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“I can’t say I have, but the Order is unpredictable. I am sure someone in the Guild may have seen something or might have received some bit of interesting news that could pertain to your female. A human stolen from the Ragoru would certainly be gossip-worthy among my brethren.”
“Would we be able to meet with them?” Rager asked, his interest piqued.
“If you can wait near here, perhaps down that alley there, I can see about it,” he said as he gestured to a narrow dark path. “I have to check first seeing how not everyone is quite so open-minded about things pertaining to Ragoru. But they just might if I vouch for you personally. But stay hidden. Someone will notice if you stand about the main street too long. I can return within an hour or two with word. I suspect they might be interested in meeting you, especially if you have a personal grudge against the Order.”
Rager turned his head toward the alley, his nostrils flaring as he considered the offer. Everything in Warol demanded that they be taken immediately, and he had no doubt that his brother entertained similar thoughts. If he did, he did not show it nor act upon it as he considered the youngling’s proposition. Rager wasn’t as impulsive as Warol was, which could be maddening at times. Still, he decided that, for once, he would yield to his lead’s decision.
“Very well. We will wait here for your return,” Rager agreed.
“I will be quick, and I will be certain to tell them of your aid against the Order’s night guard. I am certain that will bend their favor toward you. The Guild is no friend to the Order here, as I’m sure you can imagine.”
“If it assists us in any way then do so, otherwise be quick about it,” Rager snapped, and the boy saluted them with a cheerful smile on his face.
Turning on his heel, the young male ran down the stone street, his lithe form darting between structures before disappearing altogether.
As they moved into the shadows, Warol turned his ears toward Rager. “Should we trust him?”
“I got no sense of deceit from him,” Kyx offered.
Warol nodded his agreement. Everything the male had projected had been surprisingly earnest. There was only a minimal, healthy amount of fear, and that pleased him. It was enough to make the male cautious in his dealings with their triad without striking out needlessly for no other reason than fear.
“We will wait as asked, but we will be on our guard. Although I doubt the male is any threat, we cannot know the intentions of this Guild. We are not here to serve their purpose. We are only here to find our mate.”
Time passed slowly and Warol could see a hint of the approaching dawn on the horizon when a familiar form scampered at the front of the alley. Cautiously their triad moved toward Tim, not wishing to be caught in the daylight where they would be more visible. He seemed to dance from foot to foot with the impatience of youth, his smile broad as he greeted them.
“Good news,” he whispered. “The Guild Master says he’s willing to meet with you. I’m to bring you to the Thieves Den post-haste, so keep to the shadows and follow me!”
Without a further word, he raced down the road, leaving the Ragoru to follow. Tim was such a slight figure that many times Warol almost lost sight of him as he ducked into roads and alleys. He turned to look back only once to verify they were close behind when he launched himself over a short wall. The pursuit seemed to take them on a winding path through the Citadel and the further they got, the less sturdy everything appeared, seemingly in worse condition than any part of the Citadel they had yet explored. Small stone structures were intersected with flimsy wooden ones, lamplight glowing between the cracks in more than one case.
Finally, Tim disappeared among an odd cluster of people gathered in front of a narrow entrance. There was more than one startled look, and a few gasps, but the people eagerly made way for them. Warol could still feel his skin itch where their eyes watched them approach a long tunnel.
Warol paused at the mouth of the stone tunnel dropping down beneath the city. Even Kyx drew back slightly, his ears flattening with his wary hesitation. If they entered, there was an increased chance for ambush. Tim’s voice echoed up the tunnel.
“Come on, then! What are you waiting for? Just down this way.”
Rager huffed at them, shaking his head. He clearly didn’t like it either but rallied their triad. “We have no other choice. Stay alert and proceed with caution, but we must continue on if we have any hope at all of finding our mate.”
Rager led the way into the tunnel as he followed after the youngling, leaving Kyx and Warol to fall into position behind him. They exchanged an unhappy grimace before trailing after their lead as they followed him into the inky depths. There was little light except that which was emitted from random torches set up at intervals further along in the tunnel, but it was thankfully enough. While they had little problem seeing the dank interior of the tunnel, Warol wondered how any human would be able to find their way as the low-lit trails seemed to twist and branch off randomly. It was only by following Tim that they were not lost.
Tim appeared suddenly before them; his face ghoulish in the light as he popped from around a corner. “Glad you are keeping up. The Thieves Labyrinth is a bad place to get lost. I’ve been lost here a time or two myself. I was a lot younger then though, before I got the hang of things. Come on, just a little further.”
After many twists of the tunnel, it finally opened into to a massive, lit cavern and Warol’s eyes widened at the sight. Bright and colorful fabric hung from various structures. A group of females nearby dressed in drapes of fabric clinging low on their bodies giggled to each other as the Ragoru passed. Their faces were painted garishly in a manner that reminded him of images his second father produced of the Fathers’ Court of the Dead.
Everywhere, humans stared and parted. Many of them gaunt, and more than one heavily scarred or missing limbs. They made their way to a great stone chair draped with bright purple fabrics. A large human sat upon it, his frame lean but strong. His long, dark mane was bound tightly behind his head, and a long scar ran from the top of his face down to his chin, bisecting one milky eye in the process, where it disappeared into a beard. He leaned forward as Tim whispered in his ear. His eyebrows rose and then grinned down at them, his scar puckering devilishly.
“So, these are the Ragoru, come to our fair city in search of their mate,” he paused as a titter of murmuring voices echoed throughout the crowd assembled around them. “I am Cyrus, the Master of the Guild. I bid you welcome to the Court of the Thieves’ Guild.” He stood before his throne and swept a bow, his lips turned up in a mischievous smile.
Chapter
Thirty-Two
The maid tightened the straps of Arie’s corset with brutal efficiency. Corsets were a new thing for her, and she was beginning to suspect they were designed for the sole purpose of torture. Never in the sanctuary village did any but the most fashionable women bother with them. Few even made it in with the goods brought in by the merchants, and from what she’d remembered none of them had been similar to the strangling cut of the one she was being forced into under her grandmother’s steely-eyed supervision. Arie suspected they were “out of mode.” She refrained from snickering as she imagined just what all those vainglorious women in the village would have thought of that.
“Tighter,” her grandmother snapped at the maid, thumping her ivory-topped cane on the floor. “We need to tame those curves into something respectable.”
Arie winced. While she’d never been thin, she’d put on weight thanks to her mates over the winter. She braced her hand against her stomach. “I can’t breathe as it is.”
“Then learn to take smaller breaths,” came Lady Vera’s dismissive reply.
