12 Autumn, 1044

Year 21

The tall iron gate whispered under her as she slid over its spikes and tied the improvised bridge in place. As useful as the nobles seemed to think iron wrought fences were, she had never met one that could not be bested by a couple of planks of wood and a bit of rope.

As she tied off the far ends of the ropes underneath the three loosely tied boards that made a hinge over the pointy bits, she hopped fluidly to the ground. It was a fifteen-foot drop, but such heights were far less imposing when she wasn't using her face for the landing. She heard Tob and Eria plop down behind her somewhat more heavily and nodded, ready to go.

A sewer grate had let the little party of outlaws outside of the city, and while it was likely the safest way in or out, it wasn't by any means one of the more livable parts of the sewers, and Aziza was keenly aware that the three of them still stank to the high heavens. Never the less, sacrifices had to be made for all of them if they wanted to maintain their freedom, and a bit of sewage on their boots, inside their leather armor, and up the back side of their cloaks was, debatably, worth the exchange for increased security.

Her search these last few years, through the library of Central and the archives in the Southeastern Quarter, had finally led her here. In front of her climbed the ancient manor of Devos on the far edges of the city, standing defiantly farther outside the city walls than would be considered by any means safe. Instead of city walls, two layers of tall, iron fencing stood high, defiantly daring any of the beasts or bestial races that liked to raid the farmland to venture in too close.

Though the merchant family that technically owned the estate had been mostly dead and gone for some time now, the living relatives maintaining the building more for the sake of owning it than for any practical purpose, there was still a small security team that was tasked to watch over its gates. The Devos family wasn't unusually wealthy, as far as merchants go, though they had been particularly well-to-do during the early history of the kingdom, and when there were no reported goblin or beastmen attacks they generally allowed the guards guards to frequent the steps of the local Inn.

Usually one would think it a dereliction of duty, leaving guard posts as such empty, but here in the farmland, there wasn't as much risk as one might expect. The route out of the Underside was difficult enough that most hardened criminals never really bothered to leave the city, not unless they were after a much bigger score than a small manor owned by some nobody merchants, and the wrought iron fence was more than enough to deflect the wandering eyes of any passing villagers.

As the two of them got to their feet on the far side of the fence, Tob shook his head and whispered, "You owe us one, Zee. No way anything in there is worth the cost of carrying it.:

Aziza whispered back, shaking her head. "Maybe, but feel free to split anything we find. As I said, I'm only here for one thing."

It wasn't treasure or gold or loot that had brought Aziza there to that house that night, but rather a crusty old bit of parchment found in the back of the locked archives. There existed nowhere a plan of the castle construction, of the halls and towers and balconies therein, for such things had been destroyed by order of the king shortly after the building's construction. What she had found instead though, as far-fetched as it might have been, was the record of who had initially built it: the family of Devos. And at the time the Devos family conducted all business out of a singular building - this little manor in front of them.

"I'm here for blueprints or journals if there are any. Help me look, and I'll buy both of you rounds for a week."

Neither of her friends said another word, trailing behind her as they sauntered up the steps in front of the mansion. Aziza looked back and forth, suddenly acutely aware of how alone and how far they were from the city she had spent her entire life in they actually were. Tob just flicked his wrist as they walked and the doors splintered in front of them, their demolition echoing through the shadows of the night.

Aziza winced at the crashing as the remains of the door fell inward, but didn't pause. Eria's eyes darkened, swelling with ink-black light as she reached out with her fingertips, ripping a swirling black hole in the air in front of her. Without breaking step she and Tob began loading everything that looked halfway valuable through the void in the air. As the furniture disappeared into the swirling hole in space, Aziza moved along the hallways, doing a lap around the interior of the house - rapping on each wall with a knuckle and listening.

Moving her way around the first floor, Aziza climbed up the stairs to the second. She tapped on the back of each stair with the toe of her boot with every step, listening for any hollow or discordant echoes from the wood. It took her all of five minutes to search the entirety of the upper level for any hidden caches with no success. She made her way back down to the stairway where her two friends were slowly dragging an entire armoire into Eria's portable rift.

Aziza gave the two of them a hand for a moment before she made her way back down the stairs. "Find anything good?"

Eria shrugged, glancing back down the hallway. "Not much here, though at least it should all fit."

Tob held up his hand, showing off a few somewhat gaudy rings he had found, "Some bling around here, though I couldn't speak to the quality of it. What about you?"

Aziza shook her head as she walked, "Nothing yet, might need plan B."

She didn't need to look back to see the grin on Tob's face, "Rock the fuck on."

Aziza merely shook her head as she jogged down the stairway and over to the only level remaining to be searched, the root cellar. The door had already been splintered, wooden beams and splinters littering the stairs in front of her, a gift from Tob she knew. The individual powers of the Awakened were always awe-inspiring to her sleeping mind. She was careful not to step on any of the shards of wood as she started searching down into the subterranean storage room.

Upon seeing the rows and rows of wine racks twisting through the unlit vault she hesitated, wishing to herself that her friends had already looted the furniture here. Never the less, she used her bit of flint to light a torch against the wall by the staircase and retrieved the light, carefully inspecting each wall and floor as she passed through the wine racks.

She was about to give up, to go upstairs and help her friends, when something finally caught her eye. In the far corner from the stairs, there was a set of wood paneling that didn't match the other support beams. The wood was just a little, ever so slightly, different from that of the rest of the room. Faded with age, it would have been almost impossible to detect by anyone other than a trained burglar, but once Aziza saw it it wasn't something that she could unsee.

She moved toward the wall quickly, rapping her knuckles along the support beams. The unmatched section was, almost, as faded with age as the other supports, and yet the coloring, even after the long years, was ever so slightly off. Deft fingers picked their way across the paneling, searching for a seam or latch that she could pull apart. But no such weakness asserted itself as she sought, seemingly solidly built into the construction of the wall. She was still there messing with it some five minutes later when her friends made their way down the stairs.

"Find something?" Eria asked as she tugged the laceration in space along behind her into the cellar.

Aziza nodded without looking up, "I think so. Friggin Awakened architects." She glanced at the seemingly solid frame, "I'm certain there is something here, but the boards have been melded with the wall."

Tob's hand pressed lightly against her shoulder, "Don't worry about it then, come help us get the wine here. We'll take care of it after."

The three worked quickly, their small frames dragging the long wooden stands and spirits directly outside of standard space, inch by inch their spoils being swallowed by the void. It took longer than above, just due to the furniture being more substantial with the cargo of liquid hanging heavily on each rack and having to be careful not to lose too many of the bottles as they rattled across the floor. It put them slightly behind schedule, but when it came to the wine, likely the most valuable thing in the place, none of the three were inclined just to leave it behind.

Finally, their goods secured, the three partners stood in the stairwell with Tob standing the furthermost to the bottom of the cellar. He began to make fists with each of his hands, pulling each backward in turn. And as his fists danced back and forth through the empty air, across the room, the wood of the support beam began to tear. Fist, pull, splinter, fist, pull, splinter, the shaft was shredded by the Awakened ability over the course of a minute to a cacophony of small bangs. After less than a minute, the support beam was crashed and splintered, having been torn apart by awakened force.

The three of them drew their weapons, Aziza with a crude dagger in each hand, Tob with his short sword, and Eria with her battered rapier. The companions fell upon the cracks, wedging their steel in between the openings and widening the holes in the construction. Another five minutes later and Aziza began to doubt what she had seen, that there were, in fact, two different types and ages of wood making up this pillar - but even still the three carried on, disassembling what looked to be solid construction.

When the base of the pillar was entirely gone, turned into a pile of kindling lining the floor of the cellar, and with  sawdust coating their hands and cloaks, they found something odd about the wall behind the pillar. Out of the stonework was carved a small alcove, and in it rested aged pages tied within a binding of old leather with a silken cord. Carefully, reverently, Aziza lifted the bundle from the stonework, moving it into the void that twisted beside them with trembling fingers.

"Ingenious that, putting parchment in there," Tob mused. "With the temperature and lack of airflow down here, those documents could have survived for hundreds of years. Easy."

Aziza shrugged, "I'm just glad my shot in the dark seemed to pay off. Though if those are nothing more than old accounting records or something, I'll be out of leads."

Eria put her hands on each of their shoulders, comfortingly, but her words were filled with strained anxiety, "Come on, we can talk about this later. We left a hell of a mess in here and we really, really need to go." Her fingers deftly closed her rift as her hands came away, all bustle and professionalism.

. . .

"Halt!" The word rang out, shattering the quiet night's air, freezing the three instantly where they stood. Their eyes danced across the shadows, desperately searching out the potential assailants.

"Shit," Eria muttered, "We took too bloody long."

Aziza only nodded as her eyes alighted on the two shadows near the now open fence, each holding a giant, ready crossbow in their hands. All three of the little band stood silently, waiting for the two to approach.

"Stand where you are, keep your hands in the air!" Came the order from the guards, apparently having come back early to check on their charge and found the front door in splinters. As the pair inched forward toward the thieves, they moved into a hazy beam of moonlight. Both of the guards were aged, with white cropped beards pointing downwards toward their regulation chain and tabards. A little bit of yellow wetness clung to the beard of the one on the right, having been none too careful with his beer before leaving to check on the manor.

Something struck Aziza for a moment, as their faces came into view, and as they took a few steps closer, the familiarity somehow clicked within her mind. She knew the man on the left, though he was much, much older now, somehow more haggard and warn. A chill echoed down her spine as the gears in her mind spun and ground together.

"Arnold?" The girl muttered, incredulously, as the figures took yet another step closer, now not more than a good twenty feet away. "Is that you?"

Confusion sparked in the man's eyes as he looked at Aziza closer, eyes devouring the features of the young girl's face as he struggled for the memory. Before he could speak, his companion shouted a yelp of warning, "Shit, they're Underside! Undersiders!"

Before the warning had finished echoing through the chill air, all five figures had sprung into motion. An arrow flew through the air at Eria, splintering into a dozen different steel tipped shards as it flew - milliseconds before the bolts found their mark in her flesh, liquid shadows sprung to cover her body, and the girl disappeared to leave the arrows sinking futilely into the wooden walls of the manor. Aziza sprung backward, hitting the floor of the doorway with her shoulders and executing a quick backward roll back into the house and out of sight. Arnold hesitated for a split second longer than should have, eyes still glittering with confusion and surprise, even as Tob waved his hand and poor Arnold flew backward a good fifteen feet to hit the dirt with his shoulder.

The second guard dropped his now expended crossbow, ripping his sword from his sheath even as shadows coalesced behind him. His breath stuttered as he looked down, to find the long, thin blade of a rapier protruding from his stomach. Twisting his body quickly, he turned and finished drawing his longsword with a quick scraping sound, using his body as a pivot that pulled the sword out of Eria's grasp. His strike flashed out only to disappear into a tear in reality, as Eria brandished a gaping portal with her left hand, moving it as a shield.

The second guard had pulled his sword back, angling for a second strike when three daggers danced through the air from the doorway to the manor, taking him in the back and thigh. The pain staggered him as two of the three dug deeply into his flesh, and Eria found an opening. Using the wound in reality that she brandished in her left, she flung it over the guard's head like a lasso and swiftly brought the edges together with her fingers, sealing it tight against his neck. It wasn't considered good form to use a low-level dimensional storage ability in combat, but Undersiders knew well that anything could be a weapon, and they worked to hone what they had into a killing edge. Her sword danced out and back again through the guard's chest five times before he finally fell still.

Arnold kept getting up and flashing across the ground with incredible speed, his body flinging itself forward like an arrow in the moonlight, but each time Tob would take a step closer and flick his wrist, tossing the guard just a little further back into the dirt. The guard possessed excellent combat ability, Aziza had never before seen anyone move like that in combat, but it depended upon speed, and Tob was just a hair's breath faster in employing his psionic bash. Against a man in armor, Tob wasn't doing all that much in the way of damage but yet Arnold was seemingly helpless against the assault and slowly was starting to exhaust himself in the struggle.

Watching the way the guard flew through the air with every charge, Eria and Aziza didn't dare to get close. They moved instead to stand beside Tob as he slowly pushed his way forward, step by step, steadily gaining ground. Aziza had retrieved her daggers and Eria her sword from the now headless corpse, but even still the two waited to attack as Tob lead the dance. It wasn't until his body slammed against the metal grate of the fence that the guard finally relented, throwing down his sword and sticking his own hands in the air reluctantly.

The three approached, kicking the weapon away and encircling the guard. Eria held her rapier against the man's throat, Tob standing over the man with his hand at the ready, as Aziza moved to search the pair for valuables. As she was cutting away Arnold's purse, he still looked at her with the strange, quizzical expression, searching his memory.

"Tell me, girl, I... helped you once, ya? When you were lost on the streets? Or was that all some kind of a grift." The older man's eyes were haunted as the thieves ransacked his valuables.

Shaking her head, Aziza spoke while tugging off the man's boots, huffing with effort between words, "No, I was lost, and alone and I don't know what would have happened to me if you hadn't stepped in to help. You saved me and brought me somewhere safe, and I'll never be able to repay you for that."

The man's eyes darkened, "Then what happened to you, girl? How did you fall in with this filth? How did you become this piece of shit who would rob a man of his boots?"

Aziza's nimble fingers didn't pause as they moved on the unbuckling the guard's armor, chuckling, "We will leave you your life, I will leave you your life. But it was Tob over here who took you down," she said the name without hesitation. When the Awakened can look past you and take your name from you in an instant, anonymity wasn't exactly a common commodity. "And as such, as someone who has saved my life a good dozen times over, all of your valuables belong to him. Not me."

Arnold's eyes looked past her for a moment, scanning further, before they widened in shock, "You aren't even Awakened, girl. How are you an Undersider?" His voice incredulous, "How could you even survive down there? Why would you risk it when you could have had a good, honest life? You're insane!"

Aziza shrugged offhandedly as she finished the last buckle and began tugging the chain mail over Arnold's head, "A little help from my friends. You didn't exactly leave me in a house of feasting and wine, after all." As the armor came off, she added it to the pile for Eria to tuck away, "Girl's got to eat, after all."

The man shook his head, frowning deeply, "No, don't make excuses. It would have sufficed if you had gotten work, squirreled some funds away each day for food. Plenty of orphans made it through that orphanage before you and plenty more will make good, honest lives for themselves after you are gone. Whatever it is you've become, whelp, that's on your shoulders."

As the last of the plundered goods were delivered to Eria, Aziza shrugged, doing a little twirl and flaring her cloak, "And finely dressed shoulders they shall be." She quipped even as Eria moved to tie the man's limbs together, shoving a good bit of mud stained rope into the guard's mouth.

Aziza and her friends turned their back on the mansion and the guards, and as they began their trek back into the sewers of Illmouth, she never once bothered to look back.