The southeastern gate from the Syler district was closed like all the gates were at night. Two orc guards in chainmail wearing swords on their sides and loaded crossbows on their backs stood watch.

Hands shifted to hilts as Syler approached. He willed the Agency logo, a windblown tattered black cloak, to form on the palm of his currently red armor, and kept his eye faintly lit.

“Cute dog.”

He held up the logo to the guards. "Thanks. A Dokkalfar attacked me four houses down from Sanctuary Tavern. No need to investigate the death. I claim it. I'll ignore the incompetence of missing their entry into the district for now."

The guards nodded. One of them removed from a pocket a small Tekrystal and relayed the info. She covered the crystal and whispered, “The body?”

Syler shrugged, “Dump it for the oozes. They may have some magic items on them. All yours.”

The crystal-holding guard’s eyes filled with greed, and she tapped the other. “I got the gate, you go get the items-I mean, body.” He ran off.

“Open the gate.”

“Of course, sir.” She slapped the gate a single time. A tap returned from the other side and the gate opened.

He set Tootsie down and she walked happily beside him, her toenails clickety clacking on the cobblestones. She was never great at being quiet outside of her shadow form. “Bartle will be happy to see you.” Her stubby tail wagged excitedly.

Thirty minutes and two more gates later, the familiar sight of the Shipwright home came into view. Bartle opened the door on the second knock. Crates of various sizes were stacked haphazardly throughout the house.

“By Pallerva’s purse, how much did you give Sven?!”

“Enough.”

“Clearly,” he heard a tiny clacky stomping. “Oh my goodness!” Tootsie jumped into Bartle’s outstretched hands and he cradled her like a baby and rubbed her tummy. She liked it for a few seconds, then began to squirm to get down. “Okay, okay. Come in. No need to limp here.”

“Not really by choice.”

Bartle set Tootsie down and looked closer at Syler, spotting his wince as he moved. He immediately grabbed a chair and moved it so Syler could sit without moving too much more. “What happened?”

“Dokkalfar runecaster with an earth elemental.”

“In the city?”

“In my house.”

“How?”

Syler shrugged, which proved to be a mistake as he made a sharp intake of air. "I don't know. No time to figure it out right now."

“May I?” Bartle asked, his hand slightly glowing with the power of Pallerva.

The armor peeled away from his torso, revealing a massive bruise that spread across his chest. “I think a rib is broken.”

“I’ll do what I can.” Bartle pressed his hand against Syler’s chest, muttering prayers to the Goddess of Wisdom and Commerce. Warmth and light spread from Bartle’s hand, the purple and blue fading to Syler’s natural hue. “I was able to mostly fix your rib, but it’ll be sore for a few days and you should avoid getting hit there until it has healed.”

“I’ll try, but that may be difficult,” Syler stood, his shadow armor refilling the gap.

“I know.”

“There’s something else.”

Bartle raised his eyebrows, “Oh?”

“I saw Malakia with Gene exiting the Darket.”

“That is unlike Gene.”

“Are you sure about that? He was in common clothes to be less conspicuous. And he was handing out this.” Syler handed the scroll to Bartle.

“Damn. Malakia must have something on him, something to force him into this.”

“I thought the same. Didn’t seem the type. He also probably used some of the money I gave him for the ball to set up the bounty.”

“So she has you killed, seemingly by accident-”

“And she gets to steal loot that no longer has an owner. None of the other nobles would care about a noble from across Pyderon who was killed, outside of the scandal of it all.”

“They would expect me to be, plus there is the resurrection ritual,” Bartle noted.

“True, but there are ways around it, and the loot would be long gone by then.”

Bartle nodded in thought as Syler brought Tootsie back into the amulet, “So, what’s the plan?”

----------------------------------------

Several hours later, the decorations were heavily underway at the Whitley mansion as Syler snuck up to one of the thick trees set around the manor’s expansive backyard. Tables and chairs already littered the area, and ribbons with baubles of light had been wrapped around the trees, limbs, and the legs of the tables, creating an ambience of faerie lights.

Uniformed laborers were moving around the grounds, setting up additional tables, chairs, and the outdoor area for some of the auction items. Syler shifted his armor to match the uniforms, grabbed a nearby chair and walked with purpose toward the mansion.

Ten paces from the entryway Gene burst out from the double doors, another uniformed worker trailing behind and taking notes. He looked as though he had not been sleeping very well. Syler hastily turned away and busied himself with realigning several chairs.

“We need more light out here!” Gene yelled. “Bring more runecasters to make more.” He began walking through and checking every aspect of the outdoor setup. Syler didn’t waste a moment and headed into the enormous house. The rear doors had glass panels shaped into an elegant W. Through the doors was a foyer with several barstools and tall tables ready for the hors d'oeuvres. On the right Syler found three sets of double doors twenty-five feet apart, each open to a massive ballroom. At the far corner were several instruments playing soft music without any musicians.

Syler ignored the ballroom beyond a cursory glance and instead continued to the staircase up a little further along. He shifted his armor back to its usual black leather as he passed several well decorated but impersonal guest rooms, a bathroom with a wading pool for the tub, and a walk-in closet that looked like he could fit his entire house inside. The door at the end of the hall was shut and he had no trouble picking the lock. The master bedroom was a mess, the bedding shredded and down feathers spread all over.

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

His eye flared blue as he scanned around the room. A dresser had small scuffs, as though it had been struck by a blade. Several small holes in the walls near the master bathroom. Darts or hand crossbow bolts. The bathroom door was ajar and Syler noticed the cabinet door under the sink had a sizable hole in it.

A one sided fight happened here. The target had tried to flee into the bathroom and hide under the sink. A failed attempt. He was kneeling to investigate the storage cabinet when he heard the bedroom door slam. Gene's voice. Syler stepped behind the bathroom door and peeked out. He hadn't been using his eye downstairs. Now he saw Gene slowly shrink, his skin and hair darkening, hair flowing out to her lower back. Pilar.

She let her shapeshifting rune end and grabbed a torn piece of cloth from the side of the bed, holding it to her face as she sobbed. Syler understood the feeling all too well. She hadn't even noticed the door was open.

Syler shifted his eye to match the other, his armor to the red leather with gold trim, and raised both of his hands unthreateningly in front, palms facing Pilar. He was wary and ready to move if she got offensive with her magic. "Pilar?"

She jumped and orange teknaus flickered at her fingertips, but she didn't release any magic. "Zandar? How did you get in here?"

"I picked the lock." He saw no reason to lie.

"Oh." The surprise faded back into sadness.

"I want to help. I was looking for Gene and thought for a moment that you were him. Is he here?" He didn’t want to make any assumptions.

Pilar walked over to the scarred dresser and returned with a slip of parchment. “I was out when he was taken. They left this.”

‘It is to my understanding that you will be hosting a most exquisite ball and auction for a wealthy man named Zandar. You will help us acquire his more valuable goods if you wish to see Gene alive again. You will bring the manifest of goods for auction to the warehouse south of Lillard Lodge as soon as you acquire it. ~M’

“That is why you were with Mal in the Syler District last night shaped as Gene.”

“What?... No. You saw Gene last night?! Mal? Is that this M person?” she was speaking very quickly, near panic.

Syler swore at himself internally. Maybe he should have followed them after all. He sat at the edge of the bed. “Okay, I think I am getting a better layout here. I am going to need your help as much as you need mine. My real name is Syler."

Her eyes brightened at the revelation. "The hero?"

"I'm no hero."

"To many, you are."

He ignored the praise and continued, "M is Malakia, a renowned thief and thorn in the Guild’s side. My target. She brought her captive to the Syler district to negotiate the death of Zandar to make her theft even cleaner.” Pilar’s eyes had grown larger and larger as he spoke. “She must have known you have the ability to change your physical appearance magically, and thus kidnapped Gene for you to help.”

She nodded, “Yes, he was taken two days ago. I brought the auction manifest yesterday.”

“Good.”

“Why is that good?”

“If you hadn’t it would have been problematic for Gene. Did she tell you her plan?”

“I only spoke with an orcish man.”

“Of course,” Syler sighed, “I doubt he knew enough to tell you anything useful.”

“Only that I was not to interfere.”

“I figured as much. You keep going as instructed by her. We don’t want to play our hand until necessary.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Plausible deniability, Pilar. Please describe this orcish man.”

----------------------------------------

It was midafternoon the same day when the wagons arrived at the Shipwright home to gather up the auction items. Syler had lunch with Bartle and finalized a few things. He climbed up into the rafters as soon as the workers arrived, calling upon his runic tattoos to deepen the shadows where he hid. His eye could see the traces Sven had left on each of the items within the crates, seeing a faint line whenever they were moved out the house into the carts. The worker giving the orders matched the description of the orc Pilar had interacted with at the warehouse. He was heavily muscled from years of combat training, and he had three deep scars across his face, likely from an animal attack.

After the last of the crates was loaded up, Syler hopped down. “Thank you.”

“Anytime,” Bartle said, gripping him into a hug, “don’t die.”

“I won’t.”

The trace led Syler along a roundabout path to the Whitley manor. It took the road heading east, then turning south and turning east again into a small, densely forested area that many of the nobles used for paid “hunting” trips, magically summoning beasts for sport. When Syler arrived at the bend into the forest, the trace had not yet returned to the road.

Flitting from shadow to shadow in the forest, the carts finally came into view. There were more wagons than had loaded up, and Syler noted the workers exchanging crates from the new carts to the old. Clever. The scarred orc held a wand made from a yellow wood with tiny runes etched into the handle and along the shaft that he was waving over each crate, scanning them for magical traces. He smiled as he saw them crack open boxes and remove the false traces Sven had placed inside the crates and move them into the new ones. He focused his eye on the new crates, seeing well made fakes within. The carts eventually parted ways, the ones filled with the stolen goods rolling deeper into the forest to head out the other side, the fakes trundling back to the road heading south to the Whitley home. He spotted more guards at the edge of the wood who began walking in step with the carts.

Syler followed behind the carts, through the open southeastern gate back into the Temple district. They trundled along the Temple District docks that ran along the Sarta River that cut through the lower portion of Sartak City, turning south again to cross the bridge into the Tenth District. The tenth district was called the Stacks, packed to the brim with those desperate to make a better life for themselves. The streets in the Stacks were narrow, the buildings haphazardly placed aggressively against one another. As the district overflowed with refugees and laborers when the city population spiked, they began to build upwards. Misshapen but sturdy huts were stacked up to five high, with narrow scaffolding and very steep stairs. Scaling to the top and keeping to the rooftops, Syler kept the carts in view, jumping from roof to roof.

The carts moved slowly through the streets, the guards splitting in front and behind to avoid running into the scaffolding. After several aggressive strikes against too-slow pedestrians, word spread quickly through the stacks, and streets were largely empty by the time they rolled up to the Scattered Blood Bar’s northern alley. Syler removed the rods from his pack and leapt across the narrow road, pressing the button as he reached the apex of the jump. The rod held fast, suspended above the road. He reached out with the other, clicked it in place, and freed the first rod, shifting hand over hand, locking and unlocking the rods to function as a horizontal ladder. He reached the rooftop of the Scattered Blood Bar and landed silently, stowing the rods back into his pouch.

Three unconscious people lay in a pile with empty bottles in their hands, a satyr with the light brown fur and legs of a goat with a reed pipe dangling around his neck and a vibrant purple vest and two leapus men, rabbit folk with several piercings along their ears and not very much by way of clothing. He ignored them for now and peered down into the alley.

The scarred orc waved the same wand that he had used to scan the packages, and the cobblestone in the alley began to vibrate, shifting over one another and creating an opening and a ramp leading down.

“That explains why she hasn’t been found yet,” he muttered to himself. He knew much of the city, but there were still secrets to discover, it seemed. The ramp shifted back to the flat alleyway shortly after the carts disappeared. The trace trailed off there as well. He saw it trail away before getting too deep or behind too much material for his eye to track.

Alertness would be high for at least the next day, until Zandar was out of the picture, likely. Rushing in now would likely prove to be difficult. He kneeled next to the satyr, gently shaking him awake. His eyes fluttered open in a squint.

“It’s still daylight. My shift ain’t up yet.”

“I don’t care much about that, sir.”

The satyr’s eyes focused on Syler. He sat up straight, reeling for a moment, pushing himself back against the short barrier that surrounded the rooftop, “This isn’t happening. You’re not here right now.”

“‘Fraid so, bud.”

“I ain’t your bud, you prick.”

“You know as well as I that it wasn't my fault.”

The satyr threw the nearby bottle at him, which smashed to shards several feet to Syler’s right, “The fuck it wasn’t!”

“Ryn, it was raining and he slipped. He’d had too much to drink. As it appears you are doing now.”

“I loved him!” tears flowed freely down Ryn’s face. “Fuck you!”

“I’m truly sorry that he fell.”

A short cackle, “I’m sure you are. Why did you come here?”

Syler took a steadying breath, “Revenge.”

Ryn shook his head, “Not good enough.”

“My wife is dead.”

The anger in Ryn’s eyes lessened slightly, “Unrevivable?” Syler nodded. “I assure you I was not involved.”

“I know. I’m not here for you, other than to ask for your help.”

“With what?”

“Malakia.”

“The Mau? Why her?”

“Not your concern. I need information. You can get it.”

“And why would I want to help you?”

Syler held up a small bag of coins. “Enough to resurrect him.”