{Amon's POV}
Amon screamed as the cold metal teeth bit down on his skin.
"Just a little while longer," Ezekiel promised, holding the arcane prosthetic against the stump of where Amon's hand used to be.
The prosthetic hand was crafted from a sturdy material with the pale, glossy sheen of porcelain. Beneath its elegant surface, however, the interior bristled with interlocking gears and cogs, each one enchanted to respond to the user's neural signals and translate thought into movement.
The unnerving part lay in the connection itself: rows upon rows of sharp, mechanical teeth. Ezekiel explained that they were essential—biting down into the user's flesh to secure a proper link. Without that anchoring, the hand would never function.
"Done." Ezekiel let go of the prosthetic as a strong steel ring clamped around Amon's wrist. Blood seeped onto the tinkerer's floor, which she mopped away and down the drain. "How is it?"
Amon breathed heavily as Perona soothed the pain with a spell. She couldn't fully heal Amon's hand before the teeth had fully set in and his flesh had adjusted. Otherwise, the hand wouldn't function. Amon flexed his hand, and the digits clinked as they moved.
"'Bout the same as my old flesh." He took a deep breath before standing up. Aralynn pulled out from her pack a cloth that he could use to wrap around his wrist while it healed.
Amon tied it around his wrist and bowed. "Thank you, Madam Ezekiel, for the hand."
Ezekiel bowed in return. "No, no. It was the least I could do. Your body should adjust and no longer feel that biting pain if you keep it on overnight. You'll be as right as rain next morning."
Amon managed a chuckle. His wrist was still in pain, and a bead of sweat rolled down his brow. He wiped it off with the back of his left hand. "You're too modest. This kind of magitech would have cost me an arm and a leg to get. Pun intended. It works extremely well, thank you."
He looked around Ezekiel's workshop. There were all matters of inventions; small clockwork animals that ticked and jumped about, unfinished projects with gears and wires lying in the organized chaos on tables, other gizmos that he couldn't even name.
"We should get going now, Madam Ezekiel. Thank you again. It is most appreciated."
Ezekiel bowed.
- - -
{Perona's POV}
As they were heading out of the door, Perona noticed a small ring case by Ezekiel's shop window. Inside was a mechanical eye whose iris ticked mechanically inside what appeared to be an orb dotted with stars that moved on their own.
An eye…?
The more she looked at it, the more she felt she needed it. It called to her, just as much as the deck that she'd taken from the Blue Locust 2 called to her. Or was it the deck calling for the eye?
I don't know, Perona thought. I just need that eye. Why, though? I just need it. But why? I just need it. Why? I just need the eye.
Thoughts of the eye tapped into and infested Perona's mind until she couldn't resist it.
"Madam Ezekiel," she said, stopping and turning at the door just as she was about to head out.
Something about the way the words flowed out of the half-elf's mouth seemed unnatural. Ghostly. As if she were possessed.
"What is that eye?" She pointed at the peculiar item.
"That's the Eye of Ilmater, the god and overseer of the cosmos." Ezekiel wiped her hands on a towel before stepping forwards and gently lifting the eye off of the display case. "It can replace your own eye and uses the same mechanism as the hand that Milord Amon has. Small teeth will bite down inside your eye socket. It uses arcane materials from the cosmos, and should it replace one of your normal eyes, it'll enhance your powers of perception."
"I… see. How much is it?"
"For you, 50 gold."
Perona opened up her system window and wordlessly withdrew the amount, handing it over as if she were sleepwalking. Ezekiel took the gold and set it aside. She then took the eye in its small ring case, closed it, and wrapped it up in a small cloth bag.
"Thank you for your purchase." The tinkerer bowed at the door as the party left.
- - -
{Ezekiel's POV}
Ezekiel lingered at the doorway, watching the party depart as her clock pendant ticked by, second by second.
While the party didn't notice that one of their own was carrying such a cataclysmic item, as soon as Ezekiel interacted with the half-elf bard, she knew: besides from now carrying the Eye of Ilmater, that girl was also carrying the Deck of the Joker's Faces inside her pocket.
That sinister, evil deck of cards.
It was a pure magnet, asking for disaster to strike—and if that half-elf were to be found out, then the entire party would surely fall apart.
Not that Ezekiel cared.
The sound of Ezekiel's clock pendant clicked louder and louder as the party drew further away. She withdrew from her pocket two small mechanical spiders that chirped at her as she held them to her face.
"Follow them," the tinkerer said, gesturing to the party and dropping the constructs onto the paved street.. The arachnids scurried off, melting into the shadows.
Ezekiel looked on.
She always only looked on.
The party was unaware that they were being tailed.
They'd lowered their guard.
It was… a blunder.
Really, they should have known better from the start if they'd heeded The Messenger's warning and noticed Ezekiel's pendant.
It was there, clear as day. A clock, keeping track of time.
Tick, tock, tick, tock.
The ticks of Ezekiel's pendant now filled the entirety of her workshop, drowning out all other sound. She fished a pair of reading glasses from her pocket and slid them on, watching the party disappear around the corner of a street through the lenses.
Zephyr had sent his daughter to warn them.
Beware the timekeeper's hunger.
Yet they were not wary.
Ezekiel's eyes flashed in the dark as she turned back to her workshop. She smiled.
Tick, tock, tick, tock.
- - -
Walking briskly along the road, the party eventually made their way to a swath of buildings going up in flames. Guards ran back and forth with water buckets and halberds, evacuating citizens out of buildings and fighting the fires. Mages conjured water, filling liquid reservoirs and hosing down the blaze.
Saying that it was chaos was an understatement. Amongst the shouting, the crackle of the fire, and the tramping of movement on feet, almost nothing was intelligible. The party stood, dumbfounded, in the middle of Galrahn's streets.
"What the heck happened?" The houses that were spared from the fire were covered in ash and the city authorities were actively trying to contain the raging blaze.
Hadarai ran towards a guard.
"Shi—hey! Don't just go off like that!" The party jostled through the crowd.
Hadarai had already reached one of the Galrahn guards, a man whose uniform was more embellished than the others. A captain, perhaps.
"Excuse me, sir," Hadarai began, "Do you know what caused these fires?"
The guard barely spared him a glance. His voice was gravel, worn raw from shouting. "Sir, please evacuate. I'm trying to do my job."
Hadarai, unshaken, pressed further. Perhaps he didn't take heed of what Ezekiel had said about the guards not accepting help from others. Perhaps he was blinded by his faith asking him to do good. "We would be more than willing to help. But please—do you know what started this?"
This time the guard finally turned, glaring. "You don't understand. Get out of here. This isn't your job as some would-be savior. It's ours, and we don't allow citizens to interfere. Now scram, before you get yourselves killed!"
"But—"
"I SAID SCRAM!" The bellow rattled down the street.
Hadarai balked at the ferocity of the guard. Being a paladin and man of faith, he wasn't used to being talked to in such a manner.
Perona tried to interject, but the guard was already barking rapid orders to his subordinates. "Why are you all still here? Move! You're in the way!"
Aralynn clutched the strap of her pack tighter, wings shifting uneasily. Her thoughts twisted.
…If we really need to know what caused the fire, I might have a way. Imperial Army rank trump city authority; that captain would have to answer me. I still have my rank brooch buried in my kit. With that, I could bluff my way into getting the truth.
I would've never thought that I'd ever be put in a situation where I need to pull rank after I deserted, she thought dryly, much less bring up anything related to the imperial army.
Her hand hovered, deliberating whether or not to fish it out of her backpack.
But revealing that here would mean admitting that I was in the Imperial army and that I walked away, a deserter. That's the kind of thing people don't forgive easily, no matter how they feel about the empire. Besides, I could be ratted out, and if any officers find out that I was here…
Aralynn shuddered, thinking about what kind of punishments she'd be given, no matter how much power she'd gained as of leaving the army. Authority was authority, and it was to be taken seriously.
Her heart thudded in her throat as she carefully weighed the cost.
With a sharp breath, she tugged Perona back from the shouting guard, pulling the party with her to the side of the road where they were less likely to draw more attention.
For a long moment, Aralynn was silent, staring at the cobblestones, the firelight flickering across her feathers. Finally, she spoke. Her voice was low and uncertain.
"...How badly do we need to know what caused the fire?"
Perona blinked. "Do you have some way to convince the guard?"
"..."