Proper Thieves

by Smith, Luke CJ

  Out of sight of the others, Breigh's snarling continued. Allister's cries gradually turned to moans. Suddenly uncomfortable, Devan, Nalan, and Zella walked out of earshot.

  “Well. That turned ugly real fast,” Zella said, grinning ear-to-ear. She and Nalan laughed as they walked; Devan didn’t. Not only did he not laugh, but the sound of his friends’ laughter jabbed at him like nails in his skin.

  In the distance, the lights of The Palace glowed above the horizon. Zella nodded toward it. “What do you think is going on over there right now?” she said, eyeing Devan. She was trying to engage him. He wished she would stop.

  “Rioting,” he said flatly. “When the house didn't have enough gold to pay everyone out, chances are things got...”

  “...Exciting?” Zella said, winking over at Nalan.

  “Violent,” Devan said. His breath was visible in the late autumn chill.

  Nalan stopped smiling. He eyed Devan nervously.

  Zella’s expression dimmed somewhat as well. Still, she pressed on: “Well, I know what Faerathore is going to spend the night doing.” She pushed on Devan playfully. “Or, you know, not doing.”

  “Like, with his genitals?” Nalan added, trying to help. Nalan laughed weakly, clearly trying to follow Zella’s lead.

  Devan pushed Zella’s hands away.

  Zella stopped. Nalan stopped with her. Devan kept on walking. Nalan had found him a walking stick to replace his cane; he was leaning much harder on that stick than he ever did on his cane.

  “Devan. What is it?” Nalan called after him.

  He stopped and turned around. “We failed,” he said.

  Zella shot a look over at Nalan. Nalan shot a look back. He looked confused. She looked annoyed.

  “Uh...no we didn’t,” she said caustically. “If I might draw your attention to the two-ton pile of gold right over there? That Breigh and Alli are fucking on?”

  Nalan cast a worried glance over his shoulder. “We’re going to have to clean that really, really well…”

  With his free hand, Devan pinched the bridge of his nose. “We fucked up,” he said quietly. “We fucked...everything...up.”

  “Yeah,” Zella said, closing the gap between them. “And we got away with it anyway. And two tons of gold’s a pretty good payday for fucking everything up.”

  “Since when was it about getting paid?” Devan demanded.

  “What are you so fucking angry about?” Zella shouted back at him.

  “I’m angry because we’re only standing here right now because of luck. Dumb, random, fucking luck. Not one thing went according to plan. Nalan got caught. Allister nearly got us killed in an airship crash. Breigh got poisoned. You…”

  Zella’s eyes turned dangerous.

  Devan waved her off and turned to walk away. Zella caught him by the elbow.

  “We didn’t…” Devan started, then trailed off. He groped around for the right words to explain himself. “We didn’t make it out because we were good, or...because we were clever or prepared, or...or because we covered all our bases...”

  Zella pulled at his elbow, spinning him around to face her. “Bull. Shit. Good isn’t writing a script and then following it. Good is being able to improvise on the fly. And that’s what happened here tonight. All of us, we thought on our feet.”

  Devan looked over and locked eyes with Nalan. He remembered that moment on the casino floor when the mages had them. Nalan had seen that look on his face: that lost, empty expression when all of his contingency plans ran out. He’d been paralyzed.

  Devan grimaced and looked away.

  “We thought on our feet,” Zella continued, “we made it out alive. We earned a literal mountain of money. And if getting paid isn’t what you’re interested in, think about this: we pulled off a caper that Bellitt of the fucking Mire couldn’t have dreamed up in a million years. We made all the right assholes look stupid—Tolem especially—and we did something people will be talking about forever. For…ever. The only question now is, how do we possibly set the bar any higher for our next job?”

  Running both hands back through his hair, Devan growled quietly inside. How do I make her understand? he thought. Every variation on ‘We didn’t win the way we were supposed to’ would sound hollow in her ears, and he knew it.

  Fortunately, that’s when Nalan piped up. “Set the bar...higher?”

  Zella turned and flashed a smile at Nalan. “Got any ideas?”

  Nalan’s face was white as a sheet. “I’m never doing this again,” he said. “I’m going home.”

  “You…” Zella fell speechless for a moment. “...You're going home?”

  Nalan looked down and kicked at the dirt. “Like Tolem said. We have enough gold for a dozen lifetimes.”

  “Yeah?” Zella yelled, her face now twisted into a scowl. “And what are you going to do with it in The Tower?” Nalan backed up a step and cringed. “Melt it down and make gold-plated baby furniture for the kids you and Cheris are going to squirt out? Pile it up and sit on it and wait to get old? Come on, Nalan. There's more to life than reading and scribbling on parchments.”

  Nalan never looked up. “We almost died today,” he muttered.

  “Yes! Wasn't it glorious?” Breigh said, coming up from behind them and throwing an arm over Nalan's shoulders. She was covered all over with tiny gold flecks.

  “I know, I know, that was fast.” Allister called out to Devan. He, too, was speckled with gold flakes. “But the woman has a broken arm and one of her ribs is poking out of her side, so I don’t want to hear any passive-aggressive bullshit out of you, pal.” Allister turned to look at Nalan. Nalan was fumbling awkwardly with the buttons on his shirt. “What’s everyone so weird about over here?”

  “Alli,” Devan said. “Now that we’re done...what do you want to do next?”

  Allister pursed his lips and thought. “I don't know. I didn't think we'd get this far. Now...” He shrugged. “I won’t lie. It’d be nice to go home.”

  “And live like hermits,” Zella finished the thought for him. “When we have enough gold to live like sultans?”

  “But what you're talking about isn't living like sultans,” Devan corrected her. “What you're talking about is doing this again.”

  “Again?” Breigh asked, uncertainly.

  Everyone turned and looked at Breigh. Breigh only had two settings. Setting one was brash, over-the-top confidence. Setting two was unconsciousness. Uncertainty was something new.

  “Yeah,” Zella said, a tone of bitterness unmistakable in her voice. “Again. Like we always talked about: sacking the Last Cities, stealing the scarab opal off the Sultan's hat, pilfering the Transcendence Frescoes from the Imperial Gallery. Setting the bar high, clearing it, and setting it higher again...”

  Devan looked around the circle. None of the others were looking at Zella as she spoke, either. As her voice dropped off, Devan knew she’d realized it too—none of them, Devan included, could bring themselves to look her in the eye.

  “Devan,” she said incredulously. “You want to go back too. Don’t you.”

  For a moment, Devan just stood there, rubbing his hands over his nose and mouth. “For a while,” he said at last. He could barely believe the words were coming out of his mouth. “Just...for a while. A few more years of study, and...”

  Zella let an arm fall limp at her side. She shook her head.

  “Who the fuck are you?” Her voice was quiet, but its edge dug into Devan’s heart. There was something in her tone he’d never heard from her before, at least not directed at him: disappointment.

  Zella looked around at the others. “That pile of gold over there is plenty enough to pay for a life where we don’t have to kowtow and suck dick for simpleton instructors just to earn a place in the Upper Salon, or a third bar for your War Chest, or whatever pat-on-the-head they offer us if we’re good, quiet children. I don’t know about all of you, but I’ve learned more in the months since we left The Tower than in the last five years inside of
it. I’m never going back.” She looked hard at Devan. “But you all have fun sitting there with Instructor Winselle until you die.”

  Devan’s jaw was set. “Fuck you, Z,” he spat. “It’s just for a few years.”

  “Sure,” she said, turning away. “I’ll send you and Mael a wedding present.” She stalked back to the gold pile.

  Devan didn’t want to look at the coins. The whole time he was planning the robbery, he looked for a way to return the gold when they were done stealing it, just like they’d done with the ledger scroll, the black hatchet, and all their other trophies. The real prize had always been in the victory, in proving who was smarter. Keeping the things they stole just felt...common...to Devan. But this time, he was stuck with the loot. Stuck with a fabulous fortune that whole empires would kill for. It felt like second prize—a trophy for being lucky. For being smarter than Tolem, but not Faerathore. For being 'good enough.'

  But, there were worse things. If the gold could buy Zella the life she’d always wanted, then at least that was something. And someday, when he left The Tower again—and he would leave The Tower again someday—that gold could pave his way too.

  He could live with ‘good enough.’ He guessed he’d have to, from then on.

  Devan rubbed the back of his neck and looked to the others with a shrug. “So,” he said. “That's that.”

  No one answered. Breigh gazed up into the sky, one hand on her hip. Nalan bit at a thumbnail. Allister picked at the gold flakes covering his clothes and flicked them away.

  Devan squinted. What the hell are those things, anyway?

  Hobbling over on his walking stick, Devan reached out and picked one of the flakes off Allister's chest and examined it. His face fell. “Oh shit,” he breathed.

  As the other three asked what was wrong, Devan was already limping full tilt back toward the ship. He passed Zella, tossed his walking stick aside, and dove to his one good knee. Scooping up a handful of coins, he began turning them over in his hand, holding them up to get a better look at them in the light.

  With his thumbnail, he scraped at one. He left a long, black scratch on it.

  “Paint,” he said quietly as the others arrived back at the ship. “Gold paint.” He held the handful of coins out to Zella.

  “What?” Breigh thundered, digging into the pile with both hands. Nalan covered his mouth.

  Devan laughed, dryly, harshly. “He...he took our idea,” he said, shaking his head. “Iron coins, painted gold. He took our...he took our fucking idea.” Devan ground his palms into his eyes and kept laughing.

  “Who?” Allister shouted, still trying to process what had happened. “Who did this?”

  Devan just shook his head at the pile of worthless coins.

  “We should go,” Zella murmured, walking slowly away from the pile, as if in shock. “Tolem’s not coming.”

  “Tolem?” Allister turned and walked after Zella. “Tolem fucked us? Why would Tolem fuck us?”

  As if to answer Allister's question, Breigh stood up from behind the pile. “Devan,” she called out. She held up a small brown envelope covered in gold flecks. “It's got your name on it.”

  Devan crawled over to her and took it, fumbling it open as quickly as his hands could manage. The paper inside was blank, but the moment his thumb touched it, it filled with pen-scratched handwriting.

  It read:

  Devan,

  I sure hope you’re alive to read this. By now, I'm sure you've figured out what I've done and what your role in this whole thing really was.

  I hate like hell that this all had to play out this way, but the fact is, I couldn't afford to have you queer this deal for us. I really hoped we could have run this job together, but you fought me every step of the way. You never missed an opportunity to make things harder than they had to be, never missed a chance to raise the bar so you could prove to your friends that you're the cleverest boy in all the six worlds. And your friends weren’t much better.

  That's why I put Phaedra with you: to make sure you didn't get too far off the script. But even that you had to take and turn into a whole goddamn pretzel-twist mess, with magic bombs and double-blind fake outs and Krist knows what else. So while you were making a big, ugly mess of things out front, me and my crew were out back, doing the real work.

  I told you from the start: here in the real world, there are consequences to what we do. But I could never seem to get that into your head. Or Zella's. Or any of you. Well, this is what you get for not listening: you get hunted by the most dangerous man in six worlds—a man with a private army and a floating city and more money than any ten gods combined. All for a load of gold you didn’t even steal.

  Devan, your biggest problem is you see the world the way you want it to be. Well, now you’ve gotten a good look at how the world actually is. It’s time for you to go home. Put your nose back in your books where it belongs. Get married. Become an instructor. Get fat. Grow old. And be happy that you had a little adventure before you settled down.

  And to help you remember it, I’ve enclosed a souvenir I want you to have. You know, just a little something…

  ...for your troubles.

  Tolem

  Devan shook the envelope and felt something rattle back and forth inside. He turned it over in his palm.

  Out fell a single gold coin.

  Interlude

  After the Calamity, the cities went silent at night. Without mages to power the great municipal pyres, cities lost fully half of each day to the darkness, as thugs prowled, thieves practiced their craft, and darker things preyed on children who wandered too far from the lamplight.

  On a night with no moons, the countryside surrounding even the largest cities felt remote and desolate. And in the twenty years since the Calamity, the villages around Kauleth had adapted to that new reality.

  When The Palace arrived, children too young to remember the great pyres marveled as the night lit up like day. They sat out in their parents’ fields and watched as the great ship glowed like a fallen star. It illuminated the city streets all the way out to the horizon in reds and blues and greens. When the wind was right, they could hear the cheering from the coliseum, the music from the promontories. And for a while, the night didn’t seem such a frightening thing.

  But then the city started to burn.

  The music stopped, and the wind came to them laden with the sounds of angry crowds. The distant Kaulethi townships watched and whispered as plumes of black smoke began to fill the skies before them. The windows of the city’s tallest towers lit up, licked from the inside by tongues of flame.

  The children gathered back into their parents’ homes, ears still ringing with the town elders’ admonishments about the gods’ judgement sent down upon a sinful and decadent people. Meanwhile, their parents remained outside to watch Kauleth tear itself apart and to smile secretly at the misfortune of those who took away the night to begin with.

  Part IV : Night of Knaves

  Tolem

  Tolem dropped the gold coin in the envelope and sealed it. For a long time, he stared at it where it lay on Samus’ table. He stroked his beard.

  “Tolem,” Phaedra said, breaking the silence.

  Tolem grimaced and held the letter up over his shoulder for Samus to take, not wanting to watch it go. He ran his hands over his face and said nothing.

  Samus tucked the letter into his white robes. “You’re doing the right thing,” Samus told him.

  Tolem scoffed through his fingers. “Samus. How can you possibly say that?”

  “Because it’s what you want to hear,” Samus said. “And because what I want is for you to make me rich.”

  “Us rich,” Phaedra chimed in, checking her hair in the mirror.

  “And that isn’t going to happen with your children running around waving wooden swords and playing pirate.” Samus sniffed. “If it makes you feel any better, if they’re as good as they like to think they are, they’ll be just fine. They’ll soar out of here with a h
eaping big cargo hold full of gold paint and pig iron.”

  “You know, all that crap set me back sixty silver calpiri,” Vertus rasped from his seat across the room. “That’s not bad for a first take. Kack, son, you know what I took home my first job?”

  Samus sighed. “A ‘pantload’ of venereal disease.”

  “A pantload of venereal disease!” Vertus laughed. Or at least he tried laughing, but he ended up coughing up a wad of black onto the carpet. He considered the stain for a moment, then yelled “Girl!” over his shoulder at Phaedra.

  Phaedra just stared at him in the mirror and went back to teasing her hair.

  Tolem turned in his chair and looked over at Torg. He was sitting quietly, filling his trick dagger sheath with an oily black ichor. The scabbard looked like a toy in the giant’s immense hands, but Tolem was always amazed to see what delicate work Torg could accomplish with his thick fingers. “Torg,” he said. “What do you have to say on it?”

  Torg just stared down at his work. When he finally answered, it was with quiet venom: “Torg’s face is cold.”

  Phaedra crossed the room and draped herself on Tolem’s lap. “Look,” she said, staring into his eyes. “I’m not staying here. And I’m sure as fuck not going back to the beet farm. We go forward. Right? Like you always say. Forward.”

  Tolem nodded. He looked up into her eyes. “Forward.”

  Phaedra kissed him on top of the head. “That’s my Tolem.” She rose and stepped into the comfort room to finish getting ready.

  Tolem watched her go, then turned to look at the rest of the crew he’d chosen. A monstrous northerner bent on murdering a young girl for shaving off his beard. A diseased degenerate the gods seemed bent on torturing to death. A conniving rat-faced liar who’d likely knife any of them the moment they stopped being useful.

  He stroked his beard and waited. It was almost time to go.