The Thief of Dunmire and the Tear of Astra (The League of Sinister Means Book 1)

by H. K. MacTavish

  I take their orders and poke around a bit. Most of the rooms appear to be claimed by someone. No storeroom on this floor. The second floor still looks like the best way up. I finish taking the orders of any others I find but half of the rooms are empty with the heroes somewhere else. Time to head upstairs.

  I make my way up the narrow stairwell, past a couple of guards who don’t bother asking me any questions, and climb to the fourth floor where I find two more guards in shining armor and red tunics standing about. They don’t bother asking me if I should be there or not. I had to get past the other guards down below and as a slender girl, clearly dressed as a peasant, I am certainly not a threat to them.

  I look around and see a narrow hall with a few guards stationed in the corners but none right by any of the doors. Is there another story to this keep? There can’t be. I know there are only four floors. Maybe there isn’t anything to guard here. The doors all look the same as the ones below. It’s the tapestries, and the flowers on little tables at the end of the halls that make this floor seem more, regal, somehow.

  Well, this is the highest floor in the keep. The crown jewels and the Tear of Astra are here. Somewhere. Or at least they will be.

  I poke my head into the first door on the left. No one is there. It looks as if it is a study of some kind, small and narrow. I go to the door on the right…

  “Hold it,” a guard says. Is that something they are all trained to say?

  “I’m just….”

  “No one is allowed in there.”

  “Oh. Is that someone’s bedroom?” I ask.

  It’s good to try and get as much information as possible.

  “It is,” the guard says to me. “And it is unoccupied right now.”

  “All right,” I say.

  I could ask for directions but I’ll find out more if I explore on my own.

  I proceed to the next door on the right and look at the guard by the door. He just shakes his head no.

  “Another unoccupied bedroom?” I ask.

  The guard nods. He is taking all the fun out of snooping.

  I go to the next door and the guard steps towards me. Oh, what…

  He knocks on the door for me.

  “Come in,” a voice calls out.

  I step in and I see a younger man, a little overweight, cleaning up a bedroom.

  “Ah, hello there,” the man says. A woman’s perfume is in the air. This man is a noble and he is cleaning up after himself so that there are fewer questions. There are a few rings on his hand. I bet one of them is a wedding ring and the perfume I smell is not his wife’s.

  “I’m from the kitchen. Supper will be in a few hours. I am taking orders for something to eat in the meantime,” I say.

  “Ah. Well, a bottle of wine and some cheese will be nice. And some apples.”

  “Wine. Cheese. Apples. I have it. Someone will be up in a little bit,” I say. I look around the room quickly and notice that there is no place in here for a woman to be hiding. No closet, no large pieces of furniture stuck out from the wall, and no balcony. Nothing. There is either a secret passage or she left before I arrived on this floor.

  “Thanks,” the man says. I leave, closing the door behind me.

  “Did a woman leave already?” I ask. Let’s see if the guard likes to gossip.

  “A few minutes ago,” the guard assisting me says. “She went downstairs.”

  He is looking to a single doorway. I bet behind that are some stairs that lead to the feast hall I saw on the first floor.

  “I won’t look for her then,” I say. He’s too blunt to be interested in gossip. I’ll just move on to the next door.

  “There is only one room you need to bother with,” the guard says.

  Ah, he’s helping me. Drats!

  “What room is that?” I ask.

  “Down the hall to the left. The one guarded,” the guard says, pointing to the door he means. There are two guards standing by the door here. Someone important is inside.

  “Thank you,” I say. I walk down the hall.

  Now, I know what you are probably thinking. I’m going through all this work when I could just try and seduce Prince Blaise or someone close to him and swipe the Tear of Astra while they’re asleep. One thing I will not do is sleep to get my way through life. Oh I know, it opens doors when I open my…treasures. But it’s beneath me!

  One of the guards knocks on the door as I approach. I hear some shuffling on the other side. More sex? God, do these heroes do anything else? They eat, sleep, and, well, sleep. Well, not me! I have skills! I don’t need to…

  The door opens and oh, my, god, is he handsome. Chiseled face with deep blue eyes, long blonde hair, bulging muscles and bulging…everything. He is perfect below the waist and above it, front and back.

  “Hi. I, um…food. I’m here with food. Not food. I’m taking orders.”

  Damn it! Don’t you fall for his handsome good looks Corvina! You’re better than this! Get it together!

  “Another serving girl taken in with Prince Blaise?” a voice calls out from the back room. He is, all right. He’s in shape and not ugly. Well, without Blaise I’m sure he’s the most handsome man in any room, but whoever Blaise’s friend is, he’s second by far standing next to Blaise.

  “Be nice,” Blaise says.

  “Supper won’t be for a while,” I say. Composure! At last!

  “What is available?” Blaise asks.

  “For you, anything,” I say.

  Good job. That didn’t sound slutty at all Corvina.

  “He’s taken, I’m afraid,” the voice behind Blaise calls out with a laugh. “Me on the other hand…”

  “Easy Derrick,” Blaise says.

  “I only meant that, as royalty, you can ask for anything you want,” I say.

  Good Corvina. Nice. That didn’t sound sexual at all. Can I talk today? Like, at all?

  “Just bring us some cheese, wine, and fruit,” Blaise said.

  “I will. Someone will be up shortly,” I say. I turn and look down the hall.

  “There isn’t anyone else up here,” Blaise says.

  “Yeah, only thing down there are the family jewels,” Derrick says. Blaise turns to Derrick.

  “Derrick.”

  “The real ones,” Derrick corrects himself. “Well, not that Blaise doesn’t have real royal jewels.”

  “Derrick…” Blaise warns.

  “Easy, old friend,” Derrick says, raising his hands.

  “They must be heavily guarded,” I say.

  “Don’t worry,” Blaise says. “Not even the Thief of Dunmire can get close to them.”

  “That’s good news,” I say.

  “Tell me your secret,” Derrick says as the door closes. “How can I get the eyes of pretty girls like you?”

  Get better parents.

  Well, time for me to head back. Just around that corner is the vault. The treasure room! The jewels, including the Tear of Astra, all for the taking! Well, once someone puts them in there.

  “Go ahead and take a look,” the guard says to me.

  He caught me looking.

  “It’s all right?” I ask.

  “See how well it’s protected,” the guard says to me.

  I creep to the edge of the hall and peer around the corner.

  “Wow,” I say. I don’t have to fake my surprise either.

  Four guards, none of them any larger than the others inside the keep. Likely they are all part of the same guard rotation. The door looks new. I can see some dust on the floor from when they recently installed the new door. The door is iron or steel. I can’t see from here but it doesn’t matter. I can’t break it open even if it was just iron reinforced oak. The locks on the other hand are almost certainly those pick proof monstrosities. Which aren’t actually pick proof, just pick infuriating. And dangerous because no one is going to put in a metal door with a pick proof lock and not trap it.

  “No getting in from this side or the other,” the guard says.
r />   “Other?” I ask.

  My heart skips a beat. What do you mean, not the other side?

  “The windows are all barred and reinforced. It would take a thief weeks to file through them.”

  And if a thief doesn’t file through those bars?

  “Wow, such a secure room,” I say, faking my enthusiasm.

  Well, this isn’t good news. Not completely unexpected, if I’m being honest. There is a reason why the plan always had me scaling the side of a keep. I had hoped that they wouldn’t assume that a window four stories tall would be accessible. It would make my job easier, and I like easy work.

  “The crown jewels aren’t even in there,” the other guard says.

  Yeah, they’re arriving with the king, aren’t they? I had figured as much. I hoped to be pleasantly surprised that Blaise had stored the royal jewels in his keep ahead of his father arriving. Then I could act sooner and get my hands on that precious Tear of Astra.

  “They arrive with the king tomorrow,” the first guard says.

  Yup. Figured.

  “Is the Tear of Astra in there?” I ask.

  The guards look at me suspiciously. What’s wrong about that? It’s not illegal to mention the Tear of Astra.

  “What do you know about that?” the first guard asks.

  What? I thought it was common knowledge. What if it isn’t? Oh shit! Oh my god! I’m frozen! What would my sister do?

  “Well…it’s just…so romantic! The prince is giving it to his bride to be!”

  She gets all mushy over that romantic slush. I’ll just have to do my best job imitating her.

  “Yeah, well, I guess it is romantic,” the second guard says.

  “It’s so storybook isn’t it? The prince giving his true love that…” Bauble? Trinket? “…precious necklace.” Not a better description Corvina.

  “The Tear of Astra isn’t even in there,” the first guard says.

  Well I had hoped it would be. So, wait, they have a vault with nothing in it? Guarded by four men with nothing in it?

  “Where is it?” I ask.

  “No one but Blaise knows that,” the first guard says.

  And our heist has crashed off onto the side of the road. You can’t steal something if you don’t know where it is.

  “Wouldn’t that room be the best room to keep the Tear of Astra?” I ask.

  “I heard the prince arguing against just that same point,” the first guard says.

  “He says it is too obvious,” the second guard says.

  “So, if no one else knows where the Tear of Astra is, then a thief wouldn’t know either,” I say.

  “That’s the reasoning,” the first guard says.

  “Interesting,” I say.

  It’s a disaster! King Stavros and Queen Iona arrive tomorrow. I had planned on getting into that room and getting out as quick as I can. Now I don’t know where the Tear of Astra is! Why would you build this fortress of a room and not hide the Tear of Astra there? I mean, yeah, I can break into it and take whatever I want, but still! It’s supposed to be there!

  “I should get going,” I say. We say our goodbyes and I walk back down to the kitchen with the notes of who wants what in hand. I have some thinking to do and some plans to make.

  Momentary Delays

  I’ve gotten to know a lot about Jennifer. She has a husband named Michael outside the city limits. The pay here is good she says. Good for a peasant. She has no idea just how much money Prince Blaise has at his disposal. I try to tell her the worth of something like the Tear of Astra to her, a bauble that he is giving away that could purchase a small kingdom.

  She says it’s so romantic.

  I scoff. That’s not the point I was making! I mean, she’s right, it is romantic and part of me wants to squeal like a girl, like Jennifer is on the verge of doing, when I pull myself back.

  Convincing her isn’t important. Keeping her as a friend is important. I bet my sister would argue with Jennifer about how it isn’t romantic to the point of making Jennifer an enemy. My sister has constantly had trouble making friends her whole life, for obvious reasons to everyone but her at times. It has always been one of my strengths; that and building tools and tying knots. We all have our strengths.

  I smile and tell Jennifer it is romantic to be given something like the Tear of Astra.

  “It is too bad we can’t see it,” she says.

  “You think we could sneak a peek at it?”

  “Oh! We couldn’t do that! It’s locked away somewhere,” she says.

  “But when it is given…”

  “Only the king’s own servants will be present. We will be excluded from the ceremony,” Jennifer says.

  I look back and see the old matron, Lady Winters, leaving the floor.

  “I wanted to thank you again. For earlier,” Jennifer says.

  What is she going on about now?

  “What do you mean?” I ask. Jennifer looks at me and shakes her head.

  “It is better to keep it a secret. You are really nice to me,” Jennifer says.

  What? I don’t even…I should just play along.

  “Of course,” I say, winking. Jennifer looks around and has noticed that Lady Winters is gone.

  “Is it supper time for us?” Jennifer asks.

  “Old Lady Winters isn’t around to tell us no, now is she?” I smile gleefully at my new friend.

  “No,” Jennifer says with a smile.

  I take her by the hand and guide her from the bedrooms on the second floor to the stairwell. We go down to the first floor where everyone is congregating. There are so many people gathered, from peasants to knights to a few lords and ladies pointing and dictating to their chosen servants while a few heroes are just standing about watching the commotion. I recognize a few of them. Does Blaise think having so many heroes about will protect his Tear of Astra from me?

  Many of these are new arrivals. I can see young men struggling with chests and other assorted pieces of luggage. I catch at least one young man’s eyes fill with disappointment at seeing the stairs he has to climb. I’m glad I’m a girl at times like these. I would hate to have to do that kind of manual labor.

  I look at the various heads of people that look rich and important. Still no king. We must contend with Prince Blaise I guess.

  “Look, there is Lord Kincaid,” Jennifer says. A proud man with a puffed out chest and a full red bread, he looks quite regal and lordly in his fine suit of armor. I heard stories about how he humiliates thieves in order to get them to see the error of their ways.

  “I see him,” I say. My giddiness evaporates at seeing a thief hunter here. I may have to do something about him before he decides to do something to me.

  “Did you hear about his latest quest?”

  God no! I don’t need a preamble to how the rest of my week is going to go. No matter how well a story teller Jennifer is I won’t be able to stop putting myself into her story as the thief. But, I can’t tell her no; I need friends.

  “I did not,” I reply as we make our way through the crowd.

  “He caught a thief trying to steal some coins from a poor temple.”

  Never, ever, steal from someone as poor as you. You’ll have no friends in the world. If you steal from the rich, the poor won’t give a shit. If they really hate the rich person you stole from they may even help you. This thief is already an idiot.

  “Was it a well known thief?” I ask.

  “You mean like the Thief of Dunmire?” Jennifer asks.

  Not specifically…

  “Maybe,” I say with a smile.

  “No, it wasn’t the Thief of Dunmire. It was just some young thief that thought she could take something that wasn’t hers.”

  She?

  “She?” I ask. I have to know if my mind is playing tricks or not.

  “Some women are villains you know,” Jennifer says.

  Successful ones.

  “So…what did Kincaid do to this woman?” I ask. I almost called her a
poor woman. This thief is not you Mary.

  “Well, he dragged her to the center of town the next day, pulled her pants down, and publically spanked her.”

  The stuck up, chauvinistic, pig! Bet he felt really good about himself, spanking her like that in front of everyone. The big man everyone gets to talk about.

  “To treat a woman like that?” I ask.

  “She was a thief,” Jennifer says.

  “And he just pulls her pants down in front of a crowd and spanks her?” I ask.

  “Kincaid does it because thieves didn’t have their parents scold them when they were younger. So he scolds them now,” Jennifer says. She eyes me and…do I look upset? I shouldn’t. Kincaid isn’t going to be doing this to you Mary. I need Jennifer as a friend and I shouldn’t argue with her about it.

  Jennifer turns her eyes to Kincaid. “But he was an ass for doing that.”

  Exactly! Wait…did she do that to make me happy? Have we grown that close?

  “I thought heroes were all about upholding the law,” I say.

  “Well, he was permitted to exercise justice to her…”

  “The next day? Without a trial?”

  “I’m sure the story has gained some legs Mary,” Jennifer says. “I’m sure that in reality there was a trial and Kincaid was permitted to exercise justice.”

  “Still…”

  “It’s just a story,” Jennifer says with a laugh.

  “I know,” I say. Don’t get angry at her Mary. You need her as a friend. If I say it enough times I won’t say something stupid to jeopardize my friendship with Jennifer. Focus Mary!

  “People like stories were a villain gets their comeuppance,” Jennifer says patting me on the shoulder.

  As a villain, no, those are awful stories.

  “I suppose. Still, seeing him there makes it sound more like news than a story,” I say.

  “Perhaps,” Jennifer says. “He’s a good man.”