Rules for Thieves

by Alexandra Ott

  I don’t have much time, but changing my clothes is still a good idea. No one will question a girl dressed as a maid walking around the servants’ quarters. And Ariannorah’s probably given the guards a description of what I’m wearing. Plus, I’m covered in hedge and dirt and can’t come up with a better explanation than the one I gave Touzel.

  Right, Touzel’s seen me too, and someone will find him in that closet soon, probably, and he’ll be telling everyone about the maniac who locked him up. Time to change.

  I turn away and keep running down the hall.

  Eventually I find a door that takes me outside. On this side of the house, it’s a short walk to the massive circle drive where all the carriages are waiting. I find ours without too much trouble and hurry over to Jiavar.

  “What happened?” she asks immediately. “Where’s Beck?”

  “Long story.” I wrench open the carriage door and climb in. I glance through the front window at Jiavar, who tenses. Does she think I’m trying to leave Beck behind? “I have to change. Beck’s been locked up in one of the servant’s rooms. I’m going to put on my servant disguise and go get him.”

  “How did this happen?” There’s no mistaking her tone now. She blames this on me.

  “This stupid ball is crawling with guards. And Lady Atherton has a bratty daughter who attacked me right when I was trying to help Beck. I barely got away.”

  Jiavar’s silence is accusatory.

  I lift up the seat cushion, revealing the hollow space where Beck hid our extra clothes. I yank the soiled red dress off over my head and stuff it inside, followed by several other layers of skirt. Finally I can breathe. Down to only a shift, I glance at my right arm again. In just the few hours that have passed since I last looked at it, the dark lines have progressed even farther. Thick streaks of black race from my elbow to my shoulder, and veins of it curl and twist around my collarbone. Luckily Olleen remembered what Beck said about giving me a dress with sleeves, and included some cleaning gloves to hide my hands. But there’s nothing I can do about the pain, which has only gotten worse since Ariannorah tackled me. If it keeps going like this, I might not be able to move my arm anymore.

  I throw the maid’s dress over my head and button it. It’s a plain cotton gown the color of dirt. An apron, the gloves, and a simple pair of shoes complete the look. At the last minute I remember to grab Mead’s lock picking tools from the discarded dress and slip them into my pocket. Then I rub at my face with one of the skirts, trying to get the makeup off. There’s no time to fix my hair, so I leave it up. When everything’s stuffed under the seat, I replace the cushion and hop out of the carriage.

  “I heard Dearborn say Beck will be moved at dawn,” I tell Jiavar. “So if we’re not back by then, you can leave.”

  “I’ll wait for both of you at the Miagnar Gardens. There are usually many thilastri there, so I won’t be noticed. When is the deadline for the trial?”

  “The first.”

  “I will wait until the second, then, just in case.”

  I don’t think she was instructed to do this. She can return to the Guild any time she likes. She doesn’t have to help us.

  “Thank you,” I say. It doesn’t seem like enough. But I’m pretty sure she’s not doing it for me, anyway. I’m not the one she wants to bring back to the Guild.

  “Go,” she says. “Hurry.”

  I take her advice and run.

  • • •

  Back inside the house, I walk slowly through the servants’ halls, trying to act casual. I don’t know which room Beck’s in, of course, but it will be guarded, so I’ll figure it out easily enough. My only concern is running into Touzel. What if he managed to free himself from the closet and is roaming the halls? What if he recognizes me? The distract-shove-and-run trick is the kind of thing that only works once. But maybe it will work on whoever is guarding Beck.

  I turn a corner and my heart stops. A guard in blue is leaning against a door. There’s a sword at his waist, and I have no doubt he’s got other weapons hidden away. I sort of hope he’s the guard who threw a knife at me earlier. Maybe that was his only knife. And I’ll get some satisfaction from shoving him into a closet.

  But as I inch closer, it’s obvious he’s too big to be shoved into a closet. I need a new plan.

  He notices me, his eyes locking on my face. I try to fake an innocent look, but I’ve never been good at it. Oh God.

  I’m five feet away. The guard speaks. “What’s your business here?”

  I remember what Dearborn said about Lady Atherton being with healers, and the lie gushes out. “Baron Dearborn sent me to see to an unconscious prisoner?” I try to say it questioningly, like it’s doubtful that there’s any such prisoner. “I’m a healer.”

  He whistles, loud and sharp, and to my left everything explodes. Something slams into my left side, and I collide with the wall on my right. Everything spins. Blue blurs across my vision as a second guard, emerging from the smoke on my left, shoves me face-down on the floor. I breathe in the smell of the rug—lint and bleach and mold. Cold metal snaps against my wrists as the guard chains them behind my back.

  “What’d she say?” someone right above me says. His voice is muffled, like we’re separated by glass.

  “Said she was a healer,” another guard says, even more muffled. “But the healer’s already been here.”

  A hand grabs my chained wrists and pulls. “Stand up!”

  Everything hurts so bad my eyes water, but I force myself to stand. Must get to Beck. Focus. Find him.

  I wrench away from the guard, struggling with everything I have, running to the door that contains Beck—

  Something hard connects with my head, and I hear a distant scream as everything goes black.

  Chapter Seventeen

  My head hurts. I open my eyes slowly, not sure what I’m going to see. I don’t remember where I am. . . .

  “Alli.”

  Beck’s voice brings the memories flooding back—the ball, his capture, the guards . . . and Ariannorah getting the necklace from me. “Are you okay?”

  I close my eyes, trying to pinpoint the pain. “My head hurts.” And my whole left side is sore, but manageable. My right arm, on the other hand, is searing with pain from the shoulder down. I wiggle one finger experimentally and wince; it feels like I’ve been stabbed.

  “They hit you pretty hard with something,” he says. “When you didn’t wake up, I tried to heal it as best I could, but like I said, I don’t have much healing magic—it’s pretty useless. I used most of it to heal myself before you got here, since the healer they sent wasn’t much help, and then I spent the rest trying to wake you up. . . .”

  I stare at the plain gray ceiling above me, not daring to look at Beck.

  “What’s wrong?”

  I turn slowly, pain shooting from the back of my head and my right side with every movement. I’m lying on some kind of sofa, and Beck’s crouched beside me, looking confused and concerned all at once, but he’s here, he’s mostly unhurt, he’s alive. And he’ll probably kill me when I tell him. But maybe he’s figured it out anyway.

  “I lost the necklace,” I say. “I had it, but then Ariannorah shoved me and I couldn’t get up and she took it back—I’m sorry.”

  Beck shakes his head impatiently. “Don’t worry about that now. Are you sure you’re okay?”

  How can he shrug off the loss? The Guild means so much to him, and I lost it. Without the necklace, we can’t go back. Unless . . .

  He hasn’t given up yet. He’ll keep trying until we get it.

  “What day is it? How much time do we have? How long have I been out?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t been out of this room since they put me in here. Two guards dropped you off a while ago, but they didn’t tell me anything.”

  I sit up, clutching my head as pain stabs me, and take in our surroundings. We’re in a maid’s quarters or something, with only one door and not much furniture. It’s so drab it reminds me
of the rooms at the orphanage, but not as cramped: thin, dingy rugs on the floor, dim lighting, and a few personal possessions—clothes, a bag, a hairbrush—peeking sadly out of a bare wardrobe with a broken door. No windows, so there’s no way to plan an escape or even tell if it’s dark or light outside.

  Lying on the floor beside Beck are two metal chains—the cuffs the guards used to bind our hands. “How’d you get those off?”

  Beck grins. “Oldest trick in the book. Remind me to show you later.”

  Later. He still thinks there will be a later.

  “I came after you as soon as I could,” I say. “I overheard Dearborn. Said he’d turn you in to the protectors at dawn, but that they’d question you first.”

  “He must’ve changed his mind. I think it’s past dawn now, and nobody’s questioned me.” He pauses. “You really came after me?”

  “Well, yeah, how’d you think I got caught? I changed clothes at the carriage and told Jiavar about everything. She’s still waiting for us at—”

  “Don’t tell me here,” Beck says quickly. “Someone might overhear.”

  He’s right. I have to be more careful if I’m going to be good at this thieving thing. So far I’m not doing very well. If I’d been captured and Beck were the rescuer, we’d already be out of here.

  “So it’s probably the fifty-eighth by now,” Beck says. “Counting today, that gives us three days until the deadline.”

  I do the math in my head. I have about four days until the curse kills me. Maybe five.

  “What’s the plan? Do you think it’ll be possible to—?”

  “If we can escape, definitely. Ariannorah told me she and her parents are going to the big Samyra’s Day festival on the north side of Ruhia. And since it starts at midnight, they’ll be leaving on the night of the sixtieth.” He glances at the door and lowers his voice. “Which means they won’t be at home, and Lady Atherton’s personal chambers will be empty.”

  My eyes widen. “You’re not serious.” But he is. He wants to break into the Atherton manor, find Lady Atherton’s rooms, and snatch the necklace. “How would we get in?”

  “The same way we got into the ball. Disguise ourselves.” He looks at the maid’s costume I’m still wearing. “You can totally pass for a maid.”

  I scowl. “Oh, thanks, Beck, what a compliment.”

  His grin widens. “Sorry, Allicat.” But he doesn’t sound sincere at all.

  I glare at him. “Don’t make me regret coming after you, or I won’t even try next time.”

  A china dish sits on the floor beside Beck, and my stomach rumbles hopefully. “Is that—?”

  “Food,” Beck says, passing the plate to me. He already helped himself to half of it, but there’s still some kind of bread left. “Figured whoever left it here wouldn’t mind.”

  I didn’t realize until now how hungry I am. I practically shove the bread into my mouth, swallowing chunks without chewing. “So,” I say around the mouthful, “what happens now?”

  Beck shrugs. “We wait.”

  • • •

  We wait. And wait. And wait.

  I am not good at waiting.

  With every minute, I’m more and more restless, more and more trapped in this little windowless room with no light and no food and no water and no air. I try not to think about the fact that the seconds of my life are ticking away, and I might not have many of them left. But the pain in my arm is making it difficult to forget.

  “How long has it been, do you think?” I say for what might be the hundredth time.

  Beck lies listlessly on the floor, watching me pace without really looking at me. “I dunno, let me check the watch that magically appeared in the two seconds since you last asked.”

  “Why aren’t you wearing a watch? Don’t noblemen wear watches? Isn’t that, I dunno, a status symbol or something? That’s, like, necessary to your disguise.”

  “Sorry, next time I’ll make sure to include a really fancy noble’s watch, that just so happens to be lying around, in the disguise that I only had a few hours to come up with,” he says without looking at me.

  My sarcasm is really starting to rub off on him.

  I reach the end of the room, spin around on the balls of my feet, and start back the other way, counting the steps. It takes fewer steps to reach the opposite wall this time. Does that mean I’m walking faster? Or are the walls creeping in on us? Is Dearborn planning to crush us between slow-moving walls of death?

  “How much longer?” I groan.

  “Two seconds less than the last time you asked,” Beck says.

  Finally, finally, finally the door opens. I expected Dearborn or one of his guards to enter, but the man who walks in is unmistakably Lord Atherton. He has the same superior haughtiness as his daughter. I’m so glad to see someone walking through the door that I don’t even care it’s him.

  He’s followed by two blue-uniformed guards, who keep their hands on their sword hilts and glare at us like we’re a suspicious slime they stepped in.

  “Don’t even think about trying anything,” Atherton says, his voice clipped. He doesn’t really look at either of us—at least, not like he sees us. He’s taking in every detail of our appearances, but he’s not looking at us like he’s talking to another person. “Baron Dearborn has hired an excellent guard service that will undoubtedly counter any foolish escape attempts.”

  I glance at Beck, but he’s keeping his mouth shut, so I do the same.

  “Now,” Atherton says, “both of you will be handed over to the protectors and imprisoned. You will be charged for attempting to rob a noble and assaulting my wife, who is still recovering from her injuries.”

  What? I never hurt Lady Atherton. Startled her, probably, and maybe she even fell into some prickly bushes or something, but I never hurt her. I open my mouth, about to call Atherton out for being a filthy liar, but Beck’s watching me, and he shakes his head slightly. I bite my tongue, grimacing as the pain shoots up into my head.

  Atherton doesn’t seem to notice. “Unless.” He draws it out real long and dramatic, like we’re supposed to hang on his every word and beg him to not throw us in prison. I bite my tongue harder. “Unless you cooperate, and tell me what I’d like to know.”

  A long silence stretches out between Beck and me and him as he waits, probably expecting us to jump on his offer. Beck’s expression is closed and cold, colder than I’ve ever seen him. I just keep biting my tongue and wincing and ignoring the urge to slap the smirk off Atherton’s face.

  “I’ll not be making this offer again,” Atherton says, like we’re too stupid to understand. “Now, answer me immediately. Who sent you?”

  Beck doesn’t even blink. I try to imitate his blank expression and give nothing away.

  “Who are you working for?” Atherton says, raising his voice. Like asking us louder is going to make us more likely to answer.

  Atherton’s eyes flit from Beck’s face to mine, waiting for us to give something away. “Was it Wyatt? Brookshead? Yvonn Ilira?” He pauses after each name, hoping for a reaction. With every guess, his voice rises. He doesn’t even mention the Guild. Even though he seems to have countless enemies, he probably thinks he’s too important for ordinary thieves to target. Or maybe he doesn’t believe the Guild exists.

  “I know you had help. You didn’t plan to infiltrate this barony and make disguises by yourselves.” He pauses, waiting. We give him nothing. “Or was it Sir Drozzen? Is he in on it?”

  When we don’t say anything, he starts throwing out motives instead of names, waiting for a reaction. “Is it my politics? Is that what brought on this attack?”

  I want to laugh at the word “attack.” All we did was grab a necklace, not blow up the barony.

  Finally he runs out of steam. His voice quiets again, but grows more ragged, like he’s worn out. He glares for a long moment.

  His voice low, he asks, “Why did you speak with my daughter?” And something about the way he says it tells me this is the real
problem, the real question that brought him here. It’s the thing he doesn’t understand, and the thing that scares him most.

  The fear comes through in his voice, even when he makes it threatening. “If either of you so much as comes near my daughter again, I’ll kill you.”

  Chills run up my spine. There’s fear in his voice, but also anger, and those two things together make me believe he’s not bluffing about this part.

  That’s the convenient thing about dying, though. Death threats don’t really mean much.

  He straightens up, throwing his shoulders back, and his curt, haughty voice returns. “Very well. I’ll report to the protectors that you’ve been quite uncooperative.”

  He starts for the door, and the guards shuffle after him. Halfway there, he turns and looks back. “I’ll give you some time to think it over and change your minds.”

  He sweeps from the room, and the guards stomp after him. The door locks with a loud click.

  “Well, that was interesting,” Beck says casually. “Doesn’t seem to understand simple motives, does he? Never occurred to him that we’d steal a valuable necklace just because it’s valuable.” He laughs.

  I don’t. He turns, seeing my expression. “What’s wrong?”

  “I never hurt Lady Atherton,” I say. “I barely touched her, I swear.”

  Beck’s brow creases. “I believe you. I know you didn’t.”

  “Why would he say that I did?”

  “To make us think it’s going to be worse than it is. To make us answer his questions.” Beck scoots closer to me until we’re sitting side by side on the floor. He hesitates for a second, like he’s thinking about something. “It’s gonna be okay, Allicat.”

  I force a smile. “I believe you.”

  We stay that way for a while, not saying anything, just sitting beside each other and wondering if this is the end.

  • • •

  We wait for the protectors to arrive, but they don’t. I stare at the door, waiting, waiting, but I can’t keep my eyes open any longer and my head is throbbing.