[Opener is "Swan Song", by Dua Lipa.]
It took Cinder longer than she liked to signal Ren and Sun to step outside.
Finally they did.
"What?" Sun asked. "We were just about to ask her the real questions like 'who works here on those days?' Like real detectives."
"The only thing real about you is your idiocy." Cinder had lost her patience with Sun long ago. "And she won't tell you anything worth hearing."
"Why are you so sure?" Ren said.
Cinder clenched a fist. "Because I'm certain she's in on it. The entire thing is more complicated than I thought. I figured it was one person, maybe two, but my guess is it's more than that. They've gone to too much trouble to hide it. I'm sure Eurus is not the only town either that they're stealing from."
"Whoa, what if we just uncovered a whole scam?" Sun said.
"I think it'd be more of a sting," Ren said.
Oh! he was just as bad as the monkey boy!
"Or is it--" Sun began.
"Who cares?" Cinder almost exploded at them. "The point is, she won't help you. Probably tell you wrong so you'll waste your time."
"But how do you know she's in on it?" Ren said.
It took all of Cinder's wavering self control to not hit him and to instead explain, very condescendingly, what she'd figured out.
At least they were convinced.
"I'd never have thought of that. That's so sneaky," Sun said.
"You certainly seem to know how these things work," Ren said. "I'd think you were involved if you hadn't called it to our attention to begin with."
That was such a stupid thing to say that Cinder didn't even bother to dignify it with a response.
"But if she won't help, how do we get the right information?" Sun asked.
"Simple," Cinder said. "We know at least one of the pilots flying this stuff out--Teach, I think it was--and since everyone insists Zapato is innocent. It might be. He's much too well known around here for it to be so easy for him to do this on the sly. But if the other is around, he may be well aware of what's going on, and if he isn't, you can at least rule out the pilots as part of the set up."
"Oh, yeah, yeah," Sun said. "We'll find him and ask him what's going on."
"I can find out who he is," Ren said. "I'd just have to check the schedule for flyers. I don't need clearance to do that."
"You're kind of good at this," Sun told Cinder, without a shade of irony it seemed. "You should be a detective."
"Ugh," was her response.
* * *
Ren found out that Teach, whose full name was Edwin Teach, was in fact assigned to fly that day, so they were sure he'd been around.
Between flights, pilots usually visited their families if they had any around, and, failing that, they'd be in the mess hall or in town perhaps.
But as luck would have it, the flight was supposed to leave soon, so Ren was sure Teach would be around the base somewhere.
It only took a call to the front desk to find out. They didn't even bother to ask why.
"They sure trust you," Cinder said. Her tone implied that was a mistake.
"Everyone here knows pretty much everyone else these days." Ren didn't see it as remarkable. "If I'm looking for someone, they just think it's for work. And it is, in a way."
"This is so exciting," Sun said. "I wish I could call Blake in--she loves this. You sure we don't have time?"
"I think we'll be done before she even arrives," Ren said.
"But could we have her interview someone else, so they won't know it's us?" Sun had a semi-decent idea, actually.
Except they had no one in mind.
Sun insisted on calling her anyway.
By the time he finished it, Ren was already mostly to the correct loading dock, and Cinder was with him. Sun was still outside.
"If this does turn out to be bigger than just your town, I think we'd get some recognition for exposing it," Ren remarked. "Not that I really need it. It might help you, though."
He seemed chattier when he was working.
"No thanks." Cinder would prefer no one knew she was here at all.
Edwin Teach was standing by his ship (which was a small, fast carrier that would not have had a lot of equipment for fighting more than a few Grimm and was designed for short delivery routes no doubt), just checking his scroll.
He looked harmless enough. He was older and probably had been a pilot for many years, but he wasn't old, by any means.
Ren didn't know exactly how to ask him about it tactfully, so he explained the situation in brief terms.
"Have you noticed anything odd while loading up cargo? Like less of it than there should have been, or anyone around it who wouldn't normally be?" Ren asked.
Teach stroked his beard.
"I can't really say," he said lazily. "I mind my own business, mostly. I load whatever's here, and often enough no one's helping me do it, though they should be, but we're always understaffed. Ask any pilot, they'll tell you the same, and I can't imagine any of my crewmates would have stolen anything."
"Oh, I don't know if they've stolen it," Ren said. "Could just be an error in our system."
"If that's it, then you better be asking the technicians," Teach said. "Hey, lady, don't touch the plane."
Cinder had been running her hand along the hull, perhaps searching for a hidden hatch, though she doubted it would be necessary for this sting.
But she pulled her hand back with all her cat-likeness and gave him a fake innocent look.
Cinder was always so obvious when she was coy that Teach probably knew she wasn't really compliant.
"I was just admiring it," Cinder said, in her old tone that made Ren's skin crawl with the familiarity of it. "It's pretty fast, isn't it?"
"Do you know airships?" Teach asked.
"Oh, I've flown around a bit in them," Cinder said. "It's small but powerful, right? Takes a lot of skill to pilot this."
Cinder had always been bad at flattery, and even her efforts to do it sounded fake, as Raven could have told you.
However, on men in particular this didn't usually pose much of an obstacle to getting her results. They seemed to think it was part of her game.
"I don't know if it takes much more than any other plane, but I certainly take pride in it," Teach said, less hostilely.
Ren didn't really get why Cinder was bringing it up.
"Does anyone ever try to overtake you in the air?" Cinder asked, in the same tone, not as if it was an important question, just vague curiosity. "I'm sure they could catch you easily in this."
"Not many ships could catch this one. It's just too small for the big ones to get close--well, in the right landscape," Teach said readily enough. "You'd be perfectly safe as long as no Grimm caught you. But I avoid those."
"What about Bandits, you ever run into them?" Cinder said.
Teach hesitated just for a split second, which to Ren was insignificant.
"Bandits don't really use ships," he said after that pause.
"Actually, that's not entirely true." Cinder remembered with annoyance how Watts had grilled them all on bandits before they went to Raven's tribe.
No doubt he'd been nervous about it and that was his way of coping, even though Mercury and her had both told him to shut up.
But one thing he'd mentioned in passing was that some bandits had been known to steal airships from Atlesians, if they could find them intact enough after a crash, which happened often enough in Grimm attacks (indeed, it had happened to Weiss, she'd later heard) and would use them to attack people.
It was rare, because not many bandits knew how to fly, but not entirely impossible.
These bandits were sometimes called "air pirates" to distinguish them from regular bandits. But they preyed on small things for the simple reason that anything too ambitious would have gotten them shot down by more experienced ships.
It had never come up anyway; Raven's tribe didn't use ships.
However, while looking at the side of this one, Cinder had spied some marks that could have been painted over scars from a bullet or other projectile or Grimm.
That proved nothing, but it was interesting.
"Some bandits have used airships," she said aloud, casually.
"I didn't know that." Ren was no help.
"It's not common." Cinder wanted to bite his head off but couldn't at this time.
"Who knew? Live and learn." Teach shrugged nonchalantly. "But that's all I know."
"I suppose that's all we can ask, then." Ren was beginning to feel this was just a dead end.
How would they figure this out? All he could think of was going back to that lady at the desk with more official orders from Winter or Raven, and that would take a while.
Ren was getting tired of this. The thrills of it didn't appeal to him the way it did to Sun.
His scroll buzzed.
"I should take this," he said, checking it. "I'll just step out. Come on, Cinder."
Cinder!
Of course he didn't remember to use her fake name.
Had she told it to him? She must have.
Cinder glanced at Teach, but he didn't seem to have noticed.
He could still remember the name any second. She should go.
"Actually, ma'am," Teach spoke, "perhaps I was too abrupt about before. If you want to see the ship, you can. I don't like to be rude to a lady."
She wasn't a lady.
Cinder was pretty sure "see the ship" meant one of two things in this case, and she didn't want either.
"No, that's--" she began.
"It's okay, I'm going to need a minute anyway to finish this call," Ren told her, misunderstanding her hesitancy as thinking that he wouldn't allow her to linger. "I'm just going to take it outside. There's static inside."
He didn't want Cinder to hear the call anyway.
"But--" Cinder tried to think of a way to signal him that this was a bad idea.
But Ren walked out.
Oh well...she could handle herself, right?
She'd just leave anyway...but she wouldn't mind a chance to look at the ship more closely even if it was a trick, just so long as she stayed clear of the hatch.
She'd just play along.
"Oh well, I suppose," she said aloud.
"It's the blasters that are the most important feature," Teach said, as if this was normal. "State of the Art Atlas designs. The Mistral ones just don't compare."
This was dull but harmless talk, so Cinder pretended to indulge it.
She was on edge though.
She inspected the back of the ship. Of course the entrance to it was in the back, because it was a carrier and not for battle.
She moved away from the door and tried to get a look at where she'd seen the scars...at least if they were scars...
There under it.
A big gouge mark from something.
"Where did you get that?" She pointed at it.
"Oh, that?" Teach said. "Bit of a skirmish, nothing too serious. You seem very interested in battles."
"It's just a hobby," Cinder lied, not very well.
"I'm sure it is for you." Teach's tone suddenly lost its friendliness.
Cinder knew what that meant and had been waiting for it.
She immediately made a break for it.
Ren would be right outside. Teach wouldn't dare to attack her if someone was watching.
Unfortunately, before she even got to the exit, the door to it slammed down so fast it nearly hit her in the head.
Teach wouldn't have been able to shut it like that, so she looked up.
The light was dim, but she saw another man in there.
"Nice, Calico." Teach was walking up, rubbing his hands. "A bit of luck that fool went outside. I never thought he was the sharpest knife in the armory."
"Before you do anything--" Cinder held up her hand, and glass formed into a spear in it "--I am more than capable of defending myself. So you might want to think of this carefully."
"Cinder Fall." Calico had his scroll out, and it had a picture of her on it. "This is an old wanted notice, and it's missing half the face, but still, you're pretty easy to recognize, though in those clothes, you're not quite as striking as you used to be."
Fine words from a man with an earring in, Cinder thought to herself in disgust.
"Whatever you think, I'm not here on anything but business," she said evenly.
"More's the pity for you if that's true," Teach said, but not as if he meant it. "If you attack either of us, we'll both say it was you who started it. We're respected workers here. Who do you think they'd believe? I bet you don't even use your real name."
Crap!
This was just what she'd wanted to avoid.
"So is this the part where you kill me?" Cinder would not have shown fear to them for a million lien, even if she was pretty scared at this point.
"Kill you? That's a waste," Teach said. "There's plenty of people out there who'd love to get their hands on the woman responsible for the fall of Beacon and of Atlas, people who might have wandered a little from the straight and narrow themselves--but then, who hasn't these days? I'm sure they'd love to get a chance to chat."
"If that's who it is, I'd sooner just get arrested than let that happen." Cinder thought fast. "I have friends in the higher ups. I'd rather get off lighter for hurting you than allow what you're saying."
"Well, that's not a bad idea," Calico said. "The problem is, we're not going let you just stop us that easily."
He had some weapon out now.
Cinder wasn't concerned about fighting them. She thought she could take care of either of these fools, or both of them, easily.
In fact, she did.
They came at her, and they were much too slow.
She knocked Calio aside, and he didn't get up again.
Teach was a bit harder. He had more weight and more reach, so just knocking him out wasn't so simple, but she used glass to drive him back.
Where was Ren? If he and that moron Sun would get back in here and witness that this was self defense, she could avoid arrest, period!
Teach began to seem to think he might have been foolish to provoke her, after she hit him into into his own plane.
"All right, all right." He held up his hands🙌. "Maybe we were a little too hasty. Perhaps we could work out some kind of deal."
"Be honest, you're in on the sting to steal supplies." Cinder thought she might get a confession if he was in a bargaining mood.
"Is that all you're here for?" Teach said. "Why do you care?"
"You stole from me," Cinder said. By extension, she added mentally.
"Oh, whoops." Teach shrugged. "But it was right there, you know."
Suddenly, he didn't look afraid.
"There's more people than just one or two involved," Cinder accused. "I suspected it before--you're an air pirate, aren't you? You've been doing this all over, for a while now."
"I'll give you this, terrorist, not many people would have thought of that," Teach admitted. "I guess you haven't lost your touch in all this time off the field. I'm a little disappointed, though, a monster like you taking up with those cut and dried, vanilla huntsmen. At one time, I'd have thought we'd have things in common. Maybe you could have helped us out, but this way you're just in our way. I wouldn't have believed it if I didn't see it myself. What a disgrace to crime."
"Are you serious?" Cinder at one time might have found that funny, or said it herself, but now it sounded so stupid that she'd actually broken character. "I mean, do you hear yourself when you say that? 'A disgrace to crime'? Crime is already a disgrace, and we're only lying to ourselves if we claim otherwise. What are you but a small, mean, little man who can't cut it enough to get what he wants without stealing it from other people? Or, you like the thrill. Either way, your life is empty, and you're only trying to distract yourself from it. I bet you were failing before the economy dipped and people became understaffed. If Atlas was still around, you'd have been a joke to them."
Cinder had always loved rubbing things in people's faces--and she should not have indulged that at this time.
"Watch your tone, b----!" Teach suddenly turned more dangerous than before.
He didn't like being mocked, and apparently he had a hell of a temper under that exterior.
It caught her a little off guard as he hit at her much faster than before.
Cinder still retreated from it, but she made a note not to underestimate him so much. She had no magic, and her new power worked better against Grimm than other humans.
Calico might get up soon. She needed to stop Teach before that happened if she was going to get out of here before someone else saw this.
She adjusted her spear into being a knife and ducked him, then tripped him more.
"No you don't," he said, and his voice became scarier still. "I won't let you ruin this for me, especially you!"
Cinder didn't care for the insult, but something about his eyes when he said that looked wrong.
Then they seemed almost to darken.
She shoved him into the plane and held up her knife.
"Just give up," she said.
She was hoping not to have to hurt him. That would be harder to explain.
"Never," he said. "Just do it. I'm sure you want to."
He kicked her sharply.
Cinder didn't budge, but it did anger her.
She tightened her grip on the knife.
Technically this was self defense, right?
Was it okay?
But...
She hesitated.
It had been too long since she'd killed someone, and, much like quitting an addiction, even the idea of going back to it became odious to her.
It would just...undo all that work to get out of that life.
And then what had she even bothered to try for?
No, she should just walk away, before they ruined this for her.
She lowered the knife slightly.
"Drop your weapon," she said.
She had kicked his arm back anyway, but he still had it.
"No," Teach said.
Then the air around him seemed darker suddenly.
Cinder wouldn't have believed this happened if she hadn't been there herself--she'd have thought it was a trick of the mind.
But she was sure, at least while she saw it, that it was no trick.
Behind Teach, or on his shoulder, she saw a clawed hand that was definitely a Grimm.
There was no real form behind that, but it looked like one of the Avarice creatures had, but smaller.
They took so many different shapes it was hard to know what was an Avarice Grimm, but all of them had those claw-like things on one part of their body, and she'd seen a few.
For a second, she wasn't sure what to make of it.
Teach moved faster, knocking her knife the rest of the way out of her hands.
It was nothing for her to make it again, but she was too stunned to think of that.
"What--?" She was sure he couldn't have seen the Grimm; no human would have just stood there if they had. "Did you see that?"
"See what?" Teach said. "Nice try."
"No, there--" Cinder was too baffled to realize that she'd sound mad if she said it. "Behind you, there was--Ahhh!"
She stopped because someone had hit her with electricity.
Calico had come back--and she'd not heard him because she was focused on the Grimm--and hit her with one of those taser-like weapons.
Cinder had a high tolerance for electricity, but this was more than she could stand, and she blacked out.
"That was easier than I thought," Calico seemed to say dimly overhead.
"Almost too easy," Teach replied.
[Uh oh.]
[All right, I know you're all wondering about these new characters. As you probably guessed, they're all pirates. Pirates are legendary, so I think they count as legitimate inspiration for RWBY characters if Joan of Arc can, right?
Calico is a reference to Calico Jack, a.k.a., John Rackham. Edwin Teach is a not very subtle reference to Edward Teach, the real name of Blackbeard.
The woman at the desk is unclear right now, but she's probably either Mary Read or Anne Bonny (formally Anne Cormac), two female pirates who worked with Calico Jack. Calico Jack was also part of the inspiration for Jack Sparrow, from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. I'm surprised that Anne Bonny and Mary Read never appear in those movies, since Blackbeard and Barbosa did, and I know at least Blackbeard was based on a real person. You'd think they'd have jumped at the chance to have real female pirates, who actually did sail the Caribbean, in their films.]
* * *
Shine and Wally kept their word to feel out the situation with Royal, who was elated that they'd followed up on their offer to have coffee.
But, as both of them suspected, he had no questions about Cinder, at least initially. He just wanted to know where they were from.
They gave him the standard answer of "outside the kingdoms."
"What terrority?" he asked.
Sharp.
Shine took a sip and looked at Wally, who looked at her like "well, don't expect me to tell him. You're the one who's good at this."
"To be frank with you, Mr. Zapato--" Shine said.
"Royal, please. Mr. Zapato is my dad or uncle," Royal interjected.
"Royal then." Shine preferred this anyway. "To be frank, it's classified."
"Classified? Why would it be?" Royal said oddly. "Are you criminals also?"
"No, we're not." Shine didn't have to answer that but chose to anyway. She could have just said that was also classified, but she didn't see any reason to play more cryptic than necessary.
"But it's classified?" Royal said.
"Don't take it personally," Wally said. "It's classified to most people if they don't need to know."
"Let's just say that it's risky for people to know all about us," Shine said simply. "And I'm sure there are things you would not wish broadcast to the world about yourself also."
She had gathered this much from listening to him before.
"I haven't usually had much choice about that," Royal said, with a touch of bitterness for once.
"Indeed...you haven't told us anything about you," Shine said.
"Oh, why would you want to know anything about me? I'm not a famous hero," Royal said.
"But I like knowing stuff about people," Wally said.
"Of course, we did notice it was a sore subject." Shine was a little too direct. "So I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't answer--and if that's the case, you can surely understand us not answering you."
"Oh." Royal leaned back and nodded at her knowingly. "I see what you did there. Very clever. I get the feeling that nothing much slips past you, lady. I've heard them talking about you sometimes. You can take words and use them like weapons to get people to do what you want."
"Oh, they exaggerate my talents because they think it's fun." Shine waved it off. "I never made anyone do anything that they really, truly would not have been willing to do. I don't work that way. I do, however, have a pretty easy time seeing what people are secretly willing to do, whatever they say they want."
"That right there, that's also kind of a cryptic answer," Royal said. "I wonder what you'd make me do if you wanted to."
"Don't try to find out." Wally didn't like the sound of that.
"Oh, no, I'm not saying I want you to." Royal saw his concern. "It would be a bit of an imposition. But I have a feeling it'd surprise me to know the answer. For all I know, this entire meeting was just for another purpose."
Emerald was right. He was smart.
"If it was," Shine said, "it was in no harm to you. But people do usually have more than one reason for doing something. It's true we did wish to speak with you, and I love telling people about what we believe in. But I suppose it's not news to you that your interest in us has been a bit more than most people's. It's reasonable that we'd want to know why."
"Perfectly reasonable, and I don't mind telling you why," Royal said ambiably. "I thought I had told it before, but I'm interested because you all are onto something. I'm...a perceptive person. I don't mean to brag--I was born that way. I can't help it, really. My Semblance makes it that way."
"I'm just the same," Shine said.
"I'm not," Wally said.
"You are," Shine protested.
"Okay...with some stuff," Wally said. "But you know, noticing everything all the time sounds exhausting."
"It is," Royal and Shine said in unison, with wry looks.
"The point I'm making is changes in people don't usually escape me," Royal said. "Just when I let my own emotions get in the way, you know. But mostly, people strike me as one way and it turns out they are that way."
"I understand that perfectly," Shine said. "And you're saying that our little group of heroes has struck you one way, and that has proven right."
"You've got it," Royal said. "You're good, Miss Likstar."
"Shine, please. Miss Likstar is no one I know."
"Heh." Royal thought that was funny. "Right, Shine. Look...I don't usually tell people if I notice stuff--freaks them out. But I notice. 3 years ago, when Argus switched leadership to Schnee and Branwen, I was as suspicious as anyone, about Branwen anyway. Schnee I thought was a welcome change. Not that I knew her before very well, but I'd seen her with Ironwood, and I always thought she had the look of someone who really knew better than to be that...well, whatever you call the General's ironfist."
"I know," Shine said.
"Oh, yeah," Wally nodded.
"Right, and we all met her officially when she took over and told us Miss Branwen was also taking over the militia and it wouldn't be military anymore. So that meant it would involve non Atlesians. A lot of people weren't thrilled about that. But...Atlas...it was a monster by the time it fell, and some of us felt that way before it even got to that one awful week. It was crushing Mantle by having to hold up its weight. Maybe the higher ups (literally) didn't mean to, but they did. I saw both sides of that. To my mind, most people just didn't care to know if it was a problem. Of course you can't just blame Atlas--Mantle had its own problems. Not sure how Hill thought inciting people to steal was going to help mend fences."
"Thank you!" Shine gestured energetically. Royal won major points with her for saying that.
"The point is, I thought maybe mixing in some other people might be good for us. Maybe people would understand things better," Royal said. "Make sure the whole thing didn't happen again. So right off--I'm sure Sustrai told you all about our first mission?"
They nodded.
"So you know how it went. I tried to stay out of it, mostly, but I knew Claw and Piper were real pricks about it, and, frankly, Black was no help. Even so, I knew he used to be an assassin, and he didn't straight up threaten them. They'd never have had the nerve to provoke him if he was the type. That right there is a little odd. Sustrai was trying to play peacemaker, as she's pretty good at that. Branwen was losing her patience, but her focus was just on cooperation. I was surprised that they didn't care that they were being treated unfairly. But then I heard them talk about it later, too. They understood that they had messed up and that people didn't trust them. I was struck by it--who does that? Who joins a corps, knowing that they'll get that treatment, and be willing to accept it? Not many people even would. And if they might tell themselves they didn't mind, they'd still have gotten Claw and Piper removed, but that didn't happen. Things improved, in fact. What do you make of that?"
"I think it's neat," Wally said.
"It's not normal," Royal said. "Also there's something in their eyes, really.... It's not the same as other people. You can tell they've seen stuff and they know stuff. Yours are the same."
Shine nodded.
"It sounds nuts, but I just concluded that they saw or heard stuff that made them different," Royal said. "The rest of us could only hope to be that forgiving.... And then there's Cinder Fall."
Here they leaned in. This would probably tell them what they needed to verify about him.
Royal had no hint of anger, however.
"How do you go from being a terrorist who set Grimm on a school and burned, literally, through everything in her path, to...well, that?" he said. "That makes no sense. People don't just decide suddenly to not be evil anymore. Even if they did, I doubt they could stop that easily. You can't change your nature."
Shine tilted her head.
"At least I thought you couldn't," Royal said.
"Hmm, you know some people might think that her nature hasn't exactly changed," Shine said. "I've known her for a while, and I think in some ways she's the same, but her morals have changed."
"You might as well call it nature. Aren't morals what make our nature?" Royal said. "Even not having them, that's nature."
"I agree." Shine nodded.
"Anyway, it's like my old tutor uses to tell me," Royal said. "We're all dealt a hand of cards--traits, you know, and resources--and we have to decide how to play 'em. One thing you can't cheat at is what you have to start out with in life. I've picked up bits and pieces about her hand--it's not a very typical story to be where she is, even if you skipped the...well, evil part, for lack of a better word. So I thought, what could do that? And here you two are again. And you're never around, but all of them talk about you a lot. So, I figure you know something and you taught it to them. And that made them change. And they know it, but they won't tell others all of it."
"I must take some responsibility for that. They are trying to protect us," Shine said. "And they're worried that if they told you how they learned it, we'd be in danger. That is a dilemma, but one I think we can solve."
"Oh, is that it?" Royal said. "I did wonder if it was something like that. Well, that's okay. It's not personal."
"We can talk to them about it," Wally said. "I didn't realize it was stopping them so much."
"Oh, this is the trouble with doing this by proxy," Shine muttered. "The Incarnation at least didn't have that problem. I know how the prophets felt."
That remark made no sense to Royal at all.
"In fact, let me call one of our students here," Shine said. "I know he'll understand, and the others will listen to him. In fact, this site is historical--this is the same café we first talked to him at."
"I knew it looked familiar," Wally said. "Only they changed the decor since we were here before."
"In 3 years, I'm not surprised," Shine said. "I'll be back."
She stepped outside.
"Can I ask?" Royal said, "did Cinder put you up to this?"
"What makes you ask that?" Wally said innocently, taking a bite out of a pastry.
"I didn't think she quite liked flying out here with me," Royal said. "She doesn't like me. I can't imagine why. This felt a little like a test."
Wally winced. "We don't let Cinder make our decisions for us, all right? But...well, she'd be more comfortable with someone if we said it was okay. She's kind of para--that is, she has a lot of enemies out there."
"I see, but I wouldn't tell anyone where to find her." Royal assumed the wrong reason Cinder was worried about it. "I haven't so far."
"I'm glad to hear it," Wally said. "And we can put this whole thing behind us then. I wouldn't take it too personally. She used to try to set us on fire when we made her nervous. All things considered, she's come a long way."
"So that was real. I thought that was a rumor," Royal said.
"Oh, vey real, but she can't anymore," Wally said nonchalantly.