“And before he finally lets us go, he actually tries to talk us into selling the cauldron to him instead of returning it to the rightful owners!” Kel said, setting the now empty mug on the bar as the orange light of the setting sun streamed through the windows. “Rojar! ‘Nother round, please!”

The barkeep, a mousy looking young man with short light brown hair and glasses, took Kel’s mug for a refill while the three women continued to talk.

“It’s your own fault for getting caught,” Niva said. “The bastards were hounding me the whole day, but I kept giving them the slip.”

“What WERE you doing all day?” Jazathya asked as she finished taking a drink from her own cup.

“Going around town from one Diver hotspot to another, asking about the Tide Masters,” Niva said.

“And Kashin, right?” Kel asked.

“Uhhh… sure. I probably brought him up once or twice,” Niva said.

“You have got to stop with this obsession with the Tide Masters,” Kel said. “I know you want it to be easy and have the culprit be the very first group you suspected, but that’s not looking likely. Worse, it’s pissing them off, and the Twilight Eye guild isn’t going to be happy about us stirring up trouble either.”

“Did you even find out anything useful?” Jazathya asked.

“Nope,” Niva admitted. “Didn’t hear anything suspicious at all about them. They must have been extremely thorough about covering their tracks.”

Kel rolled her eyes as Rojar brought her mug back, once again full of beer. Kel grabbed it with both hands, letting her own hand overlap his and holding it there for much longer than necessary. “Thanks a lot!” she said to him with a broad smile. He blushed as he removed his hand, returning her smile before being called away by another customer.

“If we can focus on the matter at hand…” Jazathya said sternly as she glared at Kel. “What exactly do we know?”

“Magic cauldron got stolen on its way up from the Depths,” Niva said. “Everybody dies except this Kashin guy. He’d gone to Jabod the retired guild master to try to arrange a buyer for it two months ahead of time, but the old pervert didn’t bite.”

“That lines up with the report from the Twilight Eye, which says they’d been planning the expedition to retrieve it for slightly longer than that,” Kel said. “He requested to be on the guard detail for the final transfer between the Depths and the city.”

“And who does that leave as our suspects?” Jazathya asked.

“I think we should look more into this cult Jabod said Kashin was part of,” Kel said.

“How are you going to investigate them?” Niva asked. “You don’t know anything about them, right?”

“We know that they’re likely associated with one or more spirits with powerful mind influencing abilities,” Kel said. “That or they’re involved in the drug trade. What was it Jabod said would have made Kashin immune to his wife’s song? Dream kelp?”

“How do either of those help us?” Niva pointed out. “Kelp dens are dangerous places. We can’t just go to every one in the city and ask if any of the dealers are secretly cult members. So unless you’ve got any secret spirit detecting powers…” Niva waited for Kel to respond.

“And I don’t,” Kel admitted.

“Then it’s a dead end,” Niva said.

“I agree,” Jazathya said. “Frankly, as far as I’m concerned, there’s no evidence this ‘cult’ even exists. I think Jabod was trying to throw us off his trail. We knew Kashin had talked to him, so he made up the story about this mysterious cult to send us on a wild goose chase. He arranged the theft, and now Kashin is either hiding out or he’s fled the city. Or I guess Jabod could have killed him to keep him quiet.”

“Are you listening to yourself?” Kel asked. “Jabod killed Kashin? Based on what?”

“Who else could it be, then?” Jazathya said.

“I say it’s the Tide Masters for sure,” Niva chimed in.

“There’s no evidence at all that ties them to the crime!” Kel said.

“I may not be one of you nobles with your fancy schooling,” Niva said. “But the guys who keep attacking and kidnapping us because we’re investigating the theft? Maybe, just maybe, they’re involved somehow.”

“That’s because you were publicly calling them thieves!” Jazathya angrily exclaimed.

“And idle gossip gets a whole battalion of Divers chasing after me for hours?” Niva countered. “Seems like that guild is way too sensitive about the topic for them to be innocent.”

“I think Jazathya is right,” Kel said. “Garvan was very insistent about trying to convince us to sell the cauldron to him if we could recover it. He offered us at least ten times what the Twilight Eye did, maybe more depending on how much he could sell it for.”

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

“Kel, Kel, Kel,” Niva sighed, dramatically shaking her head. “Always so naive. Why do you think he went through all that effort to talk to you? He wanted to make it look like he was desperate to get his hands on the cauldron, because that makes it look like he doesn’t have it. Who cares if you’re offering a billion shelat for something if it's sitting in your back room? It makes it look like you’re seriously looking for it, and you’ll never have to pay a single coin, because nobody could actually ever find the thing you secretly already own. Trust me, it’s exactly what I’d do if I’d stolen the cauldron.”

The two other women looked at Niva accusingly. “What? It’s a hypothetical. I may be a liar and a thief, but I’m not lying about this and I didn’t steal it.”

“You’ve already admitted to lying about seeing the Tide Masters steal it,” Kel pointed out.

“Okay, fair. But that’s the only lie I’ve told about this,” Niva said. “Besides, why even go through all this bullshit if I had it? You think that if I had the thing that I’d be willing to walk straight into the Twilight Eye guild hall and bring it up? Even I’m not short sighted enough to think they wouldn’t eventually realize I’d been involved in stealing it in the first place. Give me a little credit here.”

“I hope you ladies don’t mind if I interject?” Rojar said. The girls looked at him without offering complaint and so he continued. “Have you ever heard of the king’s ring scheme?”

“Yes, the Tide Masters’ leader mentioned it,” Kel said. “It’s a confidence trick where you pretend to have been stolen from, then sell a counterfeit version of the so-called ‘stolen’ property.”

“Right,” Rojar nodded. “It’s a classic scam. I’m not saying the Twilight Eye is tricking you into helping make it look more realistic, but it’s a possibility to keep in mind.”

“Awww, thanks for looking out for us!” Kel said with a bright grin. “You must be so well read.”

“University student, actually,” Rojar said. “Bar-tending is just a way to earn money until I graduate.”

“Wow, you’re enrolled in Vecenzi’s University?” Kel said.

“Hah! I wish,” Rojar admitted. “No, I’m only a student at Costa Arcana. I’m the son of a baron, wasn’t going to inherit, and my family didn’t have the money to spare on a third son to get me into Vecenzi’s.”

“It was pretty similar for me,” Kel said. “My older brother was going to inherit the barony, so I became a knight. Closest I ever got to a college was a few odd semesters at seminary during my squirehood. It’s too bad, really. I always wanted to find out whether those stories about college students and your wild, debauched parties were true,” she added with a giggle.

Jazathya cleared her throat. “If you two are quite done, we have to discuss our next moves.” Rojar blushed and nodded to her, scurrying off with a final wave goodbye to Kel. “What can we even do at this point?”

“We can keep checking out Diver bars,” Niva said. “We already found one lead like that. Somebody at one of those has to know something about Kashin.”

“Agreed,” Kel said. “But we’re doing it together, to make sure you’re on your best behavior.”

Niva cursed under her breath and took another drink of beer.

“I’m going back to Lilannette,” Jazathya declared.

“She won’t help you,” Kel said. “When she gets in one of her moods, there’s no reasoning with her.”

“This is exactly why she didn’t want to meet you,” Niva said. “I still can’t believe you managed to run into her by chance.”

“What I can’t believe is that you actually helped her hide it!” Kel exclaimed. “How long have you known she’s a witch?”

“Only since a few days ago when she tracked me down and asked me to meet up with you when you arrived,” Niva said. “And she swore me to secrecy. Not only would telling you have put you in a sour mood, it would have been breaking my word. That’s got to be a sin or something, right?”

“And it would have made me too busy to help with this money making scheme of yours,” Kel pointed out.

“Anyway, I need to go back to her house to pick up Mipmip,” Jazathya said. “He ran back inside when the Tide Masters caught us. He will be safe with her for the night, right?”

“Yes, she’ll take good care of him,” Kel said. “She’s a good person at heart, even if she is a witch. She used to be the perfect little sister, always wanted to be just like me. Then, she got older, and everything always started turning into a fight. It was like one day she suddenly hated me and would take any chance she could to disobey our parents and act like a cruel and selfish little brat.”

“Since I have to go anyway, I may as well try to talk some sense into her,” Jazathya said. “She can’t hate you enough to want the Twilight Eye after you, right?”

“Who knows? I’d hope not, but it’s like she just can’t think rationally when it comes to me or the rest of the family.”

“Right…” Jazathya said skeptically, earning a glare from Kel. “Fine, let’s drop it. Is there anything else we can follow up on?”

“The only name that jumps out at me from his file is Umaran Gabiral,” Kel said. “It says he introduced Kashin to the guild. Any idea who that is?”

“He’s some kind of community leader for Irdishani expatriates here in Darazzo,” Jazathya said. “He helps people get settled and find work, especially as Divers. The little vulture’s been trying to get a meeting with me for weeks.”

Kel raised an eyebrow. “Bad blood between the two of you?”

“I’ve never met him,” Jazathya said. “But his whole little cadre of lackeys is stocked with people who abandoned Irdishan when it needed them the most. I wouldn’t trust those greedy, self-centered pieces of shit to do my laundry.”

“So you’re saying they’re the kind of people you wouldn’t put past being involved in theft?” Kel pointed out. Jazathya stammered, having nothing to say to that. “Look, you dragged me to see a witch. How much worse can it be to talk to some kind of mercenary staffing agent?”

“I suppose we don’t have much choice…” Jazathya admitted. “Fine, I’ll write to him and say I’m willing to meet. We can try to pump him for information and then I’ll never have to speak to him again, deal?”

“Sounds like a plan,” Kel said. “Tomorrow Niva and I will hit some more Diver watering holes while you try to set up a meeting with Gabiral and see if Lilannette won’t reconsider helping us.”

“Today went well,” Jazathya mused. “I’m actually feeling hopeful we can pull this off.”

“That’s the spirit,” Niva said, heartily patting her on the back. “It’s getting late, and I’ve got to walk all the way back home, so I’m afraid this is goodnight for me.” With that, she stood up. “Hey, barkeep! Put the drinks on my tab, alright?”