The next night, Diya and Shikra carved through the urban labyrinth that was Blacklung Bend. Diya had scouted The Ironworks out that morning and with the help of an informant, a young boy named Mako who worked graveyard shifts shoveling coal at the factory, had learned Peacock Prisha’s office was on the top floor.

  She knew she overpaid Mako. He made off with a pouch holding more coin than he likely would have made in three months for the information. Rohan would have given her a hard time about it, saying she got ripped off or hustled, but Diya had a habit of dropping money into the hands of the neighborhood kids at every opportunity. Her mother always looked out for the Bend, and since she passed away, the urge to do the same had intensified within Diya.

  Shikra zipped through a corridor on the outskirts of the Bend, feathered wings laying claim to the sky, smoggy air bending and yielding to her. With an effortless grace, the massive bird landed on the roof of The Ironworks.

  After patting her friend on the neck, Diya swung down, leather boots tapping against soot-blackened beams. Vents and chimney stacks speared through the roofline, belching an unrelenting swirl of coal smoke into the sky. Narrow skylights, framed in wrought iron and glazed with grimy panes of glass, ran the length of the roof, filtering in pale shafts of dusty light.

  As a precaution, she fished a black wool balaclava from her knapsack and pulled it down over her face. You never knew who might be watching in Blacklung Bend, and it was better to be discreet. She had no desire to find herself in hot water, or court marshalled when she reported for her next military action.

  Diya kneeled, wiping the filthy glass with her ripped turquoise scarf just enough to create a smudgy window down into the factory. In the distance, the countless forges roared with fiery satisfaction, ever hungry for more material. Young workers ran about like chickens with their heads cut off, for they could never work fast enough to appease the hungry furnaces or their demanding matriarch.

  The office of that matriarch hung over the top of the ironworks atop rusted beams, and with walls made of corrugated metal sheets that had been patched and repaired in places with mismatched materials. Iron walkways and staircases crisscrossed with no discernible pattern causing them to appear almost organic.

  A single guard stood at the shut door of the office. She was a stout looking woman with a flintlock rifle resting at her side. Diya figured her job must be a boring one, because the guard was entirely focused on the day’s newspaper.

  Pulling a tool from her knapsack, Diya lifted the pane of glass from the wrought iron frame and slid it aside, careful not to make a sound. From the opening the clamor of an industrial symphony poured out, the grinding gears of machinery, the clang of hammers, and the hiss of molten metal.

  Diya dropped down into the place like a spider, moving across the beams and girders that supported the enormous factory. Once she got into position directly above the guard, Diya wrapped her strong legs around a beam and hung upside down like a bat. Pulling a blowpipe from her belt she lined up her shot, then fired a dart right into the neck of the guard.

  A moment of confusion was afforded her before the newspaper fell silently from her hands to the iron walkway, followed by the guard’s unconscious body, not quite so silently.

  Diya flinched as she dropped down next to the unconscious guard. Mouthing a silent apology before scooping up the keyring from the guard’s belt and letting herself into the office. Just to be safe, Diya dragged the guard into the office and shut the door behind them. The anesthetic she had applied to the dart was strong enough that she would be out for at least an hour. Not strong enough to cause lasting injury though, she would wake up confused and with a wicked migraine, but it would pass.

  When Diya examined Peacock Prisha’s office, her jaw dropped, knowing Prisha she expected unapologetic flamboyance, but was still somehow surprised by the opulence. The chamber was shamelessly grandiose, as if plucked straight from a noble’s manor and jammed awkwardly into a working factory.

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  All four walls were paneled in dark, varnished wood, nothing like the rough mismatched boards of the factory floor. Oil portraits of the woman hung on nearly every wall, some in military garb she never wore, some as a saint tastelessly surrounded by poor children, and they all had one thing in common, they all portrayed her at least fifty pounds lighter than she was.

  Rectangular mirrors hung on the walls that appeared to have been fitted with some manner of defective glass, for when Diya looked at her reflection, it appeared to have been abnormally elongated. At first glance Diya gasped, running her palms over her masked face and body before realizing what was going on.

  How peculiarly on brand. Rather than change a thing about herself, she would rather distort reality around her to better match her desires. It’s incredible the lengths some people will go to perpetuate their ideal existence.

  A constant thunder of the foundry could be heard faintly, like distant war drums, though very much quieter than it ought to have been considering an entire factory was operating right beneath her feet. Diya rapped her knuckles against the wall, confirming her suspicion, Prisha must have had the walls stuffed with cotton batting to muffle it.

  The desk at the center was a monstrous thing of iron and oak, its legs shaped like sphinxes, its drawers full of sweets, unopened gifts, and at least three more small mirrors with the same slimming effect. Ick. Behind it sat a high-backed leather chair, more a throne than a seat really.

  Diya plopped down in the chair. There was no tactical or investigative purpose to it, she was just curious what it felt like to sit in such a fancy seat. Surely it could not be that much nicer than any other, after all, a chair was a chair. Diya had the sudden realization that she could not have been more wrong.

  Sitting atop the extravagant chair felt like she had been enveloped by clouds.

  Mental note, one day I need to get myself one of these.

  As she fell into a state of utter relaxation that she truthfully had no business being in, that is considering that she was currently in the midst of a break in, Diya noticed that there was a large circular stained-glass window in the floor. It depicted a colorful scene that focused on Prisha riding atop a giant elephant, with a crowd of children cheering below.

  Diya was assailed by the sudden urge to vomit, the hideous tastelessness of it all was just too much, but she was able to fight it back with a few forced swallows.

  Oh, shit.

  Through the colorful glass, Diya made out the familiar shape of Mako. He was leading a clearly furious Peacock Prisha and a gang of armed goons across the factory floor towards the stairway up to the office.

  That little bastard! I paid him way more than he deserved for that info.

  Diya looked up towards the ceiling as if her mother might have some sage wisdom from the afterlife for her about not letting this one interaction change her stance. When there was no sign, or ambiguous communication, she scrambled out of the seat, getting her nose just inches away from the back rest of the chair.

  She didn’t need a message from her dead mother, or some miraculous divine intervention, just a single hair would do. What she found when she stared at the chair flipped her entire plan upside down.

  The chair she was just praising had become the bane of her existence in the span of sixty seconds. It was made of leather and as such had not a single hair clinging to it.

  Diya cursed and flailed, eyes darting around the office. In the stained-glass window, the cohort led by her good deed for the day had disappeared from view. That meant they would be here in mere minutes.

  Panicked fingers tore through the drawers of the desk, looking desperately for a miracle. She tried to keep her cool but each useless box of treats, or self-congratulatory note sent Diya further into her flustered spiral.

  Just when she thought she would need to abandon the mission and slip out she found a cigar box full of nail trimmings. It made Diya wretch, and she felt the vomit she fought so hard to repress gurgling in her stomach. Despite dry heaving, she dumped a handful of the trimmings into a pouch tied to her belt and bolted for the door.

  As she reached for the doorknob and cracked open the door, a glimmer of light against a glossy red wax seal caught her attention, it looked just like the crest of the Crimson Mast Syndicate. Diya could see the mob moving closer towards her on a walkway just a floor below. She hated herself for being so damn curious, but she needed to know what was on that letter.

  Without a thought she ran over and snatched the letter up, tucking it into a crease in her blouse, and darting out the door. Diya jumped up into the beams and rafters and climbed her way back up to the glass pane she had entered through.

  Just as she heard the shrill sound of Peacock Prisha’s voice shriek about the invasion of her office, Diya slid the pane of glass back into place.

  Shikra appeared from the emerald hued fog and Diya leapt up onto her friend’s back. Without hesitation they flew off into the night.