The Search for Pixal

Leon took longer settling his tab than Sandore expected.

That left the three soldiers standing just outside the Broken Pike's door while the tavern slowly remembered how loud it had been before their arrival.

Sandore glanced toward Miuki.

“Lieutenant.”

She looked at him.

“That was well done.”

Miuki's expression barely shifted.

Sandore continued before the compliment could become awkward. “Mr. Aster had no intention of speaking with us. You found a way to change that without threatening him, invoking authority, or making the situation worse. And now he is coming with us.”

A pause.

Then, with visible reluctance, Miuki said, “Thank you, sir.”

Sandore waited.

Nothing followed.

He had the distinct sense that she was not thanking him for the compliment.

For a moment he considered asking.

Then he remembered the way she had looked beneath the sudden crush of tavern attention, and the way she had relaxed only after he scattered the crowd.

He let the question remain unasked.

Kameutsu, standing a few steps away, seemed to notice the exchange and just as deliberately found something deeply interesting about the cobblestone patterns of the street.

Leon returned a moment later, purse lighter and mood improved.

Sandore turned to him.

“Tell us about Pixal.”

Leon made a face.

Not fear, exactly, but it was not an expression that Sandore considered encouraging.

“Young Aetheris. Pink hair. Very sharp knife.” He considered. “Doesn't trust anybody. Especially soldiers.”

His eyes moved across Sandore's uniform, then Miuki's, then Kameutsu's.

“So be careful.”

Sandore frowned. “Anything else?”

Leon thought about it.

“No.”

That answer somehow sounded less reassuring than the first.

• • •

Finding Pixal should have been straightforward.

Leon knew people.

Kameutsu knew the Low Lanterns.

Sandore had three trained soldiers, a name, a description, and enough authority to make reasonable people cooperative.

In less than two hours, the Low Lanterns had demonstrated exactly how little any of those advantages meant.

Leon's first contact was useful.

The man ran a narrow stall beneath a sagging awning where old tools, lock parts, boot buckles, and objects of uncertain ownership hung from hooks in no obvious order. Leon exchanged a few quiet words with him while Sandore, Miuki, and Kameutsu remained far enough away not to turn the conversation into an interrogation.

The contact knew Pixal.

More importantly, he had heard she'd been active recently.

No address. No schedule. No promise that she would want to be found.

But it was something.

After that, things deteriorated.

Kameutsu missed the scout.

The Galapa paused twice to examine reflections in rain-dark windows and once to study a rooftop line. He saw nothing worth calling out.

He didn’t realize until much later that someone had been observing them meet Leon’s informant.

Sandore, meanwhile, made a different mistake.

He spoke openly.

Not loudly, by his standards. Not carelessly, he would have argued.

But the Low Lanterns did not require shouting for information to become public property.

At one corner, after another dead end, Sandore asked Leon whether Pixal had any known connection to Remnant agents operating in the district. Leon answered with a “No.” Sandore asked whether she had ever sold information to the Strategic Office. Leon had no idea.

Two men unloading crates nearby seemed uninterested.

A woman on a balcony continued beating dust from a blanket.

A boy carrying a basket walked past them without once turning his head.

By the time Sandore realized the street itself might be listening, the conversation was already done.

Miuki's mistake looked smaller.

A peddler approached her near a crossing where colored ribbons hung between two buildings.

He was narrow-faced, middle-aged, and wore a patched coat covered in hidden pockets. With the solemnity of a court performer, he offered to improve the lieutenant's mood for the price of a copper.

Miuki stared at him.

He produced three wooden balls and began juggling.

She walked past.

He caught all three, bowed to her back, and called after her that happiness was cheaper before sunset.

Miuki did not turn.

Sandore nearly smiled.

Leon did.

Kameutsu did not.

None of them saw the peddler slip into an alley two streets later and pass a message to a girl with pink thread tied around one wrist.

By then, Pixal knew they were looking for her.

By then, she knew that they were on business.

By then, she knew what they had asked.

By then, she knew that Leon Aster was leading uniforms through her neighborhood.

And by then, finding Pixal was no longer the problem Sandore's group was solving.

The new problem was what to do if she decided to find them.

• • •

The smokey glass sat wrapped in cloth in Pixal's pocket.

Broken.

Uselessly broken.

She had turned the fragment over beneath lamplight so many times that she could have drawn its shape from memory. The glass itself told her enough: imperial manufacture, specialized ampoule, made for something that deserved better containment than cheap brown medicine bottles.

The missing section told her everything she actually wanted to know.

Lot number, gone.

Program designation, gone.

Facility insignia, gone.

Of course.

Her contact had recovered it after one of the animal attacks east of the city. That alone was interesting. The fact that people she trusted believed the Remnant was involved made it more so.

It could have come from Blackglass.

It also could have come from a dozen other imperial laboratories.

That was the problem with empires. They never committed atrocities in just one convenient location.

Pixal had been trying to learn more when word reached her that Leon Aster had apparently decided to provide her with a new problem by marching three soldiers through the Low Lanterns asking questions. Questions about her.

She considered stabbing him.

Then she learned about the soldiers.

They were an interesting bunch. Her mood improved slightly.

Captain Sandore Greycastle.

That was funny.

Young.

Very young to be El Capitan.

She giggled. A young lordling slumming it in her part of the Lanterns. Maybe she should show him around town. Teach him some new things.

He was handsome, according to two separate descriptions delivered with wonderfully yummy detail.

But a noble.

Gross!

Then there was Lieutenant Miuki.

The famous Butterfly Soldier.

That was interesting too. Apparently her wings came on and off. Pixal wouldn’t know anything about that. But she was jealous. The soldier girl's wings probably wouldn’t hurt when the doctors pulled on them.

And the Galapa ranger had been described by one runner as “very serious,” by another as “quiet,” and by the peddler as “didn't smile at my joke, but I forgive him because turtles are adorable.”

Pixal agreed with the final assessment the most.

To their credit, the soldiers had not threatened anyone.

They had not flashed warrants.

They had not demanded searches.

The captain had been far too willing to discuss his purpose in public, which was either stupidity, arrogance, or the charming innocence of a man who had not yet learned that walls in the Lanterns collected gossip like damp collected mold.

Pixal wanted to meet him. Partly to see if he really was dreamy, partly because she wanted to make fun of how naive he’d been, and partly to see if he might be able to shed any light on her current Blackglass conundrum.

She did not, however, want him to know that yet.

Leon was an easier mark.

Leon always was.

• • •

The tavern did not have a name, just a sign “Ale” on the door. True to the sign, ale was available. That was probably where its redeeming qualities ended.

Leon stood in the near-empty tavern at a tall, stoolless counter along the rear wall, speaking quietly with a man whose profession depended on nobody ever being able to prove they had spoken.

Sandore, Miuki, and Kameutsu waited out of sight down the block.

Uniforms had limits. This contact would never have met with anyone associated with the military.

Leon was explaining, in a low voice, that he was looking for a certain winged information broker when cold steel touched him somewhere that immediately made every other concern in his life less important.

He stopped speaking.

His contact noticed, then stiffened himself.

Pixal stood behind the men with a dagger in each hand.

One rested in an anatomically persuasive location beneath Leon.

The other pointed at a similar region on his contact, whom she spoke to first.

“Go away.”

The man looked at Leon. The second dagger shifted slightly toward the back of the man's groin.

He went away.

Quickly.

Pixal watched him disappear out the door with a sweet smile.

Then she leaned closer to Leon.

“Leon,” she said warmly. “You don't call. You don't write.”

Her voice might have belonged to a girl greeting an old friend at a garden party.

Then it dropped.

“And then you show up at my door with uniforms.”

The last word carried enough malice to strip paint.

Leon remained perfectly still.

“Good to see you too, Pixal.”

“Oh, don't.” Sweet again. “I haven't yet decided if you need to bleed.”

The knife remained exactly where it was.

Leon glanced downward without moving his head.

“I feel like we’ve made good progress in the direction of no?”

Pixal ignored him.

“At least you brought some interesting little soldiers.”

Her entire tone changed.

“The handsome young flame of House Greycastle.”

The words came low, lusty, and almost luxurious, as though she were describing dessert.

Then her face twisted into a sickly expression.

“Shame about the noble part. Bleh.”

Another shift.

“Lieutenant Miuki,” she said in clipped, impeccable military precision. “The Butterfly Soldier.”

Then, instantly bright:

“And a cuuuute little tuttle.”

Leon blinked.

“Kame's a Galapa.”

“Turtles are cute.”

“I didn't say they weren't.”

“Good.”

The knife had still not moved.

Leon chose his next words carefully.

“They just want to talk.”

Pixal's smile widened.

“Soldiers always tell you they just want to talk.”

“These ones actually do.”

“Oh, Leon.” Her voice turned pityingly sweet. “That's adorable.”

“They're looking into the attacks east of the city. Dunmere, Bell's Ford, Orrow Fen. Animals acting wrong. They think the Remnant might be involved.”

For the first time since appearing behind him, Pixal hesitated.

Not playfully.

Not theatrically.

A real pause in her thought process.

Leon picked up on the genuine interest and continued.

“They've got people looking at some things recovered after the attacks. Cage pieces. Wire. An ampoule.”

The knife pressed just enough for Leon to stop breathing.

“An ampoule?”

“Dark smokey glass.”

Pixal's expression did not change.

Her mind worked furiously.

Intact.

If they had recovered an intact one, it might still have the marks.

Lot.

Program.

Facility.

Was it from Blackglass, or not from Blackglass.

The answer was suddenly one conversation away.

She hated that.

She wanted it immediately.

She hated that too. Her need to know was making her sloppy.

Leon was still speaking.

“They're leaving tomorrow. The captain wanted someone who knew about Remnant activity around here. I told him you might.”

Pixal tilted her head.

“You told Lord Cute Hat about me?”

“Captain Greycastle”

“Does he wear the hat well?”

Leon stared at her.

“What?”

“THE HAT.”

Leon almost threw his hands up into the air in exasperation, but then he remembered the knife. “Yes?”

Pixal smiled dreamily for perhaps half a second.

“Yummy.”

Then disgust wrinkled her nose. “Still a lord, though”

“Pixal.”

“What?”

“Knife.”

“No.”

“Please?”

“No.”

Leon exhaled through his nose.

“They're nearby.”

“I know.”

“Of course you do.”

“I knew where they were before you did.”

“That doesn't make sense.”

“Have you MET me?”

Leon sighed and tried a different approach.

“Will you talk to them?”

“No.”

“Pixal.”

“No soldiers.”

“You literally just said the captain was interesting.”

“He is interesting.”

“So talk to him.”

Pixal considered this.

The sweet smile returned.

“Alone.”

Leon frowned.

“Just Sandore?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“No Miuki?”

“Nope. Butterfly Girl stays outside.”

“Kame?”

Pixal looked to genuinely consider the suggestion.

“No, no. The turtle can stay safe outside where the tasty leaves are.”

“He doesn’t—never mind.”

“And no extra uniforms hiding around corners. No clever little arrest team. No heroic ambush.”

“They're not arresting you.”

“Everybody says that when they’re trying to arrest you.”

Leon had no answer ready for that.

Pixal watched him think. She had him where she wanted him.

She shifted her mood again, allowing curiosity to finally push fully through suspicion.

“Send me the handsome one.”

“Sandore.”

“The hot young flame of House Greycastle.”

“Sandore.”

“With his cute little hat.”

Leon closed his eyes briefly and sighed.

“Fine.”

Pixal brightened.

“You may go play fetch.”

Leon waited.

Pixal waited.

Neither moved.

Finally Leon cleared his throat.

“Pixal.”

“Yes?”

“We have an agreement?”

“Yes.”

“I'm supposed to go get Sandore?”

“That is how agreements work.”

Leon glanced down.

Another pause.

“You need to move the knife away from my balls first.”

Pixal looked down as though she had forgotten it was there.

“Oh.”

The blade vanished.

Leon took one careful step away.

Then another.

Pixal smiled at him with perfect innocence.

Leon rubbed both hands over his face. “I hate you.”

She placed her hand on her chest in a mock expression of hurt. “But our little talks are always so much fun.”

He didn’t reply and started toward the door.

Behind him, Pixal called softly:

“Leon?”

He stopped.

Her voice had changed again.

Not sweet.

Not playful.

Not angry.

Just… serious.

“Make sure he comes alone.”

Leon looked back.

Pixal was still smiling.

But he understood the warning was real. If she sensed anything funny, there would be blood.

He nodded once.

Then he went to fetch the Captain while trying to figure out what to tell him about who he was about to meet. “I knew this was a bad idea,” he said to no one in particular, as he stepped back out the door.