Evie didn't like it. Didn't like the building. Didn't like the stillness of it. It was too quiet.
From their perch across the street, half-sunk in the alcove of an old tea shop, Evie watched the safehouse like it might blink first. No foot traffic. No flicker of light. No sound. Just a too-perfect ledger on a too-neat desk waiting to be stolen. She could see it through the window. The whole scene set like a play waiting for its lead actors.
Tai stood beside her, hands shoved into his pockets, body loose but eyes alert. "Feels off."
"It is off," Evie murmured. "This is the same one Hirik and Kieran have been watching, isn't it?"
"Yeah. But it's a stage."
Behind them, Zevran shifted his weight. "A trap," he said, matter-of-factly. "Rather poorly done. Though I suppose subtlety was never the Crows' strong suit."
Evie's lips pressed together. This was lazy, it was patronising. They'd laid it out like sweets for a child.
She glanced at Tai. "Do they really think we're that easy?"
"Ledger's probably fake then," Tai replied. "Do they think we're children?"
Zevran chuckled. "Well, you haven't given them much reason to think otherwise."
"Really?" Tai asked, indignance in his hissed whisper. "If we were keeping score, we'd be winning."
"I do feel like they should be taking this a little more seriously," she agreed softly.
Zevran was a little surprised they thought so. But there was no question. They were going in. Just not for the reasons the Crows had hoped.
When Tai and Evie got inside, it was worse up close. The place was a set piece. The ledger just sat there, open and inviting. The bookshelf had the same six volumes the Crows always used for show, none of them cracked. It wasn't just fake; it was insulting.
Evie ran a finger along the mantel. "This isn't even a real operation. They've dressed up a corpse."
"Didn't even sweep the corners," Tai muttered. "Dust doesn't settle like that naturally."
She crouched near a fireplace and drew a quiet face in the ash. Flat mouth. Flat eyes.
"Are you offended?" Tai asked. "I'm offended."
"I am a little."
Tai grabbed a bottle of ink from the desk. "Let's make our offence known then."
-
Outside, Zevran spotted the first before he even crossed the street, a man pretending to be drunk, slumped beside a post with one eye barely open, hand close to his belt. A Crow, unmistakably; he could definitely be doing better. This was sloppy. The Antivan sun had gone soft on them. He could see why the children were offended.
The second was on the roof across from the safehouse, face half-covered in shadow, boots tucked in. Watching. Unmoving. Forgettable if one didn't know what to look for. The third posed as a vagrant, bowl by his feet. Clean boots. Rookie mistake.
Zevran moved through shadow like he was born to it. The first went down with a pressure strike to the neck, body caught and eased into a gentle heap in the alley. The second required a climb, a sharp twist, and a cloth laced with enough to knock him out for hours. The third, the vagrant, he approached slowly, knelt beside him as if he might give coin. Then caught him under the jaw with a quiet, efficient strike. The man folded like a poor hand of cards.
Zevran stacked them neatly, tucked out of sight and went to find the rest.
The night air was still warm, and when he was done, he leaned back against the wall and exhaled, listening. Nothing from inside. No scuffle, no footsteps. Just the silence of two young troublemakers doing whatever it was they were doing.
He smiled to himself. When Evie and Tai emerged from the safehouse, they blinked down at the unconscious Crows laid in a row like cordwood.
Evie raised a brow. "You handled it?"
Tai sighed. "We would've helped."
Zevran gestured grandly. "I thought it best you had time to focus on your artwork."
Evie looked back at the house. "We didn't even take the fake ledger."
"We gave them feedback," Tai said. "That's a kindness."
They walked off into the night, quiet and certain and just a little disappointed. Behind them, the trap lay almost untouched.
-
The house was silent. The kind of silence that wasn't empty, just stunned. Lucanis stood just inside the main room of the safehouse, arms folded, eyes tracking slowly from one ruined portrait to the next. Every face, once stern or proud or austere, now bore a cartoonish, scowling frown.
The ink was clean and deliberate. Eyebrows exaggerated into furious angles. Frowns drawn in. Not a single canvas slashed. Just the faces. All of them - dozens - scowling back at them like disappointed uncles.
"What," Teia said, voice flat, "the fuck is this."
Caterina said nothing. Her jaw was locked tight, arms crossed, one finger tapping against her sleeve with mounting fury.
Viago was already halfway down the hallway, leaning in to peer at each framed portrait like they might blink. "Every single one. Look at this. They even got the one behind the armoire."
"Nothing's missing," Illario said, emerging from the back. "No files. No coin. No ledgers. Just… this."
Lucanis glanced to the window. No sign of forced entry. No damage to the wards. Whoever it was had walked in, clean and quiet, slipped through their defences like they'd built the place themselves. And had drawn angry eyebrows on every single portrait they passed.
Caterina spun around suddenly. "They knew it was a trap."
Teia raised an eyebrow. "You think?"
Lucanis stepped closer to the largest portrait in the room - an old Crow handler whose name he barely remembered - and studied the work. It was clearly done with a finger, dipped into the open ink pottle on the desk most likely.
lllario scoffed. "The Crow who trained me is glaring at me like I insulted his cooking."
"Maybe you did," Viago muttered.
"Enough," Caterina cut in, sharp. "This was calculated. They're playing with us. Laughing at us."
Lucanis finally turned, slow, thoughtful. "No. They're disappointed in us."
The room fell quiet.
Viago blinked. "Pardon?"
Lucanis glanced at the walls. "Look at them. The frowns. No violence. Just… disapproval. Like they expected better."
Even Caterina faltered at that. Her mouth pulled into a tight line.
Teia stared at the wall for another moment before murmuring. "They even frowned Yonas. You remember Yonas?"
Caterina blinked. "The one who poisoned the Val Royeaux summit?"
"He was always frowning."
Lucanis couldn't help it. His lips twitched. Just for a second.
Teia folded her arms. "So we are being… scolded?"
"No," Viago said from the other side of the room. "They're disappointed."
"They're offended," Lucanis corrected quietly.
The others looked at him.
"They walked in here," he continued, "knowing it was a trap. And instead of falling for it or ignoring it, they left us this. A warning. Not that they're laughing. That they're insulted."
Caterina's mouth flattened. "We underestimated them."
"No," he said again. "We insulted them."
There was something almost elegant in the restraint. In the way nothing else had been touched. The blankness of the rooms only served to highlight the ridiculous frowns. He turned, scanning the room again. Not for evidence. For intent. For mood. It wasn't vandalism. Not really. No smashed glass, no blood, no drama. It wasn't even anger.
It didn't feel like chaos. Or rebellion. It felt like judgement.
Caterina's jaw ticked. "We gave them bait, and they left us… caricatures."
Something about it scraped at the edge of his mind. He didn't like being toyed with, but this didn't feel like mockery for mockery's sake. This was different, sharper. A rebuke. Whoever had done this had principles. A line they thought the Crows had crossed. This wasn't amusement.
"They're watching us," Caterina said, her voice tight. "Somehow, they're always a step ahead."
"And they think we're idiots," Teia muttered. "They left a house full of angry eyebrows."
Lucanis stared at one particularly miserable face. Deep-set lines, downturned mouth. A veteran handler long since retired. Now, thanks to the ink, he looked like someone had just called him boring at a dinner party.
Two of the men who'd been stationed to watch the house were brought in, bloodied and dazed. One of them, Tavien, still had dried leaves in his hair. Lucanis resisted the urge to rub at his temple.
"What happened?" Caterina demanded.
Tavien licked his split lip. "We were watching the north, west, and south sides, just like planned. About three hours after nightfall, we saw two of them."
"Two?" Lucanis cut in. "You're sure?"
Marius, older, his arm bound in a makeshift sling, gave a short nod. "All black, just shadows. Wouldn't have even seen them if we weren't looking. They crept right up, slipped inside somehow. Saw them through the window, just standing there. Must have been talking."
Caterina exchanged a brief glance with Lucanis. "And you saw no one else?" she asked.
"No one," Tavien said. "They moved like they knew the place better than we did. The alley was empty. Windows untouched. It was clean."
Lucanis narrowed his eyes. "But neither of you saw them leave."
The two men stiffened.
"No," Tavien said after a beat. "We… We were hit. Hard. Quick. I didn't see who. Just... blackness."
"You were watching the only two doors," Lucanis said, voice low and measured. "Two people go in. You get knocked out. You wake up, and the building's empty. That's what you're telling me?"
Marius swallowed. "Yes, sir."
Lucanis looked at Caterina. "So. Definitely more than two."
"Yes," she agreed, tapping a knuckle on the table. "At least one more. Possibly two. Two inside, one or two watching their backs."
"And they left nothing," Lucanis muttered.
"Except…" Illario drawled, indicating the portraits, "for the moody masterpiece gallery."
The two Crows were dismissed and sent to get themselves treated.
"We underestimated them," Caterina said at last, stepping into his peripheral vision, hands resting on the ball of her cane. "That's on us."
Viago gave a soft whistle as he traced a fingertip along one particularly glowering portrait of a former Crow First. "If I squint, this one looks like you, Teia."
Teia didn't even glance his way. "They walked into our trap, ruined our walls, and left without a whisper. We've got two watchers nursing concussions and not a single idea how they got in or out."
"We need another way," Caterina said. "Something that doesn't scream 'ambush' from three blocks away."
Lucanis nodded slowly, not quite trusting himself to speak. His jaw was tight. There was a coil of heat in his chest, not fury, not entirely. Something like shame and frustration.
"We don't bait a trap. We set an invitation."
Lucanis looked up.
Caterina's brow was furrowed in thought. "We leak information. Just enough. Something they can't ignore. Not a ledger. Something real, tangible. Something ugly."
"Something they'd want," Teia added.
"Something they'd feel obligated to take," Lucanis said slowly, the idea beginning to take root.
"And we make them think they're the ones doing the watching," Viago said, flashing teeth.
Illario grinned. "You're all sounding like proper criminals again. I'm so proud."
They stood there, five of them, surrounded by scowling noblemen and matriarchs inked into permanent disapproval. The irony wasn't lost on Lucanis.