Among Thieves

by M. J. Kuhn

  Nash pulled back a step, whirling out to the end of his arm. “Sorry to say I am,” she lied. “But don’t feel bad—I’m sure those tricks are fine for seducing your usual tavern girls.”

  “And what are you, then?” Ivan steered them toward the tower again, eyes darting around to see if anyone had noticed them. Nash was pretty sure everyone would be too drunk to notice a stampeding elephant right now, let alone a pair of people slowly maneuvering toward a building.

  “Me?” She raised a hand to her chest, as though offended he would even ask. “I’m the empress of the Three Seas, remember?”

  Ivan let out a short huff of laughter. Their steps pulled them together, and he whispered, “And why would an empress be working for a man like Callum Clem, I wonder?”

  “I don’t work for Cal,” she said.

  “Is that so?” He eyed the Saint brand peeking out from the neckline of her blouse.

  “I like to think of us as business partners,” she said. “I have a ship, which he needs. He has the crescents I need.”

  If Cal Clem hadn’t agreed to take Nash on all those years ago, she would have died like a rat in the gutters of Golden Port, but still… The namestone hidden beneath her clothes suddenly weighed a thousand pounds. Ma would slap her silly if she could see her now.

  “Spoken like true royalty.”

  Nash cleared her throat, forcing a smile as their steps finally carried them into the shadow of the tower. “I may be going to the deepest of the hells, but as long as I’m the richest son of a bitch there, that’s fine by me.”

  Her tone was just a bit too light for the words to ring true. Most people would never have noticed the shift. But Ivan Rezkoye was not most people. His brow creased. She could sense the question forming on his lips.

  “Come on, we need to find the entrance,” Nash said hurriedly, shrugging out of Ivan’s grip to push aside the shrubbery at the base of the tower. The mysterious Quill was here, tucked away in that tower. They needed to find Ryia and Evelyn a way inside. Nash couldn’t believe they had come all this way to steal a pen. The damned thing had better be encrusted with every gem in Thamorr, with all the trouble they were going through to lift it.

  Suddenly Ivan said, “Nash, stop.”

  “What? Why? We’ve almost got it. Then we can head back to the—” Nash broke off as Ivan grabbed her by the collar, hauling her upright.

  “We need to leave. Now.”

  “Why?” Nash asked, straightening her blouse in irritation.

  The blood drained from her face as she followed Ivan’s gaze. That asshole merchant, Elton what’s-his-name. He was speaking urgently with a Disciple. It was still strange to see the Disciple respond like a normal person instead of staring blankly into space like the Adept servants of the mainland. A small part of her perked up strangely at the thought. If Jolie had stayed on as a Disciple, would she still have her mind? Would she still truly be her sister? Nash tucked the thought away.

  “So what?” she finally said. “That ass of a merchant is bitching to the Disciple about something. Why do we care?”

  The last word came out small and hesitant as Elton whatever-the-hells pointed directly toward them.

  “Because that man, Smithe, was suspicious of us from the start,” Ivan said. “I believe your impassioned speech about Adept rights sealed our fate.”

  “I wouldn’t call it a speech,” Nash protested, flushing as Ivan dragged her to the far side of the tower, getting them out of the merchant’s sight.

  “Well, it does not matter what you would call it. We have been made. But this is why Ivan Rezkoye does not ever begin a job without a backup plan.” He yanked at the collar of his coat, releasing a tab of brownish fabric. Working quickly, he undid several clasps at the neck of his short, silver jacket. A moment later the garment was ankle-length and canvas brown.

  “Did that feel good? Referring to yourself in the third person?” Nash asked. “Because you sounded like an idiot.” Ivan ignored her.

  Fear-addled fingers made Nash’s quick-change clumsy and frantic, but the last button was buttoned and the last sash tied in less than thirty seconds. Gone was Missus Veber, Borean merchant woman. Now she wore a knee-length black coat. Her skirt had been hitched down the middle to form trousers. A pair of spectacles and a rumpled hat pulled from a hidden pocket in her coat completed the transformation.

  They slipped from the shadow of the tower, trying to lose themselves amid the drunken masses filling the courtyard.

  “Stagger,” Ivan said.

  Despite the seriousness of the situation, Nash had to bite back a laugh as the usually composed disguise master slid into a drunken limp. She followed suit, grabbing a half-empty wine cup from a nearby table at random and stumbling along, forcing a foolish laugh.

  “Where are they?”

  “They are—do not look,” Ivan said, breaking off as Nash did just that.

  Elton Smithe, the rudest merchant ever to walk the earth, stood a few steps south of the bell tower, his beady eyes scouring the merry crowd. Beside him stood a Disciple. A Senser. Shit. Its nostrils flared as it angled slowly from right to left… searching.

  The Senser’s powers won’t do it any good, Nash reminded herself, snapping her head back around and willing herself to remain calm. The Butcher had said they could only sniff out a physical threat, and so far she seemed to be right. As long as Smithe didn’t recognize them now, they would be able to get back to the ship unscathed. As long as the Disciple didn’t give too much thought to why they had been standing in the shadow of the bell tower, the job could go on as planned.…

  Nash’s stomach dropped. Except they hadn’t found the entrance to the tower. Ryia and Evelyn would have to go in blind. Fantastic.

  She followed Ivan’s lead as he fell in behind a group of Brillish guards making their way toward the exit. Just a few more steps… Nash didn’t release her breath until the creepy arena archway was behind them, nothing but a short walk to the docks in front of them.

  “Well, that went well,” she said.

  “It could have gone worse,” Ivan said darkly.

  “How? We didn’t get what we came for. And now the Disciples are on alert for intruders. How could it have gone worse?”

  Ivan pointed to the right. “We could have ended up like that poor soul.”

  Nash looked where he pointed, over the hills leading north. A blue-robed figure dragged a skinny shadow away from the docks and up the path leading to the Guildmaster’s manor. Some sorry wretch headed for the infamous torture cells. Nash narrowed her eyes as that pair entered a pool of moonlight, the skinny shadow’s features suddenly visible. Was that…? She pulled off her false spectacles for a better look. Dark, curly hair. Long, lanky limbs. There was no mistaking it.

  “Ivan… that’s Tristan.”

  22

  RYIA

  Ryia curled her toes as the bulky silhouette lurched into the cargo hold. He held a lantern in one hand, throwing long arcs of golden light over the deck. The glittery costumes lining the hull burst into full color, reflecting the flickering light so brightly it felt like someone had devoured the sun and retched it up inside the hold.

  “Inventory rations twice a day,” he said in a mocking falsetto. “The fuck does she think is gonna happen to ’em between dinner and breakfast?”

  Checking rations? So no alarm had been raised. Her hatchets sagged to her sides as she relaxed. Hopefully he was quick about it so she could get this business over with and find Tristan. The plan was still on track.

  Then the man caught sight of the costume she had dropped on the floor and the still-wet boot print beside it. His free hand slipped to the scimitar at his belt.

  “Who’s there?”

  Shit. She leapt from behind a mountain of garish shoes, spinning her right-hand hatchet in her palm, aiming for the man’s throat. Quick and silent, just like always. The bit was a hairsbreadth from his flesh when the unthinkable happened.

  She hesitated.

 
Her hand wavered uncertainly as a single word curled through her mind. A clawing, scratching rat trapped inside her skull.

  Monster.

  Ryia stepped backward, shaking her head to clear it. Of all the moments to grow a conscience, now was really not the time.

  The man dropped his lantern. It landed with a clatter on the deck but didn’t break. He clumsily yanked his blade free of its scabbard, severing his belt in two in the process. Oh, this would be too easy. He had no idea what he was doing with that thing. She rolled forward, ducking between his legs and springing to her feet behind him. She aimed her left-hand hatchet toward his neck, cutting toward some crucial veins.…

  Monster.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Ryia hissed to herself, breathless as she hesitated for a second time. She probably had only seconds before this idiot thought to shout for help. Then it would all be over. No costumes. No Quill. No freedom.

  The voice taunted her again as she swung under the man’s sloppy guard, but this time she was ready for it. She pulled back at the last second, bringing her left hand around and clocking the man solidly on the back of the head. He dropped like an anchor, thudding to the deck beside his still-flickering lantern.

  Ryia stuffed a pair of the bejeweled costumes down the front of her shirt, turning to leave. She rolled her eyes, whirling back around as she remembered why Edale’s Worst Swordsman had come to check the cargo hold in the first place. Any captain checking rations twice a day might be suspicious enough to notice the missing costumes, even if they were just extras.

  She groaned, head lolling back as she knelt beside the senseless man.

  “You couldn’t make this easy for me, could you?” she asked, grabbing his feet and pressing one ear to the hatch.

  Wet boot prints would dry, but bodies had an annoying habit of staying exactly where they were least convenient. At least the dead ones couldn’t spout any stories. She sniffed the air. Clear.

  Hearing nothing on the other side, Ryia shouldered the hatch open and unceremoniously dumped the man beneath a swaying hammock, setting the lantern down beside him. Now for the finishing touches.

  She rooted around in the man’s pockets until she found the jingle of coins. She walked a silver half across her fingers. “You’re overpaid, my friend.”

  A half-empty wine bottle lay on the floor a few steps away. She popped the cork free and dribbled a few drops onto his shirt before stuffing the bottle under his arm. He might be telling some tales when he woke up, but who the hell would believe a drunken sailor who’d clearly gambled away his last silver?

  With that, Ryia slipped above deck. She kept to the shadows, sneaking past half a dozen crew members who were too distracted by their duties to spare a look over their shoulder. The ship’s captain shouted orders from the bow as Ryia leapt over the rail near the stern, barely skimming the gangway as she soared back onto the docks.

  What had happened back there? She ran a hand over her hood as her heart rate began to slow. Monster. It was something she already knew. Something she had never let bother her before, but honorable Captain Evelyn Linley had gotten into her head.

  Her gut leapt into her throat once again as uneven footsteps sounded to her left. She dove for her axes, hoping to Felice she would have the brains to actually use them this time, then sagged with relief as the figure emerged from the shadows.

  Evelyn.

  “You,” Ryia said sourly.

  “Is that the thanks I can expect every time I risk my arse to save yours?” Evelyn asked.

  “Yep.”

  Evelyn rolled her eyes. “Did you get the disguises?”

  “No, Captain. The dancers got the best of me.”

  “… And?” Evelyn asked hesitantly.

  Ryia suppressed a smile at the new bruise Evelyn was sporting on her chin. “No feathers.” Her amusement died suddenly as she remembered why the captain had had to pick her little fight in the first place. “Still no sign of Tristan?”

  Evelyn shook her head, looking troubled.

  “Well, shit,” Ryia said. That couldn’t be good. But there was nothing they could do. Nothing but make their way back to The Hardship, wait for Nash and Ivan, and hope he turned up.

  The short walk over the docks passed in anxious silence. They reached the ship, and Ryia froze halfway across the gangway when she saw that Nash and Ivan were already aboard.

  “Party end early?” she asked hopefully, striding forward onto the deck.

  “For us it did,” Nash said glumly.

  “I take it you have bad news, then?” Evelyn asked, slipping aboard behind Ryia.

  Nash nodded. “We were almost made. Had to split. You’re going in blind tomorrow.”

  “Fucking fantastic,” said Ryia. “We have bad news too. We lost Tristan.”

  “We know,” said Nash.

  Ryia’s stomach dropped.

  “What do you mean you know?” asked Evelyn.

  “You saw him,” Ryia guessed.

  Nash sighed. “We saw him.”

  “Where?”

  But she already knew.

  “They were taking him to the manor,” Ivan said quietly, confirming her suspicions. No need to ask who “they” were. The Disciples. Who else could it be?

  “How did he get caught?” Nash asked.

  “I don’t know,” Ryia said. “The little runt went off to set the distraction and never came back.”

  “Schiss,” Ivan swore. “He must have been caught picking pockets. The Guildmaster does not tolerate theft.”

  “You don’t say,” Ryia said sarcastically. If torture and death were the penalty for a little pickpocketing, she didn’t even want to know what punishment would greet them if they were caught stealing the Quill.

  “Not helping, Butcher,” Evelyn said. After a pause, the captain said, “So how are we going to get him back?”

  The question caught Ryia off guard. “What do you mean ‘get him back’?” she asked.

  Ivan pulled out the stack of maps she and Evelyn had stolen back in Carrowwick, leafing through them until he found the blueprint of the Guildmaster’s manor. Ryia laughed incredulously.

  “He’s not locked up in some Kestrel Crown back room. He is in the Guildmaster’s dungeon,” Ryia continued. “There are only four of us. There are at least two hundred Disciples on this goddess-forsaken island. I don’t think getting him back is an option.”

  “So you’d rather leave him here to die?” Evelyn snapped. “Murder, theft, now betrayal? You really are an honorless thug, aren’t you?”

  “I…” Ryia broke off, guilt swirling in the pit of her stomach for the third time tonight. What was the point? She was planning to betray them all anyway, but she had never intended for any of them to get killed. She pinched the bridge of her nose. This was why it was dangerous to stay with one crew for too long—she was going soft. “Damn it.” She snatched the blueprints from Ivan’s hands. “Let’s figure out how to rescue the little twerp.”

  23

  EVELYN

  Evelyn stood belowdecks, covering her telltale freckles with a suffocating layer of powder and pulling on the worst outfit she had ever had the misfortune to wear: a thin, bejeweled shirt, bracelets that jingled louder than an alarm bell, and a fluttering skirt that skimmed her ankles. At least Ivan had been able to sew in some trousers, but they were so tight Evelyn felt like she was pressing herself into sausage casing.

  “You have no idea where the entrance is? Or how it’s secured?”

  “None,” Nash said, slouched on the far side of the hold. “We barely got within spitting distance of the tower before all hell broke loose.”

  “We were fortunate to spot the guards before they noticed our interest in the tower,” Ivan said as he swirled half a dozen different colors onto Nash’s face. “With luck, they will not have extra Disciples posted there today.”

  “With luck?” the Butcher called from the deck. “If you sons of bitches do your jobs right, the Disciples won’t have their ey
es on the tower at all.”

  “Yes, yes. If we do our jobs right, the Disciples should lose sight of many things,” Ivan said darkly.

  He was referring to the dungeon, of course. After last night’s lengthy discussion, they had realized stealing the Quill and rescuing Tristan each required a distraction. Why not use the same distraction for both?

  That meant that their plans were largely unchanged. Well, aside from the fact that Nash and Ivan were now one man short in their task of creating that critical distraction. And the fact that Evelyn and the Butcher had no idea how to get inside the bell tower to steal the Quill. And the fact that Nash now had the additional suicide mission of breaking into the Guildmaster’s prison. And they all had the additional task of finding Nash again before they could get off this ruddy island. And that was assuming the Guildmaster hadn’t yet tortured Tristan, forcing him to spill all their plans and ruin the whole bloody mission.

  Okay, fine. Their plans had changed quite a lot.

  “We’ll get the job done,” Nash said, ducking away from Ivan as he leaned forward to blend one last smear of paint into her cheek. “And after I risk my ass to get into that dungeon, you lot had better not leave me here.”

  “Of course, we can’t leave without you,” Ryia called down from the deck.

  Nash touched a hand to her chest. “I’m honored.”

  “I just meant we can’t leave without you because someone’s got to sail us out of here.”

  “There it is,” Nash said, pulling on the coat Ivan had sewn her last night. Its pockets were bulging, filled to the brim with their secret weapon. The smuggler prodded one gingerly, looking nervous. Evelyn didn’t blame her.

  “All right, well, first things first, let’s focus on getting into that arena today without getting caught, hmm?” Evelyn said. “Then we can worry about the rest.”

  “Easy for you to say,” Nash said. She took a swig from a nearby wine bottle and grabbed the blueprints of the Guildmaster’s manor. “Are we ready?” she asked, folding the parchment into a tiny square and tucking it into her pocket.