"That's him."
Percy recognised the other person as the one who had chased him in the alley while he was spying on Harris.
Lyro and Percy stayed completely silent. They watched the two figures circle the garden, careful not to step on the trash scattered across the ground, making their way toward the middle.
One of them flicked his fingers. He immediately became harder to notice, he also touched the other person making him harder to notice too.
The moonlight wasn't enough to properly illuminate either of them, and what little light there was seemed to struggle reaching that part of the garden at all.
Lyro nudged Percy. Percy looked at him and Lyro seemed to gauge that he had calmed down enough. He released his grip on Percy's shoulder and gave him a stern look. Percy nodded.
Lyro leaned in and whispered.
"Use your Oath on one of them. It should help cancel out whatever ability they're using."
Percy understood and considered the two figures. He decided against using it on the one he had seen before, the one who had chased him.
Even though enough time had passed to call him a stranger, he had only seen the man's face for a couple of seconds back then ,but didn't want to risk it not working properly.
He used it on the other one instead. The one who had flicked his fingers and gone harder to notice.
The man hadn't disappeared completely. He had simply become difficult to see clearly, an ability Lyro had once mentioned belonged to something called a Shade.
Percy focused his Oath on him and outlines began appearing. Faint at first. He couldn't see the man's details the way he had with Lyro earlier, the distance was too great for that, but enough came through.
A broad nose. Thick eyebrows. Deep brown eyes. His face wasn't symmetrical, the left side noticeably larger than the right. A mole sat on his neck.
After taking in the details, Percy felt something shift inside him. A warmth spreading through his chest.
He looked at Lyro and whispered, asking if the warmth meant his Oath was complete.
Lyro nodded , his eyes on the blurry two .
Percy whispered once more, asking if he could use his ability now that the Oath was fulfilled.
Lyro thought about it for a moment.
"Only for emergencies," he said quietly. "Don't use it now. Just observe."
Even Lyro didn't seem willing to risk approaching the two men to find out who they were.
But suddenly a strange sensation crawled across Percy's scalp.
He looked around, trying to place it. There was no urge to walk toward it, which was unusual, but the sensation itself felt familiar.
Since it was the same kind he had felt once before, toward a certain wooden box.
He located the source quickly. It was close. Closer than he expected.
Lyro had pulled a pendant out from under his shirt and was holding it in his palm. Percy could see it vibrating faintly.
"An artifact."
He had suspected something like this might exist. It hadn't made sense for the wooden box to be the only object of its kind in the world. Now he had confirmation.
Lyro clutched the pendant, his eyes gone hazy.
"Something that lets him see through their disguise, maybe."
Lyro nudged him.
"Observe carefully. Tell me what they're doing."
Percy's eyes went wide. "What the hell?!"
Lyro hadn't whispered. He had spoken at a normal volume.
Percy panicked, glancing toward the two figures, but they hadn't reacted at all.
"Don't worry," Lyro said, still not bothering to lower his voice. "They won't hear us."
Percy looked at the pendant and let out a breath. Still, he decided to play it safe.
"You're not in your Haunted state," he asked with a bewildered expression. "How are you doing that?"
"I don't have an ability that silences voices," Lyro replied his eyes still fixed at the direction of the two.
Percy kept his confused expression up.
"You'll find out later," Lyro said. "Just tell me what they're doing."
Percy nodded and turned his attention back to the two men.
"They're digging."
The one he recognised from the alley was working a small shovel into the ground. After a few moments he stopped, and the second man pulled out a metal case.
Percy watched closely.
The moment the case opened, the sensation hit him again.
"Another artifact?"
A faint red glow came from inside. Something that looked like a finger.
"What the fuck!"
The man set it into the hole and covered it, smoothing the dirt over carefully to match the surrounding ground.
He grabbed a handful of trash from nearby and scattered it across the disturbed soil to hide the edges.
The two men nodded to each other and climbed back over the wall they had come from.
A few minutes passed in silence.
Percy told Lyro of what they had burried under the ground to which Lyro seemed a bit confused and wary towards .
Lyro began turning hazy. He stayed still for a moment .
"You're certain," he said. "You saw them bury a finger there?"
"Yes," Percy said.
Lyro's brows furrowed. He stood there a while longer before finally rising and walking toward the spot where they had dug.
Lyro stood near the spot, both hands pressed to the ground, eyes closed. A few seconds passed before he opened them again, his brows visibly tense.
" still don't sense anything." Lyro thought as he stood up.
Percy approached him from behind and asked.
"Should we take it out?"
"Yes," Lyro said. "I don't know what their purpose was, but it can't be anything good."
"Waiting for others from the eclipse syndicate to arrive and investigate it would take too much time and could make things worse, if whatever this thing burried underground is a kind of an object that would do harm."
Percy looked around at the trash scattered across the garden from their own work earlier.
"Our actions aren't exactly good either."