"As it turns out, I met their alpha recently," said Heiji. "I think we can work somethin' out. Question is what we want to go for. It might be a good idea to just set up a basic nonaggression pact. After all, from their perspective, we're mostly creatures of legend. They have no real reason to trust us past convenience's sake."

For now, anyway.

"I've also asked one of the Hillingdon clan to gauge interest for a similar agreement on their end. They're on the other side of the map, but they're also rather conspicuously surrounded by Redbright, one way or the other. I'm sure that fact hasn't escaped them."