I followed Yen down the stairs leading from the rooftop.

  “Things have changed since you were here last,” she said as we walked. “Aurelion refers to the warehouse as his court now.”

  I scoffed at the word. “His court? Like a king?”

  Yen shrugged. “Felix made the announcement one day. Said we even had a name now. The Court of Lions.”

  I had to stifle the laugh that grew in my throat. That bastard. He’d spent so much time claiming he had no desire to build himself up as a king in my world. And yet, the moment that I’d vanished for a week, he’d done exactly that.

  It made me wonder if he had always planned to stab me in the back once we took down the impostor wearing my skin. How far would I have trusted him given the chance? It was a dark enough thought to make me shiver.

  “Anything else I should know?”

  “Uhh, he’s been making deals with people. Other gangs mostly, though I think he also has some of the city guards under his thumb. He’s supposed to be meeting with a group today, I think, about moving in more men or something. I don’t know all the details, he never tells us anything and getting information out of Felix is almost impossible these days.”

  I took all the information in as we continued down the stairs to the second floor. Here, Yen led me into a long hallway before taking me through a small room and out onto a balcony. She pulled a long piece of wood that was leaning against the wall and then shoved it out over the gap between this building and the next.

  “Ophelia came up with it a long time ago,” she said as she noted the look on my face.

  I wasn’t sure what I looked like at that moment, but there was probably a hint of confusion mixed with an impressed look. These kids had really thought of so much on their own. It was no wonder Aurelion had turned them to his side. They were extremely resourceful.

  We crossed over the gap and dropped onto another balcony. When we were clear of the bridge, she pulled the piece of wood onto the balcony and leaned it against the wall next to the door.

  “Just have to remember not to leave them out or the city guard might start to pay attention. Luckily, they don’t tend to look up. Nobody does.”

  We moved through another small room and then up the stairs to the fourth floor of this building. I caught myself looking around corners and peeking into rooms, but I didn’t see signs of anyone.

  “I’m not leading you into a trap,” Yen said as we reached the end of a hallway. She stopped and turned to address me as she spoke.

  I shrugged. “Hard habits to break. Easier to stay alive if you trust very few people.”

  Her mouth turned up disapprovingly.

  “Plus,” I said, slipping ahead of her and peering around the next corner before she could step around it, “people will say anything to keep themselves from being killed.”

  The hallway was empty, and Yen didn’t argue with what I’d said. It was an impossible argument to win; I knew. Well, almost impossible.

  I’d only ever seen one human stick to his word wholly in the face of death. I shook the thought of his burned and deformed face away before it could fully materialize in my mind’s eye.

  I had to stay focused. I could be walking into any number of traps right now.

  We crossed another wooden bridge over the alleys before finally reaching the last building we would need to traverse to reach the warehouse. As she settled the wooden bridge against the wall, Yen turned to me and held up a finger to her mouth.

  “Aurelion posted up some new patrols in this building. Some of the men he’s been making deals with.”

  “Let’s take it slow then,” I said, pulling the dagger I’d used [Viper’s Bite] on from my belt.

  I started to creep forward into the first room, but I noticed Yen hadn’t moved at all. In fact, she had her arms crossed over her chest. She held out a hand expectantly, frowning down at the other dagger I had at my waist. Despite our deal, she hadn’t been permitted to keep her weapons.

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  “You can’t be serious.” I stifled my laugh.

  She didn’t move. If anything, her frown grew deeper. “I’m not going into something that could get me killed empty-handed. If I wanted to die, I’d have just let you kill me up on that roof.”

  I ran my hand down my face and let out a sigh. Was she wrong? Probably not completely. It was a reasonable request. But I still didn’t trust her.

  “Fine. But after this is done, I want to know everything you do. About Aurelion, about this Court of Lions.” I prickled at the words as I said them. “About everything.”

  I withdrew one of the daggers from my belt and held it out to her, hilt first.

  Yen nodded and took the dagger with a slow movement. She hefted it in her grip, like I would if I were trying to get a feel for the weapon.

  “These feel cheap,” she noted, spinning the dagger around in her palm. She thrusted it into the air several times and frowned at it. “Once we get out of here, I’ll show you where to get a good dagger.”

  She brushed past me, smirking as she did. I shook my head and followed her.

  We moved slowly through the next two rooms, checking each corner before moving through the doorways. The first guard was waiting in the fourth room.

  He was a scrawny man with long, red hair that clung to his head as if he’d been sweating all evening. He wore simple clothes and no armor, which was good. Hopefully they were all like that.

  “See, told you he had brought in thugs.” Yen whispered, pointing at the man.

  I didn’t look at her. Instead, I kept my eyes on the man as he walked away from us, moving toward the far door. We needed to move quickly, before he had a chance to get around anyone else.

  I took a step forward, moving to strike him. Yen brushed past me, brandishing the dagger in her hand with ease. She crouched as she closed the distance quickly and then straightened, driving the dagger into the side of the man’s neck. He let out a grunt as she twisted the dagger.

  Closing the distance to them, I helped her settle his body to the floor so that it wouldn’t make a lot of noise. Then, moving as quietly as we could, we dragged the body into one of the darker corners of the room.

  Yen shot me a cocky look as we stepped away from his body. “They’ve been nothing but trouble since they joined up. Nobody will miss them.”

  Part of me instantly regretted trusting her with a blade.

  We started moving toward the doorway the thug had been walking toward when Yen froze, another guard stepping into the room. His eyes widened as he took us in and I used [Swift Strike], sending my body flying forward with a kick. I brought my dagger up into the bottom of the man’s chin and twisted the blade, his eyes rolling into the back of his head as I pulled the weapon out, blood pouring out of the wound.

  Once again, we settled his body into the dark corner next to the other corpse. I thought about looting the men for anything valuable—I still hadn’t managed to replace all the gear that I’d lost when we were captured in the palace—but I had to hurry to keep up with Yen as she passed through the door and out into the next hallway.

  We encountered three more of the men on our trek down the stairs and through the second floor of the building. Each one was one of the thugs that Yen had mentioned Aurelion making a deal with, and each one was approached quickly from behind, and taken out before they could cry out.

  When it was all said and done, Yen had taken out two of them, while I had only had to handle one.

  I had just settled the last thug’s body in the shadows when Yen slipped out of the room and into the next. I waited several long seconds for her to return, and when she didn’t, I moved next to the door and crouched against the wall before peering around the corner.

  I swore as I spotted her in the center of the room talking to a young boy who looked to be maybe six or seven. Flickering light bathed them from the windows that led to the alley outside and she had her hands on either side of him, locking him in place by his shoulders.

  “What are you doing here?” She hissed at him. Her voice was barely loud enough for me to hear.

  The boy's eyes were wide, and he had turned his head to stare at the dagger she held, his entire body trembling.

  “Is… is that blood?” His voice grew quieter, as if he were struggling to even ask the question.

  “Don’t worry about it. Come on, we ne—“ she spotted me peering around the doorway and turned, pushing the boy behind her with a quick movement of her arm.

  I stepped out from the other room, straightening as I did, and started toward the two of them, dagger held firmly in my grip.

  “Please,” she said, holding the dagger out in front of her, the bloody tip of the blade facing me. “He won’t tell anyone. I promise. He promises.”

  Her words came out in a rush, each one colliding with the one before it. Fear filled her eyes and her mouth twitched. Her feet shifted slightly. As if she were getting ready to pounce.

  I raised one of my eyebrows as I took in the scene, coming to a stop less than a meter away from her. It was too close for any normal person to respond to her attack—if she attacked—but I had the System on my side. At least I could count it as an advantage in this fight.

  “Who is he?” I kept my voice cold. Calm.

  The boy held tight to Yen’s waist, his head peeking around her side, his eyes staring up at me. They were still wide, the fear ever-present within them.

  I offered him a smile before flicking my gaze back to Yen’s.

  She spoke quickly again. “Nobody. Uhh. Somebody important—I mean, not important. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that he won’t say anything. I can promise you that.”

  Shaking my head I let out a sigh. “Loose threads… they always seem to unravel when you leave them be. You know I can’t risk him being left here alone and someone else wandering in and asking him questions.”

  “He’s just scared,” Yen argued. “He doesn’t have to die.” She moved her hand higher, the blade of the dagger catching some of the flickering lantern light from the alley outside.

  My eyes flicked to the blade and then back to her, the fingers that held onto my own dagger twitching.