Things calmed in Occulara after the raid on the vampire’s warehouse. Leon knew that Kassia was being interrogated and that he’d eventually get a report on what she’d said, but for the next couple of days, he spent his time moving his retinue into his villa and exhaustively overhauling the security wards in their homes. He was still angry about how his people had been abducted, but now that Alcander and Marcus were safe and he didn’t have an immediate target, his passionate wrath had largely subsided, just waiting for him to receive the next piece of actionable intelligence to rear its head.

Once Marcus, Alcander, and everyone else got settled into his villa, though, Elise made it known that she didn’t want to put her entire schedule on hold for too long. Leon, not wanting to turtle up, agreed with her that continuing their business was for the best, so long as they maintained some stronger security.

To that end, when Elise and Helen left the next morning to continue surveying properties for a possible apple orchard, most of Leon’s retinue went with her, including Maia. Leon had Xaphan with him who assured Leon that he’d fight if they encountered any vampires, so as far as he was concerned, he didn’t need any more eighth-tier backup.

He kept Talal, Marcus, and Alcander with him, though, both to give himself some kind of entourage and to make sure the latter two weren’t targeted again while he was out seeing to his own business.

And his first stop was Sid’s workshop.

—

“Siiiid!” Leon called out as he stepped out of the magic lift and into Sid’s atrium, his three companions getting out just behind him. “I come bearing gifts!”

“What?!” he heard Sid shout from somewhere in her dense nest of various smithing tools, hidden from direct view. “Did I hear something about gifts?!”

Her head poked out from around an enormous furnace, her hair tied back, a doubtful look on her face.

“Leon!” she shouted as she saw him. “Is that you?!”

“Something wrong with your eyes that you can’t recognize me?” Leon asked.

“More like something wrong with my ears,” Sid replied as she stepped into the atrium, warmly smiling at him for a moment before her smile turned teasing. “I’ve never really known you to bring gifts, so I wasn’t sure if it was really you…”

“I bring gifts all the time,” Leon argued.

“Name one time,” Sid smugly replied as she crossed her bare, heavily muscled arms over her smithing apron.

“There was…” Leon began before he cut himself off. “No, no, I suppose that was just going a little beyond with a job… But there was that other time… Eh, that probably doesn’t count…”

“Anyway,” Sid cut him off before he could continue too deeply down that rabbit hole, “what’s this about bringing gifts?”

“Ah, right!”

With a theatrical flourish and an enormous smile on his face, Leon conjured from his soul realm a dozen huge boxes of wyvern hide, scales, and bones; everything Sid could possibly want for making weapons and armor with wyvern material.

Sid, obviously full of anticipation, skipped over to the nearest box and tore its lid clean off. When she saw the glittering golden scales within, her eyes went wide and she gasped in surprise. “Leon!” she exclaimed. “This is a gift?”

Leon nodded. “All of them are. Just my way of thanking you for all the lessons.”

Sid paused as she made to open the second box and glanced at him. “You say that like you’re not planning on coming to any more lessons…”

“That’s not the case. Or at least, not permanently the case. I have some personal business that may take up quite a bit of time. I have an expedition into the Sacred Golden Empire to plan and execute, and I have no idea how long that might take. So, I think it’d be safe to assume that I won’t be coming back in for at least six months. But I am by no means expressing that I want our lessons to end. Just… a temporary hiatus, you know?”

Sid frowned as she fully faced him. “You’re not going to fall out of practice, are you?”

“No, absolutely not,” Leon assured her. “This is just personal business that has to be taken care of.”

Sid stared at him for a moment before her stern exterior dropped. She almost burst out laughing as she went back to the second box and opened it to reveal it was filled with blue wyvern scales.

“Lukas! Elias! Atticus! Get out here!”

Sid’s three main apprentices poked their heads out from other corners of the huge, packed workshop.

“Take care of all of this for me,” Sid ordered, and the three young men quickly stepped forward to deal with Leon’s gift and leaving Sid able to face Leon without being distracted. “Thank you, Leon,” she said. “Your gift is greatly appreciated.”

“You’re most welcome,” Leon replied. “It’s the least I could do as thanks for all your patience over these past ten years.”

Sid nodded while waving dismissively. “It was nothing at all, don’t mention it.” Her eyes then narrowed and her demeanor grew more serious. “By the way, Leon, I heard a little something through the grapevine… what’s been going on these past couple of days?”

Leon breathed a quick sigh of relief, having worried he’d have to broach this topic on his own, but she brought it up of her own accord without any prompting from him.

“Oh, you know, just dealing with a bunch of uppity vampires. They attacked Marcus and Alcander over there, and I had to hunt them down and kill them for it.”

Sid looked a little uncomfortable with Leon’s casual mention of killing vampires, but that was to be expected as far as Leon was concerned. She made weapons and armor, but whenever he’d brought up killing around her over the past decade, she’d usually reacted with discomfort. But she gave Marcus and Alcander a quick look.

“You boys are looking good for having been attacked by vampires just a few days ago.”

“We had some good healers,” Marcus replied.

“No puny vampires are going to put us down for long!” Alcander boasted, flexing his aura and his massive arms for emphasis.

Leon saw Sid smile appreciatively at his enormous retainer. “Say, Alcander,” she said, “if you ever get tired of serving this surly boy over here, feel free to come on back here. I could certainly use someone with your… talents in here…”

Alcander just smiled back at her, but before he could verbally respond, Leon interjected.

“Can you not flirt with and try to steal my retainers in front of me?”

“I’ll try, but I make no promises,” Sid responded as she turned back toward Leon. “Anyway, these vampires, is the threat over with?”

“Unfortunately, no. A few of the larger bats seemed to have flown off before we could crush their nest, which is actually one of the reasons why I came here.”

“Oh?”

Leon paused for a moment as he made sure he really wanted to say this, and when he was certain, he still hesitated for a moment longer.

“Listen,” he said, “I have some reason to suspect that these vampires might have some connection with Heaven’s Eye, and I have quite a few reasons to not trust the Director as far as I can spit. I’m not entirely sure that he’ll let me hunt these bastards down, but that’s not going to stop me. They **ed with my people, and I can’t allow that.”

“Understandable. If anyone went after my apprentices, I’d bury them alive…”

For the first time since he’d met her, Leon felt a few thin strands of killing intent waver through Sid’s aura, lending her words quite a bit of weight.

“Well,” Leon continued, “I was hoping that if push came to shove, then you would support me in hunting these vampires down and excising them from Heaven’s Eye. I’d rather do this with the Director’s blessing than without it, and if he doesn’t want to give it, then I’m fine with trying to force it. However, I also don’t want to make things too difficult for you, so if you say no, then I understand…”

“What? Say no? Like I’d ever do that!” Sid reached over and pulled Leon in for a brief, playful headlock. “I don’t much like vampires. Honestly, they kind of terrify me. If you’re worried about them infiltrating Heaven’s Eye, then you have my support in rooting them out by hook or by crook… for however much my support’s worth, which I can’t imagine is a lot.”

“Nonsense,” Leon responded as he pulled himself free of her gasp. “Given your skills, I’m sure you could get quite a bit moving in Heaven’s Eye—at least, within Production.”

“I think your mother-in-law might be able to get a little more done than what I can do,” Sid pointed out.

“And I’ll be speaking with her later, but every ally’s an ally, right?”

Sid chuckled. “I suppose that’s true.”

The two then went quiet for a moment, and after a while, Leon departed, though not before Sid managed to coax out one last promise from him not to let his blacksmithing skills wither from lack of practice. Leon thusly stepped back into the magic lift with thoughts of how to make his workshop portable filling his head.

—

When Leon arrived at Emilie’s office, he found that his mother-in-law was already in a meeting. As a Hand of the Director, he could, if he wanted to, force his way in, but instead he chose to wait. Fortunately, he didn’t have to wait long, though when the stream of men and women came filing out of her office, he noted that few of them seemed happy, and most were so absorbed in their own hurried whispers that they barely even realized he was there.

A couple did notice him, though, and instead of meeting his gaze or offering their greetings, they turned their gaze to the floor and hurried away from Emilie’s office as fast as dignity allowed. After all, if a Hand of the Director arrived, it rarely meant good things. Fortunately, he wasn’t here to be a harbinger of doom… or at least, he hoped he wasn’t.

Once everyone had left Emilie’s office, Emilie’s secretary showed him in right away. Emilie’s office wasn’t much to write home about—it was luxurious, but Leon already expected that from a member of Heaven’s Eye’s board. It had a conference table off to one side and a lounge area to the other, while directly across from the door was Emilie’s enormous desk. It wasn’t quite as big as the Director’s, but it was still big enough to be not only imposing, but to make Emilie look almost small from behind it.

He still thought her office from the Heaven’s Eye Tower back in the Bull Kingdom was far nicer.

When she saw Leon walk in, Emilie, who’d been frowning and glaring at a stack of papers like she wanted to incinerate them with her gaze, looked up and her expression immediately brightened.

“Leon!” she exclaimed. “Oh, good boy, have you come to rescue poor old me from all of this tedious paperwork?”

“For one, you’re not old,” Leon said with an amused smile as Emilie’s secretary exited the office and closed the door, sealing the two of in total privacy. “For two, are you in need of rescuing? I’m sure someone as powerful as you could get herself out of this place if she really needed to.”

Emilie laughed as she rose from behind her desk, her papers seemingly forgotten. As she came around the desk, she gestured toward the brightly-lit lounge area, and Leon went and sat on one of the small sofas, while Emilie sat in an armchair directly across from him.

“So, Leon,” she said, “what brings you here today? And why don’t you come more often? You know that I love seeing you and Elise as much as possible!”

“I’m sorry we’ve been a little scarce lately,” Leon replied with genuine sorrow. “I’ve been extremely busy with smithing work, then the wyvern hunt down south, and then there was some ugly business involving vampires in the city after we returned…”

“Ah, yes, I heard something about that. But you were involved?”

Leon hummed and nodded. “Do you remember the house-warming party we held back in the Bull Kingdom?”

“How could I not? That party was attacked by vampires, too. This is related?”

“I believe it is. The same faction of vampires has been hounding me for a long time, from the attack on our old house, to the attack in the Ilumerian Wetlands, to now, when two of my retainers were snatched from their homes and tortured for days before I could find them.”

“That’s terrible! Who was it?! Are they all right?”

“Marcus and Alcander, and they’re on the road to recovery if not already there thanks to Heaven’s Eye healers. They’re waiting for me down in this building’s lobby, as a matter of fact.”

“Pass on my well-wishes if you can.”

“Will do.”

“Is this why you’re here? This vampire attack?”

“In a way…” Leon paused a moment, wondering just how to proceed. With Emilie patiently waiting and having already covered this topic with Sid, he was able to find his words again fairly easily. “This is more about the Director; the vampires are, in some ways, kind of more incidental…”

Leon then gave Emilie a brief rundown both of the vampire attack, and his current issues with Director.

“… so I think you can see why I’m having some problems trusting the Director right now.”

Emilie, having listened in silence the entire time, stared at him in shock and disbelief, but in the long, quiet seconds that followed, her expression fell into something more contemplative.

“That… was quite the story,” she said a little absent-mindedly. “I believe you, though. You’re not one to lie, and when you do, you’re honestly really bad at it…”

Leon wanted to argue, but he kept his mouth shut, knowing that she was right.

“So, what are you looking for from me?”

“I think you might already know.”

“I have my theories, but I don’t want to sit here and guess. You’re my son-in-law, we don’t have to stand on pretenses, do we? We should love and support each other as family.”

Leon smiled. “Thanks for saying that. It’s hard to keep that in mind; my family has never been that large, and trust can be hard to come by.”

“Do you not trust me?” Emilie sounded almost offended, so Leon hurried to correct himself.

“It’s not that! I do trust you, I do! I wouldn’t have told you all of this if I didn’t! I’m just trying to express my appreciation for this, all of this trust going around. That’s all.”

“Hmm,” Emilie hummed as she gave Leon a teasing look.

Leon, his face turning a little red from embarrassment, decided to just push on to his point. “I’m going to be taking this matter to the Director. Naturally, given what I suspect about him, I’m not too optimistic that he’s going to do anything. Maybe throw me a bone, but… If my doubts turn out to be accurate, then something has to change.”

Emilie leaned forward, all trace of playfulness gone as the conversation turned in this extremely serious direction. “Are you asking me to support some kind of coup?”

“No!” Leon hurriedly exclaimed. “Nothing so drastic! All I want is some pressure from someone he can’t just dismiss.”

“He can just dismiss me if he wants,” Emilie pointed out.

“He wouldn’t have put you in this position if he didn’t value your skills and abilities. He has to have some kind of trust in you, and Heaven’s Eye wouldn’t be nearly as large and powerful as it is if he did nothing but appoint into powerful positions people who only tell him what he wants to hear.”

“All this, and you say you don’t trust him?”

“I suppose there’re different degrees of trust, isn’t there? I don’t trust his intentions towards me, but I trust his abilities. He’s shrewd and manipulative. He appointed you to a position of power, so his judgment is pretty solid, but still, I’m just trying to cover my ass here.”

“Then what?”

“I need him to crack down on vampirism in Heaven’s Eye. If you can apply any pressure at all to him on this, it would be appreciated. Naturally, if you don’t think you can, then I won’t push, it’s just… I need to do whatever I can to make sure my people remain safe. I can’t allow them to be targeted by anyone, especially not my own personal enemies. I’m not trying to launch a coup against him, and I’m not trying to subvert his power in any way. Not yet, anyway.”

Leon paused, having said his piece. He felt like he could qualify and argue for this for hours, but he believed his point had been made.

Emilie gave him a hard stare for a long moment, and then burst out laughing. When she managed to draw in a breath and steady herself, she said, “Ooh, not yet, hmm? I was starting to wonder if that card of yours had burned a hole in your pocket and got lost!”

Leon grimaced. He still had his platinum Heaven’s Eye card, the ID card of his Ancestor Demetrios, the son of Jason Keraunos. With it, he could theoretically take control of Heaven’s Eye, but he doubted that would work at all. For now, he wasn’t interested in directly moving against the Director. For now.

“I still have it, and it’s not the right time to use it. But we can talk about that matter another time. For now, will you support me in this? Do you agree with me that we need to do something about the vampiric menace in this guild?”

Emilie, seemingly without hesitation, replied, “Yes, these vampires need to be scraped off our boot before they start to smell. Are you going to see the Director soon?”

“Yes,” Leon said.

“I’ll do what I can to make sure he knows that you and I are in agreement,” she said.

“That’s all I ask,” Leon responded. “Thank you. Really, I feel like I should say something stronger, but nothing’s coming to mind…”

“Don’t worry about it, we’re family!” Emilie cried as she rose from her seat, pulled Leon off the sofa, and then pulled him into a tight hug. “Just do me one favor in return?”

“Anything.”

“Maybe get Elise to come by a little more often? And I wouldn’t say no to grandkids…”

Leon’s blood ran cold for a moment at the mention of children. “That first one is definitely doable,” he murmured. “That second… we’ll… um… probably not.”

“Ah, well,” Emilie sighed as she released Leon. “It’ll happen someday, I’m sure.”

“Someday,” Leon promised. “Just not soon.”

“Don’t keep me waiting too long! I am getting old, you know!”

Leon smiled and nodded, and soon enough, he was back in the building’s magic lift, heading from near the top floor back down to the atrium. When he walked out the back, Marcus, Talal, and Alcander at his back, he knew that he’d be staring up at the Hexagon, where the Director was.

He supposed he could go to Penelope first, but he honestly didn’t know where she was or if she would say yes. So, instead of hunting around for her, he decided to just head right for the Director. With Sid and Emilie on his side, he hoped that the Director would see things his way. If he didn’t, then Leon supposed he’d have to make other plans. Whether those plans involved the platinum card or not, he hadn’t yet decided…