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But she didn’t have any other ideas, did she? And even a bad idea felt better than nothing.
Taking a deep breath, Fey eased the door open and crept inside.
It was easier inside to keep to the shadows, to keep hidden. The building was huge, full of equipment and inventory. Full of places to hide.
The main space was exactly what Fey had expected—machine after machine, in assembly line formation, filled the first floor, some equipment tall enough to almost touch the high ceilings. The emergency exit Fey had entered from put her near enough to the assembly line’s end, where the final products were collected and boxed. Fey flipped a box open, peeking inside.
Soda bottles. Innocuous, marginally unhealthy soda.
She was in a factory that made soft drinks.
Fey found herself feeling a touch… disappointed.
This? This was where Alice sent her? This was the clue she’d been searching for, for months?
There had to be something more. Anything more.
But searching the factory floor, examining each station around the room, yielded nothing suspicious, no additional clues.
No, no no no, there has to be something here.
Fey could feel her time running short. All around her the city would be waking up, and she had nothing. No more clues, no plan of where to go from here.
There had to be an office, on a higher floor. Somewhere the factory managers did paperwork and supervised their workers. Maybe that’s where she should go—maybe that’s where she’d find something.
A metal staircase snaking up the wall clearly led to the upper floors, and Fey had started toward it when she heard the sound.
Subtle, but there to the trained ear—a single intake of breath. Someone was here, with her, in this building. She heard them shift, just a whisper of a sound, heard the scuff of their feet on the concrete floor.
Fey didn’t pause or glance around in the hopes of catching them. She didn’t want to reveal what she’d heard, but she did grow a little bolder in her movement toward the staircase, a little more obvious. Let them think they could sneak up on her, let them think that they were hunting her…
Sure enough, as she crossed the room the sounds of someone moving behind her grew closer, and Fey grew bolder, still, luring them in, letting them get close enough to?—
The scuff of their shoes on the ground alerted Fey her prey had gotten close enough to strike. Whipping around, Fey struck first, diving toward the noise, and drawing her blade.
The rising sun outside did little to illuminate the room around her, and Fey’s opponent clearly knew how to use that to their advantage. The moment Fey had turned, they had moved back, ducking into the shadows of the equipment around them, and when Fey launched herself at the space where they had once been, she found herself striking at nothing.
A blur of movement to her right, and Fey struck out again, and this time the tip of her blade snagged skin, earning her a hiss of pain from the darkness. Fey moved again, and again, and again, striking out at the shadowed figure.
But the shadow kept retreating, keeping just out of arm’s length. Never attacking, but always one step ahead of her.
With a snarl, Fey feigned an attack, and when her opponent went to retreat again, she was ready. She spun, moving into the path the Shadow retreated to, and angling her blade toward their neck.
Thunk.
Fey hissed in pain as the Shadow lashed out, striking her wrist as she spun and forcing her to drop her blade reflexively. They had known, had seen through the feint, and somehow knew exactly what Fey was planning to do. Had been ready for it.
Before Fey could react, before she could retreat herself to regroup and think of a plan, the Shadow attacked.
It was vicious. Like no one Fey had fought before, a flurry of quick, effortless blows, pushing her back, back, back into the room.
Except… Fey had sparred with someone like this before. Had been taught to fight by someone who moved exactly like this…
Fey’s arms moved up in front of her body, her forearms raised to protect her face and neck, and she didn’t see the box behind her until she stumbled back into it, losing her balance and falling, hard, back against the concrete, the breath leaving her lungs in a rush of air. She twisted, coming to a crouch and readying herself to rise again.
“Stay down, Fey,” a familiar voice insisted. “I’m not trying to hurt you.”
Fey’s head snapped up to the Shadow in front of her, just as the sun crested the horizon and the first rays of dawn spilled in through the factory window. And in the warm light of dawn, she could finally see the Witch standing in front of her.
