Beware, dear traveler, and mark well my words. For, by the yellowed fang of the Trick Moon and the Dead Maw’s eye, may it never a’lit you, my words are true.
There is a score to be paid, in gold and blood, from whomever casts away from gentle shores, for no choice is without price and the water grows ever hungry.
——
There is a skull and it sits in the dark, waiting. It is still, for now; eye sockets long empty but ever watchful. Vast treasure surrounds it; drifts of golden coins bearing the face of a long dead king, piles of goblets crusted with jewels and delicate engravings, chests full of pearls that long to adorn a neck, to swirl into a glowing ballroom and clink their laughter along with their mistress as they spin in wild dance. But in all the golden glory, no living thing remains.
The cavernous dungeon room is silent, save for the sound of the ocean far above, for this is a sunken place, lost to the dark waters of the Dragon Coast. The torches that mark the entrance door, the sconces that adorn the stone walls, have long burnt out. The sun forgotten.
But want calls to need, and far above, there are those who answer.
The skull grins, sitting on it’s throne, ruling no one. A word echoes, out of meaning and back again, through the dungeon that became a tomb.
Dearest.
--
Mooni kept her hands in her pockets and wormed closer into the storyteller’s crowd. She glanced behind her.
The market square of Hanging was busy today. There had been an unexpected party of southerners, rich with warm, fresh money, straight up from Fort Orinica and the town had reacted in kind. Like a long dried sea urchin in king tide, it’s tendrils had unfurled in the hope of supper; shop doorways were swept, window displays arranged and door guards, in starched uniforms, were paid extra to watch would-be pickpockets. Like her.
They paid no heed to the shops and stalls as owners rewrote their signs, the prices doubled. Some types of theft are just part of the game.
But today, with the salt breeze rising up as the sky shed her starlight for a gray smock of clouds and the rattle of anticipation from the crowd behind her, Hanging was the most beautiful place in the world.
Where the sea had eaten away into the cliffs, where there was enough room for a couple rows of wood shingle shacks and a road, there was Hanging. And since the town had no room to grow out, like mussels on a tide pool rock, it had followed the path of least resistance and moved skyward. First on stilts to elevate the second row above the original homes, then up the cliff, with iron hooks to anchor the wooden platforms that became streets, and a tangle of ladders, stairways and ramps to connect the floors.
Mooni had stacked her deck when she chose this market as her hiding spot. Halfway up, halfway down, the Red Fin market had the best chances on both sides in case this day required a fast exit. She pulled her shawl, indigo and sporting more than its fair share of holes, over her braided mass of straw colored hair and hunched further into the crowd as a two man guard patrolled by. A few drops of rain, sparse and hard, began to fall.
A good weather day by Hanging’s standards.
The story teller had been working himself up for the better part of an hour and was drawing to the end of his story. Most penny stories contained treasure and violence, a guaranteed crowd pleaser, and the tin bowl at his bare feet showed the fruits of his labors. The red painted sigils, the mark of a storyteller, on his hands and face had started to run in the damp, and his already mottled overcoat was tinged with new red.
He lifted his face to the sky to cry out the end of his tale. Rain mixed with paint, it looked like he was crying blood. If it was on purpose for effect, he would never admit it but Mooni bet it was. Or she would’ve bet, if she had a single coin left to her name.
Cheers, and the plink of new pennies for the tin bowl, rose from the crowd as he finished with the classic line “And then they went to the tavern and drank till dawn”. Mooni warmed herself with satisfaction. She had picked correctly. No one in this crowd would remember her that much was certain.
The group began to drift apart. Mooni turned and surveyed the square again, weighing the risk of standing in unobstructed view against the lack of appropriate target.
A quick-thief always waited till the right moment to slip in, dart between the cracks in the expected reality of daily life. The only question was to see who was too preoccupied, or privileged, to think they could be robbed in broad daylight.
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There were less than ten people around her now. She would have to act, good target or not. One of the new guards walking the market, or the old guards with a fresh bribe in his pocket, would notice her soon. She had changed into an sad sack of a dress, lustered her eyes in dark gray, but it wouldn't matter if they saw her face.
The wanted posters had made sure of that.
Her face, the one thing the Court of Justice had gotten right, the one thing she wished they had known less about. The court artist had drawn her up fairly; the straw hair, the face freckled from sun, thin from missed dinners, the dark eyes set deep above cat smile lips. Even when her scowled, her face betrayed her. That ghost of a smile had landed her into more undeserved trouble than she could remember, but also out of it, sometimes.
Mooni felt the shift in the market like a current and let it pull her along into step behind a pair of ladies with matching dark green skirts until they came to the stairs leading up to the next level. Then she doubled back, towards the market, and attached herself to a new group; a man and a mule with a wagon. Neither noticed the shadow of a girl behind them. Half obscured from wider view by the wooden crates on the back of the wagon, she kept one shoulder to the wall, one eye on the market shops.
Where were they? One a usual day, there were plenty of easy pockets. But each person she ran her eye over was too aware, too protected, or too poor to be a target. The weather was turning as more clouds rolled in from the sea. The wind kept teasing at the shawl draped over her face, daring it to fall. Her left hand, still in her pocket, ached.
She broke off again and settled into the dry side of a doorway behind a fruit stall to wait out the rain.
“Sweet potato, miss?” said a sailor’s collection of orange and yellow coats that was sitting on the stoop next to hers. There was an old man in there somewhere. She could just make out his eyes under the bulk of his knit cap. He jerked his head towards an oven, little more than two pots nailed together and set over a pile of coals.
Mooni’s stomach answered before her mouth could.
“Made em myself this morning, still soft, see.” He reached in and pulled a purple potato from the pot then broke it in two. The steam lifted off of it, tempting.
“How much?” She said.
“Two penny.”
“I’ve not even two penny, here or home, sorry.”
“A flat penny then, for a nice girl like you.” He said.
“And not much nice, I’m afraid.” Mooni said. “Those do look good though.”
“Ah.” He said. He took a bite of one half and turned his attention away. The other piece he returned to the oven.
A pair of men in oiled coats trimmed with red aiguillette appeared around the corner and walked through the middle of the street, sharks in the water. Mooni didn’t have to try to make herself small.
The old man spat out a potato skin as they passed and held up his right hand in an impolite gesture. Or what was left of his hand.
Good currents or no, it was time to move. She nodded goodbye, wished him luck and slipped away towards more risky waters.
Shops alongside the cliff wall were made of thick wood, painted and trimmed to attract more affluent customers. Each door had a guard but each patron had a purse of silvers. A chance at gold if you played you cards right.
Her stomach grumbled, a complaint at a missed meal as she walked past a butcher shop. A woman was inside, trimmed in otter fur and pearls. And flanked by personal guards.
Across the street, a whip-like man with a black mustache. A purse swung freely from his belt. Right next to his Guild-issued twin daggers.
An old man holding a suit box. A lady and her children, distracted, easy, but her indigo dress had been patched and re-patched while her children’s clothes were new.
Mooni could feel the eye luster sinking onto her cheeks. Her leather boots were full of wet. She turned down one more street and then…
There.
The mark.
A man had just walked out of a jewelry shop. He was dressed in a stately long coat of cream wool, trimmed with embroidery. Fat, round buttons, each stamped with a crest Mooni didn’t recognize, marched in perfect lines down the front. He donned a wide brim rose colored hat and stepped off the raised shop stoop into the street with the ease of a person who isn't responsible for their own laundry. His coat flapped behind him, buttons catching the light the way only real gold can.
The man turned back to shout. A serving man stood in the doorway in a stiff black uniform. His body hunched around the effort of holding a gift wrapped box the size of a donkey’s head. By the looks of it, the box was just as heavy. It was done up with ribbons that wafted into his face whenever he tried to move. He couldn't see his feet let alone the step down but said nothing. The southern aristocrat swept his own empty hands around him before turning away, and, then, as if he was allergic to being still, set to adjusting the lilac colored silk scarf that frilled out from his throat. It was held in place by a single ruby the size of a fist set in even more gold.
Mooni breathed a sigh of relief and drifted towards her intended position.
There was a guard on either side of the doorway. They were too busy playing the imposing guard to be of real use. One had the pallor of a man who might pass out if he kept his knees locked for much longer.
She was only a few steps away. An blue shadow, drifting. Mooni wasn’t a shark, but she didn’t have to be, not when she was the one with the hook.
The serving man stumbled down onto the street, his back to her. He had attached his purse to his belt in haste, most likely to pick up his burden and follow his master.
“-around the corner-” he was saying. “She will be most-“
She closed the distance. Out went her right hand.
With practice, perfection.
The purse came free in her palm and disappeared into the folds of her dress. The serving man already striding to cross the street, unaware.
Mooni let herself relish the moment.
A good thief knew how to not get caught. A professional thief knew how to get caught at the right moment.
She locked eyes with the guard and winked.
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