“Think on it. You have until we leave. But there are assassins out there, and I would appreciate the added protection.”

She thought on it, sweeping up and down the hall, brushing past him with every pass, to let him know she was there.

Ingenue waited at the end of the long hallway. She was dressed in a short dress with long sleeves, and with the hose and cape she wore, she was as covered as she ever was. The ex-Birdcage cell block leader was pixieish, her eyes sly, her smile mysterious.

The Overseer remained closer to Teacher as he walked closer to the woman. Protective, defensive. Nobody disturbed her quite as much as Ingenue did when Ingenue was near Teacher.

Then there were the others, in updated, finer costumes. The Thomais Fallen in somewhat old fashioned clothing with a sinister spin, and The Horseman wearing ragged bandages beneath a tattered suit. The Horseman was a gift from Cheit, and a security. Their eyes on Teacher, which was an irony, considering Teacher’s many eyes and the tools he had at his disposal. Saint, Dragon’s nemesis, was there and standing proud in ornate armor, his cross-tattoo on his face colored gold.

William, Scapegoat, was catching up, drawing nearer to the Thomais Fallen. Elijah, Valefor, walked arm in arm with his mother, Madam Mathers, who wore an ethereal white gown with a shawl around her shoulders. Her health was better since coming here, since she’d been… helped, with firm boundaries. She looked closer to her actual mid-thirties than the weary young crone she’d been before.

“This will be preparations for your moment,” Teacher told the woman.

Madam Mathers curtsied, supported by her son.

The portal opened at the hallway’s end, managed by teams of tinkers. Big, dramatic, bright.

“Shall we?” Teacher asked, and he looked at nobody specific as he asked. Because the Overseer occupied nearly every place, every position, like a gas with molecules writ human size with faint human capability, he looked at her.

“We shall,” she said.

The group walked through, two of the tinkers tapping at their equipment to turn it off, so the dimensional effects wouldn’t interfere.

The Overseer passed through, and the power that had gripped her and defined her form pulled at her, stripped away her selves.

For three, four seconds, as they passed through the glowing, arching doorway, she was a meek girl again, wreathed in tatters. One of fifteen children sold in exchange for power. Sold and taken to a prison, sold and left to watch as other children went to pieces or became monsters.

And even then, somehow, seeing those horrific ends, she’d been relieved.

“Scared me,” Ingenue murmured. “Custodian?”

“Overseer,” her own voice was rough, uneven. She’d talked while doing her work around the facility to stay in a kind of practice, but it didn’t really work.

“Overseer,” Ingenue said. “You’re older than I imagined you. Do you have a name?”