Oath of the Thief

by Zackery Arbela

A hundred Avexiner lancorails escorted Fenn and Oleyvac through the streets of Kirondaal, clearing a path through the streets while more stood at the sides and behind. Eyes were open and weapons at the ready. Their caution was understandable - by the time the days business was over, Fenn would be carrying an Emperor’s ransom in the handtrucks the mercenaries pushing beside him. That kind of wealth attracted all sorts of unwelcome attention.

  There was an art to corruption, particularly at this level of the game. Each Grand Master thought he’d bought the loyalty of the General, if they learned that he'd taken money from all of them the game would be over. It was made clear to Fenn that this could not happen. Mora himself gave the order...there was no sign of Serana, and the fact that Fenn walked out of the house with his head still attached to his shoulder suggested that whatever revenge she had in mind would wait until after the money was paid.

  So as they approached the mansion belonging to Petro Yussa, the bulk of the mercenaries held back, with only Fenn, Oleyvac and one man pushing a hand truck walking around to a courtyard in the back, where they were let into the opulent house by a doorkeeper with a nasty case of the sniffles. The interior of the house was as opulent as to be expected, with floors of black and white marble laid out in a checkerboard pattern, fine paintings on the walls, and for some reason an inordinate number of clocks, all set to different times and filling the place with a constant chous of ticks and tocks.

  “Grand Master Yussa has an interest in time,” Oleyvac whispered. “Every clock in this place mirrors the time for a different city somewhere in the world.”

  “Is there a reason for this?”

  Oleyvac shrugged. “A wealthy man needs no reason to spend his money. And if he’s an Arcanist, I've learned it’s better not to ask.”

  They were escorted by a servant into what looked like a workshop. Multiple tables were scattered about the place, covered with gears, springs and various other pieces of clockwork. A tapping sound echoed off the walls, and a dog came from behind a table, fixing beady red eyes on the two men and growling. It padded forward, feet tapping on the floor moving in a jerky fashion. The mouth opened, revealing teeth made from steel. A barking sound came out...woof woof woo…

  It stopped in mid bark. A grinding sound came from within its body, followed by a metallic squeal. The ‘dog’ halted, then fell onto its side with a thud.

  “Blast!” Yussa came over, picking the dog up and opening a panel in the side, revealing an intricate mass of gears. “I had it...cough...working this morning...better than a real dog, don't you know! Doesn’t eat, doesn’t shit...cough...all over your floor, and it will rip out the throat of anyone at a command. If only the damned...cough, cough...command gear would stop jamming…”

  Fenn said nothing, waiting for the coughing Arcanist to finish his rant. Finally, with a sigh the man stood, placing a rag over his mouth and engaging in a furious spate of hacking. “Here for the money,” he wheezed out, turning a nearby minion and snapping his fingers twice. The acolyte un turn waved several men forward, who carried between them a heavy wooden chest, setting it on the floor and opening the lid. Inside were many small cloth bags. Fenn picked one up, and saw a mass of gold aurins inside.

  “Thank you,” Oleyvac said. “Lord Mora will remember your generosity. He invites you to a meeting two days from now at the Hall of the Council, where he will present his plan for restoring order to the countryside. All the Grand Masters will be there.”

  “Ah! A perfect opportunity to end matters once and for all,” Yussa said. “If he wishes to keep my friendship,” all traces of the cough suddenly vanishing under his sudden and visible hate, “he can deliver Caspaar Viin to me. I plan...cough…on testing my creations teeth on his exposed belly.”

  With that Yussa dismissed them.

  They left the house, the guards placing the trunk in the handcart. They met the rest of the detail in the streets, where Oleyvac ordered a squad to escort it back to the General’s house.

  “One down,” Oleyvac said. “Heaven grant it goes as easily as the rest.”

  “He wants to disembowel a man with his clockwork dog.” Fenn shook his head. “I don’t call that easy.”

  “We’re not the ones being gutted,” Oleyvac pointed out. “That counts as a success in my book.”

  On they went, the remaining handcarts trundling after them. Two streets way was the home of Caspaar Viin, though in terms of the politics of the city it may as well have been on the far side of the world.

  Viin himself was a gangly fellow with a pockmarked face, bulging eyes and a nasal voice that seethed with a bitter sense of entitlement, a man who still harbored a grudge against the world even after he’d risen to a position of command within it. Perhaps that explained why he chose to meet them in a mock throne room, with a pair of women lounging on the floor by his feet. One of them was sucking on the fingers of his hand as Fenn and Oleyvac were ushered him, the Grand Master of the Hyacinth School shivering in delight, causing Fenn’s gorge to rise.

  “Ah, Lord Mora’s men.” Viin pulled his hand away, and after a moment wiped it on the woman’s blouse. The look she gave him would have splintered glass. “Come for the General’s payment?”

  “Lord Mora is glad for your friendship,” Oleyvac answered as two servants lugged out another chest. When opened a sickly sweet smell came out, suggesting it was being used to store perfumes not too long ago. Gold coins were piled inside, and for a moment Fenn tried to calculate the odds of him getting out of here with the loot, before putting it aside.

  “Thank you, Grand Master,” Oleyvac said, as the trunk was carried out. “Lord Mora is grateful for your friendship...”

  “Then perhaps he can repay me with the contents of that wretch Scanthi’s house,” Viin said, interrupting the captain. “Including his daughter. I am eager to...as they say, be friends with her.” And the look on his face as he said this made Fenn consider whether or not murdering this bastard on the spot would count as a crime.

  “Lord Mora will take it under advisement,” Oleyvac answered tactfully. “But in the meantime, he invites you to a meeting at the Council House two days from now, where he will present his plan to restore order to the countryside…”

  They took their leave. As they walked out, a pair of soldiers dragging the tunk behind them, Fenn heard Viin say to the women, “You did my fingers. Now do my toes…”

  “Degenerate,” Fenn muttered, shuddering.

  Back into the street. The second trunk was sent off with its detail, when Oleyvac and Fenn went with the rest of the detail towards Scanthi’s house. This was some distance away, and it gave Fenn the chance to watch the streets, taking note of who was paying attention. To his complete lack of surprise, that number was many.

  Eyes watched them pass by...street urchins trailing alongside the soldiers, shouting out questions even as their sharp eyes took note of their numbers. Heads looked out from windows, ducking back inside when someone looked up at them. Men lurked in allways, slouching hump-shouldered, wearing coats that bulged out where their coshes and saps were hidden beneath dark ragged coats.

  Movement above. Fenn looked up, where two men squatted on a rooftop, watching the mercenaries go by. One of them stood and waved slightly, arms moving in some sort of pattern. Fenn shifted his gaze, where a man stood on another roof, watching the signal, then turning about and repeating the message, relaying it to another.

  “Apples! Aaaaapplessss!” The hoarse cry cut above the noise in the street. Fenn looked over, where Alyana stood by her cart, filling a housewife’s basket with fruit. She gave no sign of recognizing Fenn, twitching her head slightly to the left. Fenn looked over, and saw Kalen standing by the door of a tavern, a clay cup of wine in one hand. He watched the mercenaries go by, then turned his eyes towards the others watching it.

  Fenn said nothing, gave no sign. His instructions were clear - on the street they were strangers to each other. Like every other thief and opportunist in Kirondaal, they were tracking Oleyvac and
Fenn, for word had gotten out, as Fenn knew it would, that a fortune would be on the street this day. Protected to be sure, by a small army of trained killers...but opportunity might present itself, even to snatch just a part of it, which would more than most of them would see in a lifetime.

  And Fenn had a sense that among them were men in Serrana’s employ, with orders to make sure that he did not make it back to the barracks breathing.

  So, the watchers followed Fenn, while Kalien and the rest of the Red Shadows followed the watchers. Hopefully it would be enough to keep Fenn’s back free of pistol balls or assassins blades.

  Sircha Scanthi, Master of the Rose School, was not at home when they arrived for his contribution, thus they were mercifully spared a glimpse of whatever off obsession that particular worthy embraced. Though a guess could be made - every available nook and cranny in the place was filled with odd, distorted sculptures of dark glass, resembling twisted trees, broken and contorted in the hands of a drunken sculptor.

  “Lightning Glass,” a servant explained while they waited in an antechamber for the money to brought forward (the Grand MAster himself currently at his Schools tower on official business.)

  “Come again?” Fenn asked.

  The servant flicked one of the sculptures, sending out a clear ting. “His lordship likes to travel to places in the hills where sand has been piled high by the wind or the work of quarrymen. He waits until a storm appears, and then uses his Art to summon lightning bolts. Where they strike, these are created.”

  “Your master summons lightning bolts to create works of art?” Fenn shook his head. “Isn’t that dangerous? He might get hit himself.”

  “The Grand Master says true art entails a degree of risk. Though in all the years I've served him, he's never once come to any harm.”

  “What about the people around him?” Oleyvac asked quietly.

  The servant grimaced. “Well...there have been a few accidents. A few years back one of the bolts missed the mark and went into a nearby forest. It hadn’t rained in a goodly while...the good news is that most of the people in the nearest village were away in the fields, and tt was summer, so sleeping outside after the flames died down was an option.”

  “But his lordship wasn't affected,” Fenn said, an edge in his voice.

  “Erm…” The servant suddenly brightened. “Ah, here it is!”

  A chest was brought in, filled with bags of coin. The servant ushered them out of the place without further comment or conversation.

  Back in the street, another squad of soldiers was detailed to escort the chest back to the General’s house. “He summons lightening for art,” Fenn said shaking his head.

  “And sets forests on fire.” Oleyvac looked troubled as well. “Suns and Spirits…only one left, so let’s get it done.”

  To the house of MIro Tamelan they went, which required a more roundabout route. The Grand Master of the School of the Tulip lived in what at first glance an exceedingly modest house hard up against the city walls, some distance from the Square of the Schools and the tower that was the seat of his own power. A small structure of stonebrick with a steep tiled roof, the sort of place a middling tradesman might live with his family. Fenn almost expected to hear sounds of children running around, their voices coming out the windows along with weary calls from their mother to keep the racket down to an acceptable level. Instead they were greeted by a burly fellow in studded leather armor, holding a ironbound club in one hand and looking on the lancorail escort with undisguised contempt. Several others of a similar type were inside, sitting in the rooms or standing guard by the windows, saying nothing as they were escorted into the main room on the ground floor.

  “Down there,” said one of the guards, pitning at an opening in the floor, square shaped and framing a stone stairway headed underground.

  Fenn looked at Oleyvac who shrugged and indicated they should do as commanded

  The stairway went down a good twenty feet, emptying out in a broad chamber lined with brick and supported with stone pillars. Three passages led from it. Dwn one they saw another starway, headed even deeper into the earth, while another ended at an open shaft with a pair of thick cables dangling within. The third left to a room where a gaggle of bored-looking acolytes sat on benches while an arcanist stood before a lectern lecturing on them on some Aethyric theory.

  “Follow me,” said Oleyvac. “I know the way.”

  They took the second set of stairs, which led them a further three levels down. Fenn realized that the School of the Tulip maintained a secret fortress beneath the streets of Kirondaal. The first two levels thronged with Arcanists of levels and standing, engaged in all manner of eldritch workings. Strangely colored lights flickered, loud bangs and sounds that defied description echoed off the walls, barely noticed by the men going about their business. As Fenn passed by the floros, he noticed that every door in the place was made of thick wood and reinforced with enough iron to stop a charging bull in its tracks. Mre that a few showed signs of having been damaged and repaired, a frightening sign.

  They reached the bottom of the stairs, and the lowest level. A long, dimly lit hallway extended before them. Lights flashed ahead, illuminating a smoky chamber beyond. Fenn raised a foot to take a step uot, then halted as...something screamed, the voice echoing down the hallway. The sound was odd, sounding as if it came from immeasurably far away and also right next to his ear at the same some, leaving him feeling queasy and with a sense of fear gathering in the pit of his stomach.

  “He’s breaking free!” a panicked voice shouted.

  “Strike him again,” said another, icily calm.

  A pause, then another scream, carrying on and on, scraping down their nerves and then fading away into silence.

  A moment later the calm voice spoke again. “Excellent.” One word, suffused with a cold satisfaction.

  Oleyvac cleared his throat, the sound echoing down the halls. “Nothing to do with us,” he said, headed down the halway. After a moment, Fenn followed.

  They went down the hallway. To the left a passage branched off leading to the same shaft as before. A wooden box sat inside, the cables running through the top and connecting to an iron ring in the bottom. A single man stood there, his face twisted into a mas grn, his eyes wide and filled with madness. A trickle of foam leaked from the corner of his mouth, even as his arms remained rigid at his side, clenched into a fist. A moment later the cables tightened, and the box inched upward, disappearing up the shaft.

  Fenn stared at this, then at Oleyvac. “I’ve earned not to ask,” was all the Captain said in response.

  They reached the room at the far end. The smoke cleared away by the time arrived, and they entered a round chamber, cut out of the bed rick. Faded symbols were painted on the walls, too faint to make out in detail but whose appearance was enough to inspire a faint sense of dread. A small table sat in the center, which sat an iron pot. Faint wisps of steam floated out from the top, and a look inside revealed a small pie of ash mingled with flecks of quartz crystal.

  A wooden desk was set against a wall, at which Miro Tamelan sat, furiously writing in a battered book. He looked up and nodded in greeting. “I’ll be with you in a moment,” he said, writing down one final notation, the setting the pen aside. He closed the book, and turned about in his chair, still remaining seated. The Grand Master of the Tulip School was dressed plainly this day, his face haggard in the dim light cast by a long candle set on the desk, the only source of light.

  “My lord,” Oleyvac said.

  Tamelan nodded to him, then looked at Fenn. “So,” he said. “You are the one Lady Kiala spoke of.”

  “I...suppose?” Fenn said, a bit confused.

  “You danced with her at the ball. She spoke of it. You definitely left an impression.” Tamelan eyes met his, and what was unsaid was heard even louder. I know who you are...

  “I am flattered,” Fenn responded. Fingers twitched slightly towards the pistol thrust into his belt. “She is...a rema
rkable woman.”

  “There is none like her,” Tamelan replied. “Did you know I introduced her to Lord Mora?”

  Fenn wondered of he should shoot the bastard now, then reckoned on his chances of getting out this pit alive. On the other hand, Oleyvac was here as well, and perhaps the man wouldn’t be eager to murder him in front of that particular witness…

  He became aware of Tamelan saying something. “What was that?”

  “I said, your money is there.” Tamelan pointed at Fenn’s boots.

  Fenn frowned and looked down, then stepped back as he saw a wooden box sitting next to his left foot. It hadn’t been there a moment ago, and he saw no one bring it in. Oleyvac looked down, surprised as well, though he hid it better.

  “Count it if you wish,” Tamelan said, picking up the pen and opening the book. “I would never deny the General what he is due.”

  “Your word is enough, my lord,” Oleyvac responded.

  Tamelan then looked at Fenn. “You are an interesting specimen,” he said. Put your affairs in order, you aren't long for this world…”

  “I am to please,” Fenn answered. A moment of relief...he wasn't going to die here. Although when they got back to the streets, that was another matter entirely…

  As they went back own the hallway, carrying the box between them Oleyvac asked. “What was that all about? Did you insult his mother, or something along those lines? He has a hard eye for you, Fenndar.”

  “I never met the man,” Fenn answered. But I know what he is…

  They paused by the lift The cables still dangled, jering back as forth as the wooden box came back down. “Never liked those things,” Oleyvac said. “Too many ways things could go wrong “Still this box is heavy...shall we risk it?”

  “You can if you want,” Fenn said. “I'm taking the stairs.”

  They emerged from the house some time later with aching arms and numb hands. The lancorails helped them put the box in the last remaining handcart. “Back to the General’s house, sir?” one of them asked.

  “In a moment.” Oleyvac grimaced as he bent backwards, swinging his arms about and performing various stretching exercises to revive strained muscles and weight-numbed fingers.