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I froze.

Not that there was really much of an alternative, I was forced to admit. With a strange demi kneeling on my chest and a gun jammed under my chin, “sit down and shut up” was basically the only option that presented itself.

“Wait,” I heard Aedan say, his voice rising. “Wait, wait, wait.” I could see him at the very edge of my vision, if I stretched. He still held Doug’s arm in his grasp, his knife pressed against the larger man’s skin. The bodyguard’s shirt was already soaking through with blood from where he’d been slashed.

“You going to play nice?” the man kneeling on me said, looking back over his shoulder.

The sheer unfairness of it welled up inside me. Before I could stop myself, it boiled over into words. “We never-”

In the time it took me to spit out the three syllables, the man pulled his gun from under my chin and jammed it right into my mouth. I froze again, pinned in place by his disinterested glare and the feeling of metal between my lips.

“I’m not warning you again,” he said, locking his gaze onto me. “Another word and I’ll be having Justin go get the mop.”

“He’s a demi,” I heard Justin say behind him. “Self-cleaning.”

“The dustpan, then,” the man said with a laugh.

I wished I could share in their amusement. I couldn’t. My heart hammering in my ears, I nodded once, quickly. Aedan’s eyes met mine over the man’s shoulder.

“Do what he says and shut the fuck up for once,” he said, spitting the words at me. Under the frankly understandable frustration and anger, though, something else lurked in his tone. His eyes were focused in laser-tight on me, and they seemed just as irritated as ever, but there was a wildness there I hadn’t seen before.

Was Aedan actually worried? That was enough to push me to the edge of laughing - almost. How sweet of him.

The knowledge that if Aedan was concerned I had no business at all laughing settled in a second later. I lay back, looking up at the man hovering over me, and nodded as well as I could.

He gave me another sharp look, holding my stare for a long, drawn-out moment, and then pulled his gun back.

“Like my friend there was trying to say. We didn’t come here looking for a fight,” Aedan said, spreading his hands to either side. “We were just here to deal.”

“And does your friend have a name?” the man with the gun said. Skepticism colored his every syllable.

Aedan pursed his lips, glancing over to him. “He does.”

“Don’t be an ass,” the as-of-yet-unnamed bodyguard snapped. He still stood half in front of Justin, keeping the finder safely out of the way.

Aedan shifted, scowling. I appreciated that. I didn’t really want to go giving out my name either - anything that could let trouble follow us home was a bad idea. “What about you? Introductions all around.”

The man frowned, his expression lengthening the longer the silence dragged out between us. My pulse accelerated gently. If this went south, well...Aedan would be fine. Damn it, I’d know this was a stupid, idiotic-

“Patrick,” the man with the gun said, still leaning on my chest. I didn’t fight the matter.

Aedan leaned back, still gripping Doug by the arm. “Pat. Wonderful. Now-”

“He’s trouble,” Justin said, peering out from behind his bodyguard’s back. “He wanted-”

“I was listening,” Pat said, shooting a quick look towards his finder.

Justin colored red instantly. “O-Oh. Yeah. Okay.”

“So you’re that asshole looking for the impossible focus,” Pat said. His eyes stayed fixed on me - and even if his posture was a bit more relaxed, the gun was still business-end towards me. “Thought you were an urban legend, myself.”

“It’s not impossible.”

It took everything I had not to twist and glare at Aedan. The whine in his voice was unmistakable. This wasn’t the time to get petulant, damn it.

Patrick only chuckled. “Whatever. So you were just going to sail in here, make use of our crew, and leave us to clean up your mess? What a fucking joke.”

My hand twitched. Pat’s eyes narrowed. I stopped - and then slowly, carefully, raised one finger. Even without words, it was easy enough to understand what I wanted. I hoped.

“Not happening,” Pat said, shaking his head.

Inwardly, I sighed. But I just curled my finger over, jabbing it down towards my pocket. The one without my relic. There were things he didn’t need to get his hands on, and my relic was at the top of the list.

The man only stared at me, his gaze sweeping up and down my face. It was like he was sizing me up, trying to see if I was lying.

“Go ahead and entertain him,” I heard Aedan say from behind Pat.

“No tricks,” Pat said, raising his gun.

I forced a smile, cheap and fake. And then I nodded once, laying my hands out to either side. It was hard to really look threatening, when he was sitting on me, but it was about as good as I could do to get my point across.

His eyes never left my face - but he dipped two fingers into my coat pocket, exploring tentatively.

Recognition flashed across his expression - and then he pulled out the wad of cash I’d gotten at the gas station.

“We were always going to pay you,” Aedan said. His voice had lost all of the fear from moments before. If anything, he sounded almost gleeful. “I don’t know what you’ve heard, but it’s completely unfair. Totally unbased. You can’t just-”

Pat shot a look back towards the immortal. Aedan shut up.

“And what about anyone on your trail?” Pat said. He still looked as casual as ever, perched easily on top of me. I could feel the tension running through him, though. He was just a giant knot of pent-up energy, I realized. “What about whoever shows up on your ass? You expect us to up and deal with it for you?”

A crooked smile tugged at Aedan’s lips. “I think if anyone’s following, they’ll be coming here regardless of what you do next. So why kill customers? That’s not going to help your reputation.”

I tried to keep from tensing up, watching the man carefully. The others clearly regarded him as their leader - or at least the person in charge, if not the outright boss. I didn’t think Aedan would tangle with a prime crew straight off the bat. Not that it was out of the realm of possibility, but it’d be a bit bold even for him. So, it was reasonably safe to assume Pat there was important.

The fact that Aedan was even comfortable digging into finders’ business spoke a lot as to his current opinion on affairs, I realized. He’d been edging towards starvation a few months before - and here he was, poking around again as though everything was fine.

He was either happy about how things were going, or getting desperate.

The sound of hard-packed fabric slapping against flesh brought my attentions back front and center. Patrick was still watching me, smacking the wad of cash against his wrist absent-mindedly. And then he stood, groaning softly to himself. “Fuck me,” I heard him mutter. And then a little more loudly. “All right. Another wrong move, and-”

“No, no,” Aedan said, beginning to chuckle. “No trouble.” He hesitated, as though unwilling to relinquish the little bit of control he’d gotten his hands on - and then he let go of Doug, skittering a step back.

A step wasn’t quite enough, it turned out, as Doug spun and buried his fist in Aedan’s midsection.

I winced, making to jump to my feet. Aedan staggered away from the bigger man, gasping for breath.

Pat’s hand landed on my shoulder a second later, still clutching the wad of cash. “Nope,” he said. “That’s fair. He got cut.” He let me ease myself into a sitting position, but no farther.

“...Fuck off,” Aedan spat between wheezes, his green eyes fiery. But he didn’t try to make another go for Doug, no matter his feelings on the matter.

“You just sit there nice and quiet,” Pat said, glaring down at me. He waited, watching me until I nodded my agreement.

When he turned away, watching Aedan and his subordinates, I slid my hands into my pockets. It just looked like I was a bit chilly, I told myself. I had every right to be. The warehouse was cold.

And no one so much as looked at me funny. I smiled thinly, still hearing my blood rush through my ears. My pulse was starting to slow, beat by beat, but it would take time.

Fuck. I hadn’t woken up ready to have a gun stuck in my face. I couldn’t quite keep myself from blaming Aedan. He’d promised it would be safe. This was his idea.

But that anger simmered low as Pat approached him. He was older than us. Or, well, me, anyway. Not much, not enough to be old, but flecks of silver were just beginning to mar his otherwise mundane brown hair. One didn’t get to be old in this part of the country without being comfortable in a tense situation, I suspected.

“So you want information,” he said, rocking back and forth on his heels.

Aedan snorted, wiping his mouth. “Like we said.”

Pat looked to Justin, totally disregarding the petulance in the immortal’s voice. “And? Anything?”

Justin’s head snapped up to level, clearly responding to the iron in his boss’s tone. “Excuse me?”

“The focus the redhead’s after. Got anything?”

“That thing’s just a legend, Pat. You know that. If something like that actually existed-”

“Just answer the damn question,” Pat said. His voice was still carefully cheerful, but there was no mistaking the sharp edge that had appeared in it. “I’m sure these two are busy.”

And he wanted us out of his hair. The light went on in Justin’s eyes, right as Aedan sniffed and turned away.

My ally’s eyes drifted over me, pausing for the faintest of seconds. I didn’t miss the way he glanced down, noting that my hands were in my pockets. I might not be able to respond properly, but I nodded as minutely as I could.

I was listening. I wasn’t about to miss a word.

“I’m checking the city daily, just like you asked,” I heard Justin mutter.

“I know.”

“Do you really think that something like that could show up and we wouldn’t all know?”

“Just do it.”

I saw their finder roll his eyes - and then he leaned back against the warehouse’s wall, grabbing his wrist again.

Staying quiet was harder than I’d thought, harder than I’d expected. I wanted to say so many things - to talk to Patrick, to argue with Aedan. To ask Justin if he could work just a little faster. But things had finally reached a bit of a truce, however tense. Setting it all off again by opening my mouth just seemed like a bad idea.

The seconds ticked by as we waited, frozen in uneasy silence. My eyes slid shut. I ran over the conversation we’d had, however small. Were they buying time for more of their allies to come after us? I didn’t think it was a big crew, but that didn’t mean there were only three of them. But if they were just going to turn on us, why would they delay? Why not just-

“Like I said,” Justin said, sounding irritated and smug in equal parts. “There’s nothing out there, Pat. Not like that.”

“Look again,” Aedan snapped. “It’s a big damn city. And from this far away-”

“I don’t know what you’re expecting, asshole,” Justin snapped. “I told you. There’s nothing.”

Aedan spun on his heel, stalking through the murky half-light of the warehouse. The low, muffled sound of him swearing with shocking creativity drifted over to where I sat.

Pat chuckled, rifling through the fold of money he’d taken from my pocket. “Tough luck there, son.”

The look Aedan gave him would have cut glass. “Don’t call me son.”

I let a sigh slip out, still more than a little sour about the whole matter. I hadn’t expected Pat to take everything - especially not for a big fat ‘no’ that had taken his finder a minute or two’s work.

Judging by the tiny, satisfied smile on his face, though, I didn’t think my odds of getting it back were very good. I was left to simmer, thinking about just how quickly it had all gone sideways.

“We done?” the still-unnamed bodyguard said, creeping closer. He didn’t seem in any particular hurry, but he didn’t look comfortable, either.

Pat tucked the wad of bills into his pocket, his smile growing. “Think so. Well, you got your answer. Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way-”

I held my hand up, waving it frantically back and forth. He came to a stop, his brow furrowing. “What?”

I rolled my eyes. I couldn’t very well answer - which he seemed to realize a moment later, as he started chuckling. “Want a piece of paper?” he said. The derision soaking through every word was enough to make my skin crawl.

I crossed the dark room instead, walking to meet Aedan with as much purpose as I could. Without seeming like I was lunging towards poor Doug, anyway. The bodyguard had one hand pressed to his arm, stemming the flow of blood. He watched me as I approached, his expression growing more and more dour, but didn’t shy away.

Aedan’s lips parted as I plunged my hand into my pocket, pulling the glove out and shoving it into his arms. Don’t drop it. I did my best to convey the message through the look I was giving him, locking eyes and trying to look at least a little scary. Maybe it worked, maybe it didn’t.

Either way, his lips curled back in a sneer. He twirled back around, all of his disappointment from a few moments before hidden under whatever cheerful facade he’d put on. “Your finder can sense rel- foci, yes?” he said, gesturing towards Justin. “Then he should be able to confirm-”

“Whatever he just handed to the ginger, his focus was in it,” the finder said. He still had one hand on his bodyguard’s arm. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to hide behind the bigger man or push him away, but he didn’t sound as freaked out as he had earlier. “He’s down.”

I raised one eyebrow, looking back to Pat. Sure, what the finder had said should be enough for most people. I didn’t want to wind up shot, though.

Pat leaned back, fixing me with a look that was passing ‘stern’ and careening towards ‘venomous’. “What now? I’ve got places to be, you know.” When I didn’t immediately launch into an explanation, he shook his head, letting his eyes roll up to gaze tolerantly at the ceiling. “You can talk. Jesus Christ.”

“He wanted to know about the foci,” I said, hurrying my words along. The others didn’t look like they were in a patient mood - and as important as Aedan’s suicide mission was to him, it wasn’t why I was here. “I don’t care about that. That’s his problem.”

Patrick chuckled. “That’s pretty honest of you.”

I could feel Aedan’s glare on the back of my neck, his eyes boring holes in my skin. “It’s the truth,” I said instead. “I have a question I’d like to ask. And I’ll ask you, I guess, since…” I made a face, scanning the rest of the warehouse and his companions. “I think you’re the one with draw around here.”

“Spit it out.”

Right. None of the pleasantries, then. “My friend and I are...traveling through,” I said, stumbling over the word. “But I have other friends.”

“Good for you,” Pat said, deadpanning.

“One of them is hurt. Bad. We don’t have a healer.” Putting it into words like that...it was more painful than I would have expected. When I said it out loud, knowing that we were supposed to be a prime and it was supposed to me my crew, it felt more and more like I’d failed. The fact I’d never wanted to be the crew’s leader didn’t factor into it.

Greyson was counting on us to find a way to fix him. I owed it to him to see it through.

“Ah,” Patrick said. I stopped. His voice was low, softer than it had been. “I see.”

“If...If you have anyone who can help, i-it wouldn’t take long. Just enough to get him on his feet again. He’s not…” I swallowed hard, shaking my head. The sight of him lying in a puddle of blood in his own home appeared in my mind’s eye again, every bit as poignant and horrible as it had been that day. “I don’t have a lot of options left,” I finished lamely. The lump in my throat wouldn’t quite seem to go down.

But when I held Pat’s gaze, matching his stern expression with my own, he just made a face - just a tightening of his lips, creases appearing at the corners of his eyes. It was a tiny, delicate change, and yet, new wrinkles appeared across his skin from out of nowhere. In the span of a few seconds, he might as well have aged ten years.

“We’re a small group,” he said, just loudly enough for the words to carry to me. “I’m afraid most of the demis we’ve got are here in this room.”

“Pat!” Justin hissed, going pale. The hold he had on his bodyguard’s arm didn’t seem so comfortable anymore. The two men didn’t react at all - they just watched Aedan and I, unflinching.

Patrick chuckled. “What? It’s the truth.”

“You don’t have to tell them that,” the finder mumbled.

“Right. Well, in any case, I’m sorry,” Pat said, turning his attentions back to me. “This close to the city, it doesn’t pay to keep a bunch of people sitting around under our banner. I don’t have the healer you’re looking for.”

The ground wobbled under my feet. I drooped. I know I did - I could feel the tension fleeing my shoulders, like strings had been attached to my bones and then cut. “O-Oh.”

“Sorry,” he said again. His face slipped back into shadow as he pulled back, eyeing the door.

“A-And what about you?” I said, stepping forward hurriedly as I saw Justin start to follow him. “Do you feel any? Any healers? Anyone who could help? Maybe someone’s passing through - we can pay them, too.”

Justin flinched at my approach. Doug stepped forward, putting himself firmly between the finder and I. I froze, holding my hands up disarmingly.

“Go ask the markets,” Pat said, not unkindly. “Mercenaries usually register there. You’ll have more luck.”

“I can’t,” I spat out, feeling the pit under me yawn wider. “They won’t- I just don’t have the best relationship with them. All I’m asking for is information.”

“Well, that sounds like a whole other can of worms,” Pat said, shaking his head. “No. Sorry, kid, but no. I don’t know what you’ve got going on, but between you and him, I think we’ve done enough. You’re on your own.”

I cursed under my breath, raising a hand like I was going to grab him and hold him there - and stopped. I couldn’t beat it out of them. And even if I were to do something like take my relic back and force him to talk, what good would it do me? We were still too close to the city. Any of the demis they’d be able to tell us about would probably be out of reach regardless.

His eyes lingered on mine, something like regret flickering in the depths of their brown. And then he sighed again, shrugging. Without another word, he wheeled towards the door.

Justin lingered a step behind him, falling away from even his bodyguards. I eyed him sidelong, confused.

“Look,” he began, running a hand through his hair.

I stopped. The finder had frozen, tripping over his own words, but he didn’t look so stubborn anymore. “What?” I said at last. Pat and the other pair had come to a stop, waiting for him.

“I don’t...that focus you’re after isn’t a thing, man,” he said, glaring at Aedan. “You’re not the first one who’s wanted it. Someone would have found the damn thing.”

“You’ve already made your point,” Aedan snapped, forcing each word through his clenched teeth. “Shut the fuck up already.”

Justin’s shoulders stiffened. I could see his hackles go up. “Well, if that’s how you’re going to be, I’ll just-”

“Hey. Eyes here,” I said, snapping my fingers until he came to a stop. When the finder looked over, his lips curled down in a frown, I shoved my hands back into my pockets. Already I could feel it - the itch across my skin, the lack of my relic within arm’s reach. It prickled, making the whole series of events even more annoying than it already was. “He’s an asshole. Sorry. Talk to me.”

“Excuse me?”

“Ignore him,” I said, a bit more insistently. Justin only chuckled, glancing over to where I just knew Aedan was likely in the process of going incandescent. “You had something you wanted to say?”

The finder shifted uncomfortably, rubbing his shoes against the concrete and drawing lines in the muck. “I just...it sucks you’re having a hard time,” he said, his voice low. “And then you- well, I guess we overreacted a little.”

It was my turn to laugh awkwardly, a bit unsure how to handle the whole situation. Demis? Behaving like adults? Having an actual conversation, without killing or shooting or stabbing?

No. I’d just gone crazy, clearly.

“I said everyone’s looking for something like that,” Justin said, looking back to Aedan. “It wasn’t a jab. It’s a fact.”

Aedan’s indrawn breath echoed across the still air. “I already fucking-”

“I meant that literally. There are a lot of finders out there hunting for foci like that. Strong ones. Rare ones,” Justin said, locking eyes with me. “Some of them are with primes. Contracted.”

“And some aren’t,” I said slowly.

He smiled, inclining his head a fraction. “Right. There’s...look, you’re looking into lost foci, aren’t you?” he said, turning back to Aedan. “If you’re not, you should be.”

“Gee, that sounds like such a simple thing,” Aedan said, crossing his arms across his chest. “I’ll just hop in a submarine and troll the ocean floor for some magical artifacts that got tossed in centuries ago, shall I?”

“Fine. Don’t listen,” Justin snapped. “Anyway. If we haven’t seen anything crop up in recent history...the odds of any relics in circulation having that particular skillset aren’t good, you know?”

“Thanks for the reminder.”

The light went on in my head. “So you think he should look into relics that aren’t already being used.”

“There are worse ideas,” Justin said, shrugging. “Look. I heard from- from some of my friends. There’s another finder out there right now. Sort of a collector. A real one,” he said, fixing me with a look that told me he hadn’t bought our cover story in the slightest. “A rogue.”

“A rogue collector?” Aedan said with a snort. “Hope he bought life insurance.”

“No one will touch him,” Justin said, raising his voice to talk over Aedan.

Aedan stopped. “What?”

A smile tugged at the finder’s lips. I knew exactly the look - it was the look that was just beginning to enjoy the fact that he knew something Aedan didn’t. “His abilities are different.”

“He’s a finder. How different can he-”

“He can detect relics that aren’t bonded to anyone,” Justin said, neatly cutting Aedan off again. And this time, Aedan just blinked, falling silent.

I nodded, straightening. “So people think-”

“He can find lost relics,” Justin said. “He’s not an appraiser. But apparently, he can see them from enough of a range to be worth a damn.”

“And so no one will kill him,” I murmured.

“What’s his name?” Aedan snapped, pulling closer to the finder. The second bodyguard pushed in front of him, sending him stumbling back. He didn’t seem to notice. “Where’s he ranging of late?”

“Hell if I know,” Justin said, throwing his hands up. “That’s all I’ve got.”

Aedan took another step closer to him. I groaned, grabbing his collar and pulling him back. “Aedan.”

“Don’t touch me,” he muttered, knocking my hand free, but there was no real venom behind the words. “Do you have a name?” he said instead, looking back to Justin. “A description? Anything?”

Justin shrugged, sticking his hands into his coat pockets. His breath was a pale cloud of fog in the dim light, obscuring him from view. “Don’t really know. Thought it might help. Sorry.”

“It does,” I said quickly, seeing the irritation written across the finder’s face. “Thanks. Really.”

Aedan was still silent. I kicked him. He mumbled something vaguely appreciative. When I turned for the door, though, he followed.

I could feel the eyes of the four men lingering on us, following as we took step after step towards the outside.

And then the door shut behind us, pushing Aedan and I out into the sunlight.