Almost too easy, she’d said.
And she’d meant it.
Dunhaven Street was a crooked little lane lit by iron lanterns that swayed in the wind. They walked further down until they stopped by a squat, dark-windowed structure with the words Krusty Krag Bakery in faded gold paint on the glass. During the day, Liora could imagine it bustling with customers, but at this hour, it was closed, the display cases inside empty.
“This is it,” Maldenis said. “Let’s go to the back.”
They went around back and found a heavy iron door was set into the stone wall. Maldenis knocked five times, just as the waiter told them.
A slot slid open and two dark eyes stared out at them.
“Password.”
“Minotaur,” Maldenis answered.
No reply came, but three seconds later, they heard the sounds of bolts unclicking and the door swung inward.
“Where’s the guard?” Elian asked.
Liora shrugged. “Who knows? Let’s just go and not waste anymore time.”
“We’re headed in, Hektor,” Zara said, touching her ear, or rather, the earpiece tucked in there. Since Hektor could not join them, he patched in remotely via Zara’s phone, able to listen in on what was happening.
They went down the long, steep stairs carved directly into the mountain rock, and the smell hit Liora before they’d even reached the bottom—yeast, but also, something older underneath, like damp stone and spilled beer.
“It’s warm in here,” Maldenis remarked, then sniffed the air. “Smells like thermal heat.”
By the time they stepped off the last stair, they realized he was correct; there was a massive hearth on the far wall, filling the space with a damp heat. A large firebox was fixed on the wall, and the glow from it filled the room with an amber light.
Elian whistled. “It’s bigger than it looks.”
“That’s what she said,” Liora snickered.
Zara shook her head. “No, Hektor, no one said anything, it’s a joke from—I’ll explain later, okay?”
The den itself sprawled out before them in a low, labyrinthian layout. The walls were lined with dark mahogany paneling and polished brass fixtures, and booths and game tables branched off in every direction.
The patrons were mostly minotaurs, which Liora had expected. But scattered throughout were others—a group of harpies clustered around a roulette wheel in a side alcove, feathers ruffled with excitement, and here and there a few creatures that she didn’t recognize or perhaps a hybrid of others.
“Okay,” Elian murmured, looking around. “How do we even find this guy?”
“Why don’t you try asking?” Liora said, glancing at Maldenis. “You seem to be very lucky tonight.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
They moved deeper into the den. Maldenis approached the nearest group—a pair of minotaurs hunched over a low table—and opened his mouth. The larger of the two turned his head, looked Maldenis up and down with dismissive sweep, and turned back to his game without a word.
Maldenis tried another with a group playing some kind of electronic poker machine. Same result.
A third simply walked away mid-question.
And then one of them—a stocky bull with close-cropped horns—knocked his shoulder hard into Elian’s as he passed, not even breaking stride.
Liora pressed her lips together. Elian straightened up, said nothing.
“Well,” Maldenis said. “That’s not great.”
“You probably got lucky with that waiter,” Liora muttered.
