Chapter Text
In retrospect, Hissera thinks, perhaps she should have ignored the small black box that she found placed conspicuously among her things. It's wrapped with deep purple ribbon and sealed with shimmering gold wax. It's light, and there's no sound as Hissera turns it over in her hands. There's a vaguely familiar sigil pressed into the wax seal. It's one of the Crow House seals, but it's not de Riva. It isn't Cantori either. It makes Hissera a little uncomfortable. She doesn't have any connection to any of the other Houses, and she's been with the Wardens for years. Far away from the convoluted and dangerous politics of the Antivan Crows. She isn't familiar enough with the other sigils to place it, not aside from the generally uniform stylistic choices that bind them together. Everyone knows a Crow sigil when they see it, even if they don't know specifics. That's the entire point of the sigils, that outsiders can see them and recognise them for what they are on sight. They're an announcement, a statement, a message. Hissera doesn't like receiving a message without knowing who exactly is sending it.
The colours are nonspecific. Most Houses use purple, and black is just indicative of the Crows as a whole. Gold would help narrow it, but half the Houses used that as well. It can't be Dellamorte for a multitude of reasons, not least of which being that they don't use gold in official capacities, a defining feature that marks them as the holders of the First Talon title. She sets the box down on the table and folds her hands, leaning forward slightly, scrutinizing. A single provocative sentence is written on the surface of the box in gold ink, the same shade as the wax. The letters are a delicate, flowing script from an unfamiliar hand: We know the truth.
"Why," Lucanis says from somewhere behind her. "Are you receiving packages from House Arainai?"
Hissera swallows. Well, that places the sigil at least. It doesn't answer any of her questions; only adds to them. She doesn't know anyone in House Arainai. She barely knows anyone within House de Riva. If it were House Cantori... Then again, Crow politics are complex and ever-changing, and poaching of talented Crows isn't uncommon. It could theoretically be someone she knows. Still, it's been long enough since she left for even that to seem unlikely, and she was never close to anyone there, not really, not enough for them to be contacting her indirectly. "I don't know," she admits, running her thumb over the unbroken seal. "It just... showed up."
She hears Lucanis move. When she looks up he's seated across from her, his eyes narrowed. "That's rarely good," he says with an authoritative edge to his tone.
"I know," Hissera says quietly. She turns the box over in her hand again. "It's... we're in the Fade. Maybe the Lighthouse made it?"
It's a nonsense suggestion. The Lighthouse does seem to manifest objects, but they always have some sort of link to the memories or wishes of the person they appear to. Aside from Hissera's tenuous connection to the Crows, the box has no real significance. To suggest the Lighthouse made it is naively optimistic in its absurdity. She practically wilts at the withering, nearly disappointed look Lucanis gives her in response.
"Yeah," she says, voice soft. "I don't believe that either. Not really." She leans back in her seat, eyes narrowed towards the box, wary. She should get rid of it. She shouldn't even bother with breaking the seal and seeing what it contains. Disposing of it would be the safe move. It would be the rational move. It's the move she knows she should make. Nothing good has ever come of her getting tied up with the Crows. Crow politics are half of why she left Antiva, and yet... something about the box tugs at her mind. It's a borderline compelling sensation, almost akin to the Blight under her skin but sharper somehow, more insistent. Her left eye aches slightly.
We know the truth.
"Have you told your sister?" Lucanis asks. His expression is relatively neutral, but his eyes and his voice both betray his concern.
Hissera frowns. "Have I told them that I received a mystery package from a Crow House with which no one here is directly affiliated? Absolutely not." Hissera glances down at the box. Underneath the wax seal and the single sentence is a lone word written in sharp Qunlat print: Saarebas.
"Hissera," Lucanis says.
She shakes her head. "No," she says. "This doesn't involve them." It's a lie, and it tastes like ash on her tongue. Whoever sent the package is taunting her. Implying they know her secrets. She needs to know why. Needs to know if they know or if it's only a guess. And if they know for certain, she needs to know how they found out. Because almost no one knows. The Crows would never have let her leave if they did. She doesn't have much time to decide what to do, not now that Lucanis has seen the box. He won't keep a secret like this, not for her, not when it might threaten Asala or the team. Hissera stands. She slips the box into her pocket. "I'll handle it myself," she says as she moves to leave. She will. She has to. She doesn't have much time before Asala finds out. They'll try to talk her out of it. Out of opening the box and finding out what it contains. Out of reacting the the veiled threat presented by the sentence and the word.
She doesn't have much time. She has to act before Asala can convince her not to.
We know the truth, Saarebas. And the implicit question that follows: Don't you want to know how?
And she does. More than anything.