by Raoul Miller
The sun had finally set, the crushing heat of the day slowly giving way to the cooler night air. Adusa yawned widely, the action echoed by Rishi a moment later. They had been able to snare a little sleep after having arrived in the city that morning, but the weariness of the road wasn’t to be shaken off that easily. He’d really needed the rest too. The past few days had been miserable.
The hike through the mountains hadn’t troubled him much. They had made fairly good time, despite having only their newly acquired sense as a guide. When they finally reached the broad river that coursed northward from the city they had bartered for passage aboard a passing barge. This was where his ordeal had begun. He had spent the entire journey with his head hung over the side of the wallowing tub. Annoyingly, Rishi hadn’t seemed the least bit bothered by it.
The dark-skinned thief began to notice an increase in the affluence of the homes they passed. The stately buildings didn’t have the street to themselves however. They stood shoulder to shoulder with tall, balconied apartments, older, more run-down tenements and small live-in neighbourhood shops and offices.
“This must be it,” he said quietly, coming to a stop in front of a large manor house.
A tall, whitewashed wall surrounded the property and was capped with a sharp metal railing—a deterrent for any would-be burglars. Fortunately however it didn’t obstruct his view of the house. Handily, a series of small portholes had been built into the wall. They had likely been designed to allow airflow, but to the thief they would be footholds.
Peering through the holes, Adusa could see a large garden, lush and well-manicured. Beyond that lay a richly decorated, double-storied building. They’d have to find a way in. Dull lanterns lit a wide archway at the front of the manor. A small inner courtyard could be seen through the opening. Movement caught his eye.
“Two… no, three guards in the courtyard,” Rishi whispered.
“There’s also one coming up the alley on the side.”
“Provided there aren’t any inside then, that makes six with the two at the gatehouse,” the bearded man summarised.
“Over the wall, and look for a way in from the alley or the rear?” Adusa suggested after a considering it a moment.
“We’ll have to deal with the alley guard then.”
“As soon as he turns to go back up the alley...” he responded with a smile, meaningfully patting the blackjack hanging at his hip, the companion of a steel mace that hung from the other.
“Very well,” Rishi nodded. “The shadows in the garden are deep enough. We’ll easily find concealment should we come upon any more.”
The grin still on his face, the tall burglar retrieved a coil of rope from a deep pocket, and swung it up in a graceful arc, looping it around the railing atop the wall. Using the foothold-portholes, he easily pulled himself to the top, gingerly stepped over the spikes, and jumped down to the soft grass on the other side.
His partner followed nimbly, passing him the rope as they crept forward across the dark garden. Then, pausing behind a bushy hibiscus, they watched the patrolling guard approach from the alley mouth.
The young man was sharply outfitted in a light, lacquered breast plate, worn over a gold-trimmed red jerkin, with tall leather boots and a matching helmet. His bored expression said that he really wasn’t expecting to see anything, but he diligently looked out over the garden before turning to go back down the alley toward the rear of the house. Adusa’s light footfalls offered no warning before the heavy blackjack struck the man’s temple.
The thieves worked quickly, binding and gagging the guard with strips of cloth. Then, noticing a door set a little further down the alley, Adusa motioned to his partner to grab the man’s legs. Hefting the limp form, they shuffled quickly toward it. Rishi promptly began to draw lockpicking tools from a multitude of pockets concealed around his leather vest. The incomprehensible array of picks, wrenches, hammers and fine-toothed saws were baffling to the more straight-forward thief. In his experience the simpler approach usually worked equally well. He eyed the door lever thoughtfully, then gave it a tentative push. The door swung open silently on well-oiled hinges.
“Lucky,” he whispered, his smile betraying just a hint of satisfaction.
Inside was a dark kitchen, lit only by a faint glow from the dying coals in the hearth. Adusa was left to handle the unfortunate guard on his own as Rishi hurried across the floor to another door. A hushed conversation accompanied the sliver of light that spilled through underneath. Adusa wrestled his burden into the space under the large kitchen work-table, then stood watching as his cautious friend wedged a chair in below the door lever.
“The gem is through the door on the right,” Rishi said quietly, motioning toward a short corridor beside him.
“Better block the other door as well then,” he answered, indicating a fourth doorway, this one to the left of the barricaded door. “Easier than checking what’s in there.”
Leaving Rishi to the task, Adusa crept toward the door at the end of the corridor, then gently eased it open.
The thief found himself in the main hall of the house. He could see lanterns hung at regular intervals all around the big room, but only two had been lit. Burning low, they sat on either side of a wide double door—likely a portal to the courtyard outside. A long, polished yellowwood table, ringed by matching high-backed chairs, took up much of the floor in the centre of the room. A large, ornate chandelier, also unlit, was suspended from the high ceiling above.
Sensing the stone’s nearness, he moved lightly across the hardwood floor.
The hall was designed with symmetry in mind. On either side of the big courtyard door were the kitchen door and its twin, a doorway to the other wing of the house. Beside each of these was a gilt-worked spiral staircase, linking the hall with another set of doors on the upper floor. Ahead, a row of tall windows gave Adusa a view of the dark rear garden.
The metallic shine of gold and silver caught his eye. Moving closer, he saw a long, low shelf, fixed to the wall at the base of the large windows. On it was a staggeringly eclectic array of trophies, trinkets and treasures. The thief could scarcely believe his luck. It was a larger trove than he would have expected to find in any ten such homes, and left completely unguarded! Casting his gaze across the collection, he saw a familiar glimmer.
“Here,” he whispered, excitement plain in his voice, as the other thief came up behind him.
The orb lay resting on a small satin cushion right at the centre of the shelf. Its semblance to the stone the goddess had shown them was unmistakable. It was much larger than that little remnant however. This stone was a slightly bigger than an egg, but with the same aquamarine hue and irregular shape. The thief picked it up carefully. The lantern light danced across its surface.
“Is that it?” Rishi asked.
“It must be,” he said happily.
“Great. We might as well grab some of these other trinkets as well then,” the bearded man said, indicating the gleaming assortment of objects the orb kept company with. “Travel expenses.”
With a nod, Adusa dropped the gem into one of his brigandine’s pockets and then turned his attention to the other treasures. With the practiced eye of experienced thieves they were able to quickly choose out those most marketable. Soon both he and Rishi had their pockets stuffed.
“I thought stealing divine power would be a much greater challenge. This has been remarkably dull,” he remarked as they turned to depart.
“There will be many more jobs to come,” Rishi shrugged. “Few are likely to be so effortless.”
“You’re probably right. Well, then the sooner we get out of this city, the sooner we can be on to something more interesting. Let’s go.”
They were almost back to the kitchen door when he heard a loud click.
“Who’s that? W–what are you doing in here?” a voice stammered from the gloom beside them.
The thief met the startled man’s eyes for a moment, then broke into a run, Rishi hot o
n his heels. He yanked the kitchen door open and charged through, right before the big door to the courtyard crashed open behind them. All around them the house came alive. The handle of the door to the courtyard rattled against the chair and heavy boots rang out against the wooden floor in the hall. Cries of alarm carried down from the floor above as people were roused from their beds.
Back in the kitchen, Adusa saw that the alley guard had regained consciousness. The young man was still bound and gagged, but had wormed his way out from under the table. Leaping right over him, the fleeing thieves passed through the final door and ran back out into the alley. The neat garden beds were just yards away, when another guard stepped in front of them—this one on his feet, and heavily armed.
At the sight of the intruders he charged, shouting wildly as he slashed down with a long-bladed halberd. Adusa frantically reached for his mace and, drawing it out, struck desperately to deflect the wicked edge—a moment too late. The blade glanced off of his mace and bit painfully into his leg. The watchman strained to bring the heavy weapon back up for a second blow, but the blade was firmly stuck in the flagstones.
Adusa couldn’t believe he’d been wounded by such an inept fighter. Rishi stepped past him and almost casually drove his heel down onto the back of the blade, forcing the weapon from the man’s hands and sending it clattering to the floor. Adusa smiled. The guard reacted just as he knew he would. Forgetting the dagger he wore on his belt, he instead scrambled for the halberd. Rishi’s fist caught him right on the chin.
The obstacle dealt with, the pair hurried on. They rounded the corner of the alley and rushed on into the garden. The guardhouse at the gate ahead was deserted. Adusa didn’t know where the other sentry had gone to, but he wasn’t about to spurn their generosity. Running as fast as his limp would allow, he chased after his companion as the other man tore down the gravel path, through the gate and on into the street. The echoing shouts of the guards rang out behind them as they sped on into the night.
Several streets away, Adusa sank down against a wall, gasping for breath. “I think we’ve lost them,” he heaved.
“Do you still believe this job is too dull?” Rishi laughed, sitting down beside him.
“I may have spoken too quickly,” he winced, clutching at his wounded leg.
His bearded friend pulled a tightly rolled bandage from a small pocket at the front of his vest and passed it to him. “Hey Adusa,” he said after a moment. “What did we just steal?”
Adusa’s hand drifted to the pocket where he had tucked the orb. He could feel the outline of the stolen gem beneath his fingertips, but the compass-like sense still pointed toward to the manor.
“Why would there be a fake gem in the very same house that the real one resides in?” Rishi asked of his lanky friend, sat awkwardly on a low stool opposite him.
Adusa made several attempts at giving a coherent response, then, accepting defeat, settled down to finish chewing.
The men were sharing a breakfast of grilled chicken and fruit at a street-side eatery, not far from their inn. The enterprising proprietor had set up her café in a short alley that linked two busy thoroughfares. A pair of tall tenements on either side provided escape from the blazing, late-morning sun—turning the little space into a shady, urban oasis. Potted plants dotted around the tables completed the effect.
“It looks precisely like a larger version of the stone that Alunia held,” Rishi added, more to fill the silence than anything else.
After they had returned to their room the previous night, he had examined it more closely using a hand lens, and found it to be no more than cleverly wrought glass.
“Perhaps to mislead thieves,” Adusa finally managed. “Worked well enough,” he chuckled ruefully.
Rishi’s brow furrowed. “I don’t think that’s it,” he said. “Look at the food vendor over there.” He motioned with his head toward the proprietress, standing by her cart at the mouth of the alley. “Her coin box isn’t secured with lock and key—it’s just a biscuit tin. All the vendors we’ve seen have been the same.”
“That does seem a little careless. In Musa, we consider anything not behind two locks to be public property.”
“In Muziris it is much the same, though there your property might actually be safer in a tin. Something not locked away is asking to be stolen. It’s too suspicious. Nobody would touch it.”
Adusa grinned. “So you’re saying that the people here have no fear of crime? This city has no thieves?”
“It appears so,” he said, nodding his beard. “When we returned last night I noticed that, instead of carting them back to a warehouse, or to their homes, many of the street sellers had simply packed up their wares and left them in trunks at the roadside. They think their goods safe though they leave them unwatched and secured only with crude padlocks. Any person with rudimentary knowledge of locks and even simple, improvised tools could open one.”
“A determined person with a half a brick could open one,” Adusa laughed.
“Precisely! That kind of naivety couldn’t survive unless there were very little crime. Perhaps their culture has a strong taboo against theft.”
“That would explain why we were able to get into that manor so easily,” Adusa mused. “I’d never have thought we could find a collection of gold and jewel-encrusted ornaments in a house with an unlocked door and only a handful of exterior guards.”
“Indeed. With such a carefree attitude toward the security of their valuables, it seems unlikely that someone would go to the trouble of obtaining a high-quality decoy, purely to deter thieves.”
Adusa considered this a moment. “Well, maybe we’ll learn the reason when we find the real one.”
“There’s little profit in delaying it,” Rishi said with a nod. “We should return to the manor tonight, once darkness has fallen.”
“Yes. It’s best we don’t give them time to work on their security now that they know how poor it is,” the other man agreed. “I hope this time I can manage to escape without running into a guard’s sword.”
Rishi laughed. “How is your wound this morning? Will it slow you?”
“Not at all,” Adusa replied with a big grin. “When I woke up it was just a faint red scar.”
“It’s gone?” he asked incredulously. “I had no idea the goddess’s boon would be so effective.”
“I didn’t either. I thought strong fortitude just meant we’d be more resistant to the sniffles.”
“That makes me feel some concern over her other boon.”
“The good fortune? That one doesn’t seem to work very well,” Adusa chuckled, rubbing his leg.
“Or perhaps it’s working perfectly. She only said that fortune would deal us a stronger hand, not that the hand would be good.”
“I hadn’t considered that,” Adusa said, scratching his chin. “Why would she give us the boon then though? If we get killed because of bad luck, it’s bad for her too.”
“She is patron of the reckless. Rash behaviour is her very nature. I suspect she may not put very much care into her decisions.”
“I suppose that’s possible. We won’t accomplish much by worrying about it though.” The tall thief smiled. “It may actually work in our favour. It’ll keep us from getting bored.”
Rishi didn’t respond. He was looking over his friend’s shoulder, toward the vendor. She was carrying out an animated conversation with two members of the Royal Guard, nodding and pointing toward the foreigners.
“I think I’d prefer boredom over the hangman’s noose though,” he said, rising slowly. “Time to go.”
They came to their feet, meeting the soldiers’ eyes for a moment, then took to their heels.
“I didn’t expect to have the guard after us so soon,” Rishi said.
“It definitely isn’t only good luck,” Adusa laughed, sprinting along beside him as they swung out into the broader street.
The dense traffic made it difficult to shake off their pursuers, and it seemed to be g
rowing denser still. Soon they were shoving people aside and leaping over carts just to make any progress at all. The cries of enraged hawkers joined with the guards’ bellowed orders to halt, driving them along. Clambering onto a wagon, Rishi finally discovered the cause of the jam.
At the intersection ahead, dozens of cycles, several heavily-laden carts and one very large ox-drawn wagon had caused a complete blockage of the road. Each trying to turn a different direction, none could go forward or back. They were going to need another route. They thief cast his gaze around. Unless they could very rapidly learn to fly, the only avenue of escape was a narrow lane leading off ahead. Motioning to his companion to follow, he leapt back into the crowd and began to force his way over to it.
The alley, really more of a footpath, might lead anywhere, but it was certain to be an improvement over the deadlocked road. Leaping over baskets of refuse and shoving past parked bicycles, Rishi sped along with Adusa close on his heels. He turned one corner and then another. Soon he had lost his bearings and was running blindly through what he came to realise was a maze-like network of alleys and footpaths.
The tall tenements that had lined the sides fell back in favour of ramshackle huts and shaky lean-tos. Their overhanging roofs were often crowded so close to the path that they reached out to each other, meeting in the middle to create a dim tunnel. Another wave of angry cries began to chase them along as they tore through the teeming slum. Soon a trail of overturned laundry, upset washbasins, spilled coals and the occasional toppled cyclist were left lying in their wake, but the thieves didn’t dare slow.
Just when Rishi had nearly given up hope of ever making it out of the disorienting tangle of alleys, he rounded a corner and was met by a bright square of light—a herald for the more orderly broad avenues. The thief pulled up just short of the portal, collapsing against a wall and heaving for breath.
