“You really headed out there?”

“I’m telling you, she was worth her weight in gold. Scrawny as she was,” Nox replied. From the corner in which Suveli lounged, an amused snort reached him, accompanied, as always, by the sound of whittling.

“She won’t come.”

“Then you can make me feel better when I come back.”

“Top or bottom?”

“Yous are disgustin’.” Nuri, the latest addition to the thieves’ guild, put down the boots she had been in the process of shining and threw both of them a judgmental look. For all her history of stealing secrets in some of Moodburn’s most notorious brothels, she possessed a peculiar sense of virtue which led her to struggle with the guild’s loose morals as upheld by Suveli and him. A pity, really, given her utterly sinful face.

“Thanks, sweetheart.” Nox grabbed the leather boots she had just put down, slid them on his feet and headed for the door, raising his hand in a leisurely gesture of farewell.

“Hey, those weren’t ―“

“Wish me luck!”

“Ugh, go to hell.”

He slid out into the night with a smirk on his face, remembering those very words on the girl’s lips.

Her face had been sinful, too, if in a grander way.

Nox pulled his hood over his face as he merged with the shadows, sidestepping the night patrols with ease and heading deeper into the maze of Keveli’s old quarter. He agreed with Suveli that the girl probably wouldn’t show, but his curiosity had the habit of getting the better of him, and so, occasionally, did his pride.

Oxen, his ass.

His escape from the gendarmes that day had been a thing of beauty, and he was dying to know how she had done it, how she had managed to follow his trail when he had so easily given the khans’ men the slip.

With the way things were headed, hers was a secret that could be worth acquiring for the guild, whatever pitfalls it came with.

He rounded one more corner and then there it was: the Maslenitsa, the terrible beauty of the city’s butchered beliefs. Once an impressive old dame, the church now stood in its sizeable square looking more like a ravaged maiden, gold scraped from her domes, walls pock-marked by explosions. The far end of the building still lay in utter ruin, six years after the war, and Nox had no doubt that deep underneath, scores of skeletons still lay in the rubble. His favourite part of the building was the arch that now abruptly stopped mid-air, like a broken finger pointing back to a more wholesome past.

It still surprised him that the khans had left the ruins untouched ― especially since people had begun flocking back mere weeks after the fighting stopped. The brutality with which the new regime had bled magic from the realm had stopped at the gates of the spirit realm, a non-sensical decision Nox still struggled to understand.

Yet the weeks had turned into months had turned into years, and no attack on the churches had followed, no campaign to eradicate the last roots of “evil” had called for fresh soldiers, bred fresh loss.

It irked him, still, like a missing piece to a puzzle.

The sound of the choir reached him now. Even-song was the last of the day’s four prayers, and, to his non-believer’s ears, it was the most stirring one. Dedicated to those who had been left wandering the burning lands, it was carried out solely in song, uniting old and young voices alike.

Nox could pick them out as he neared the entrance, which stood guarded by a huge willow that had been cleft in half during the war. The tree still stood proud like a sentinel - a mournful emblem of a city left half dead, half alive. The interior of the church differed little from the outside: the high, painted ceilings were lit only by the scarcest of lights; candles, like everything else in the city, were beginning to get scarce, and donations were slowly trickling to a halt. The late hour helped hide some of the worst scars left on the former beauty of the building, but row after row of revered Keveli patrons stood headless in the shadows - marble statues, decapitated by a lust for gold.

Nox knew, like all the other inhabitants of the city, that no treasures had been hidden inside their bodies, and that destruction had continued regardless in a violent frenzy. Only the highest dome had preserved its virgin beauty, presenting a lush landscape that was home to a pantheon of spirits even he knew by heart: tree, well, noon and mountain.

Silly beliefs, he liked to think.

Nonetheless, he didn’t look up, knowing the tales that said their eyes could follow.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Waiting for his eyes to adjust to the dim candlelight, he started on a slow perimeter of the building. Darkness clung to both the walls and the vaulted ceilings, but where the congregation of singers huddled, right under the main dome, flickering shadows allowed for the slow recognition of their faces.

Soon enough he realised that he was out of luck: there was no sign of the girl.

He swallowed, his disappointment starker than expected. She had been distrustful, yes, but desperation had clung to her, too, and a part of him had expected her to show after all - not for her own sake, but for her brother’s, whom she was clearly so keen to protect.

A weakness and a strength, that.

Family, the bond that killed, the bond that saved.

Others, maybe.

Certainly not him.

He waited out the end of the song, but didn’t dither once silence fell. Enough was enough, and he had given her time to show. She was prudent not to heed his call, but it was unlucky for the guild and unsatisfying on a personal level, a combination best drowned in a bottle.

Stepping back out into the chilly air, Nox pulled his hood deep into his face and started off on a brisk walk, choosing to cut across the square rather than slink along the shadows. With the dark as thick as it was, he could pass by the few gendarmes that would be patrolling this part of the city now.

“Wait.”

He stopped in his tracks, biting down on a curse.

This was the second time she had crept up on him, leader of the thieves’ guild.

He set his face and turned around, barely able to make out her figure that was shrouded in a cloak just like his. She appeared thinner than he remembered though, more wisp than woman, and her eyes were on him, reluctant but forthright. Her mouth remained shut.

“Well?”

“We need to talk.”

Nox’s eyebrows went up, unimpressed. That was... stating the obvious. She was here, though, and if fortune had chosen to smile down on him after all, he wasn’t going to pass up on the opportunity. Considering his options for a moment, he ended up flashing her a sudden grin.

“Follow me.”

Given how they’d met, he reckoned it wasn’t too much of a challenge.

Without waiting for her response, Nox turned around and ran. Across the square, up a flight of steps and onto a terraced roof he bounded, swift of foot and silent, utterly secure in his memory of the inner city’s layout. The lack of moonlight made up a little for the lack of people among whom to get lost, and taking several corners in quick succession, he finally slipped down onto a balcony and then a dirty alley. The heaps of dirty straw on the ground softened the sound of his feet as he landed, and just like that he was off again, darting down a narrow passageway that toyed with your senses and appeared to lead up and down at the same time.

All of Keveli was built like that - its neighbourhoods grown out of and haphazardly leaning onto each other, mutinous shapes connecting incongruously across several street levels at once. Anyone with a good memory could find his luck in this city, while those without the gift of images on their minds were inevitably lost.

Rumour had it that was why the khans’ men were so useless in this place, but Nox didn’t trust any sources but his own.

Regardless, they were clumsy fools that did breathe as loud as oxen.

He stopped once he reached the small courtyard that stood adorned by two stone benches and a withered orange tree. Catching his breath in a small crevice of the wall that seemed to lead nowhere, he listened for her footsteps, yet the only sounds nearby were those of mice scurrying away and a single voice raised in murmured sing-song.

He waited several seconds, but only the patter of rodent feet gave way to silence.

No other sounds followed, no rapid breaths announced a new arrival.

Furrowing his brow, Nox reached up and grabbed the hidden ledge above. It was strange that she had not managed to follow, but he pulled himself up anyway, not looking back down again. Whatever her reasons were, whether she had truly failed or simply refused to follow his challenge, fortune smiled on those who worked to beat the odds.

He had earned himself that drink now.

Not too long after, he sank onto a bench in his accustomed corner of The Raging Rat. It was his favourite watering hole and an establishment that had escaped, along with a few others, the rigid rules of the khans, and which continued to be sticky with wine and clouded in smoke day and night. It was a tavern and a gambling den of the first order, as well as a part-time brothel, a butcher’s, and a library.

Nox ordered his usual, then sank back into his chair and cast a furtive glance around the room.

Was he disappointed? Maybe.

He was also relieved to find that he hadn’t lost his edge after all, that there was a way to beat her.

Whoever she was, mystery girl had simply lucked out the first couple of times.

Right?

She stepped into the room the next moment, as if in answer to his question.

“Spirits,” was the sole curse that left Nox’s lips as she made her way straight to his table, followed by the curious and somewhat hostile glances of several patrons. She ignored them all and then had the gall to sit down in front of him, taking that seat like it belonged to her.

“That was stupid,” was the first thing that left her lips, and to his own chagrin, Nox realised that she wasn’t out of breath.

“You were in no hurry to follow me.”

“Does that hurt your pride?” She leaned her head to the side as she asked, a glint of both exasperation and mockery in her eyes.

“You tell me,” he responded, not entirely in control of his bad mood.

“Anythin’ to ―“ the bar help interrupted, but he didn’t even get to finish his sentence.

“No,” they both replied, in unison.

The girl’s face hardened, then she briefly looked at the boy who was hardly older than her brother and treated him to a curt, but civil reply. “No drink for me. Thank you.”

“Yes’m.”

Nox gave the boy a quick signal with his fingers as he turned to go, then focussed his eyes back on the girl in front of him. Girl, woman, other; he wasn’t sure what she was, but he was sure of one thing: that she could make someone rich.

“You wanted to talk,” he began, leaning back into his chair and reaching for his cup of wine.

He took a sip, slowly, eyeing her over its rim, then set it back down.

“Talk.”