Stealth 15. Spot Hidden 7. Disguise 10. Find Traps 8.
I lean into my skills, one after the other, as I move, silent and ghostly in the quiet streets near the compound of Greyland. Not everyone in this city is in bed, far from it. The further I progress towards the great ziggurat that dominates the skyline, the busier the city becomes. All the street stalls are closed but there are several buildings from which comes the noise of many people talking, the scents of cooked food, and the drum beats of dance music. Lit by bright lanterns, I see through windows into rooms that are busy with inferni eating, drinking, and dancing.
Does this city of blood-drinking inferni intimidate me? Not in the least. Indeed, I hope that the nonchalance in my step furthers my disguise. For while an overly timid, cautious motion would speak of guilt, my confident gait says that it is as natural for me to walk these dim, cobbled streets as it is for a fish to swim in water.
Stopping behind a slatted fence, I look through a gap to study one of the lively establishments. Inferni, both men and women, stroll openly up to where three guards – leather armour, with swords and daggers in their scabbards – give a perfunctory check and let them through. Beyond the door I get glimpses of the people dancing. I can hear conversation, laughter, and someone singing, accompanied by a flute. To go inside is my desire, but none of the people approaching those on guard duty have masks or hoods. A curious crow I may be, but not curious enough to climb the building and seek another way in.
Onwards I walk, always towards the ziggurat. In my mind, I see my route from above and I do not fear becoming lost. All the same, I create a list of landmarks should I want to retrace my route in a hurry: lion fountain; three-story house, boarded up; house with broken roof tiles; wall with blue-glowing vines; and so on. Have I a purpose? Other than to refuse to be intimidated by the warnings of our guide? Not particularly. My after-dinner stroll mostly serves to give me information about the city beyond that made available by our guide. And I have in mind too that if I can find a way to contact them, the rogues’ guild of Dūr-Abihâr might be of help to my quest. Assuming they honour the same codes as I was taught by the guild at Nekis.
After about thirty minutes of cautious journeying through Dūr-Abihâr I come to a wide plaza between myself and the south side of the ziggurat. Here there are almost a dozen well-lit, open buildings, many of them two-storey, and there’s even a three-storey one. Carefully, I take up a station where I can observe the largest, which is also the most popular. Again, people are entering past guards (these doormen are in gold and blue livery, a better class of warden), some of them arriving in carriages and looking very well dressed. From the complex texture of the music I can hear, there are at least four musicians playing inside with stringed instruments. And from the hubbub within I can pick out peals of laughter: the inferni here are enjoying themselves. Well, well, so the inferni know how to party. From travelling for weeks with the dour and bitter Amaris I would never have known.
This time, I am resolved upon entering the building. Blinkstep from beside the outside wall might work but I don’t like the risk of appearing next to someone who notices my unexpected arrival. Studying the shadows on the streets gives me an idea. The carriages typically have lanterns on their roofs, or bright, luminous plants which create a glow around them. As the next carriage approaches, slowing down with the clear intention of letting out its passengers, I start to walk brisky towards the building. A slave leaps down from the back of the vehicle and hurries to open the door to let the passengers out, I hurry too, so that just as the shadow cast by the swinging carriage door crosses the entrance to the tall building, I step on it and Shadow Step a few metres beyond the guards. Without looking back, I hurry on down a wide, blue carpeted corridor to a reception area. I have done it! There are no shouts, no hurried footsteps behind me. Crow has crashed the party without an invite.
In this foyer are carpeted staircases left and right, both curving around to meet at a landing above me. Ahead, double doors are fixed wide open, showing a large room where there is music, drink, and dancing. Several servants are here to greet new arrivals, taking their coats, showing them inside.
I won’t be able to bluff my way into that room, not with my weapons and black leather armour. Hardly breaking stride, as if I know exactly what I’m doing, I turn up the left stairs and ascend them to the balcony. Now I can take stock, relying on my Stealth 15 to be unnoticed by those moving around in the foyer below. As still and observant as a crow in a tree, I let my heartbeat settle and watch as more inferni arrive. There are servants moving through the room below too, with trays of food coming from side doors and returning with empty dishes. It is through one these doors too that the bodyguard of a newly arrived female inferni noble goes. A few adjustments to my appearance and I could perhaps enter the servants’ area, posing as a bodyguard? The conversation of servants is invariably worth hearing.
First though I should test the double doors behind me and although they are locked, by crouching I can bring Amaris’s high-quality tools to bear on the lock without being visible from downstairs. Pick Lock 4 (yet another skill I wish I had more points in) plus whatever bonus I have from the tools proves enough to trick the tumblers into falling and I am able to turn the handle and ease one of the doors open. Beyond it is a short corridor (with a door off to either side) that opens to a large, well-lit room with many people in it. Strangely, these people are almost silent, although I do hear muttered exclamations.
Slipping through the doors, I close them behind me and use Stealth to edge along the corridor to get a better view. I can now see into the wide, circular room, which is well lit by a central chandelier, holding some thirty candles. There are two rectangular tables, each seating eight people, at which card games are taking place. A significant amount of silver coins is piled on the tables. Enough to make you a very wealthy person in Nekis. Naturally, the silver casts an allure on me: come, come steal me, carry me off to your nest. And I do briefly run over my skills, thinking about how I might swoop down and get away with a couple of handfuls at least. The shadows here are quite distinct.
Treasure, especially silver, is a always a thrilling distraction but I am a crow on a mission and I return to my careful study of the room. There are sixteen card players at the two tables: one has eight men; the other four male, four female players, at least to judge by their clothes. All the players are expensively dressed, they would be nobles in Nekis, with their silk and velvet, although their taste for large collars, cuffs and ruffs would be considered flamboyant back home. Around the walls, at least to the extent that I can view them, are six guards in the blue and gold uniforms I had seen earlier, and two others in black leather armour with metal helmets.
While I am surveying the room an exasperated male, clearly upset with having lost, stands up and leaves via the far corridor. Some of the others at his table are grinning. It is not long before another inferni noble arrives, takes the empty seat, and places several stacks of silver coins in front of him. I’m a little envious of him. How exciting it must be to play a game for such high stakes. But not only is it impossible for me to pass off my disguise at that close a distance, I do not know the rules of the game and would surely be shown up as a fool. I recognise cards from the standard Tarot suits, but there are special cards, whose role and value I do not know.
Each player puts a silver coin into a central pile and receives a hand of six cards. Then three cards are turned up by the dealer and placed side by side for all to see. Next, a fourth card is turned over on its own and the players all make a bid for it in secret, lifting their hands to show their silver, with the winner pushing his bid into the pot, slotting the card they won into their hand, and discarding one face down. Then everyone bets, or resigns, until they show their cards and somehow determine the winner.
It is all very fascinating, yet I cannot imagine returning to Belle and explaining that the risks I have taken have been rewarded by knowledge of a new card game. I should perhaps leave and go in search of a place where I might spot pickpockets and meet the rogues’ guild. First, though, I really study the scene intently, with my Spot Hidden skill of 7. And I do notice something very interesting. There is cheating taking place.
I’m looking at the hands of the dealer at the all-male table. His fingers, as he shuffles and straightens the pack, are lingering on the edges of the cards, caressing them. What does he do with the information he seems to be gaining by this? It takes me several hands to understand but having seen every kind of scam in the dens of Nekis, I quickly appreciate the setup. The new player is the victim. When the victim has the best hand, the dealer glances to his left, towards a player with a green velvet jacket. And when the victim has the worst hand, the dealer momentarily looks to his right, to a player with his white hair in several braids. The victim’s opponents know when to resign and when to add more coins to the pot, and they will soon wipe him out.
Up to now I’ve been enjoying my jaunty adventure as mostly providing proof that a child of Nekis is more than a match for the inferni of the Underworld, despite their fearsome reputation. Now, though, I feel that acceleration of heart and mind that comes before action. And before I even have a plan, I am walking over to the victim, forcing the necessary words into line as I close the distance between us.
‘The cards are marked along their sides, you are being cheated; the dealer is helping two others and you must certainly be defeated.’
‘What in Asārte’s name––’
I snatch up a card and run the edge over the victim’s bare forearm, so that he feels whatever small notch or bump the dealer was searching for with his fingertips. The victim understands. His face, which had been a snarl directed towards me, fangs exposed, recomposes itself to something much darker, much more evil, as he puts his hands on the table and stands to address the dealer.
‘Give me those cards!’
My voice had been a mutter, for him only, though one or two nearby may have heard me. His shout fills the room.
‘They’ve marked the cards! Everyone stop your game! The cards are marked! The dealers are corrupt!’
To the credit of guards at the walls, they have reacted extremely quickly and I am already nearly surrounded by the nearest four. Unfortunately for them I am no ordinary rogue. Helping myself to a handful of silver from the nearest stack and a few of the cards, I Blink.
Then, as they look for me, my doppelganger appears and I have him leap on a table, kicking coins around the place, before attempting to get away on the opposite side from that which I entered. He is wrestled to the ground but his struggles are creating the diversion I need.
There are plenty of shadows, so even though my Blink took me to a relatively unfavourable part of the room, I can take several nimble Shadow Steps on shadows that cross one another until I am back in the quieter corridor, still with a comfortable 12 mana in hand. I know I should keep moving but I allow myself a moment’s amusement at the uproar behind me.
The former victim, having reached over the table and grabbed the dealer, has pinned the man’s head to the table, under his knee. Four or five fights have broken out, with hidden daggers now revealed and gleaming in the light of the chandelier. The more timid inferni are hurrying away, to the far side mostly. The braver, or more venal, are snatching at silver coins, which are all over the floor. And the uproar is astonishing. A moment ago this was a room of people in quiet concentration, now there are screams of pain, screams of rage, urgent shouts and vehement cursing.
Deep within my hood, this must surely have a merry gleam in his eye.
My exit from the building is a simple matter, as the guards have mostly run inside and those that remain outside cannot do anything in the face of a throng of inferni, pushing past each other in their hurry to get out. I just have to join the stream of bodies, elbowing my way into the middle, until released with the ending of the press as we spill onto the plaza. On my way out of the jostling crowd, I take advantage of the confusion and the undoubted skill bonuses of the situation to Pickpocket from an inferni noblewoman beside me, obtaining a silver broach with a dozen gems in it and a pearl-embedded fan.
And then I am in the quiet, dark streets once more. Perfectly aware of the route back to the compound, my stride is surely even more jaunty than when I set out.