Minho spent the first week since our meeting showing me around. Instead of showing me the hot spots in town however; he took me through the back roads. He told me which people would be the most useful to me; who was on our side, who was against us, who were to be trusted, and who were horrible liars; his fellow spies and his rivals, the best places to gather information, and the best places to spread it. He showed me the complexity of the system and how he had “mastered it”.     

I think he was trying to teach me. He should have shown more humility. He showed promise in philosophical thinking, and he happened to be skilled in planning and putting into action his ideas; he was good, but not as amazing as he thought himself to be. His informants were far less than trustworthy, and very hard to work with from what I had seen. The entirety of the time he had shown me around, we were being followed. Minho hadn’t noticed a thing. He walked with an air of importance, as if he knew he was on top. I could barely contain my laughter when I heard our follower sigh, even he thought it tiresome; the way Minho acted.

    I wasn’t worried about our follower. I had known the human boy who was following us since the very moment I stepped foot in this town. He had been a young boy then, and I had suspicions that he had caught wind my true identity. Still, I trusted him. More than the stranger before me.

The boy was nearly a man now, and I had quite a soft spot for him. Since he first saw me, he had followed me. Never with ill intent, just vibrant curiosity. He had not known me long enough to see that I didn’t age as he did, however he seemed to be aware of it anyway. We had never talked; me and the boy. I didn’t even know if he knew how to speak, never hearing word nor whisper, not even a sigh. He just watched, and I in turn kept my eyes on him.

He was handsome for a human, or maybe cute would be a better word. When he wasn’t following me I would see him running around the town doing odd jobs. He needed a good haircut.

He learned many things by following me. Things that Minho needed to learn desperately. Ways to stay hidden and how to find hidden things; he was a keen observer. Minho, as I discovered after listening to him for a while, had a lot of knowledge that he had not worked for. Taught by his father, an adept spy, he had all the knowhow and all information he could want, but he lacked innate skill and could not easily employ his fathers perfected methods. In effect, he was a bumbling log who thought himself a genius.

The two men were similar in age, Minho being only a few human years older than the other. To me they were both simply children. A child who acted as a spy, and a child who was one but didn’t know it. I sighed and shook my head at the thought.

“Are you tired?” Minho asked.

“Yes I do happen to be. Have you not seen him?” I asked.

“Seen what Krystal?”

I tilted my head towards the direction of our follower, and I could hear the faint sounds of him flattening against the wall behind the corner.

Minho squinted his eyes and looked past me into the dim allyway. “I see nothing.”

“A boy has been following us.” At this the boy sprinted down the ally, not caring to be careful of the sound. Minho hearing his footsteps quickly dashed after him, his long legs carrying him closer to the boy with each step. He caught up quickly and pulled the boy back by his collar. I stifled a laugh, seeing the embarrassed faces of both of the boys; Minho for not noticing his existence, and the boy for getting caught.

Minho threw the boy on the ground in front of me; taking away the humor of the moment.

“Do not be so so rough.” I commanded, and was ignored.

“Who are you?” Minho asked of the stranger.

The boy looked around wildly for a way to escape. Seeing none, he apparently decided it would be best to answer the furious man.

“My name is Taemin.” He said softly, picking at the dirt that had accumulated on his pants.

“Why were you following me?” Minho asked.

Taemin scoffed and smirked, but his expression quickly changed after a swift kick to his legs for Minho. Taemin scowled, even if the kick hadn’t been painful, it had smeared even more mud across his pants.

“I wasn’t even following you! I was following the girl.” He protested.

“Krystal? Why would you follow her?” Minho had a disbelieving look on his face.

“I want her to teach me how to turn invisible.” He said bitterly.

I held my breath, shocked and ready to flee at a seconds notice.

“Invisible... oh I think I get it. You want her to teach you how to be a spy.” Minho explained to himself.

“No that’s not...” Taemin started.

I interrupted him, “You know the reason he was following us now, so why don’t you let him up off the ground.”

Taemin nodded.

Minho helped him up and brushed some of the dirt off of his back. “Listen, sure Krystal has some natural skill, but you won’t learn anything from her, she still new at this.”

Taemin sighed indignantly and looked over at me with his eyes raised, expecting me to correct him.

l held a finger against my lips, shushing him while Minho wasn’t looking.

“How long have you known Krystal?” Minho pushed.

“I never really knew her. I just followed her around, ever since she came here.” Taemin said.

“Oh, this is a situation caused by love at first sight?” Minho laughed and ruffled Taemin’s hair. “Adorable”

Taemin swatted Minho’s hand away.

“I didn’t follow her because I liked her. If you had noticed what I had you would have followed her too. Sometimes her skin becomes clear, once she even turned completely invisible.” Taemin crossed his arms.

I tried discount the situation quickly. “I’ve never disappeared, you probably just lost sight of me.” I glanced over at Minho gauging his reaction.

“Still playing childish games, aren’t you too old for that now?” Minho said with a smirk.

“Games? I’m not lying I really did see...”

“I’ve had enough of listening to your stories, we have work to do.”

Minho started walking; I was following Minho and Taemin was following me.

“Do what ever you want. You still won’t become a spy.” Minho said just loud enough for Taemin to hear him.

. . .

    In the weeks that followed, our group somehow managed to learn to work together. Minho was surprised to find the me and Taemin were actually skilled. Though I found it demeaning when he told me he was impressed, as if it was hard to impress him. He hasn’t even seen my talent yet. Not that I cared.

    Minho and I started meeting almost every day, Taemin almost always found us so eventually Minho just started telling him where to come so he wasn’t late. Minho was very cautious about telling us his plan, not giving many details. He was planning a mission to get more information about a rumored attack on the Saerons, but he said he wanted to get into contact with a spy named Luna before he told us anything else. Luna, according to Minho, is adept at getting into places where she doesn’t belong, unlike Minho who was skilled at gathering information that he wasn’t supposed to know.

    He told us we would be having a meeting with her in a few days. She wasn’t a difficult person to contact, but she rarely took any jobs. He told us that Luna, being a very happy and enthusiastic person, enjoyed her life very much, and wasn’t keen on losing it. Not many people knew why she had become a spy, including Minho. Luna was famous within the community of spies, a very dangerous thing, but she was the type of person that one would go to any length to protect, and that made her dangerous.

    Minho spent the days before the meeting going over every possible scenario we could run into. He, like all humans, worried too much. I doubt Prince Suho will barge in just as we finalize a plan, or that Luna would suddenly decide to kill us for asking for her help, but he had a plan for it anyway. It seemed like he really enjoyed making those plans. He had a certain fire in his eyes, and it got brighter everytime he found a solution to a deadly scenario.

    Taemin was quiet throughout Minho’s lectures. He would lay down on whatever furniture was available and pretend to sleep, but I knew he was paying attention to every detail of what Minho said. His relationship with Minho hadn’t improved since their first meeting, and he didn’t want to show interest in anything Minho said, but I think he was starting to look up to Minho; he wanted to learn from him.

. . .

    We were all tense as we headed to our meeting with Luna. The scenarios Minho had thought up were even starting to make me paranoid. She had picked a strange place for a meeting of spies. We were headed towards a small family restaurant on one of the lesser traveled streets. Minho said it was her favorite place, and we were lucky she had picked it. It would put her in a better mood.

    They way Minho talked about her, I had thought she would have a menacing presence, but when we walked through the door I was surprised to see how... feminine she was. She had on a bright yellow and pink dress and her hair was curled, simply but beautifully. Luna smiled brightly at us waving us over to the table where she sat. We, Minho, Taemin, and I, slid into the booth opposite of her.

    “So,” She looked each of us in the eye as if inspecting us. She sat back; folded her arms; smiled and said, “What do you want to eat?”

Author's note:

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