E.J. Butler crosses the bar, and half the patrons brighten at the sight of her, calling out what I'd assumed to be her middle name. Hidden in my dark little corner, my heart pounds wildly. What if she thinks I'm stalking her? Can I possibly escape without her seeing me?

"Jonathen!" The bartender sings, and the room suddenly feels golden and bubbly-warm. "Here you are," somehow, they have Ms. Butler's drink ready for her the second she reaches the counter.

"Thank you, Ren." As she takes the cup, Somi darts over to flash a code to the bartender.

"My pleasure. No Beatrice tonight?"

It's hard to tell from this distance, but it looks like the shadow of a scowl passes over Butler's face. "Not on my arm." The words clip from her lips like razors, leaving her expression raw and uncomposed—for almost a whole second.

Ren's voice drops low as they reply, reaching across the bar to clasp Butler's arm, their lips forming words I can't make out. Ms. Butler nods briefly, brows knitting together and releasing. A heartbeat later, her face is a picture of studied warmth and confidence. A finely-wrought mask.

Then in a motion so fluid and immediate I don't have time to look away, she turns her eyes to burn in my direction. My blood freezes and my bones take root. This must be what a rabbit feels like, when the wolf meets its eye. I sit, helpless and frozen, as Elizabeth Jonathen Butler stalks across the room, straight for me.

"May I sit?"

In spite of having just come in from the downpour with no umbrella, her clothes and hair are in perfect condition.

"Um, y-yes. Please." I gesture weakly to the seat across from me, and she takes it. Her glass lands on the table just a bit too hard as she brings her elbows to rest. Her eyes are narrowed as she leans towards me. I swallow, my mouth suddenly desert-dry.

"Who told you about this place?"

I shake my head frantically, my hands going up. The presence which had so dazzled me before now burns and blinds. It hurts to look her in the eye, but I can't look away either.

"It's...I just wanted someplace to drink after wandering around town, and my companion led me here. I swear, I had no idea—"

I trail off as Butler's eyes go wide with shock—but only briefly. The next moment, the mask is back.

"Ah, of course," she says, leaning back a bit. "Forgive me for making assumptions."

The total and immediate change in her tone practically gives me whiplash.

She tilts her head as she regards me, brows knitting together. "Would you prefer I left you alone?"

"No!" I blurt before I can stop myself. Heat rushes to my cheeks. "Please, stay."

"I take it you have questions about the interview?"

Her eyes catch me in their gravity, and I find myself wondering what shade hides behind that earthen brown.

I go to take another drink, hands trembling slightly-only to be reminded that my glass is empty, and I let it drop back to the table, embarrassed.

But E.J. flicks a signal to Somi, who whirs off to the bar. Moments later, Ren's on their way over with another glass of mead.

The liquor warms me like a hearthfire from within, igniting a spark of audacity.

"Yes, I do." I take a deep breath. "Why were you so sure I didn't want the job?"

A small shrug. "I could just read it off you, in a million ways. Honed perception, pattern recognition...it's a gift I had even before I became an Umbran, but it's stronger than ever now."

"Read it off me how?"

She sighs, takes another drink, and sets the glass back down. "That's a lot to get into. And it's not just about what you want, it's about who you are and what this job requires. Even if you had actually wanted the position, I couldn't have given it to you."

A pit opens up inside me at those words, and suddenly I'm fighting back angry tears. "Why not? How could you know without even interviewing me properly, and before you'd interviewed anyone else?"

"There's a reason I need a human assistant even when I have the most advanced Servitor Umbral technology—my own technology—can provide. A lot of those reasons I can't go into without your signing an NDA first, let alone in a public space. But one of them is that I need someone who can help me deal with the...human side of things. Someone outgoing. A people-person."

"But I—"

"You didn't so much as make eye contact with a single one of your fellow applicants."

"You were watching us?"

"Of course. And it's not just that. I need someone who can adapt to change, who welcomes it. Someone organized. Not, for instance, the kind of person who's worn the same jacket almost every day for, say, six years or so? Who doesn't carry a bag or wallet because she's probably afraid she might set it down somewhere and forget about it?"

My face burns, a thousand different retorts battling for precedence at the tip of my tongue. "You don't carry a bag," I mutter under my breath.

Her eyes crinkle at the corners. "Those aren't necessarily bad things. They're just a few of the many reasons that this job isn't right for you. You'd have been miserable in it. Really."

"That's not for you to say. You don't know me. You should have at least given me a chance at a proper interview."

"I said that I would answer your questions, not that I would argue with you." The words are cold, but her tone isn't. "Do you have more, or would you like me to leave now?"

I have no way to describe what I feel in this moment aside from burning, contradictory chaos. I hate her. I'm enthralled by her.

I don't want her to go.

"No. I have more questions."

She raises an elegant brow. "Oh?"

"What's up with this place? It seems, I don't know...different." My eyes flash sideways to the mirror at the other end of the bar, then to her again.

Settling back, she takes another sip of her drink—regarding me over the top of her glass.

"This bar is the public front of an Otherside club," she says. "A gateway between the ordinary world and a place where we can cast aside the roles society and fate impose on us. A place where we can choose our own."

"Oh," I breath, feeling a sudden heat rushing to my cheeks. "So it's some kind of sex club, then?"

E.J. laughs. "Yes, and no. The Otherside scene isn't only about sex, but it certainly can be and often involves it."

I catch my lower lip in my teeth, my gaze darting away from hers as I try to think of what to say.

Then my voice link chirps rhythmically in my ear. My mother's signal.

Shit.

I look up, meeting Butler's eyes from across the table. For a moment, I almost consider ignoring the call. Almost.

"I...I have to go," I say, jumping from my seat and snatching up my umbrella. I sketch her a quick bow as I edge around the table. "Thank for your time, and, um, for answering my questions. Have a good evening."

The chirp continues as I rush out the door and up the stairs.

"Answer call."

"It's about time!" My mother's irate voice buzzes through the voice link. "How did it go? Why didn't you call me sooner?"

I feel sick to my stomach, and my heart pounds like I've been running a marathon. The words come out in a painful rush. "Mom, I didn't get the job. I'm sorry."

~*~

I wander aimlessly the whole time I'm on the call with her. Circling through the same explanations and defenses about twenty times over before I'm finally able to get her off the link. When I look up to take stock of my surroundings for the first time since answering her call, it's to find myself lost. Even with public transport and Hex navigating my way home, the journey takes hours. There's a reason they call this place Labyrinth City.

It's well past midnight by the time I make it to my block. Just in time, too—because violet lightning has begun to flicker in the clouds overhead. The precursor to an Umbra storm.

My feet are practically screaming curses at me as I climb up to my sixth floor apartment. Even now, I refuse to take that death-trap elevator. I've long since folded my umbrella and tucked it under my arm. It's a warm night, and I'm thankful for the rain on my arms, neck and face— though I know I must look like a drowned raccoon.

It's not until I'm a few paces away from my door and I go to pull my keys from my pocket that I realize I'm not wearing my coat.

I haven't been this whole way home. I left it back at the bar.

Oh my fucking spirits I'm an idiot, I'm an idiot I'm an idiot—

"Fuck!"

I shriek as a dark figure unfolds itself from the shadows near my door. Its face shrouded in smoke, it bears down on me through the darkness, arms outstretched—a crumpled form hanging limp from its grasp.

"You forgot something," it says in a vaguely familiar voice, thrusting the thing out to me. I cringe backward even as I look down at its offering.

A faint rainbow of irridescence dances across soft leather folds in the glow of the emberstone.

My jacket.

~*~

"M-Ms. Butler? You scared the curses out of me!" I bluster, all propriety forgotten.

I take the coat from her, checking the pockets discretely as I go to pull out my keys. Everything's where it should be.

"We're well outside of a professional setting now," she snorts, tucking away a pipe and settling further back into the shadows. There's something slightly off about her, both in how she looks and how she sounds—but I can't make out what. "You can call me E.J. if you like, or Jonathen."

I take a few rapid breaths, hand to my chest—willing my heart rate to slow.

"You...how long have you been here? How did you know where I li—oh." Of course. My address was in my application materials.

"I rushed after you as soon as I realized you'd forgotten your coat, fifteen minutes or so after you left. I expected to find you on the way, even stopped at the nearest station to wait for you. But you didn't show up there, and couldn't let you end up locked out when you got home."

My skin feels suddenly cold, clammy. "That long? I sort of took a detour on the way home."

"I'm sorry I frightened you and showed up at your door without invitation. I honestly wasn't sure what else to do at the time, just rushed into it without thinking much." Somi hovers into view over E.J.'s shoulder, and its glowing eyes flare bright for a moment before returning to a dim flicker.

"Typical," it chirps.

"Hush, you," E.J. bats playfully at the servitor, but it bobs up out of reach. "Honestly, I'm surprised your companion didn't let you know you'd left it behind. If you like, I can take a look at it sometime." As she talks, she begins to edge away, still keeping to the darkness.

"Oh, you're right," I frown. "My mother fixed it last time I had a problem. I'll ask her about it next time I talk to her."

"Ah," says E.J. "Well, I'll be going now. Have a good night, Ms. Fleetwood."

My breath stops, my stomach sinks. "Wait, you can't go. There's an Umbral storm coming in! People get struck all the time. And...and you don't have to call me by my last name, either."

She flashes sharp canines in another obnoxiously brilliant smile. "Don't worry about me, then, Ashwyn. I have a car, it's just down there," She jerks a thumb in the general direction of my apartment complex's cramped parking structure. "It's designed for this sort of thing. I'll be fine."

With that she lifts her hat, dips her head to me one more time, and is off before I can think of how else to stop her.

~*~

The power is out. Purple lightning crackles across the sky, heralded by earsplitting thunder. Each flash illuminates the business card I hold in my hands. The one I found tucked into a pocket behind my companion, just after E.J. Butler left me with the rhythm of her patent-leather footsteps still echoing in my ears.

On the back of it she's scrawled a note in sharp-edged cursive.

Gallery Onyx

368 Steelcross Way, Ohji Heights

Go there in person with your portfolio ready (they're a bit old-fashioned), and tell them I recommended you. Show them this card.

Looked up your work on the Aether while I was waiting, you really do have what it takes.

E.J.B.

On the front, embossed in glossy gunmetal ink, is her name, title, and contact sigil.