Once the recruits had made their way into the tunnel, the door was quickly sealed behind them. The movement of the desk could be heard as it was pulled back over the hatch. Inside the tunnel it was as dark as it was moist. The only light was the candle that Feelsworth had taken before they were sent down there. After a brief moment of silence Feelsworth pushed his way through the trainees to Lale. Once he was there he gently put his hand on her shoulder.

"Hey, are you alright?" His eyes were soft and had an almost worried look to them. "I want to let you know, we're not going to hurt your family." With that Feelsworth returned to the front. "Alright, Lets head out. Don't stray to far or you'll get lost down here and while we're walking you might want to get to know one another better. You'd be surprised how much an ally is worth in today's world."

Feelsworth began to walk through the tunnels leading them. At every stop he paused a brief moment just to look back at those he was leading.

Levi swiveled around quickly upon hearing the tunnel entrance close. Unfortunate. He would've liked to know if any of the recruits decided to stay behind. He quickly gave up on this thought, however, and turned back to look deeper into the tunnel. His eyes were greeted with little more than darkness. The sole source of light being the candle Feelsworth carried, casting shadows upon the recruits in front of Levi to make them appear as featureless silhouettes. The small, flickering flame illuminated the large man's head from below, the candlelight dancing eerily upon the contours of his face. It looked as if it might be extinguished by the slightest disturbance, though the archivist doubted that would happen, or at least, not by mistake.

Levi stiffened as Feelsworth unexpectedly began to approach, gently pushing his way through the wave of recruits. His eyes traced the escort's movements until he came to a stop not two feet away. The archivist breathed a sigh of relief when the man addressed Lale instead of him. As he listened, though, he found himself surprised by Feelsworth's demeanor. His words certainly didn't sound like the kind that would come from a seasoned assassin. Levi stroked his chin as the man moved back to the head of the group and spoke again before starting down the tunnel. Most, if not all the recruits fell in line immediately, and not wanting to dismiss Feelsworth's advice, the archivist tentatively scanned the gathering. However, he was unable to bring himself to speak to anyone.

Lale stared at the floor as the large man put his hand on her shoulder. He had a much gentler look about him than the nightmare that they had just left behind, but Lale was already drained of courage. It was all she could manage to nod her head in thanks as he assured her that her family would be safe. Despite the fact that he was working for terrible people, this man, Feelsworth, gave the impression of trustworthiness. She would cling to the hope that he was speaking the truth and carry on.

After they had walked for some time, Lale could feel her strength begin to return. This wasn’t so bad, she told herself repeatedly. There were worse things than being kidnapped by assassins and forced into a world of death. Not many things, but they existed. Somewhere. She was sure of it.

Lale continued to march in silence.

After what felt like hours of traveling through dark tunnels they finally came to a stop. Feels worth reached up and opened a trap door on the ceiling. When he did so a rope ladder feel down. Feelsworth turned to face the newbloods.
"Once you climb the ladder there's a wagon. Climb on and take a seat. I must ask that you remain as quiet as possible for this part."
He climbed up and looked around before turning and helping the recruits. One by our he assisted them up the ladder and into the covered wagon. Outside the air was oddly dry and hot for night. They were in the middle of a dark forest. Creatures could be heard scampering around. Inside the wagon it was dark with only small streaks of moonlight shining into it. Once everyone was on Feelsworth walked around to the front. They could hear some chatter, before long the wagon began to move. When it did a horse began to follow it, On the back of the horse was Feelsworth. Once the exited the forest people could see the fires of the city in the distance. Many began to realize what exactly they had gotten themselves into at this point. Some began to weep, others began to panic, and even others began to feel the fear that Lale had felt.

The wagon ride was long and exhausting. They what little sleep they got was on the wagon, they ate on the wagon, and the wagon only stopped shortly for use of latrines. After a whole night of traveling they were awoken by the wagon stopping and chattering with the driver. For those that looked Feelsworth was no longer behind the wagon. The people words began to become clearer.
"What do you got in the back then?" Said a older masculine voice
"Nothing just some supplies." Said the drivers voice.
"Well then you won't mind if we have a look then?" With that a horses shadow appeared on each side of the wagon as they headed toward the back of the wagon. Then came the fear, or disappointment in others cases. The host from the other night and Mania came into view. The host jumped off his horse before walking onto the wagon. He stood tall walking by each recruit. As he passed each one he looked at them as said the same thing.

"Dead"

His voice was cold and emotionless. He stopped at the front of the wagon turning towards the group. "Each and every one of you. DEAD! If I was a soldier for the king. Let this be your first lesson, Whenever the wagon stops it is not safe." He paused. "Now get up and move inside!"
They began to be rather rushed out of the wagon. The Host led with Mania following both on their horses. They were constantly being barked at by Mania to keep up or else. One older man fell behind the group. Mania didn't hesitate to make an example out of him.
"Move it!" She raised her voice. It was sharp and fierce.
"I- I'm so tired. I'm afraid I can't go much faster. This much travelling without sleep has made me weak." The man looked at Mania.
Mania paused looking at the host who gave a short nod before turning back. Mania allowed a smile to cross her face.
"It's a shame. We have no use for the weak." Mania then kicked the man over. Mania the tugged on her horse's reigns. The horse went in a circle. Mania led it a small bit away before turning it around and face the man.
"I don't know if you've ever been trampled by a horse, but I assure you it's not fun. You have until I make it to you to show me that you are not weak and that you can walk in a line!" Her horse began to trot towards the man. The man struggled to get to his knees. Once on his knees he fell again. Mania was getting ever closer to him. He tried again. He was shaking in fear as tears ran down his face. He struggled again this time making it to his feet. He looked only to have Mania's horse stop beside him. Mania leaned down to the man's face.
"I believe you forgot about the last part." Following her sentence the man began to walk as fast as possible to the line. Once he was there Mania continued. "Good, Now DON'T FALL BEHIND AGAIN!" Mania again took her place behind the line as they moved again. They were led to a large building. It was old and had an elegant look to it. As the approached the gates were opened.
Once inside they were led into the large courtyard. There were beautiful trees and flowers all around. Birds chirped and all sorts of insects could be heard around. The host turned to face the new comers.
"Welcome to your new home. This is Aerie Manor. You will train here, You will sleep here, and if you're lucky you'll eat here. You will now officially begin your new lives as members of the Ashen Wing. Inside you will find Feelsworth. He will have your room assignments."
As they entered the were met with the soft face of Feelsworth. He had some more instructions for the newcomers.
"Training will not start today. We wish for you to become familiar with the manor and rest. After I have shown you all your rooms, you may head towards the dinning hall." Feelsworth pointed to a door on his right indicating the dinning hall. He then led each person to their rooms before heading into the dinning hall. He prepared the table with all kinds of fresh fruits and vegetables as well as a freshly smoked boar. He then waited in the corner for any others to come in and join him.

As Feelsworth showed everyone around the mansion, Levi made sure to note the location of several of the recruits’ rooms, paying close attention to Lale’s in particular. Afterward, he combed the premises until his curiosity was satisfied, making a mental map of the structure as he went. With that out of the way, he situated himself in the dining hall. He noted Feelsworth in the corner of the room, but very few others were present; Levi had taken care to make his rounds with reasonable haste. He’d wanted to make sure he had some time left for some much needed silent reflection.

Levi rested his elbows on the table he’d chosen, interlacing his fingers and resting his head on them, eyes closed. He made sure not to touch any of the food that had been prepared, lest he be punished for eating out of turn. Their host had made it very clear earlier that even the smallest infraction would incite at least a stern lecture, and possibly the threat of physical violence in more severe cases. Vigilance would be key here. The archivist thought back to just before he’d entered the wagon. The implications of the smoke that could be seen from the direction of town were not lost on him. Everyone who had been gathered here may as well have been dead. Everything they might have had to return to was now reduced to ash… how fitting. As Levi absently wondered what had become of his spiders, it occurred to him that he would have a difficult time reading without his spectacles. Suddenly he wished he hadn’t travelled so light.

As the large, kindly man walked off - the only one of these “ashen wings” who seemed to have a soul in him - Lale shut the door to her room and collapsed on the straw mattress that had been laid out for her. For some time she lay there, motionless, face buried in the covers. They smelled, but their receiving darkness allowed her a shallow retreat from the ugliness of the world around her. Her mind, however, she could not escape. Nor could she hide the eyes of her memory from what she had seen this night. She thought back to the man whose speech had cost him his tongue, to the man who had almost been trampled to death for being unable to withstand the exhaustion of nighttime travel.

She could still see the terrified agony in his face, still feel the dreadful warm shame of her own cowardice. She had averted her eyes, denying the man a witness to his execution. He had lived, yes, but how many others would she see die before this hell ran its course? Would she be among them? Would her family, innocent of wrongdoing, be tortured and slain for her failures if she could not satisfy the blood-thirsty demons that were her masters henceforth?

The farm girl broke. It was too much. The tears came slowly, at first, but soon devolved into long, drawn-out sobs. Why did monsters like these roam the earth? Why had they chosen a poor farmer’s daughter to play their sick game? In what way had she offended Heaven that this curse had been placed upon her?

She cried herself to an uneasy sleep, restless misery dominated by visions of stabbings, hangings, tramplings and other gratuitous forms of execution. Overlooking it all was the face of the nightmare man, his pitch black cloak reaching, surrounding, entangling, choking, suffocating – Lale woke up in a cold sweat, blanket wrapped around her splayed limbs.

She jolted up, chilled to marrow, and looked around for the source of the deathly cold that had taken hold of the room. A frozen draft was making its way through the pointlessly-shuttered window, filling the place with whispers of the season to come. Lale stood, and she could feel the ice of the stone floor through her thin shoes. The things she would have given to be wearing her own boots. The nightmare had called this place the... Airy Manor? Now she knew why. She would be lucky not to catch cold before the week was out.

Lale went to the window and forced open the shutters, straining against the old wood. They gave way with a loud crack, revealing the darkness outside and letting in a particularly frigid blast of air. Lale shivered. Her room gave onto the inner courtyard, and she could see the warm glow of firelight emanating from the windows on the ground floor. She had not the slightest notion of how long she had slept, but the growling of her stomach reminded her that she had had nothing to eat since the tiny hors-d’oeuvres served at the party. Lale was torn. She had no desire to venture outside what was now the safest place she had been since that morning, especially not if it was to be met by whatever other thieves and murderers might be about the place. But she was hungry, and she was cold. The main hall promised warmth, and, if she had not slept overlong, food also. Her stomach made the more convincing argument. Slowly, she cracked open the door to the hallway and ventured a gaze into the corridor. There was no one else about, so Lale stepped out, closing the door behind her. The exact way back to the main hall escaped her at the moment, but there was light at one end of the hall, and darkness at the other. She walked towards the former, hoping against hope that all the doors would remain shut as she picked her way through the maze of passageways and toward the smell of smoked boar.

Gabriel followed the old man to his assigned room and was not particularly impressed with what he found.
Ah well, Gabe thought, beats military barracks.
He had planned to remove his outermost layer of clothing and leave it in his room, however the draft coming through the poorly made shutters convinced him otherwise. He left his room and headed towards the room he noticed the young woman had gone into. He intended to check on her, make sure she was all right, he knew the importance of moral and having your head on straight in enemy territory and was worried about the girl.
Yes enemy territory, that is exactly what this is until and unless they can prove otherwise.
On arrival though, he heard no sounds other than light snoring. Deciding the leave her to her sleep, he wondered the manor making notes of windows, exterior doors, and other possible avenues of escape and began making plans in his head for such an eventuality. he also passed another man doing, what Gabe assumed, the same thing. Satisfied he made his way towards teh dining room. It was still sparsely populated when he entered except for the elderly gentleman waiting in the corner. he took a seat at the table away from anyone else and waited, doubting anyone would feel much like conversation at the moment.

Yagami at some point had begun to shake. Something that very well might look like a frail lady finally breaking down in fear from the faux raid and the attempted trampling, but was more anger then anything. It was very clear to her these recruits meant nothing more to these Ashen Wing people then a fast horse- they'd be used to exhaustion then replaced. There was no family here for them. If there was, no recruit in the wagon would have been "dead", since the driver would have taken out a lowly guard, or even Yagami herself, if it had been a face she didn't recognize as a member. And she knew all of these rogues had probably seen the same shakiness before, so she didn't bother to act as though it was something else.

Yagami was unresponsive as possible as she was lead to her new room, and elected to stay within for a time even though she could hear others roaming the halls, and soft sobs somewhere farther off, surely the girl. Those looking for escape should know better, they were still untrustworthy, and thus being watched. Your safest bet was to be in a closed off area that you could secure before moving on, so that's what she did, searching for any loose areas or small holes, and once satisfied she was "alone", worked on here own hiding spot for the dagger hidden behind her mask. Only after having some sort of backup planned did she leave, coming in later then most to the dining area, but, notably before the girl Lale. Like a few of the others she touched nothing on the table, but poured herself a drink from her own stock.

As the trainees worked their way into the dinning hall, Feelsworth finished preparing the feast. In the center of the room there was a large table with a large variety of food. A freshly cooked boar held it's place as the main attraction as the center of the table surrounded by various fruits and side dishes. Feelsworth took a moment and admired his work before he bgan setting a place for everyone at their respective tables. For those that hadn't chosen a table he kindly walked up and handed them a plate as well as utensils and a cloth napkin. Once everyone had their own dishes Feelsworth stood in the middle of the room.

"I know many of you don't trust us yet and I understand that. I can assure the food hasn't been tampered with so please enjoy as much as you'd like becuase this one's on the house." He turned and began to leave only to pause at the door.. He looked back concern was obvious in his face. "I don't know how many more will be on the house." He hung his head as he left the room leaving everyone to their own devices.

Levi could scarcely believe what he was hearing. Trust? It hadn't been half a day since this odd trio of contract killers had kidnapped everybody here under the threat of severe bodily harm (or death for those that were literate such as himself), brought them to this decrepit excuse for a headquarters, and threatened to starve them unless they performed. So yes. Trust was off the table for now. In Levi's case, more like forever, even though he was probably one of those least upset by recent developments. The archivist cast an apathetic glance toward Feelsworth as the man made his leave, equal parts disinterested and perplexed by the his demeanor. He took it that in its current state, the Ashen Wing was in pretty dire straits financially, which made sense. Putting the thought aside, Levi served himself some fruits and vegetables from the array that had been prepared, though he steered clear of the boar. As he began to nibble halfheartedly on his meal, he nonchalantly scanned the room for Lale.

Yagami didn't really feel bad for the gentleman, he wasn't the victim here. Nevertheless she had thanked him as he put the plate in front of her. At minimum it was be an exchange of fake manners for fake manners. If he truly felt bad, well, he didn't have to be here. It was possible to walk away. She knew.

Oh well. Shouldn't let all this food go to waste of it was actually okay, and if it wasn't- well Yagami had a nack about telling such things, so she'd just not eat such pieces. She made sure most of the others that were willing to test the waters were done before moving in. She planned to use her hair pins as her eating utensils and didn't want the others to make a fuss about them being in her hair before touching the food, even though she was skilled enough that the only food they'd be touching was that she was talking. Mostly fruits and veggies, but she did not abstain from the meat. If she could eat it, having the protein would serve her well.

Sitting down once again she spoke, holding of the bottle she had been drinking from. "For any interested, I'll poor a glass for a name." It was low, but it didn't take much to to be heard when everyone else was so silent they might have as well had had their tongues cut out too.

“M… my name is Lale,” came a soft voice from behind Yagami. It was the farm girl. She stood there, eyes locked to the ground, shoulders rolled and hands clasped nervously together.

Unsurprisingly, it had taken Lale a good while to find her way to the dining hall; her path had been far from the most efficient. However, before taking a wrong turn that would have sent her on her third lap of this wing of the mansion, she had had the good fortune of encountering the only person from whom she would not have felt the need to run: the kindly giant who had first shown her to her room. He ensured that she found her way, and though she was among the last to enter the room, from what she could tell, there was still plenty of boar to be had.

Before she could think to head for the table, however, her attention was arrested by the woman who had comforted her in the dark room where this whole ordeal had begun. She was offering drinks of some sort, alcoholic, no doubt. Lale’s mother had always called ale her “liquid courage,” a potion of which she partook whenever she was bargaining at the market in her husband’s stead. Lale felt that she could use some liquid courage right about now. So it was that she made her way behind the woman with the fox mask and introduced herself. Following her initial introduction she added humbly: “Thank you for what you did, earlier, ma’am. You… you helped me to be brave.”

Ah, there she was, Yagami had almost thought she wasn't going to show up, but she was just fashionably late. Lale. Just a child with plenty to live for beyond this life just scooped up in to the darkness- and not even by her own choice. While Yagami though for just a moment she should make an excuse to not poor the girl a glass, she also knew the alcohol would ease the girl enough to get some sleep, so she caved and began to poor a glass.

She didn't give it to her right away.

"I may have given you a little push my dear, but any bravery you found, I assure you was your own. Besides, I know all to well what you were feeling. I had a similar experience to this one when I was but a girl as well believe it or not, and I made it out just fine." She swooshed the glass in her hand, before extending it in offering. "I already had your name Lale, it was said back there, though I suppose the deal I offered didn't say it needed to be a new name. Be careful with this drink though, the strength is a bit overwhelming even to casual drinkers, take small sips even if your body tells you to try and down it all at once."

Although she smiled, her eyes were sad. She was wondering if this is how it felt for the giver when she was first offered a drink. No, she didn't expect it was. But that sad gaze didn't rest on Lale for long, she needed to be alert for any one else interested in her deal.

Levi turned to look at the foreigner as she made her rather generous offer. A noble effort, attempting to bring together those who had been forced into this situation. The archivist was about to turn back to his meal when he saw the farm girl stand and move to the woman's side. With a sigh, he picked up his own plate and made his way to their table, overhearing what the two were saying as he grew nearer.

"She's right, you know." The man said as he situated himself across from Yagami and slid his mug toward her. "The way you handled yourself was quite admirable. You should hold on to that determination. It will serve you well in the coming days."

After a moment, he spoke again. "Ah, my apologies. My name is Levi Messer. If you don't mind, some drink would do me good right about now. I don't need much."

After the trainees had eaten they were escorted back to their rooms by Feelsworth. Along the way Feelsworth tried to make small talk with the newcomers, hoping to make them feel a bit more comfortable. After a long and restless night the others were awoken by a loud knock at the door. Each recruit was greeted with the face of Mania. She told each one to get moving so training could start.

The trainees trickled into the large main hall one by one. From there they were led out into a large court yard where they would spend most of the upcoming days doing some of the most intense and life threatening training they've done. The host was waiting for them when they entered.

"I'm so glad you all could make it. Did you all sleep well?" The host said with a most sarcastic tone "First off I would like to say that Feelsworth is passing out 5 coins to each off you. Keep these coins close to you. Why you ask? Because the meal last night was the first and last free meal. Your meals for the next week will either be hunted yourselves or paid for with one of your coins. It should also be worth mentioning that we don't care how you get the coins to pay as long as it is paid for. So feel free to steal from your fellow partners, if they end up dying during training they weren't suited for this line of work anyways. So let me say that again, If You end up dying during training You weren't suited for this line of work anyways. Alright let's begin training."

The next several hours were spent doing the hardest training session any of them had done . They ran across roof tops and moving logs. They spared with Mania all ending with being pinned on the ground, sometimes painfully. They spared with one another until they were sore.

They finally got gathered again in front of the leader. Everyone was sweating and tired as the sun was beating down on them.

"Alright, you guys are moving along a bit faster than expected. But one of the most important things to know is being an assassin isn't always about the kill. In fact the kill is usually a small part of the mission the main part is fleeing. If you can't run you die. Behind me is a large obstacle course. You will first run across a field, then swim across a pond, then climb up a wall, then you must run across some burning coals. After you have completed the course you will be able to eat lunch. Oh that reminds me. The first one to cross gets lunch on me and the last one doesn't get lunch. Also a word of caution I don't recommend trying to go around it. Any questions before we begin?"