War does not break out by itself. It must be fostered, stroked like a flame until it blazes through everything. War is just another form of diplomacy and war breaks out through diplomacy. No war was ever started without any previous diplomacy, as even closing all diplomatic channels could be seen as a conversation.

We wanted war. Lucinda was dead set on eradicating the werewolves from the face of Solaris, and I could see why. They were by far the most dangerous faction for us as their members consisted of trained individuals, completely unlike the other ones. I didn´t even know who would win if a fight between us and the werewolves broke out suddenly, but I knew Lucinda was working on something again. The time she spent with me decreased considerably during the nights and if we met to discuss the next moves she seemed a bit exhausted and I caught her more than once, looking into the distance, deep in thoughts. Her commands decreased considerably, which left me with no other choice to do it on my own.

She wanted a war and I promised her one.

Stealing all the sapphires was only part of the plan to anger the Wolf Street Gang especially. I provoked them, using whatever I had at my disposal. As they were specialized in the illegal slave trade and I had quite a bit of money at hand, I bought their slaves under an alias. And then, I set them free. All of them. With all their information they had about the Wolf Street Gang.

With glee, I watched how the city guards were scurrying around, going after every single hint these slaves provided them. It was quite hilarious to see them cease their operations from the next day to another, but it was even better as I sent out invitations to each and every leader of the criminal groups. All accepted, including the Wolf Street Gang who simply had no other choice to declare war, or to come to the negotiation table out of a position of weakness.

After a few more days of preparation, this meeting was finally held in a deserted, open warehouse. The four gangs who ruled over the underworld were given a compass direction each where they could position their forces. After all, nobody trusted the other at all and so, we could give each and everyone a false sense of security because the leaders of the groups were obviously not alone.

Behind me, who acted as the leader of our group, stood Lucinda, completely covered from head to toe. I was sure she would beat the guards from Guiseppe D’Antonio and Vladimir Tarasov with ease. While both looked fairly strong and one of them even wore full plate armour, they lacked this imposing aura. Only one person could rival the feeling I got from Lucinda sometimes, which was Sirius himself. The tall man sat opposite of me, a completely covered person behind him as well.

It wasn’t this person I was worried about, but rather his leader. He could very well grab over the table and squash my throat with his bulky hands, even though I hoped Lucinda would stop him. But the threat remained.

“Welcome to the first meeting of the underground council. The location may be a bit shabby, but I do hope it satisfies your security concerns.” The person behind Sirius stepped forwards and laid his hand on Sirius´ shoulder. The leader nodded shortly afterwards and his guard stepped back once again. This move alone led to quite the bewilderment among my other guests, but none seemed to freak out yet.

“Today, we want to set clear boundaries, for everyone. It cannot be the case that we fish in the same pond and haggle amongst ourselves. We need a clear definition of which business model each of us is following.” I stated and waited for the other three to react.

“You were overstepping your bounds first.” Sirius claimed and looked at us with downright hostility.

“You probably mean the robberies, but I cannot remember that your group ever offered these services.” I mentioned casually. True, they weren’t selling any sapphires they stole which left a huge demand for stolen ones.

“We were stealing jewellery even before you came here.” Sirius claimed, which was completely right.

“Is that so? I had a customer come to me because she needed to have a shop robbed by us. And I was told you turned her down.” I claimed and grinned happily under my mask. I loved to back him into the corner. Not offering the service of robbery was akin to admitting a group doesn’t do robbery. And someone had to satisfy the demand, the other two were too well aware of that.

“That´s not true.” Sirius claimed, but luckily the bearded Guiseppe D’Antonio chimed in.

“It is … probably. But so far, you never robbed others on a large scale. Your business has always been slavery.” Guiseppe concluded. Thankfully, he was on my side there, otherwise, it would become quite hard to pressure Sirius further.

“On the other hand, we aren’t that conceited to claim the whole robbery business for us. The Tarasov Clan for example makes a fortune by making the commoner district unsafe, largely by using the same methods we have. If you would claim the noble shops for you as well, I wouldn’t mind.” I said and hoped he would take the offer. After a rather long pause though, in which their leader looked to Sirius more than once he shook his head lightly.

“The nobles are a hassle to deal with. Feel free to cause as much havoc as you want.” Sadly, he didn´t want to be put in between two fronts. Shrugging, I let my gaze wander to Sirius who stared at me with hostility.

“Why do you want a war? It would only weaken us both, there is no incentive to bash each other´s heads.” Truly, a normal war would weaken us both. But we weren’t planning to sacrifice our men for such a thing. A war would only damage them, especially because it would be over within a single night.

“I do not want to start a war? I only want to solve the issue at hand peacefully.” I claimed and tilted my head sideways like Lucinda did when she looked at me with disgust in her eyes.

“Peacefully? You started robbing shops that clearly belong to us.” Was that so? Never seen any signs on these shops we robbed.

“I don’t think so. See it this way, you only need to let go of your sapphire business, and we can become best friends.” I said and chuckled loudly. Being friends with a rivalling gang is never an option.

“Never.” He said and squinted his eyes in anger.

“It only makes out a small portion of your income.” I said, presenting what we learned about them thus far … which wasn’t much actually. We neither knew where they lived, nor how they operated. They were like ghosts.

“I said no.” Sirius repeated, clearly a lot angrier than before.

“Then tell me the reason. You can´t expect me to understand if I don’t know why you are so desperate about these gems.” I said and noticed how Lucinda stirred behind me. I heard her steps as she moved to the side, while I looked at Sirius´ guard who was moving in the exact same direction.

“I. Said. No.” He repeated once again, but this time with a dangerous smile on his face.

“Is it a very specific one you are searching? We would be willing to support you on your search.” I explained, slightly distracted by what our two guards were doing. They were walking away further from the scene, going far enough so that Guiseppe D’Antonio didn´t feel threatened by them.

“You wish for that, don’t you? But no, I think I have a better idea. Why don’t we resolve this amongst ourselves? I don’t think Mr Tarasov nor Mr D’Antonio have an appetite for war. I can assure you that your business will be untouched, no matter what will come out of this discussion.” Sirius snatched the flow of this conversation out of my hands faster than I could react. It was true that none of them wanted war at this point, but I never expected them to stand up and excuse themselves.

There must have been a backroom deal I didn´t know of … sadly for Sirius, that didn´t change anything at all. We still would get our war, no matter what. Honestly, my guess was that Lucinda wanted this meeting to escalate, so that she could wipe out a large portion of them with one swoop.

“We haven’t taken anyone with us … just like you didn´t.” His guard unsheathed a blade used by the military, while Lucinda just stood there in utter silence. Something was has gone wrong, that was for sure. Either they massively overestimated their powers or underestimated us, which shouldn’t be the case. I mean, we were known for an all-encompassing information network and could back that up with quite a few achievements. Well, Lucinda was the large unknown for them, but my guess was that he valued her at least as a very capable fighter.

Sirius´ guard on the other hand apparently failed to notice the difference in their fighting powers as he stormed towards the completely frozen Lucinda and went for a vertical slash.

She wasn’t reacting. At all. She just stood there and waited. Her cape didn´t move, but that apparently didn´t mean she wasn’t doing anything. The sword stopped in its motion with a metallic sound, as it hit the dagger hidden underneath the coat. The coat, now damaged at one place was still only moved by the wind.

Suddenly, she sprang into action, reached out of the coat with her dagger in hand and placed it behind the guard´s blade. Now locked between the two blades, the guard had no other choice to pull back while Lucinda let him leave.

“Three to one.” She said and suddenly bolted forwards, her daggers flashing through the air, attacking both sides of the guard at the same time. He danced even further away from her, stepping back each time she tried to attack. I could see how Lucinda grew more and more frustrated as her movements became less and less elegant.

The guard was apparently now in his element as well, as he managed to block a few attacks, and even return the favour a few times. The favour of the battle seemed to turn against her even more as she failed to block a swipe correctly and ultimately could only block under a barrage of attacks. It was incredibly strange to see her in the defence, especially because she cockily wore a sapphire necklace over her coat. She was sure she could beat Sirius, but she failed to beat his guard?

Lucinda evaded another attack, but I could see she wasn’t in her element anymore. The guard pushed her back and as she slipped over loose rock, it was basically over for her. The blade stopped a few centimetres near her neck.

“Three to two.” said the guard with a familiar voice. I knew him from somewhere, I just couldn’t say from where exactly. He was definitely a formidable enemy … and he had to be trained somewhere close to Lucinda. Maybe he was someone out of her past, but then I wouldn’t know this voice.

The sword … that voice … the fact they knew each other.

“Markus Goldbaum.” I muttered underneath my breath. The person who was with us in the army was Arthur´s guard. The person who disliked Lucinda all along. And the person who certainly held a grudge against her, now that Arthur was dead and he had been sacrificed by her.

They were continuing the sparring match the moment I looked away towards Sirius. They didn´t count from zero at the start. They knew exactly who their opponent was from the beginning on.

“Lucinda … or Lucy or however she likes to be called, certainly loves her new family, doesn’t she?” She would go on a rampage if anything happened to Mary, that was for sure. There wouldn’t be much to salvage after Mary´s death. I had to avoid that at all costs. “My men are currently encircling the White´s mansion.”

Suddenly, Lucinda crashed into the table, shifting the table to the side considerably. A sharp blade followed suit shortly afterwards and dug deeply into the edge of the table as Lucinda pushed herself away from it.

“I give up.” She said and seethed both her nicked daggers. Afterwards, she reached towards her hood and dragged it backwards, while throwing the mask on the ground. Markus did the same, revealing lush, silver hair he definitely didn´t have before and a stupid grin plastered over his face. Lucinda’s face was contorted with rage, but as she touched my shoulder apparently because her left leg was bleeding, I couldn’t feel any of that. She was calm, insanely calm. There wasn’t any unnecessary strength in her grip on my shoulder, making it feel more like a soft touch than anything else. I understood. The moment she leaned a bit more onto my shoulder in an attempt to steady herself, I understood what needed to be done.

“We agree to your demands. We will stop stealing all the sapphires we can get our hands on.” I stated and folded my hands in front of me.

“We want the sapphire in the White´s procession. I am sure that as her daughter, she can do that.” Sirius said to me, probably rather unwilling to speak to Lucinda herself, fearing she would plan something. In truth, she was already communicating with me by gripping my shoulder a bit stronger and then releasing the pressure again.

“She will do it. But she won´t bring the sapphire to you. She will protect her own mother while I will hand the gem over. You have to promise me that you will not reveal Lucinda´s true identity.” I claimed.

“Whatever … as long as we have the sapphire. You will hand it over on Wonder Street, at midnight in three days.” Sirius said to me, while Lucinda gripped my shoulder again. Thus, everything has been agreed upon. He stood up and left together with Markus Goldbaum, a person who should have died weeks ago.

Shortly afterwards, I whistled loudly for the coachmen to pick us up. This meeting … was the worst I ever held. From complete dominance to submission in a mere minute, just because someone found out about Lucinda.