As their party of three stepped into the Palace, Raven looked around herself. The castle was just as posh and fancy on the inside as it had seemed from the outside. The entrance hall was wide, its walls lined with photos and memoirs. The ceiling was high, and the carpet was brown and soft.

They reached a dark blue pair of doors, guarded by fully armored soldiers holding a spear on each side, who bowed to the two officials, and then pulled open the doors to let them enter.

The room behind the doors was a huge square, the floor tiled with marble, and the walls white. There were two huge windows studded magnificently into one wall, and the glass showed a beautiful view of the gardens beneath, filled with greenery.

Against the wall opposite to the doors, was a throne of a kind, and on it sat King Emyr Frederick dressed in all blue, his clothes reeking of Royalty and valor. The Chancellor was seated on his right, looking lesser haggard than he had the last time Raven had seen him, and on the King's left was who Raven presumed was the Princess, Anya Frederick.

They stepped in, and Raven's acquaintances bowed to the King.

"This is Raven, Your Majesty." Lieutenant Alexandre said, gesturing politely towards Raven.

Raven looked at the King, the mischief in his face, elegance in his stature and humor in his smile. He was as young as the Chancellor, she knew; the two had grown up together, from what she had heard.

Alexandre stepped closer to her. "You are supposed to bow." He whispered into her ear.

Raven turned to look at him, an eyebrow raised. He nodded, and gestured for her to simply do it. She half shook her head at the fancy greeting being pushed onto her, yet complied, amused.

"Good morning, Raven." The King said, standing up from his throne.

He walked closer to her, followed by the Chancellor.

"Good morning, Your Majesty." She replied.

"You are..." He trailed off. "Younger than I expected."

"I could say the same of you," She said, and then suddenly felt the stares of the people in the room dig into her.

The King, however, took no offense, and only laughed. "My, it has been a while since someone joked with me like that. It is welcome, indeed, in these times of jeopardy, where the castle is but filled with gloom."

Raven felt the officials release a breath.

"The question here," King Emyr continued, his smile lessening and forehead creasing. "Is whether you can fulfill our purpose of bringing you here. I have been told, Raven, that you can help us. I have neither any reason to believe you, nor any to not. I simply know that now is a time where I would love to hold on to even the slightest bit of hope."

Raven felt the heaviness in his voice, and the worry in his words.

"You sound so let down, Father" A sweet female voice said, and Raven turned towards the throne to look at its source. "It is not as if any of us are in immediate danger, is it?"

It was the Princess who had spoken this time. As she stood up and walked towards them, passing the light from the windows, her red hair glowed, and beneath her pale purple gown, she seemed to shine in the light. Her amber eyes were filled with a strange emotion.

She is the sort people call beautiful. Raven thought involuntarily, and then shook her head. On another note, it seems like the intensity of the danger she is in is being hidden from her.

As the Princess reached them, she looked up to see her father's expression, which had immediately changed to its previous amiability.

"Of course not," He said, in a lighter tone. "I simply wished to see how serious our employee is about her work."

The Princess looked as if she were trying to see through her father, but after a few seconds, gave up.

They might have tried, but they have failed. Raven's head went on. She knows they are hiding something from her. She is no fool.

The Princess turned to Raven, and then smiled.

"I am Anya," She said, as if not expecting Raven to know her name.

Raven bowed, lesser reluctant towards the gesture this time. "Raven, Your Royal Highness."

Her smile slipped a little, but before she could say anything further, the King spoke.

"Now that introductions are complete, shall we begin with the purpose of your visit today?" He said. "We only wish to see an example of the strength we have heard so much about. If you do not mind, could we ask you to have a friendly duel of sorts with General Allyss?"

"A friendly duel?" Raven titled her head.

"Wherein you do not fight to kill or maim." The Chancellor explained.

She had never done such a thing before. She only knew how to fight to kill. Once her sword had left its sheath, it rarely returned back into it clear of blood.

She fought by instinct, for that is what she had grown up doing, and her sword was an extra limb attached to her body. She remembered, then, what the owner of a tavern had once told her: her fighting style was animalistic, as she were a beast feasting on her prey, toying with it before ending its pathetic little life, taking joy in its pain.

That was what Raven considered a compliment, and even thinking of it now made her feel that familiar surging emotion in her chest.

Raven sensed that General Allyss was looking at her, and decided to try the friendly duel.

.

.

.

Naomi watched the girl closely.

Even without all the information they had gained on Raven in the past few months, you could tell from one look at her face the sort of life she had been living.

She had two visible scars, and Naomi was more than certain she was hiding more beneath her shirt. One of her hands rested permanently on the hilt of her sword, a habit which she possibly wasn't even consciously aware of.

Raven's cold eyes hadn't stopped moving around the room ever since she had entered, except to speak with the King and the Princess, and Naomi was sure that she had committed the room, and everything else in it, to her memory.

Raven was exactly what they needed. And the best and worst part of it was perhaps that she did not yet know of it.

She agreed to the friendly duel, even thought it had seemed that she did not know what it was.

Naomi nodded, and Alexandre accompanied the King back to the throne, standing on his left. The Chancellor and Princess, too, resumed their respective seats.

Naomi took off her cloak, and placed it on the floor beside a wall. She took off her waist belt, the one that held her sheath, and deposited it beside the cloak, pulling her sword free of it.

As she turned to look at Raven, she found her standing at the same spot as before, right in the center of the room. Naomi went to stand a few feet away, facing her.

"You do not feel the need to remove your sheath?" Naomi asked her, as she raised her sword in a respectful stance.

The girl shook her head, and even before Naomi could comprehend it, her sword was out.

Raven did not attack yet, and Naomi figured the other would rather she initiated the duel.

And so she did.

Naomi gave Raven a word of warning, even if she knew the latter wouldn't need it, and charged. Their swords met between them, and Naomi threw Raven's off. She began attacking, throwing a blow at Raven, who seemed startled.

Her reaction speed, however, was fast. She blocked the incoming attack, and then foresaw another one headed towards her gut.

Naomi kept them both moving, and slowly, it felt as if Raven was getting used to it. Now, with blocking, she began attacking too, unpredictable slides of her sword, a style of fighting that Naomi had never encountered before.

It was course and rough, and somehow at the same time elegant. It was nothing quite the same as the sword-fighting that Naomi knew, and was strangely... raw. As if those brutal movements were that of a wild leopard, twisting and sparring with crude force but seeming as if the beast were dancing all the same.

Raven took the charge of the duel soon enough, her sparring forcing Naomi to step back, not giving her enough time to strategize an attack. She drove her sword towards the latter almost relentlessly, and Naomi realized that Raven was perfect.

She had everything.

Brute force, graceful movements and speed.

Almost suddenly, Naomi realized Raven was going easy on her. She watched carefully, and came to the conclusion that she was right; a muscle would twitch in Raven's forearm every time her sword got too close to Naomi's vitals.

Naomi did not know if she was supposed to appreciate it; all she knew was that she hated it.