When Faine walked into the kitchen, she was met by the quick—rapid, rather—clop of a knife against a wooden cutting board. She looked in that direction and spotted a fellow feliram quickly working her way through a white onion. Before Faine could blink, the onion was diced and slid off the cutting board into the pot of stew on the stove, warming over an open flame. As were the rest of the pots and pans, their liquids bubbling and their solids simmering.

The feliram was too distracted to notice Faine was there, let alone care for anything else in the kitchen other than the stove. Faine sniffed once, twice, and caught the burning smell coming from the brick oven in the corner. Her nose worked one second quicker than the other feliram's as she suddenly dashed across the kitchens, swerving around the wooden countertops and tables to pull out the pie that was steaming, one second away from gathering too hard of a crisp.

Everything resembled chaos. While she worked hurriedly, there was no one else behind to clean up the mess or prepare the meals while another cooked them. It was clear why Faine's assistance weighed heavily on the shoulders of the kitchen staff—there wasn't any support, to begin with. Better to start now before she was standing there too long like a statue, observing so much that she actually became one.

"I'm Faine," she said loud enough for the feliram to hear.

Finally, she looked up, spotted her, and relief like Faine had seen on the faces of many splashed across her features. With the back of her forearm, she wiped the sweat from her green forehead.

"Finally, someone is here to help me," the feliram exclaimed. When she smiled, her sharp fangs dashed out from the rest of her teeth. "I'm Ametrine."

Although she extended her hand, she spotted the mess of onion pieces and sticky sauce stuck to her fingers and quickly retracted the greeting. She was a young feliram, visible by the size and length of her mud-colored horns. They hadn't curled yet and barely reached the back of her head; their width wasn't anything compared to Faine's or even Kaspar's. While not every feliram inherited the tight curl or a looser style that Faine developed, it was easier to tell age by how wide and strong they appeared. Ametrine was still young and inexperienced.

"Is there anything I can do for you? If my nose is working correctly, something on the stove is burning," Faine said, pointing over in that direction to the early stages of smoke.

Ametrine whirled, her eyes growing wide, and she hastened towards the stove with a cloth towel in her hand, rapidly removing a steaming pot quick to overflow with whatever she was cooking on the inside. Her pouted lips, pierced on the left side, stuck out even further in dissatisfaction. If anyone in this base—in this entire stretch of Pinedon—needed help, it was Ametrine. She was moving too quickly to keep up with herself.

She turned back, amber eyes searching, and blew a loose strand of black hair out of the way of her face. In the morning, half of it had been pulled back into a bun, held together by twigs, while the rest of it hung down her back. The kitchens had done a number on it; there was hardly anything to decipher from the hairstyle and black hairs sprung wildly around her green face.

"You can...peel potatoes and chop them into cubes for hash. I'll get a pan ready, and..." She came over to where Faine was standing and stared up at the array of pots and pans hanging from the rack off the ceiling. As her body was doing, her eyes were moving too fast. Instead of waiting for her to find the right cast iron pan she was looking for, Faine pulled one down and handed it over. "Ah, thank you."

"How is it that no one has provided you with help?" Faine asked once she got started peeling the potatoes. The skins fell into the wastebasket along with the rest of the scraps that would likely go to the hogs. If they had them, at least. All scraps went to the dragons back at Rising Eternity.

Faine's heart sunk when she thought of Tyvni, all alone and wondering where she'd departed to. The dragon didn't like to be separated for more than a few hours and years ago, when Faine had a mission in Fanorre, Tyvni flew across the land and landed on the trail in front of her—nearly crushing her. By that point, it was too late to make her go back to the base, and it wasn't like the young dragon to obey anything Faine said.

Needless to say, Faine had her hands full with training once she arrived back to Rising Eternity's base.

"Silver Willow is very busy," Ametrine said, more to herself than anyone else. "Positions are rotated and I happened to be stuck without an assistant. They think I can cook a meal for an entire legion of spies, killers, and thieves, but I cannot. I am only one woman."

Faine was moving onto the second potato when Ametrine turned around and began chopping carrots and cucumber. Her knife skills moved like a blur and before Faine had fully digested the ability to peel a potato, Ametrine shifted onto the next task.

Her work revolved around focus, and that was not something Faine was accustomed to while attempting to discover clues and hints for Rising Eternity. It was easy to forget that was what she was here for; it was effortless to find herself lost in the exhilaration of a new experience, but she had to remain engrossed.

Ametrine was standing before her, chopping basil and parsley to add to the stew. It was the only chance Faine got to study her before she turned around again. Her broad green nose was pierced in a bull's manner and her pointed ears, small, were clean of such iron. Strange, considering every other volatile part on her face held sharp points of metal.

Faine craned her neck to view the dining area beyond the stone archway. Completely out of character, she'd forgotten to look around before deciding Ametrine needing help was more important. But the long tables pressed against the walls, their benches just as extensive, only lower for the members of Silver Willow to sit upon.

The surface of the tables held nothing other than forearms and plates, dishware and napkins, but the people sitting at those tables, chattering amongst themselves, were waiting for the breakfast to find its way into their mouths.

"How does this work?" Faine asked. "Do we serve them or do they serve themselves?"

"Are you kidding? I don't trust these people to feed themselves. There're gadigators and sinwolves out there. If I give them the chance to serve themselves, they'll take three helpings and leave nothing for the rest of the base," Ametrine snapped. She scowled, though it wasn't directed at Faine or her sudden quickness to peel the russet potatoes. It was in direct reasoning towards the always famished beasts sitting at the tables beyond.

As Faine looked once more, she found herself staring back at Eliphas. His bright eyes watched her closely, his predatory nature being completely still, and she forced herself to look away. There was no sense in finding herself hurdling away from him across the kitchens after chucking a knife at his forehead. Eliphas was too strong, too wise, and too brave to leave her out in the cold. He'd kill her instead.

"I can see why that would be an issue," Faine admitted. She clamped her mouth shut before going into detail about how Rising Eternity worked. More than once, she'd found herself wanting to slip that knowledge, only to remember she cannot reveal her true, full identity. Though she was certain Ilian was trying to discover her complete being at that moment. "Don't worry, I won't cower against any of them."

Ametrine huffed a distracted laugh. "I would hope not. They don't play games around here; they'll bite." She raised up her green hand and revealed that a tip of her ring finger was missing. The injury was old, the skin long healed over, but that finger was abnormally shorter than all the rest.

The peeling of the potatoes slowed when Faine furrowed her brows together and stared at that once mangled finger. Teeth marks left scars on the skin and the tattered mess of flesh wasn't anything as clean as it once was. In fact, her fingernail was completely gone. Lost to whoever bit it off.

"Who did that?" Faine asked carefully.

Ametrine jerked her chin at the archway past the pots and pans hanging from the ceiling. "The sinwolf sitting at that table out there. The most impatient and cruel of them all. Eliphas Fang." She shivered when she said it and shook her head. Faine didn't allow her eyes to dart back in that direction; he might eat the tip of her finger if he knew they were talking about anything other than preparing the meal. "Watch him carefully."

That was the first thing she'd decided to do. Mental note after mental note lodged in her head, but that one stood out the most. The reason Faine tugged on her floorboards, weakened the hinges, and sealed the secret passage in the armoire wasn't to keep out Ilian. It was to keep out those like Eliphas that lurked during the night. Sinwolves were the most dangerous of all the beasts in Pinedon, and Faine was finding herself face to face with a deadly beast in the base. And she'd only just arrived.

"There's no punishment for behavior like that?" Faine was moving onto chopping the skinless potatoes, glad to have a knife in her hand capable of stabbing anyone that came too close.

"There is," Ametrine responded with a nod. "Ten lashes. Or in a sinwolf's case, hardly anything. For a mortal or fladlines or even us, our skin isn't as strong as a gadigator or sinwolf. Those punishments are hardly a pinch on their backs."

"Who delivers those punishments?"

While stirring the stew, Ametrine shrugged. "Anyone that wishes. Celestia, mostly. But on rare occasions, she'll make the friend of the one being punished do it. Sometimes their lover. It all depends on the situation." She waved her hand about as she spoke.

Faine had heard of such policies. Zebulon had come close to implementing it in Rising Eternity but never went so far. When he discussed it, half the guild threatened to quit. That wasn't what they were there for, to beat and whip each other, and Zebulon had let it go. Silver Willow, on the other hand, they were too far beyond development to change such a stage of punishment. Faine had no doubts that everyone received an invitation to attend the spectacle of watching their fellow member bleed.

"That sounds terrible," Faine whispered to no one other than herself.

But Ametrine heard those words. "Don't get in trouble and you won't face the crack of the whip. That's the most important piece of advice to give you as you start your life in Silver Willow." She braced both hands against the counter and stared down her broad nose at Faine. "We all come from different pasts, some of us worse than another, but we become one when we enter those broad, ridiculous wooden doors at the front of the base. We are only here to serve, not make a name for ourselves. In Silver Willow, we have no name other than what we were given at birth, and our guild. We embody this lifestyle."

"How did you..." Faine cleared her throat when her voice came out as a whisper rather than the proud tone she was used to having. Somehow, Eliphas's eyes watching her from the dining area was beginning to prick at her skin. She could have sworn she heard the rasp of his claws against the wooden table. Her heart was beating rapidly inside her chest. A warning. "How did you become part of Silver Willow?"

Ametrine closed her eyes, slowly. Exhaustion so early in the morning was unprecedented. "I've had a long life. I started out as a young, feral feliram. Poachers caught me and when they realized I hadn't grown into my horns yet, they sold me to a Lord in need of a servant." She dragged her tongue along her bottom lip and looked down at the table. Her entire body tensed with rage. "He made me his chef, his lover..." Faine knew what was coming. "Even if I didn't want to be that."

Rage had always hit Faine like a slap to the face. Always unexpected. Never contained. This occurrence was no different. She set the knife down slowly to avoid chucking it at Eliphas's head as she was certain he was indeed staring at her. But it wasn't him she was pissed at; it was the Lord that Ametrine had served with no other choice.

"Don't tell me he's still alive," she hissed. Now it was her turn to stare down her fellow feliram. A formal feral, those that lived in the mountains as savages and killed everything that moved.

Ametrine shook her head. "He's not. He struck ill when I poisoned him after years of service. The first meal he didn't have someone else taste before he took a bite. I fled once the meal was served, and I never set foot in his residence again, nor was I caught. To protect myself, I joined Silver Willow. Simple." She bugged out her eyes.

"I used to kill men and women like that, you know. It used to be my job." Her side job, if Faine was speaking correctly. Zebulon never would've let her take on such a task if he knew she did that in her spare time. Killed those that forced others into doing things they didn't wish to do. "Men and women would come to me after being abused."

"I considered that route for some time." She chewed on the inside of her lip, right over the piercing. "Things became easier as he started to trust me. But we all learn something from situations like that."

Faine snorted. "And what could you possibly have learned?"

The pot of steaming stew transferred from the stove to the counter, followed by a pan of potato hash with white onions and red peppers. The first course devoured before the second one: the potatoes Faine was working on. Shortly, they'd begin the cooking process.

Ametrine tossed both oven mitts onto the counter and smirked. "I learned that under no circumstances can I tolerate a man."

Faine was surprised when she heard herself laugh out loud. She hoped it didn't draw the attention of anyone important in the other room. "If you find the right one, they're easy to love."

"Impossible. I cannot see myself—"

Faine and Ametrine smelled him before they saw him. Sinwolves carried a scent, a warm musk permanently stuck in their fur. Either due to lack of washing or just that the world cursed them with such a horrible stench. But there it was, following Eliphas around and to where he stood, his shoulder pressed against the open stone archway. Faine wished there was a door she could slam in his face.

His snout perked in their direction. "I hear plenty of talking, but not enough working. The last thing I need is to whip you two into shape," he snarled.

"Eliphas, the food is almost ready. Please sit down and I'll call all of you when it's time to serve," Ametrine sighed.

Ignoring her entirely, he craned his neck to view Faine on the other side of the counter. She glared, respectively. All she could think about was Ametrine's finger, the teeth marks, and the pain she must've experienced at that moment after escaping from forever serving a Lord. When her hand started to go numb, Faine realized she was clutching the knife handle too tight.

"Did you sleep well last night?" he questioned with the flash of a smile, revealing his sharp, predatory teeth. Capable of ripping out throats.

"Considering I used to sleep on a cot, or sometimes the hard floor of an alleyway, I slept well. Thank you." It was a struggle to keep her voice sweet and respectful.

"Don't think that warm bed comes without debts."

Faine's eyes darted between him and Ametrine. "What do you think I'm doing here? Do you see the knife in my hand?" She waved it about. "The rats under the floors didn't cut these potatoes, you buffoon."

She ignored Ametrine gaping at her and silently shushing her. It needed to be said. From the moment she saw him, from the way Ginevra and Ametrine behaved towards him, there was no mistaking his kind. Even Ilian was annoyed with his presence. If there was one person in the base that Faine would not hold back with, it would be Eliphas. He deserved every bit of sass he was about to receive.

Eliphas took one step into the kitchens. "Watch your tone, newbie. We don't take kindly to those that don't belong."

"I suggest you ask around before you speak. There's a reason Celestia accepted me, isn't there?" She narrowed her eyes.

"Most newbies in Silver Willow don't last a week. We'll see how long it takes for us to string you up by your ankles."

Bored, Faine rolled her neck. "I've heard that feral felirams prefer the taste of sinwolf meat. I hear they pluck the fur while the beast is still alive and even take off some of the skin." She frowned. "I'd hate for the same to happen to you." Though her tone didn't reveal her sarcasm, it was clear.

Eliphas huffed through his snout and growled at her, revealing those sharp teeth once more. It didn't affect her, not in the slightest, and the dream of dislodging the hidden blade in her arm bracer and aiming it directly at him kept her from feeling any hint of fear. She wore those bracers proudly on her arms, yet it hadn't been revealed that blades were strapped within. Faine smirked at the wonderment of secrecy.

"I want to eat within the next five minutes," Eliphas directed towards Ametrine. "Either you finish, or I'll come back in here and find a way to make you."

Though she gripped the knife tighter, Faine did not throw it. Not on her first day, not when everything was riding on her finding out every bit of information about Silver Willow. She could do that and rid the world of one ridiculous beast at a time. Those that believed they had power over others were weakly incompetent.

Those like Zebulon, Eliphas, and maybe Celestia. Her true nature had yet to see the light, and it was one of the most important pieces of information to deliver back to Rising Eternity.

Faine and Ametrine finished cooking the meal and served it to the many members of Silver Willow. She took that time to view their faces, study their attitudes, and go through the overall nature of the base. It was just as she expected. A family atmosphere, but separate. They each had their own duties that set them apart from the rest, but they brought themselves back together to eat.

They didn't speak, some expressed gratitude with nods or a simple 'thank you', and others ignored them outright. Faine didn't remember each of their faces, but she absorbed as much as she could. And when she heard a familiar laugh coming from the dining area, she stopped wiping down the wooden counter and untied her apron in hopes of escaping before he found her.

Alas, it was too late. Ilian appeared around the corner and his eyes found hers. She blew a grey strand of hair out of her eyes and flashed her fangs. She'd keep doing it until he didn't balk when viewing the animalistic side of her. Not only to further his trust but to show that now all immortals were out to kill him. Threaten as much as she might wish, she'd never hurt someone that didn't deserve the pain they were receiving. It was one condition set in place with Zebulon ninety-nine years ago.

"Come with me," Ilian ordered with a jerk of his chin. Ametrine's stare rose from where she'd been scraping the bits of burnt onion out of the bottom of the pan. She watched carefully to see what Faine would do; if there was any cause for concern. Not because Faine was new, and she wanted her to be safe, but it was out of habit. Doing it for other women after it had happened to her was one of the most important parts of surviving such an ordeal.

"Where are we going?" Faine asked. She hung up her food-stained apron and followed him out of the kitchens, offering Ametrine one final wave. The feliram returned it, albeit weakly after cooking all morning.

Ilian was wearing training armor, leather and weak compared to what men might adorn on a battlefield. Dark hairs stuck to the back of his neck and his forehead, and he reeked of sweat. Faine scrunched up her nose and wished, that for once, her immortal senses weren't so front and center. Smelling the burnt remnants of onions was more pleasant than his stench.

"Celestia has summoned us. We're being assigned a mission." Ilian sighed. "Together."

Every force in her body was telling Faine to explode from excitement. But the only surprise she allowed herself to show was a brief slowing of her steps before she caught up with Ilian again. It was happening. Her first mission as a member of Silver Willow. How had it been so soon, and how had she been so lucky as to do this in the first place?

She could hardly contain her exhilaration as Ilian bathed and prepared himself for the meeting. All the while, she paced around her room and shook out her hands in provision. This was new. This was exciting. This was what she had been waiting for. Gathering information about their missions, what types of people were seeking out Silver Willow, and what Celestia's motives for action were.

It was all falling into place. And sooner than Faine had expected.