Maskbound: The Ultimate Hunter

The windows on floor twelve overlooked the entire Crown District, a glittering grid of Guild halls and pale towers. Nilo pressed his forehead against the glass, trying to decide whether the view was a gift or a bill.

“Chat, behold the office, a door that closes, one fish, plus the pink boxes Crown seized,” Pipa narrated, spinning her drone in a slow circle.

“Gerald is not forgotten, he is merely admiring his skyline,” Ganzo said, hugging a bowl to his chest.

“A working printer, a desk of real wood, a kettle that does not leak… I keep waiting for the catch.”

Bruno dropped onto the sofa, the cushions sighing beneath his shoulders until he pronounced it adequate. Nobody mentioned that it was the first sofa any of them owned without a landlord attached.

On the desk sat a squat lead case taped shut with six strips of Bureau seal.

‘The plain mask inside whispers at three o’clock, one word, like a postman who never learned a second.’

“Kevin Two already jammed on the Director’s memo, I count that as a good sign,” Zinnia said, tapping the printer.

“Give the rookie a week before you judge him.”

Jingles crept to the edge of the bandolier, bells trembling, to peer at the unfamiliar city sprawled below the window. He counted the towers aloud until the number grew embarrassing, then declared every one of them personally judgmental about him.

“We are twelve floors up and I am already being graded by architecture,” he squeaked.

“Nobody is grading you,” Nilo murmured into his collar.

The door opened without a knock, Crown stepping in with a folder tucked under one arm. Her face gave away nothing, yet Ganzo lowered the bowl very slowly, like a man surrendering.

“Good morning, Squad Nine, I trust the windows are satisfactory,” Crown said.

“They beat a pipe, Director, I would not trade them for one.”

“Then sit, all of you, the Gala of Mirrors is not what the invitation claims.”

She laid a photograph on the desk, a ballroom of tall glass panels ringed by gilded columns. Fox ears were carved over its doors, a crest Nilo recognized before she spoke a single word.

“That is the Hall of Mirrors,” Zinnia said quietly, “it belongs to my family.”

“Every autumn the Gilded Foxes host the Guilds’ ball there, this year the Court’s silver card arrived in the same envelope as your father’s.”

“My father received a card from the Masquerade Court… and told his own daughter nothing?”

Her hand tightened around the notebook until the knuckles paled, the only crack in her flawless composure. Nilo wanted to say something kind, then remembered kindness usually cost him a lie on her tally.

“He told the Council on Tuesday in a closed session, they voted to attend.”

“Attend what, exactly, walk into a trap with our good coats on?” Bruno asked, sitting up.

“Your father voted yes, Steelhorn, you may take that up with him over breakfast.”

Bruno’s jaw worked for a moment, but no speech came, which was the strangest thing of all. The brass marks at his brow dimmed a shade, as if the sofa were drinking his shine.

“Why hold the Court’s ball in a Foxes’ hall?” Nilo asked.

Crown tapped the silver card on the desk, its edge catching the light like a knife held flat. A single line of script curled beneath the invitation, ink that seemed to shift whenever he looked away.

“The Gilded District is where the Collector hunts,” Crown said, turning a second photograph face up.

It showed Kell Rowan in a hospital bed, a smooth blank bandage where his face belonged. Nilo knew that bandage too well, the memory twisting his stomach into a tight knot again.

“Rowan was the first, the Bureau expects the next inside the District, every mask cut away without a mark on the skin.”

“What does he cut them with?” he asked.

“Nobody who saw it kept the memory, the survivors remember a mirror and a gloved hand.”

“The Bureau kept it quiet?” Pipa asked, lowering her lens.

“The Guilds already blame each other for everything, a panic would hand the Collector a crowd.”

“Then the Gala is a hunting ground,” Zinnia said flatly.

“The Gala is a mirror room, Quartermaster, the Collector steals whatever stands in front of one.”

‘A mirror room, a card for the thirteenth key, a thief of faces… somebody wrote this party for me.’

“Tink gave us three rules, keep your mask on first, change partners every song, leave the sugar alone,” he said.

“Tink was a cautious man, careful ones do not hand out rules they have not paid for.”

Nilo thumbed the lead lid open an inch, just to look at the thing inside it. Blank as a plate, the mask lay within, while every hook on his bandolier went quiet.

“It is staring at me, very rude for something without eyes,” Jingles whispered.

“We were invited as the thirteenth key, whatever that is, so we are going,” he said.

“We?” Crown asked, raising one brow.

“Squad Nine goes in as guests, borrowed finery, the Captain watching the back—”

Ganzo boomed over him, cracking his knuckles, “A kitchen door is a lovely thing to watch, I have excellent kitchen instincts.”

“No lens passes the Hall doors, Miss Pipa, every camera is surrendered at the coat check, brooches included,” Crown added.

“Chat, I do not exist, I am a rumor with a brooch,” Pipa whispered, pinning a tiny lens to her collar.

Crown closed the folder, studying him for a long moment as if weighing a coin she could not read. The room waited with her, even the printer, which chose that exact moment to stop humming and listen politely.

“Faces optional, it says here,” Nilo muttered, “what kind of ball makes that a rule?”

“The kind that already owns the faces, Hunter, by midnight half the room forgets which one it wore in.”

“The Bureau cannot send a team to a Guild ball without declaring war on the Guilds,” she said at last, “so you go as guests, nothing more.”

“Then I shall confirm us myself, as guests of my family, it is the one title I have never had to earn.”

“One favor, Director, nobody gets a mask cut off tonight.”

“I cannot promise that, I can promise you a reason to try.”

She left as quietly as she came, the door sighing shut behind her like a held breath. Down the corridor a tape measure clattered, then Tilly’s voice rose over the noise like a siren.

“Hold still, a borrowed jacket needs fitting, fitting has a fee,” she announced, bursting in with a bundle of black silk.

“You are not even on the payroll.”

“Which is why the fee is double,” she said, pinning a sleeve to his arm.

She tugged the silk across his shoulders, humming around pins that bristled from her mouth like a hedgehog’s spines. Beneath the black cloth ran twelve small pockets, one for every mask he owned plus a few hopeful spares.

“You sewed five pockets for masks I do not have yet?” he asked.

“Optimism costs extra, I put it on your tab.”

Ganzo unrolled a greasy napkin across the desk, a map of the Hall sketched in what smelled like gravy. Four doors, two balconies, one kitchen entrance, each marked with a tiny boar, his own personal sign for danger.

“Kitchen is mine, the floor is Zinnia’s, the stairs belong to Bruno, the roof is Pipa’s,” he said.

“And what is mine?” Nilo asked, leaning over the gravy.

He tapped the dance floor with a thick finger, “You dance, kid, it is the one job nobody can accuse you of stealing.”

Bruno stopped listening, his gaze fixed on the photograph of the ballroom as if it owed him money. Nilo crossed the room and dropped onto the cushion beside him, leaving a polite gap of one horn.

“My father will be in the front row tonight, I intend to stand where he has to look at me.”

“Then stand next to me, I am much easier to look past than any Steelhorn.”

“A Steelhorn does not overlook the man who cut his table in half,” Bruno said, his mouth twitching.

Late light turned the window into a mirror, his reflection hanging in the glass like a coat nobody claimed. The edges of his face were softening, the way they always did when no mask covered them for long.

‘Tonight a hall made entirely of mirrors has to decide what to show of a face I cannot hold myself.’

“Darling, a ballroom, an audience of the finest families, I could weep for days,” Cadenza sighed from the rack.

Clangor added stiffly from the hook, “Young man, a gentleman keeps his visor shut at a dance, remember it.”

Across the room Zinnia sealed the acceptance with gold wax, pressing her thumb into it twice. When she caught him watching, she studied the ribbon on his belt, then looked away pink.

“If your father asks about the ribbon, what is the answer?”

“The answer is that you stole it, which is true often enough to be convincing,” she said, dryly.

“The tally goes with you tonight, I will be counting whatever the Hall shows you.”

“I will lie only when it is strictly necessary.”

“That is not a promise, that is a loophole.”

“It is both, loopholes are the kindest promises,” he said, grinning as the whole office sighed.

“The Gala is in the Gilded District, where the Collector hunts,” she added, tucking the notebook away.

“Then we bring the best bait in the city, a boy nobody remembers.”