by Brian Keller
No point in just sitting and waiting, he started feeling around to find the box he had been looking at. Finding it he turned it so he could find the lock by feel. If it wasn’t a warded lock then it probably had pins. Unless the lock went further into the box than he expected the lock would only have a few pins. He pulled a pick from a pouch he had bound flat against his forearm. He relocated the keyway by feel and slid the pick inside and pressed all the pins up. He slowly withdrew the pick from the keyway listening for the clicks as the pins snapped back into place. He counted three pins. He slid a tension wrench into the keyway and went to work. This lock was really simple, the pins felt really sloppy and they almost seemed to want to slip into position. Once he had the box open he returned the pick and tension wrench to their places in his sleeve and then felt around inside the box. It felt like some folded cloth, a couple of cups, a few pieces of table ware and that was it. The table ware felt like a small set of spoons, forks and knives. The knives didn’t have a sharp edge and had rounded points. “Maybe these aren’t knives after all”, he thought, but they were all cool to the touch and definitely metal. He tapped the cups lightly with one of the spoons. It wasn’t a ‘ding’, it was more of a ‘clunk’. That’s a way Skaiven had told him he could tell silver from a cheaper metal, like pewter. The spoons and forks might be silver, but that’s not what he was here for. He closed the box and pushed it to one side. He didn’t know whether the guard had passed through the master’s chamber yet, but at least the door to this room hadn’t been yanked open. He didn’t want to risk standing up to look for another box and then stumble over something and wake the whole house. He got on his hands and knees and felt in front of him as he crawled towards the wall where he thought one of the other boxes was located. Once he reached the wall he stood up and started feeling along the shelves until he felt another box. He repeated the process that he’d used on the other one. This lock was not nearly so poorly made and it took a minute or two before he had it open. He wanted to dig right into the box, but carefully replaced the pick and tension wrench first. If he lost those somewhere in this darkened room then he’d just as well return home… unless this was the box he was looking for. As he dug his fingers through the box the items made a combination of jingling and clattering noises. There was no doubt that some of the items were rings. Those were easy to tell by feel. Cooper laid out a sheet of leather and began transferring items from the box onto the leather. As he picked up some of the items he could tell that they felt like heavy strings, most of them had bulbous items attached to them. “Necklaces!”, Cooper could feel his excitement building. This had to be it! He continued to scoop items out of the box and onto his leather sheet. The items at the bottom of the box were smaller than coins, most about as big as his thumbnail, but a few about the size of Skaiven’s thumbnail but felt like smooth stones or pieces of polished glass. Whatever they were, Cooper added them to his growing bundle. He then gathered the corners of the leather sheet and grasped them together in his fist. The guard had to have passed through the room and surely had returned to the lower level by now. Cooper dropped back down and crawled across the floor to where he knew the door to be. He could hear Skaiven’s voice in his head, telling him that most thieves get caught on their way out, after they had the loot in hand. He couldn’t deny he was feeling really excited and that thought calmed him down. The job wasn’t finished yet. He reached the door to this little room and listened intently. He put his ear to the back of the shelving and listened again. He couldn’t hear anything but his own breathing and the pounding of his heart. He put his shoulder against his side of the door and leaned forward a little, taking up any slack that might exist, and then he leaned a little harder. The shelf began to shift and Cooper figured he’d never moved so slowly in all his life. Shift, listen, shift, listen. Once he’d move the door a few inches he could see a faint glow from the moonlight coming in from above the door of shelves. At this point, he figured that if someone was inside the room, he’d know it by now and he pushed the door open and stepped out into the master’s chamber. After spending so much time in a completely darkened space, he could actually see quite clearly in this room. He set down his bundle of valuables and re-entered the secret room. He replaced the boxes on the shelf and made the room resemble what it looked like before he’d entered, or at least as close as he could guess at it. He then stepped out. Pushed the door back in place. Slid the pins back into their locking position and turned to retrieve his bundle. A small item on a bedside table had caught his attention and looking more closely he could see it was another ring. “One more for the bundle”, Cooper decided. Then he stopped. He’d done what he could to conceal that he’d been here and taking this ring would be the only item stolen that didn’t come out of the box in the secret room. He’d need to think about that a moment. Fortunately, he had a moment since he not only needed to open his bundle in the moonlight to confirm what he had, he also needed to devote more attention to make sure the bundle was securely tied shut. It would be a shame to make his way out of this home and back to his own House only to discover the bag was half full and he’d left a trail of valuables behind him. He gasped as he opened the flaps of leather he’d folded over. He could cup his hands together and not be able to hold all the rings and necklaces. The polished stones just had to be gems but in the moonlight there was no color, they just glittered. He tucked one of those glittering stones into the fabric of the sash he called a belt and tied it off at each end to hold it in place. Then he turned his attention back to the small pile of treasure. He had no idea of its overall worth, but he knew he’d likely never have to pay House dues again, ever. He had decided, “I was sent here for jewelry, and that ring is jewelry too”, and he snatched up the ring from the bedside table and added it to the bundle. He carefully folded the corners together then folded the entire bundle together, almost rolling it up. He then wound laces around each end and pulled them tight, then he tied another set of laces to those and left them to dangle loose. Those he tied around his slim waist and the others he tied across his body and over his shoulder. He knew that it would chafe a little bit, but better to deal with a little chafing than to trust just one set of laces to hold a bundle like this. As his hand rested on the handle to the door leading into the foyer he heard the clocks chime. “Oh, by all that’s holy!”, Cooper thought, “this just can’t be happening!”. There was no way out through the foyer, it was just too open. He considered trying to bribe the guards, but that thought passed instantly. If they were willing to take a bribe then they’d be willing to just kill him and take it all. Images of the floorplan flashed through his mind and a plan formed. It was a risk but the only other option was taking a chance that the upstairs guard would check the other side of the house first. If it didn’t happen that way then Cooper was doomed. He did not like those odds. He glided to the second story window that faced the same street he’d crossed to enter the property. There was a small roof that projected from the front of the house. It was this structure that the columns out front were designed to support. He couldn’t tell where the guards were outside, or how soon they’d come around the front of the house, but Cooper knew he had to get out of this room. He unlatched the window, slipped out onto the small roof, and slid the window closed behind him. He knew he couldn’t remain on top of this roof, all the upstairs guard would need to do is look out the window and he’d see the boy crouched there with eyes as big as platters. Cooper slid over the edge of the roof at the corner and hung off the edge with the front of his body plastered against the column that stood there. The pain from his ribs almost made him cry out. The guards had always started on the other side of the house first and then come around this side of the house before going back inside through a side door. He hoped they were creatures of habit. He didn’t see anyone on the grounds as he slipped over the edge of the roof, but he didn’t know how much time he had before the guards came around to this side of the building. He released his hold on the roof and tried to hold onto
the column enough to slow his descent. It mostly worked, but he almost twisted his ankle when he reached the bottom of the column. He limped off toward the street and stopped once he reached the shadows near the wall. He settled in and let the shadows absorb him while he listened. Once he had his breathing under control and the pain of his ribs became tolerable, he glanced up at the house to make sure he couldn’t see any lantern light glowing at any of the windows. Seeing and hearing nothing he was over the wall in the blink of an eye. Once he’d crossed the street and tucked himself away in a deep shadow he started heaping insults upon himself. It hadn’t even crossed his mind to check for City Guardsmen before he crossed the street. He’d just wanted to get himself away from the house he’d just robbed. That was precisely the kind of thing that Skaiven had warned him against. That was how thieves got caught. He was fortunate this time, and he vowed to be more attentive starting right now.
Chapter 4
Cooper burst into Skaiven’s room and bent forward at the waist trying to catch his breath. He had run as fast as he was able all the way from the Whitefoam River. Skaiven stood from behind the table he called his desk and crossed the room toward him. Cooper pulled himself upright and walked to the table, untied his bundle and let it fall to the table with a clattering thump. He untied the bundle and with a victorious smile and a flourish he pulled open the folds. The light from the lantern hanging from the rafters reflected off the small pile of treasure and sent pinpoints of light all around the room. It looked like they were standing inside a kaleidoscope. The first thing Skaiven felt was elation but that feeling lasted for only a moment as he felt an icy chill climb up his neck. He had expected to see a few rings and a necklace of two, the boy had collected a veritable King’s ransom in gems and jewelry. In the few seconds since Cooper opened the bundle, Skaiven’s plans changed completely. He had to leave town. He had to leave the kingdom! If there wasn’t a boat leaving tonight on which he could purchase a berth he’d need to buy two fast horses so he could switch mounts as soon as whichever one he was riding started to slow down from fatigue. He had to be as far away as possible by morning. God’s mercy! One of the necklaces had a sapphire half the size of Cooper’s little fist! Just that gem alone would’ve been enough to secure Skaiven’s future and that was just one of almost a dozen necklaces! And there was easily a handful of loose gems! He saw amethysts, emeralds, and at least a couple of rubies! And the rings! There had to be twenty or more! His blood went colder when he realized that one of them was the Signet Ring the Duke used to press into the wax seal of his important documents! Just having that ring meant death to anyone that wasn’t the Duke. What had he done?!? At least the collection of gems and jewelry would be enough to allow him to live a life of leisure and pleasure. As long as he could escape and get far away enough to spend it.
Cooper saw none of this. He saw the look of amazement on Skaiven’s face and then the young thief started looking around the room. He sensed something wasn’t right. He couldn’t see it, or hear anything amiss, everything even smelled as it should but there was something… his eyes scanned the shadows cast by the lantern but everything was as it always was. He heard Skaiven talking, saying something about needing to leave, to find a safe place to hide this treasure. Cooper was about to suggest somewhere in The Ruins but then he realized that Skaiven has stopped speaking in midsentence. Cooper turned to look at him. His House Father’s chin was on his chest and he was looking downward in disbelief. At first Cooper couldn’t see what the old man was looking at but then the light glimmered off four inches of polished steel that was protruding just left of the center of Skaiven’s chest. The steel disappeared into his chest and reappeared over his right shoulder in a movement so fast it was just a blur. The blur flashed across the front of his neck and retraced its path so quickly Cooper felt his heart beat a full beat before he saw the blood flow down the front of Skaiven’s tunic. The dead man dropped to his knees revealing the small man standing behind him.
The small man was crouched down but even when standing he couldn’t have been more than a few inches taller than Cooper. He wore a ragged, threadbare cloak that might’ve been black when it was new but it was a charcoal grey now. His boots looked almost like Cooper’s except the small man’s boots were covered in what looked like a month’s worth of accumulated dust. From seeing nothing but this, anyone would assume this man was a beggar in Batter’s Field and therefore not worth a second look. Looking at any part of the man other than that revealed an entirely different story. The man was otherwise dressed in what looked like a suit of oiled leather but completely covered in straps, sheaths and small pouches. Even his legs had a few rows of small pouches. The man’s cheeks were streaked with soot and lamp black and looking a little higher Cooper thought he had never seen eyes so intense. The color of the man’s eyes were what he had heard called Hazel. At one moment the man’s eyes were green, then brown, then something in between. As the man took a few steps toward him, sheathing his thin blade in one smooth motion, Cooper would’ve sworn the man’s eyes glinted a shade of amber, almost yellow. The man held one finger to his lips, signaling for him to be quiet. The boy gulped and nodded, it hadn’t even dawned on him to shout or give any kind of alarm, and now that he thought about it he was confident that it would’ve served no purpose even if he had.