rix_scaedu

I wrote this for lilfluff's seventh prompt.

“Has anyone found out yet just how many contracts they have out there on the elf?”  Brise was doing something with her feathers as she spoke, stretching each wing forward and holding it in that apparently awkward position for a few minutes each time while she checked each flight feather for security and condition.

“There’s no way to tell.”  Calhoun was cleaning his handguns again.  There was a drop cloth on the table in front of him and the cloths, solvents, lubricant and tools he needed were neatly arranged around his work area.  He sighted down the barrel section of the weapon he was working on.  “We can’t tell how many people they contacted or how many took up the offer.  It not generally a subject for public discussion and it’s not like there’s a pub or a bar everyone goes to and talks shop.”

“I would imagine that the ones that do talk shop in a pub don’t last very long,” suggested Kaye idly as she knitted, well out of any possible splash range from Calhoun.

“True,” Calhoun smiled but it was a humourless grin.  “Talk can make you fatally unpopular with clients, competitors, targets, even partners and associates.”

“Spouses, family, in-laws?”  Kaye made that suggestion with a smile of her own.

“Why do you say that?”  Brise was grooming a couple of feathers she seemed a little dissatisfied with.

“Oh,” Kaye looked up and continued knitting, “I think-.  Amanda volunteered me to help go through the lists of overseas arrivals for oddities, names that looked obviously made up, that sort of thing.  There was one name that’s stuck with me - none of us could pick the source for Tupenes.”

Calhoun sharply shifted his full attention to her.  “Tupenes is a name with a reputation, in professional circles.  Untraceable, unstoppable, varied methods and virtually unknown outside our circles.  Which flight or ship was he on?”

Kaye blinked and her hands stopped.  “I saw the name at least half a dozen times, both genders, on multiple flights.”

Calhoun whistled admiringly.  “So that’s how part of it’s done.  Not one person, but a group, maybe a family.”  He looked at the work in front of him.  “One of you tell Amanda we might have a wolf pack inside the gate while I finish up here?”

This is in response to ysabetwordsmith's first prompt.

“Amanda?”  Bolt claimed the administrator’s attention with grace, his voice carrying no trace of the concern that was producing the creases around his eyes and on his forehead in his darkened by sun to deep caramel skin.

“Yes?”  She took in the uncharacteristic expression on his face, laid her pen aside and asked, “What’s the problem?”  She gestured to one of the chairs facing her desk.

“I maintain an email address for professional purposes,” he sat gracefully, hands folded in his lap, long legs crossed at the ankles in front of him, “and I have received an approach of interest to our employer.”

Amanda raised an eyebrow.  “Isn’t this conversation a breach of professional etiquette?”

“I’m taking the Elf’s money, so it is in my interests to protect his interests.”  Bolt smiled briefly.  “Also, I have no wish to be considered a potential traitor.”

Amanda nodded, understanding in her honey-coloured eyes.  “If you give me the details, I’ll pass the information on.”

As she picked up the pen there was a knock on the door.  “I’m sorry to interrupt,” it was Calhoun, “but I need to discuss a matter of business.”

Bolt looked over at the doorway where the slightly shorter, bearded man stood.  “You too?” he asked.

“My agent has received an approach,” Calhoun agreed.  “The interested parties made it clear who their intended target is.  I should add, for this audience alone, that my agent is unaware that I’m on the Elf’s payroll.”

“Please, come in and sit down too,” Amanda indicated another chair.  “I’ll need to get the details from both of you.”

“Certainly.”  Calhoun was all urbanity and his face showed none of Bolt’s concern, but his movements and pose spoke of action ready to be released when needed.  “Once, could be just of those things.  Twice, could be coincidence.  If there’s a third, perhaps Jung in Three or la Sare in Four, then we have a pattern.”

“Agreed,” that was Bolt.

Amanda’s, “You’re right,” was simultaneous.  Then she added, “After I’ve passed on your information we’ll have to work out who else they might ask.”