the Council into funding Talis' Hex-tech research. In the span of six years, thanks to the Hex-Gates, she had transformed Piltover from a charming city-state into a technological juggernaut, rivaling empires like Demacia.

And the price of the progress was paid by the Undercity.

What was once an independent industrial zone whose technology, raw material, and labor were centered on local means, had already been systematically desecrated by Topside through taxation, legislation and outright coercion. The Fissures had lost their autonomy piecemeal: first the mines, then the smelteries, and finally the refineries. Their auto-dynamic industrial system was diametrically opposed to Piltover's aims for monopolizing those resources for itself.

The Hex-Gates worsened the decay. Year after year, they brought forth trade delegations, each bearing waves of change. New goods flooded Topside's markets in exchange for those the Undercity held dear: stone, iron, copper. And bodies. With each delegation, the cost rose higher. From a few hundred workers per annum, to thousands. From one million tons of raw materials every five years, to triple that amount within one. Every time there was a fresh influx of goods, the prices rose hand-in-hand with the death toll.

The Undercity's crippled development, and the creation of a dependent, one-legged economy, led to stagnation in legitimate growth and a spike in organized crime. By the time Silco became the luminary kingpin of the Lanes, the Undercity threatened to collapse into bedlam.

But who sees bedlam beneath the feet of Piltover's rising towers?

At the surface, the Gates glowed as bastions of progress. Belowground, Silco's forces took to the streets. His men ran roughshod over both the criminal underworld and the self-ordained overlords. Through the profits of Shimmer, he bought off the Enforcers. Through subterfuge and violence, he asserted control over the gangs. At his zenith, almost all of the Undercity was his domain, gripped not by an iron fist, but strings pulled from the shadows.

In the end, none of it mattered.

There were a million luxuries his domain would never experience, no matter how much power Silco accrued. He was a faceless king, his crown forged with Fissure-bled steel—but his kingdom was a slag-heap compared to Piltover's blue skies. Even the chem-barons, perched high above the ugly rookeries of the Sumps, were like birds in wrought-iron cages; their lives devoted to money, sex, drugs, and depravity. All to distract from the putrefaction of the smog, the poison in the waters, the corruption in the air.

All to avoid contemplating what came after.

The Hex-Gates stole more than just the Undercity's livelihood. They swallowed its soul. Talis, by building the Hex-Gates, was the architect of their downfall. But Medarda was the one who signed the decree—and sealed their fate.

Now here she sits, hand on Silco's knee, smiling.

He seizes her wrist.

Medarda jerks: shock, resistance. But Silco's grip is inexorable. With a sharp tug, he drags her closer. Their faces are inches apart. Her hyacinth aroma suffuses his lungs. Her hand knots into a fist. Silco imagines real knots biting into her wrist. Imagines the husked music of her voice debauched into shrieks.

Lechery is the wrong word for his ideations. He wants to devour her as he wants to destroy Piltover. Wants to strip the skin from her bones with his teeth.

For months of doublespeak. For a lifetime of unfairness.

For Jinx.

Silco meets Medarda's eyes. Lets her see past their inky blight into the abyss at the center.

"Are you familiar, Councilor, with the etymology of seductress?" he says. "It stems from the old Shuriman seducere. To coax someone astray, so they desert their allegiance, and lose an integral piece of themselves."

Medarda's body-language betrays no anxiety. But Silco feels the thrum of her racing pulse. Her smile comes easily, too easily. "Is that so? Then are you aware, Chancellor, that the word rake comes from the word rakehell. It alludes to a man who rakes hell's coals as recompense for his devilry."

"Indeed? How curious."

Silco loosens his grip. Medarda yanks her hand free.

Wariness scrubs the sheen off her composure. Her pupils are expansive in the sunlight. She'd expected him to bite the lure. Instead he's bitten her. Silco takes in her discomfort with a voyeur's relish. It's like thumbing the colorful lipstick off a woman's mouth to find it more succulent bared of camouflage.

He straightens from his slouch, body rousing itself to indolent attention. His voice is pitched to a slither.

"You asked for explicitness. So here's an earful. You'd run screaming from my devilry—and I'm too far gone to be led astray. So let's put the games aside. We're not here for fancy drinks or flirtation. We might, however, be able to salvage the Peace Treaty. But not if you keep attempting to play me like the needy old roues dangling from your string at the Council."

Medarda volleys a halfhearted tease. "You think I am playing you, Chancellor?"

"You do try. It's what you're good at. Making of your sweetness a mirror that you hold up to each dupe, so he sees his cleverest and most accomplished self reflected in your lovely eyes." Silco beholds her over the rim of his glass. "Impressive. Truly."

An arch glance from Medarda. "Your method is much the same. Only your mirror aims to overwhelm and intimidate, infecting others with a sense of weakness, then bypassing their instinct to resist."

"You're not so easily bypassed, my dear."

"Nor you so easily duped."

Silence falls. A strata of smoke boils off the Ironworks.

Medarda says, "It seems we're in mirror-image positions. Perhaps we can help each other."

"Two mirrors facing each other are a void. I'd suggest we angle ourselves sideways." Taking his glass, Silco knocks back the rest of the drink. "Your turning the Peace Treaty into a chokehold makes it difficult for Zaun to achieve its goals. My stubbornness in cooperating with Piltover makes it difficult to accomplish yours." He wipes his lip with a row of red-gloved knuckles. "We ought to give each other leeway."

"How much leeway?"

"A few inches worth."

“I can’t decide if that’s too little or too much.”

“An inch is all it takes.”

She chides, "I thought we weren't playing games."

Silco irons his expression innocently smooth. "Did that come off as a double entendre?"

"You are incorrigible."

"And intractable. Mustn't forget that."

She stifles a smile. Fleeting, but he catches it. A good sign. She's ready to stop playing seductress to his snake charmer.

Now is the time for business.

"Well," Medarda says. "How do you propose we stop tripping over each other to achieve our goals?"

"Explain why you used Violet to sabotage the Peace Treaty."

He says: You. He means: You, not the Council.

Talis isn't sly enough to turn a wildcard like Violet into a winning hand. The rest of the Council aren't bold enough. That leaves only one person who has the guts and the guile to pull it off. Except her gambit goes beyond undermining Zaun, or making a bid for political power. In each tactic, there is significant long-term strategy.

Silco is ready to know her end-game.

Stiltedly, Medarda says, "Sabotage was not my aim."

"What then?"

For the first time, her poise slips. She sets her glass down. The flower-pin sparkles at the side of her updo like a signal. "Vi's recklessness was a contingency I'd prepared for. But I failed to anticipate how rapidly the situation would escalate. My intention wasn't to see her harmed. Nor to cause violence in Zaun. Rather, it was to steer matters in a certain direction."

"Turn the Peace Treaty into a gridlock."

She nods.

"Against Noxus."

Medard's silence takes on an uncharacteristic depth.

"Your mother has crossed swords with a prominent enemy," Silco goes on, "You believe that if Zaun achieves official independence, our nation will ally with him. And move against Piltover."

"You hold an indisputable grudge against us."

"Indisputably justified."

The creeping daylight traces Medarda's profile. Gone is her seductive languor. Her gaze is haunted.

Silco senses he is seeing another side of her, a part kept painstakingly concealed. He prefers it. Her Councilor's persona holds no allure. It is too affected; her coyness redolent of a courtesan. Beneath that is woman who has aestheticized her old wounds into an art form. She carries them in her embellishments the way Silco carries them in his scars.

Except Silco earned his wounds as an idealist in a hopeless hellscape. He wonders what could inspire the look in Piltover's most privileged at three and thirty. Wonders, too, what damage awaits her in double the time.

Perhaps at his own hand.

Medarda says, "A house divided protects no one in a storm."

"We are not a house. We are two separate nations."

"Our nations are sisters." Her dulcet do-re-mi hardens. "It would behoove us to be allies."

So that's her game, Silco thinks.

Since their first meeting, she's worked to secure his cooperation, wheels within wheels. Checkmating him as he's checkmating Vi. Safeguarding her agenda as he safeguards Zaun. But if she hopes to outplay him with the age-old pitch of My-Enemy's-Enemy, then she's got her work cut out for her.

Her talent lays in setting traps, not starting fires. Silco's expertise lies in both.

"Sisters," he says, "are not bound by subterfuge."

"Agreed. They are bound by trust."

"Lobbing Violet like a grenade between us isn't trust. It's duress."

"I understand you might be reconsidering the Peace Treaty—"

"I am not."

She stops mid-sentence. "What?"

"I am not," he repeats, laying out each word precisely. "It's why I'm here. With your Peacekeeper in tow—instead of facedown in the Pilt. But first I must know something. Why this elaborate stratagem? Why not use your influence with the Council to help your mother."

Medarda's eyes, fringed with thick lashes, hold a foxlike gleam. "It is precisely because she is my mother."

"Care to elaborate?"

"It's a family matter. Please indulge my reserve."

"Your reserve? Yes." Silco's scarred features chisel themselves in steel. "Your obtuseness? No."

Medarda's eyes dip down to the clasped hands in her lap. A golden ring glints on the dark interweaving of her fingers. Her family crest. She twists it, and says, "War means different things to different nations. To Zaun, it is defiance. To Piltover, it is a blow to our pride. To my mother's homeland, it is a way of life."

My mother's homeland.

A distancing. A house divided.

"Now," Medarda continues, "she seeks to turn Piltover into her private armory."

"With Hex-tech as the bullet."

She nods. "As a daughter, I am duty-bound to safeguard my kin. But as a Piltovan, I can see the writing on the wall. If we engage in conflict with Noxian warlords, the outcome is destruction. Ours—and Zaun's." Her see-no-evil expression wavers. "Tell me. Have any of Noxian parties approached you for a partnership?"

"That would be telling."

"Not to mention unfortunate."

"I trust that isn't a threat?"

"It's a reminder of what we have in common. The threat—"

"The threat beyond our walls," Silco finishes.

Talis' words in her mouth. He understands that they spill from the same bleeding-heart fount. If there is one thing to be said about Talis, he is chockful with good intention. But so was Vander. So was Silco, once.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

"I see your dilemma," he says. "But we are neither of us naïve. You posit Zaun and Piltover's relations as a sisterly dispute. But sisterhood suggests equals. Our relationship is the opposite."

"Chancellor—"

"Let me finish. Because it seems you've neglected your history lessons. Else you'd remember that Piltover's progress was carried on the backs of Zaunite labor. You exploited our mines for your factories. You devoured our children for your scutwork. You shrank our enterprises with your taxes." His expression slices from civility to a sharp-eyed contempt. "You've fucked us balls-deep, as the Undercity saying goes. Now you expect us to fight alongside you against a 'common threat'?"

Medarda stiffens. "There is no reason for crudeness."

"You bled us dry for decades. But it upsets you when I say fuck?" He pronounces it with a devious glide, so the F is like a blade cutting effortlessly across satin, and the K ends with a switchblade-soft click. "What a coy lot you are. I'll have to teach you to say what you mean. Topside's rotten legacy can no longer hide behind pretense."

"Rottenness can be remedied."

"And blood unspilled?"

"Or shared." Her eyes implore him to see reason. "Zaun's legacy hangs heavy on Piltover, too. Not only because the Fissures accounted for one-third of our mineral resources. Zaun's loss has dealt a blow to Piltover's foundational myth: that we are a city of equality."

"A blow Zaun was privileged to deliver."

"Blows are a short-term solution. Consider the long-game." She takes a breath. "Very well. I will be explicit. Cooperation between Zaun and Piltover would not only fortify our defenses. It would encourage commercial partnerships between our businessmen. It would foster dialogue among our academics. Dialogue that leads to financial packages—and atonement for Zaun's stolen dignity."

"Are you speaking of trade? Or reparations?"

"Do the semantics matter?"

"Semantics always matter. Piltover's wealth was bolstered by Zaun's resources. Reparations mean forfeiting that wealth in its entirety. Tallying billions of hours into the currency of blood. Not to mention compensating for countless lives ruined by maltreatment, disease and starvation." Uncrossing his legs, Silco reclines into a more comfortable spot. "High stakes. The Council would never take the gamble."

"Would you settle for mercy?"

"Mercy lacks teeth. What Zaun needs is payback."

Medarda doesn't flinch. "Payback has limits. Moving forward does not." Her voice drops to a solemn hush, "Do you know of the legendary blacksmith, Ornn? The Freljordian spirit of the forge?"

Silco nods. "He crafted the talisman known as Salvation."

"An enchanted weapon to safeguard nations. Paired with a second talisman known as Redemption, they could summon a lance and shield of pure energy to defend cities." She leans closer, her warm breath playing across his face. "We could, between us, be the same. Redemption and Salvation. We could set a precedent. Show our people how to evolve beyond their differences. Act as a unifying force against foreign incursion."

Silco doesn't care for her premature use of We. His expression reveals little beyond a jaded amusement. "Better the devil you know, eh?"

"Mirror images."

Dawn creeps in a surreal glow. The air between Medarda and Silco warms. A tantalization of intimacy, with its kissing knees and nearly kissing lips…

Silco yawns, exposing a row of sharpened teeth. Medarda blinks, the yawn catching, a gloved hand demurely covering her mouth.

Their eyes meet. The tension is offset by humor.

"My word, Councilor," Silco says, "you've a talent for putting a man to sleep."

With tart sweetness, she replies, "I hoped you'd have more stamina."

"Coffee is in order."

"I'll call for two cups prepared."

"No need."

The salt-and-pepper strands are slipping from Silco's pomade. He smooths them back, and stretches past Medarda, grabbing a bottle from the ice bucket. A coal-black coffee liqueur.

Silco's good eye idles over the label. "Zhyunian brew, hm? Bitter as death."

"Bitter is not my preferred fare."

"Then let me make it yours."

"Would that be part of our deal?"

"Let's not be hasty." His smile is no more than a sharkish contraction around his eyes. "We've not even undressed down to our terms."

Into two glasses, he pours three fingers' worth of liqueur. A dollop of cream; a clinking of ice cubes. He nudges one glass toward Medarda. She accepts it with a mute distaste. He doubts she favors such concoctions. But she'll have to accustom herself to such unsavories—and worse.

Especially if this alliance is to be.

Not bothering with a toast, Silco drains his glass in half at a go. Medarda does the same—and grimaces. In Va-Nox, she breathes, "Er schmeckt schrecklich."

"Man gewöhnt sich daran." Silco nudges the sugar pot toward her. "In Zhyun, they hold the cubes in the mouth between sips."

"That seems a choking hazard."

"Only if one's tongue lacks dexterity."

Her features twist, a scowl reined in. Or is it a smirk? After a moment, she plucks out a cube, tips her head back, and opens her mouth. Her tongue is pink as a sea-anemone. Silco watches it curl delicately around the cube. She takes another sip, and swallows.

"Mmm. Better."

"A little goes a long way." Silco sets down his own glass. "In some trades, sharing a cube is like sharing a handshake. It cleanses deception from the palate. Or so Noxian warmasons claim."

"Warmasons?"

"Zaun has been contacted by one. He and his cadre represent the man your mother antagonized. General Jericho Swain."

The tiny hitch in Medarda's breath is the only sign of alarm.

"They've made Zaun an offer. Five years' unlimited trade through the Ironspike Mountains. Grain, textile, weapons. In exchange, help them infiltrate Piltover's borders, and stage an attack somewhere in Mainsping Crescent. Plenty of fire and blood. In the disorder, our agents will abduct a dignitary. Engage him in a man-to-man tête-à-tête—with alligator clips to his bollocks. All to ensure his cooperation, so General Swain's life is made easier."

"Who, precisely, is this dignitary?"

Silco's chuckle rolls hollow as a smoke ring. "Jayce Talis."

Medarda falls still. Silco traces the distress creeping below her poised surface. A cold gleam rises in his eyes, a smile gone inward. He does enjoy that iron will of hers. It strikes a match in counterpoint to that sadist's spirit inside him.

It strikes a match below the belt line, too.

"Swain," he says, "would be a profitable ally for Zaun."

Her eyes narrow. "I imagine so."

"However I turned down his deal."

"You—what?"

Silco smooths out the perfect white knot of his cravat. "Short-term gains should never eclipse one’s end-goals."

"Which are?"

"Zaun's survival."

"As your private enterprise?"

The thin line of Silco's upper lip suddenly peels away from his teeth, an inchoate snarl. "As my home, Councilor. Warlords have no place here. Soon, they become landlords. We've terminated our lease with one. I'll never bargain with another."

A vein throbs along Medarda's neck. "But you will bargain with me?"

"You are not a warlord. You are a businessperson. So am I." His good eye slits. "But I am also father to a nation—and to a child."

The message is implicit: A threat to either will be met in kind.

Medarda sits haloed in toxic green sunlight. The glittering pin is working its way out of place; she untwists and repositions it. Her expression holds a dark-eyed ambiguity, as if her opinion of Silco has taken an unexpected trajectory.

Reaching for the liqueur, she refills their glasses.

"Rakehell," she says.

"Excuse me?"

"There is devilry in your devotion, Chancellor." She extinguishes her smile in her drink. "But I applaud it. It stems from a worthy cause."

Silco tips his own glass in ironic salute. "One I am determined to rise to."

They click glasses together. The liqueur goes down as if coldly aflame. Silco savors the burn in his gut. Medarda drains her own gamely. Silco notes the softening slope of her shoulders. A good sign. Preliminaries are done; the rest is a matter of haggling.

"Well," Medarda says. "We've had our toast."

"Indeed. Let's state our terms."

"Go first, Chancellor." A playful flirt of lashes. "I shan't consider you ungallant."

Silco doesn't hesitate. "A reworking of the Peace Treaty. Henceforth, a Treaty of Mutual Cooperation, Trade and Security. It will entail economic exchange on the private-sector. The establishment of mutual wings of government dedicated to political engagement and commercial partnership. Quota-free trade volume in goods and services."

Medarda stifles a smile. "I daresay you came prepared."

"I'm not finished."

Her smile fades into a coaxing lift of eyebrows.

"The Council will balk at reparations. Instead, Zaun will settle for reformation. We will agree to a press blackout for your Peacekeeper's crimes. We will allow Topside to conduct an inquest—with a foregone conclusion. In exchange, a real committee consisting of Piltovan and Zaunite activists will be formed to investigate Enforcer brutalities in the past decade. They will undertake a thorough public consultation process. Look into organizational malpractice, oversight and accountability. Emphasis on accountability. We've not forgotten the atrocities on Bloody Sunday and the Day of Ash. Now our dead demand just desserts."

Medarda challenges, "Did the dead request this?"

"Dead is dead. But the survivors will have restitution. And names."

They lock gazes. Silence stretches.

Evenly, Medarda says, "I will see what can be done."

"Do."

"Is there more?"

"With me? Interminably." He folds his hands together and brings his fingertips to his lips. "All former undercity prisoners at Stillwater will be handed over to Zaun. Your courts will cooperate with ours to ensure they undergo re-trial and resentencing. Those found guilty will be transferred to Dredge prison. Those deemed innocent will be freed."

"Chancellor, I hardly think—"

"Do keep up." Without giving her a chance to interrupt again: "Piltovan journalists will participate in a public relations strategy to promote Zaunite interests. Diplomatic incentives for Piltover's foreign allies to invest here. Particularly in sectors of education, health and housing. We aren't looking for mercy. Our citizens are hard workers. What they need are the opportunities thus denied."

"By your criminal empire."

"By your collective negligence."

Again, they stare at each other, challenge contained in subtle lines.

"I shall need time," Medarda says, "to persuade the Council."

"I've great faith in your persuasive abilities."

"Let's not overreach, Chancellor. Your proposal is—" A headshake, "—novel. And you've yet to mention the Security aspect of the Treaty."

"Simple. I propose an independent body to monitor the Treaty's implementation. It will be composed of Piltover's agents and ours. High on mutual disarmament. Low on non-proliferation." He rests his chin on his steepled fingers like he does in the war-room. "Given the Noxian threat, it will prove useful. Zaun's agents can move unimpeded within Piltover. Often and at short notice."

"Are you mad?" she asks, as if inquiring whether he prefers veal or venison.

Silco pops a sugar cube into his mouth. His tongue is a playful roll along the sharp row of teeth. Medarda's eyes follow it, before she snaps them back front and center. Her stare gives off a discomfited heat.

As it stands, the conversation is risky. Well beyond the bounds of political propriety. Medarda is the one who chummed the waters. But she may have second thoughts. She may reclaim her scruples, scramble ashore, terminate the Treaty altogether.

Conflicted allies, allies with ideals, are cowards. Silco must play this with precision.

"If Swain is attempting to undermine Piltover," he says, "Then Zaun's refusal won't deter him. He'll try again. This time through a different source. Sooner or later, his warmasons will breach your territory. They will enact worse crimes. A coup. A string of terror attacks. A bloodier reprise of the Piltover-Zaun war." The cube shatters between his teeth with a brittle crunch. "Whatever it takes to destabilize Piltover—while simultaneously smoking out your General-Mother."

Medarda's scowl is querulous. She says nothing. He has a point.

"It would—what was your word? behoove—our interests if my network kept a weather eye on the horizon," he concludes. "My men can slip through gaps yours never even knew existed. While the warmasons are in Zaun, my network will shadow them. Should they make moves on Piltover, I'll supply a contingent of talented agents to liaise with yours."

"On the record?"

"Off the books."

Medarda's lashes dip. He senses her thoughts ticking over.

"I assume," she enunciates with care, "your network will keep their hands clean?"

"Clean?"

"Curb bloodshed at Piltover's expense."

"We cannot succeed by playing contradictory scales."

"Contradictory?"

Silco's hands make a languid pattern in the air, describing the time signature in an opera. "My dear, if you play a major mode with your left hand and a minor with your right, you've massacred the symphony beyond salvaging."

"Must it come to massacres?"

"If you've cold feet, we can terminate the deal."

"I didn't say that."

"You needn't." He shoulders back in his chair. His bruised ribs twinge. But in the game of wordplay, and its inverse of bloodplay, he is in his element. "You Topsiders have no stomach for massacres, do you? Not unless they're kept out of sight."

Medarda's glossy mouth purses. "May I ask you a question, Chancellor?"

"Of course."

"How often a month do you kill someone?"

Silco's lip quirks, alerting Medarda that this is a risky rhetorical game.

She shakes her head. "Do you fail to see the wrongness? How many men are even posed such a question?"

"I can't say," he retorts. "But I imagine those who pose it have the luxury of never dirtying their hands. Their lives are a joyride, while an engine of drudges break their backs to keep it so. When they die, more drudges take their place. On and on ad infinitum—right until the wheels come off, tossing its pampered passengers arse over teakettle into the filth of their own making."

Medarda glowers.

Good, Silco thinks.

Hypocrisy has its uses. Denial does not. Especially from a woman as complicit in murder as the Shimmer in his factories. Moreso—because the Shimmer was a cheat-code against Piltover's rigged game of progress.

A progress patronized by Medarda's ambition.

"Councilor," he says. "If we're to coexist, then any shared threat to Piltover and Zaun must be struck down with decisive action."

"The rationale of zealotry."

"Piltover is complicit in tenfold worse."

"You can't blame us for all the evil you practice."

"Blame has no bearing in a war," Silco snaps, a flash-point of temper in seething slow-motion. "All that matters is survival. You forget that, you lose your head. Remember, it was not through ideals that your forbearers forged the Immortal Bastion. It was through trickery and bloodshed. They had the minds of foxes and the hearts of wolves. Unless you want to return to the days when Piltover was a pauper's backwater, you'd best remember their lessons."

The statement sinks in, casting tiny ripples across Medarda's face. Her stare hardens.

"Grim words," she says, "for a potential partnership."

"Life can be grim—with angels of mercy in short supply."

"Is that what you believe I am? An angel of mercy?"

Silco's malice thaws into mockery. "Oh, I know better."

This time, it is he who leans closer. Medarda's hands make reflexive fists in her lap. Another time, he'd heed the gesture, respect her territoriality. Abide by the rules of sovereign conduct. But they've left behind the safety of those shores.

The waters now are an encircling darkness.

Silco doesn't touch her. But his thumb circles the stem of her glass, as if entitled. A high thin note vibrates through the air. "Angels of mercy seldom condescend to visit Zaun,” he muses. “Nor do Councilors bargain with cutthroats. Which, I wonder, are you?"

Her scowl is leashed but fierce. "Not a cutthroat. But—"

"Strange times bode strange bedfellows?"

"When you phrase it that way, it sounds—"

"Crude? Clandestine? Adulterous?"

Her anger isn't quite so leashed now. "—dangerous."

"But profitable." Silco's voice drops from raw silk to rough stone. "And what is profit without a taste of danger? I must warn you, though. This isn't a deal you can back out of. Nor one you want to lose. It's one thing to sanction fires from one's tower. It's another to be locked in a burning room with no way out. Every order you issue could bring you closer to the flames. Consider carefully if you wish to be partners."

Disquiet flickers across Medarda's features. But she is too shrewd to be dragged under.

"If we're to be partners," she retorts, "then we must abide by the same rules? Yes?"

"Absolutely."

"In the case, I'll begin first. Our future correspondence shall be conducted through my personal pneumatic courier. If I'm unavailable, my secretary, Elora, will be assigned to receive messages."

"Understood."

"Next: does Zaun have a speaking telegraph system?"

"Not at present."

"Allow me to recommend a Demacian communications firm. They specialize in inter-and-intra city communications. With a direct line in place, you may contact me at any hour of the day. Or night." Through her lashes, she imparts the warning: Hold the double-entendre.

Silco does—narrowly. "Suppose one uses the channel for unsavory purposes?"

"Our bargain is predicated on trust, Chancellor. After all, our interests align, don't they?"

Slyness curls around Silco's words. "As mirror images."

The sky has lightened into ashen fullness. The Ironworks, limned by the glow, power full-steam ahead. The monstrous edifice begins bleeding bodies. Works scurry everywhere. Foremen, dockhands, runners. None can afford to dawdle. The day has begun, and every minute is a coin lost. But those with a few minutes to spare gawk at the yacht in the deep dock: a pristine pearl in Zaun's filthy waters.

Silco gazes back.

Once, he was like these men and women: a cog in the wheel of progress. Shivering with Vander in the grey chill of the mining barracks at dawn; smeared in soot and sagging with exhaustion at night. A brute vestige of his nature is their nature, such that he knows why that girl is dawdling by the alleyside with a red rag on her arm (a floor sweeper making extra coin with a knee-trembler); why that man is filling a pail with water from a pump (a scrubber preparing to debride the docks of scum); why that boy is running up the stairwell with a bag slung over his shoulder (the tea boy late for his shift).

Silco's expression downshifts. Coveting Zaun in all its potential—not blighted but beautiful. To live in this city is to know its sorrows and joys. And to be the Eye is to have an intimate peek into its cruelest vices—but also its most cherished dreams.

And think also: only a few miles to the southwest, under the same brightening sky, still asleep, is his own dream.

His child.

It stirs him with a solemn sense of wonder. The old feelings he used to try to pen down in pamphlets, yet made brand-new. The connectivity of the city, the intimacy of the streets and its people, their sufferings and triumphs, all unbreakably linked.

When he glances back, Medarda is watching him.

"Hail, infernal world!" she says, quoting Paradise Lost again, "and thou, profoundest Hell, receive thy new possessor!"

"The mind is its own place," Silco retorts, "and in itself can make a Heaven of Hell/a Hell of Heaven."

"This is your Paradise, then?"

"There are better places than Paradise."

Curious, she tips her chin, "Perhaps someday you'll give me a tour?"

“Is that a tease, or a dare?”

Their stares catch and hold. No need for pretense. He's on her hook. She's in his jaws. Almost literally.

Silco takes a triple-shot of the liqueur straight from the bottle, then blows idly across the lip, a melody like a signaling ship. "I've one last question."

"By all means."

"You posit yourself as representing the Council. But is the Council privy to our meeting?"

"Would you refuse if they were?"

Silco's good eyelid curves half-shut. "Councils are dangerous to work with. Each member has their own off-the-books way of getting things done. The outcome crosses wires and causes muddles."

"May I ask what you're driving at?"

She already knows his answer. She is merely testing how many moves ahead he is thinking. Same as her.

Mirror-images, indeed.

"If you expect my cooperation," Silco says. "I expect a full disclosure on silent partners."

"There are none."

"Not even Councilor Talis?"

Her expression doesn't change. But her spine straightens as if pinched. "It's complicated."

"That is neither a yes, or a no."

"Should it matter?"

"In point of fact? It does. You've a reputation for a level head. The Golden Boy? Not so much."

Especially after the attack he and Vi pulled at Silco's factory. It hadn't been so disastrous as to get under Silco's skin. But it had drawn blood. Casualties on the frontline; casualties behind the scenes.

He'd rather avoid a byplay.

"Councilor Talis trusts my intentions,” Medarda says delicately. “He understands that a good deal of the Council's policies are… outmoded. He believes there must be change. The conflict between Zaun and Piltover has proven as much. In that vein, he needn't be privy to every decision I make. Just as long as we're both doing the right thing."

We're both doing the right thing.

The phraseology of a couple, not of colleagues. Yet the discord in her body-language is plain. As if her feelings for Talis, and her strategies against her mother, are creating an inner-rift. Tempting to pry deeper. Turn the rift into a crack, and discover what secrets it disgorges.

Now isn't the time.

"I have a question of my own." Medarda says.

"Of course."

"Peacekeeper Violet. Will you deny her reentry into Zaun?"

Silco feels a chill touch his spine and seep into his balls. By Kindred, he thinks, and tastes the old premonition like blood. "I'd be well within my rights."

Her Sphynx-eyes glimmer. "I hope you reconsider."

"This is a family matter, Councilor. It will be settled accordingly."

"By Janna's grace, I hope not."

"Excuse me?"

She leans closer, in a dizzying waft of perfume. "Peace is a fragile thing. So is sisterhood. We may end up locked together in a burning room. But we must be careful to burn no more bridges. All the better to move forward, yes?"

Through her lashes, she imparts her message. Let Vi live.

Silco stares.

Gods, she's a devious hellcat. She's trapped him with his own checkmate. Again. Offering him in equal measure the promise of perfect simpatico between Zaun and Piltover, or the threat of the worst possible outcome. All contingent on his choice to keep Vi onside.

To show mercy.

He wonders how many times she replayed variations of this game in her head, with the different prices she can afford to pay. He imagines her calculating his reaction, and knows she is right in every set-up: he has no choice but to accept the bargain.

For now.

"No need to sell past the close," Silco says flatly. "We are in accord."

Medarda proffers her hand. Silco shakes his head.

"Not that way."

"What?"

Silco unsnaps the glittering pin from her updo. Her glossy locs tumble around her face, with a bracing whiff of her body's perfume.

Medarda jerks. In the periphery, the Enforcers spring, weapons ready.

Silco ignores them. His fingers turn the pin over, inspecting its stiletto point. "Tsk. So much for playing by the same rules."

Medarda's features go rigid. "How dare you—?"

"You dared first."

She snatches for the pin. Evading, he wields it blade-first. The exchange sets off a chain-reaction: the Enforcers flex their firearms, and the blackguards uncoil to strike. One false step, and a massacre shimmers on the horizon.

Medarda makes a soothing motion. "Hold."

The closest Enforcer falters, "Councilor—"

"I'm sure Zaun's Chancellor was only admiring my bauble, Jaden." Her hands form into fists in her lap, then relax. "That's all you were doing, yes?"

"A memento of our partnership."

Silco makes a pirouetting flick with his finger. As one, the blackguards melt away. Medarda inclines her head at the Enforcers. Likewise, they retreat. The furor ebbs into silence.

Medarda says, "Respect would not be remiss, Chancellor."

"Give to get."

"The pin was a precaution."

"Now it's a prop." His stare orients on hers. "If you'd lend me your hand?"

"My hand?"

"We'll square the deal the proper way. Blood for blood."

Her expression darkens. "A blood bargain signifies life or death."

A shadow-smile touches Silco’s lips. "What in hell do you think this is?"

Medarda glowers. Her temper is real—and damnably attractive. The breeze stirring off the Pilt carries the motes of her perfume: hyacinths musked with body-heat. She's a tough one, all right. Toughest so far. But that makes the payoff all the more promising.

Silco extends his hand. After a moment, she lays hers inside it. He takes her wrist and tugs her glove off, baring silken flesh to harsh sunlight. Her palm is small and exquisitely shaped. The lines hold an interesting pattern of notches.

The palmists at Janna's Temple would call it an unlucky hand. A childhood of suffering; an adulthood of complications.

Silco smooths a thumb over her life-line. Her breath hitches. He meets her eyes, and mock-soothes, "It only hurts a moment."

"I'm not afraid of pain," she says evenly.

"Just the scars, hm?"

Letting go, he starts to remove his own glove. She beats him to it. Finger-by-finger, she strips off the suede. Unsheathed, his palm feels chilled in both her own, then warms. Curiously, Medarda traces his fingertips, as if manifestly disinterested in anything but the state of his callused flesh.

He traps her fingertips in his own. She doesn't balk. Her eyes glint with defiance.

"Not all scars are obvious," she says.

Wielding the pin, Silco takes her wrist. The point slices into her palm. Medarda's brow tightens. The cut oozes blood. Silco repeats the action on his own palm—a deep red notch. Then he extends his hand to Medarda.

"Now our deal is done."

Medarda's mouth firms. She takes Silco's hand. Her grip is unlike their previous handshakes. No politeness, but a fierce squeeze with a hint of fingernails. There is determination, even wildness in it. A fox who submits to no traps. And yet trapped she is, by the undertow of imperatives between them. He will try to drag her down to his level; she will try to lift him to hers.

Whatever it takes to safeguard their sovereignty, and their secret prizes.

Jinx; Talis.

They sit eye-to-eye. And the Ironworks spray fire, a cascade of red sparks like blood.

FLASH MESSAGE

SUBJECT: ?

You are alive.

Lookouts confirmed it.

END OF MESSAGE.

FLASH MESSAGE

RE: SUBJECT - ?

UNDELIVERABLE - RECIPIENT NOT FOUND.

Also: fuck off.

END OF MESSAGE

(Correspondence recovered from Entresol Zone C)

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