Chapter 20

The infiltration of the Loremasters had been a success.

However, it had also been discovered by the Loremasters.

The very next day, Kyven learned that dark truth after fifteen seconds out and about. His first stop was to Veraad to drop off a crystal he'd cut for him on Friday but had forgotten to take over, and Veraad told him that he'd heard from the chandler that he'd heard from a streetsweeper that something had happened with the Loremasters last night, and that the Loreguard was out in force, so he'd better be careful as he walked the streets. When Kyven went out, he saw that they were more than correct, for the streets were crawling with Loreguard, and they all looked angry. He stopped in at the greengrocer that Clover patronized most often for their vegetables to buy some beets, and the man told him in a whisper that someone had attacked the Loremaster building last night. He said he'd heard it from a patrol of Loreguard that stopped in at his shop just as he opened to get some water. They talked of a break-in in the building, and how the Loremasters had had a collective apoplexy and now all the Loreguard had been mustered out of the barracks to patrol the city. Kyven couldn't get much out of him other than that, though he immediately knew that it had something to do with him. Somehow, some way, they had detected him, or had learned about the invasion after the fact, and now he was seeing an immediate response. That morning he passed by the bridge leading to the island after stopping at the greengrocer, on his way to the guild, and saw a whole company of Loreguard on the bridge, stopping every single person going to the building, be them Loremasters or civilians, and both searching them and interrogating them, going so far as to use an alchemical device that looked like a steel rod, waving it around people to check for something. They were stirred up like angry hornets, and he knew that it was because of him.

He saw that delivering that crystal might be just a little tricky. Thank the Trinity the Loremaster was supposed to come to his shop to pick it up today. From the looks of all that security, Kyven would never get past them all without being found out.

Shario confirmed his suspicions when he arrived that morning to collect his five hundred chits. The first thing he did was give Kyven a cool, amused look, stepping in when Kyven opened the door of his shop that morning. "Ah, I thought you wouldn't be here today, my friend," he said with a knowing smile.

"Whyever would you think that, Shario?" he asked as he led the Flauren back into his workroom, where Patches was handing bowls of porridge to Clover and Tweak. "I have a lot to do today. The Loremasters are coming to pick up that crystal I cut for them over the weekend."

"Oh? I see," he said with a smile. "So, do you have my money?" he asked.

"Clover," he called as he pulled out his stool. "Go get it please."

"Certainly," she nodded, and hurried towards the cellar.

"Would you like to come for dinner tonight, Shario?" Kyven asked.

"Ah, I fear not, my friend. There's much afoot today. Have you not heard?"

"The greengrocer mentioned something about some kind of trouble with the Loreguard, and I saw a bunch of patrols out."

"You've barely heard the surface of it!" he said. "My friend, last night, someone broke in to the Loremasters' headquarters!"

Kyven gave him a startled look which was not faked. "Broke in? How could someone break in?" he asked. "What happened? Did they take anything?"

"Ah, I'm not sure," he answered. "I'm still gathering the truth of it. Many thought such a thing was impossible because of their alchemy and their heavy guards, and yet someone has managed it. My people have been out ever since word of it leaked from the island. I may be able to come tomorrow, though."

"That's fine, you're welcome any time," Kyven said.

"What did you hear of it?"

"From the grocer? Not much. You know how it is, he said that someone said that someone said. I didn't pay much attention to it, at least until I saw all the patrols out on the streets when I went to the guild this morning. I thought that the grocer had misheard something and that some rich noble or something had had his house robbed. I immediately thought of you," he said, his illusion giving a sly smile.

Shario bowed with a flourish. "Funny, when I heard of the break-in, I immediately thought of you," Shario told him with a slight smile.

"Me?" Kyven asked with a start. "Why me?"

"Oh, you know, a mysterious cutter who is not who he appears to be, showing up just weeks before a break-in in a building many say is unassailable."

"Yeah, sure," he snorted. "I'll bring you the wiping paper of the High Master right out of his private privy next time I'm there."

Shario laughed. "I'm sure it will be soft and perfumed, and befitting a man of my station."

"Yes, something worthy of wiping the shit off your ass," Kyven noted, and they both laughed.

"Since you seem to be a man curious about the goings-on within Avannar, I might see fit to let you in on what I discover," he offered.

"I think that might be worth buying," Kyven said carefully. "If only so I keep abreast of things. It might affect what I charge the Loremasters for my work."

"Yes, I thought you might see it that way," Shario smiled as Clover returned carrying a small leather pouch that chimed with crystalline chits. "I'll let you be privy to my findings, for, say, an extra one hundred?"

"I'll have it for you when you return. Later, then?"

"Later."

Clover watched him go, as Lightfoot ambled down the stairs and passed him, and she leaned against his workbench. When the bell tingled in the lobby to herald his departure, and Lightfoot closed the door to the lobby, Clover looked seriously at him. "I heard most of that."

"I thought you might."

"Be careful, Kyven. I get the feeling that Shario knows something. I don't think he was joking when he said that he suspected you were behind the break-in."

"That's possible. Shario is very, very smart," Kyven said. "I just hope he's given up on me, for his sake. I like that man, Clover, I really do. I'd hate to have to kill him."

"Me too," Clover agreed. "Do you have to deliver that crystal, or are they coming to get it?"

"They said a page would check in once a day to see if I was done and then come get it when it is. They won't let something like that walk the streets. Speaking of that thing, let's bring it up to my office. I'd rather not have one of the guards insist on following me down to the vault."

"Ah, no, that would not be a good idea," she grinned in agreement.

The page showed up asking if he was done about an hour before lunch, as he quietly sank back into the identity that kept him hidden, cutting a crystal for one of the alchemists that Veraad had directed to him, an old alchemist named Bralder who had a shop about nine blocks from Sun Street. When he told the boy he was, about half an hour later, the same gray-haired Loremaster, Yoris, arrived with six Loreguard escorting him. "You are finished, Master Steelhammer?" he asked.

Kyven nodded and waved for them to follow him back into his shoproom. Kyven had already carefully prepared the area for their arrival by covering the other benches and making sure that Tweak, Patches, and Lightfoot were nowhere to be seen. They were all upstairs, and they were going to stay there until the Loremaster left. Clover, however, attended him, sweeping the shop, wearing nothing but a long apron. She had her back to them as they entered, and Yoris looked around curiously. "Setting up for apprentices, Master Steelhammer?"

"I've had these benches set up since I opened the shop," he answered. "I'm not quite ready yet, though. I don't have enough capital built up. I think I might be ready for apprentices in a month, though. Come to my office, I have the crystal there."

Yoris followed him to his utilitarian office, where the crystal sat on his desk, covered with a simple wool cloth. Kyven removed the cloth and picked it up, offering it to the graying man. "It's cut at thirteen and a quarter," he said. "I cut the nexus at the base in case you socket it."

"It looks quite impressive, Master Steelhammer," he said, taking a magnifying jeweler's glass from a pocket under his surcoat and inspecting the crystal with a practiced eye. "Yes, a very good job. Very, very well done. The chips?"

"Here," he answered, pointing at the pouch on his desk.

"I see your reputation with the guild is based on merit and not looks," he said with a chuckle. "You have earned every chit." He took a leather pouch from his belt and spilled it out onto his desk, holding seven one hundred chit counters and a fifty chit counter. "There's an extra fifty for timely delivery, Master Steelhammer, and be assured that we will definitely be bringing you some more contracts."

"Why thank you, sir," Kyven said with a smile, handing him the pouch of chips and crystal dust. "I'm just glad you got here so fast, and didn't forget about me. There's quite a bit of rumor flying around out here."

"Oh yes, I'm not surprised," Yoris laughed. "Isn't it amazing? A break-in on the island! I thought it to be impossible, and yet some enterprising scoundrel managed to circumvent all our defenses and slipped past all our guards!"

"Was anything damaged or stolen?"

"I don't know, but I wouldn't be surprised," Yoris said. "There's quite a few valuable items in our headquarters. I have no doubt some valuable knickknack or maybe a crystal or two pulled from a device found its way into the thief's pocket."

"Always possible. I hope they don't go too crazy, though," Kyven said, his illusion frowning. "I passed like ten patrols on my way to the guild this morning. I hope they don't punish the whole city for what one person or a few people did."

"There's no telling. The whole building's in an uproar right now," Yoris said, making a sour face. "They even sent a search team into my office, and I'm way out of the way of where it happened."

"Oh?"

"Yes, my office is in an underground level, and the break-in occurred up on the sixth floor, I heard," he relayed. "Though how they got up there is beyond me. They had to get past five floors worth of guards and alchemical devices."

"Well, when they catch him, I'm sure they'll find out," Kyven said mildly.

"Oh my yes. Well, I'm afraid I'm busy today, Master Steelhammer, so I'd best be off. I'll send a page to call next time I have work for you, to warn you someone is on the way down to see you. That way we avoid any other little misunderstandings," he said delicately.

Kyven chuckled. "I do appreciate that, Master Yoris."

Kyven escorted them out of his shop and went back into the workroom, then thumped the broom handle on the ceiling to tell the others it was safe to come down. "Well, that was interesting," Clover said. "I heard you from out here."

"Yoris didn't really say much, but at least now I know where the crystal stocks are kept," he grunted in reply. "His office wouldn't be far from the storage rooms."


He and Clover spent two days gathering all the information, added it to what Shario brought him, and then pieced it together to form a complete picture of what the Loremasters knew, what happened, how they discovered him, and how they reacted. It took Shario's people and two days of trolling taverns frequented by Loreguard and city workers, pouring copious amounts of ale down throats and making suitable promises that he'd keep a secret spread among several men allowed him to take the different pieces of information they knew and piece it together to form a framework of an explanation, and a timeline.

Evira Longsail was the beginning. It was where their tracing of his infiltration began, for it was her door that was the first indication to them that something was awry. It turned out her door did have some kind of reaction to him, for on that door was a glowing imprint of an Arcan's hand on the knob, and two Arcan footprints on the floor, where his feet had to have been when he grabbed the doorknob and opened it. He had never seen those footprints, but thankfully, neither did Evira Longsail. Both of them had walked right over them without ever seeing them. Because of that door, they knew that an Arcan had somehow invaded the island and gained entry into the compound. From there, using alchemical snoopers, they tracked the invader's movements, both forwards and backwards. They tracked the trail backwards through the Department of Arcan Control, through floors below that made it clear that the invader had wandered around, tracked the trail all the way back to the bridge, showing that the invader had walked right past the four Loreguard stationed at the bridge's foot. Literally right past them, right between them in an insultingly brazen manner, as if the invader had no fear whatsoever of the guards through which he entered. They couldn't follow the trail any further than the bridge, because of a limitation of the device dealing with suddenly having the trails of many other Arcans crossing the trail it was following.

Forward, they discovered, to their shock, that the invader had breached the defenses of the west tower, and had entered a Councillor's office. Somehow, the invader got past the defenses on the sixth floor and the west tower, had walked right past guardposts on every floor without arousing suspicion, past an alchemical defensive device, and had even gotten past the Councillor's magical door. Then, the invader went down to the barracks, back up to the west tower, and then left the island by going right back over the bridge from which he or she entered.

The Loremasters were in a furor, the Loreguard had told him morosely. Harsh interrogations had been undertaken with the guards that had been on duty that night, for they wanted to know how the hell an Arcan could walk right past them without them ever noticing it. Vituperous reprimands were dished out liberally to everyone involved, even the watch commander who was on duty that night, even though he had no direct involvement in it. Loremaster alchemists were marched through the halls droves to inspect the alchemical devices through which the Arcan had passed without activating them, from the doors he'd opened to the devices in the floors he'd walked over.

From what Kyven pieced together, it didn't take them long to work out just how he did it. Interrogating the Loreguard and Evira had introduced the common element, the page, and it didn't take them long to find out that the page Kyven had used as a cover had not been in the building that night. A low-level department worker that oversaw the cleaners had told him in a conspiratorial voice that they had given Evira Longsail the third degree when they interrogated her, wanting to know just how she had been that close to an obviously disguised Arcan and had never noticed. But she swore up and down that the page was human, making sure to tell them that she touched his hands, that she was absolutely positive that she didn't touch anything but skin. The functionary told him that they'd even used an alchemical truth-divining device on her, but she had passed that test. She was utterly convinced that she had dealt with a human.

Yet there were unmistakable Arcan prints on her door and floor outside her office.

Their interrogation of Jamus Abberdon wasn't as intense, but it was just as in-depth. The Arcan had gained entry to his office, and after they ensured that nothing was missing or disturbed, they grilled him about the page. He too swore that the page had to be human, that he'd looked right at the boy, and that the door, which was bane against Arcans, did not attack the boy or otherwise hinder him when he opened it. Abberdon declared that the boy performed the tasks that he had given him just like any other page, and the recipient of the message, as well as the men in the Department of Arcan Control, testified that the messages they entrusted to the page were delivered promptly and without being opened and read beforehand. Both Evira and the Loreguard officer in the barracks testified that the seals on the messages were intact when they were given to them. The page had given not one indication that he was acting out of character for a new page still learning his way around, for that was how every guard interrogated described him. A young, slightly nervous and flustered teenager who was trying to find the offices to which he had been tasked to report, but obviously knew where he was going well enough to know generally where his destination was located. It was a common enough sight in the building for it not to arouse too much suspicion. Pages often needed a few weeks to fully learn their way around.

An interrogation of the real Aldin Vonner and his father was fruitless. The boy swore up and down he'd been home all night that night, and his parents backed him up. The boy passed an alchemical screening to prove that he wasn't in the building that night, and he didn't know how he seemed to have been in two places at once.

The Loreguard officer that he'd had to get almost falling-down drunk to tell him filled in the last pieces. The Loremasters had no idea how he did it, but they knew that an Arcan, probably a Shaman, had either assumed the identity of the page, or had kidnapped the page and forced or brainwashed him into acting as the invader's decoy, following the boy and using him to gain entry to sections of the building, then wiping it from his memory to sweep away his tracks.

This was almost panic-inducing to the Loremasters. Never before had their building been infiltrated by an Arcan, and the ease with which this Arcan seemed to have gone through their building, right past guards, into offices, into a Councillor's office, terrified them. They had no doubt that it had to be a Shaman, a Shaman using magic the Loremasters had never seen before, some kind of magic that had either allowed the Shaman to convincingly masquerade as a human or had thoroughly altered the memories of everyone the Shaman had encountered within the building, altering their memories to make them all believe that the invader was a human page, not an Arcan.

That was the theory in favor with many of the gossipers. They couldn't see how an Arcan could disguise himself as a human and get away with it, so they all thought the Arcan knew some kind of magic or had some kind of device that changed the memories of those who had seen him, making them believe he was a page.

The third day, Kyven received reports from the Masked in Avannar, and got another tidbit from Shario, that demonstrated the Loremasters' reaction. They had quadrupled the guard within the building, introduced roving patrols utilizing alchemical devices to detect the use of magic or devices that were crawling all over the building at all times, and even restricted pages by requiring the Page Master issue a badge to them showing exactly where they were going to any guard that stopped them. Pages could no longer perform cascading tasks, doing an errand for the recipient of the message they carried, they had to return to the page pool as soon as the task was completed. They could, however, bring messages back with them to the page pool for delivery. Workers were restricted to the floor on which they worked and were forbidden from wandering without justification from the guards.

Kyven couldn't understand this extreme reaction to a single break-in, but on the other hand, the Loremasters weren't accustomed to anything ever going wrong within their capitol city. Someone had walked right into their headquarters and wandered around, a hated Arcan, using a method, device, or magic that was completely unknown, unknown to a group that thought it knew everything. He would expect them to tighten security, but not go this crazy. He didn't think it would last long, though.

But in the interim, it did pose a problem. He had to find out what they discovered about the Masked's operation, and the answers would be in that building. He'd have to go in again, and go in soon, and ransack the office of the Department of Arcan Control. If they already knew that there was an invader, then there was little reason for him to particularly try to cover up what he was doing. It gave him free rein to take more direct action than he originally intended, since rifling through an office was very hard to do without someone noticing that someone had been there.

The first step, though, was Shario. Kyven was still waiting to find out what he learned, since Shario still had people working on it, and was waiting for some messages to come in from other cities. Shario was a prince of sorts among thieves, operating an organization here in Avannar that, while not the only such organization, was the largest. He controlled more territory than the other thieves' rings, and that made him the most important. He had connections among other rings, both the rival rings in the city and other rings elsewhere, and those rings would pass information along, both for a price and to repay favors. Kyven had paid for that information, and it was Kyven's money that bought that information from other cities.

After four days, when Shario came over while he was filling an order, and his face was quite serious as he came in through the door to the lobby, waiting to be let in because the door to the workroom was locked. They'd installed the lock just because of Shario's habit of walking in without permission, and that lock gave Tweak and Patches more than enough time to cover their benches and open the door without having the Flauren wait more than ten seconds to be let in. "Ah. I'm glad I caught you in, my friend," he said, coming to Kyven's bench. "I feared you might be out on errands."

"More so than usual. The streets are getting jumpy, I just don't feel comfortable letting Clover go out by herself, not with all those patrols out there. They never look very hard for a reason to abuse Arcans who are unescorted.

"Dreadful, dreadful, I've had to nurse three of my thieves back to health because of them," he said with a frown. "You are quite right, my friend. They see any unattended Arcan as a troublemaker in need of severe punishment. But, I'm not here on a social call, my friend. I finally have enough to bring to you about the issue we discussed last week."

"Really? What did you find out?"

"I'd rather discuss this in your office, my friend," he said soberly. "But, I think that our dear friend Clover should join us. I know that little goes on here she does not know, so at least let her hear it directly from me rather than secondhand from you."

Kyven immediately put down his tools. "Certainly."

In his office, Shario sat on the chair in front of his desk, Clover sat on the desk, leaning near Kyven, who sat behind it. Shario produced a small sheaf of papers from his elegant doublet, held together by two silver rings, and filed through them. "Alright, where to begin. I guess with a basic overview."

Kyven and Clover gave each other a serious look. Had he learned so much he had a detailed report ready for them?

"Alright. It seems that what is going on is a coordinated effort," he began. "The identities of the players is easy to discover, but that is where it stops being easy. I investigated each man," he said, filing through the papers. "Each one is a small-scale businessman who had been running shops or working farms in cities and farmland all over Noraam. Here are a few examples. The fellow buying Arcans in Two Rivers is a cooper from Cheston. The fellow buying Arcans in Atan is a farmer from an area south of Phion. And strangest of all, the man in control of the Arcan buying effort in Alamar is a successful and respected former hunter who has been part of the Arcan trade for years, named Toby Fisher.

"Now, it's clear they're all working together. Each man began buying Arcans on the same day, and seems to be working primarily on his own using the Arcan kennelmasters. The only exception is Toby Fisher, who began buying Arcans earlier than the others, and who is buying up every Arcan he can find, even sending out agents to buy them off plantations all over the south. The man is throwing around obscene amounts of money, and that money is producing results. Arcan kennelmasters and plantation owners are depopulating the entire south of Arcans to sell to Fisher. There's barely an Arcan to be found between Alamar and Flaur," he said with a frown. "He is buying them for outrageous sums, but he is also buying them quickly. As a result, even the famed Blue Ring is finding it hard to field any auctions. Four days ago, Fisher marched into the Blue Ring and bought every single Arcan, outbidding everyone else. Racing Arcans. Fighting Arcans. Breeding Arcans. All of them. Every single one. Then he just added them to a huge train of working Arcans and sent them northwest, buying them for labor, it seems," Shario frowned.

"Now, here is the mysterious part," he said, flipping to another page. "It's one thing that these fellows are buying Arcans. That's not illegal. But the fellows I traded information with can't find the Arcans that have been bought. These fellows who buy them are marching them into the frontier wilderness in chain gangs, and they never come back. It's the oddest thing. They outfit them with collars and march them out of the villages, or out of Alamar, and nobody has managed to follow them deeply enough to find out where they are being sent or what work they are being made to accomplish. The rumor is that some new player has entered the scene, and is buying out the Arcan stocks to build something big out in the frontier. The tracks of those being sent out seem to hint that all their trails will converge at a lawless frontier settlement called Deep River. I have a friend who has sent a man out to investigate what's going on in Deep River, and when he writes me back with the information, I'll pass it on to you.

"Now, back to these men and what they're doing. Some of my colleagues seem to think that this is some kind of mass movement by a new power player in Noraam, maybe even some country from Eusica who has secretly landed a force here and is buying Arcans as a slave labor force to erect fortifications to lay claim to the unsettled lands west of the mountains. Some think it's the work of a consortium of rich merchants who are buying all the Arcans in order to corner the market; buy them at low prices until they own most of them, then sell them at high prices, making a profit. The theory is that they're using many agents in many cities to hide what they're doing until it's too late… which was a few days ago."

"You called those theories. You're a businessman, but you're also a man who has his ear to the ground, Shario. What do you think?"

"I think that you don't want to know what I think, my friend," he said seriously. "For it would open up all sorts of uncomfortable questions and nagging uncertainties that would threaten our rather unique relationship."

"I paid you to find out everything. I value your opinion, and your opinion would be part of it."

Shario made a face, but Clover was looking at Shario very closely.

Shario seemed to steel himself. "Very well, if you wish me to be honest, then I will be honest. I think you are behind it," he declared.

Kyven honestly laughed. "Me? Me? Shario, I'd be a little over my head trying to operate a global Arcan buying ring. I have enough trouble doing my own books."

"You sent me on this errand to see what I could learn, knowing that what I could learn, the Loremasters could learn," he said calmly. "You aren't just more than you seem, Kyven, you are not who you appear to be. You, and Clover, are members of the Masked," he declared. "I think that my Little Chef, the ferret, and Lightfoot are simply Arcans along with you to help you, servants to you, but are not part of this themselves. They may not even know what you're doing, but I doubt that. Arcans are very open with each other, and they are very good at keeping secrets. I should know, I both own and employ quite a number of them myself, and once you earn an Arcan's loyalty, they are steadfast allies and companions.

"I believe the Masked is behind this. They are freeing the Arcans on a massive scale, and doing it not by stealing them, but by buying them," he told them. "I would guess that some Masked sympathizer who doubles as a miner must have hit a mother lode of crystals out in the mountains, and instead of keeping it for himself, he donated it to the cause. Now the Masked is using that fortune to do in one fell swoop what would have taken them a hundred years to do otherwise. Instead of sneaking about and stealing Arcans from owners one at a time, they're buying every Arcan they can find, and setting them free in the wilderness west of civilized lands."

"He is quite sharp," Clover noted to Kyven with a slow smile.

"They sent you and Clover to Avannar to be in a position to keep an eye on the Loremasters to watch for any possible retaliation or action to stop your comrades from completing their mission. I think it was you who invaded the Loremasters' headquarters last Sunday, Kyven, to try to find out what they know. Only you could walk past those guards without arousing suspicion, yet still manage to circumvent the defenses of the building. You are not human, my friend. You are an Arcan, and I will shave off my moustache if you and Clover both are not Shaman. What I see before me is some kind of amazing magical disguise, so effective that it fools everyone who sees it, including me at first."

Kyven gave the sober Flauren a long, steady look, the body behind the illusion tensing up, but Clover made no motion of tensing or preparing, simply leaning on her hand, her tail swishing on the desk, regarding Shario with light amusement. "That's a pretty wild declaration, Shario," he said carefully.

"I've known you're an Arcan for quite a while. Since our third dinner together, I think," he mused, tapping his cheek in thought. "Your disguise is quite amazing, my friend, but it can't hide everything about you, and I've been around you long enough to notice these discrepancies. For one, I have never seen a boot print in this building that was not my own, despite the fact that I see you wearing boots all the time. I do, however, occasionally see a much larger pair of Arcan prints similar to Clover's, larger than could be made by anyone except your size, before Patches scrubs them away. When you pass by me, sometimes I feel a strange rush of air that has nothing to do with your back, which I would assume is your tail, hidden by your magical disguise. And those times I've seen you pick up food and put it back down at the dinner table, deep in conversation with someone, I have noticed that there are small holes in your food over where your fingers grip it, made by something that is not there. Claws, perhaps?" he said with a smile. "Now, I know that I've probably just put my life in danger telling you this, but you did ask me to be honest, and we are friends. At least I hope we are still friends. I know your secret, my friend. I've known it for quite a while, and as you see, I'm still here, and there is no platoon of Loreguard beating down the door to your shop. I've done nothing either against you or to spite you. Simply put, I don't care what you do, because I find myself in quite a profitable relationship with you. And by being honest with you, perhaps it will become even more profitable," he said with measured words. "As long as you keep your part of our bargain, who am I to interfere in what else you do? Little Lightfoot knows enough about my operations to destroy me, and I am in a position to destroy you, yet I do hope it never comes to that. You have done right by me, and continue to do right by me. In return, I will do right by you. Among thieves, that is a powerful motivation to keep the status quo."

Clover looked back to him, and she gave him a slow smile. "Should we kill him?" she asked, which made Shario flinch.

"We should," Kyven grunted. "But Patches would be devastated."

Shario blew out his breath. "I am quite glad you're willing to be reasonable about this," he said.

"Oh, we'll decide that later, Shario," Kyven told him, deadly serious. "Deciding to have you killed isn't something we'll decide right here and now."

Shario gave a nervous laugh. "So, my secret is given, and I'm glad you didn't overreact. I'll have more information to pass along when it comes to me. I still have favors out, waiting for my colleagues to get the information and bring it to me. May I come to dinner tonight?"

"You want to come to dinner?" Kyven asked in surprise.

"I hope that little changes, my friend. I do adore my Little Chef's cooking, and I enjoy your company. I don't come here just because I know you are major players in a dangerous game, and associating with you keeps me in the loop on major events, far beyond the Loremasters," he noted, a touch smugly. "I come here because you and Clover are intelligent, brisk conversationalists, Patches is an outstanding cook, Tweak is quite amusing with his youthful outlook, and Lightfoot is still one of my most promising apprentices.

"Would you indulge me with one thing?" Shario asked. "What do you really look like?" he asked.

"Why Shario, I look like this," he said calmly, motioning at himself.

He laughed lightly. "We shall see, my friend. I will find out, if only to satisfy my own curiosity. So be warned," he grinned. "Well, I will take my leave now. I'll bring the wine," he promised, standing up. "Be well, my friends."

Shario took his leave, and Kyven and Clover were quiet a long, long moment, just looking at each other. "What do you think?" he finally asked.

"He knew a while ago, yet he kept it quiet. He didn't have to tell us, but he did anyway, because he wants to be more involved, wants us to include him in information he can't get anywhere else. He is clearly playing his own game, my friend. I think we might hold off on having Lightfoot kill him," she said, her eyes reflective. "At least for now. He can still be useful. He can get information that only the Loremasters could match, as he so effectively proved before he told us. He was proving his value to us. We will have to watch him very, very carefully, though. I like him, and I see use in him, but I don't entirely trust him." She tapped her chin absently. "We'll just have to be very careful."

"I'll trust your judgment, old friend," he told her. "You have much more experience with this kind of thing."

"It could be a mistake," she admitted. "I'll have to have Lightfoot find out what game he's playing. She has much more extensive contacts with his thieves. She might get that information. Until then, we treat Shario like a live snake. We let him continue the task we paid him to do, let him come to dinner, but we give him nothing in return until Lightfoot feels him out." She sat up on his desk, then swung around to face him. "If we can trust him, we can certainly benefit from him. If we cannot…"

"Then he dies," Kyven said in a grim tone. "Lightfoot!" he shouted.

The striped cat opened the door and looked in, her nude body swaying in a way he found attractive as she closed the door behind him, her belt hitched jauntily over her hip. "Lightfoot, we have a problem," Clover told him.

"Shario?"

Kyven nodded. "He knows about us. And I mean everything."

Lightfoot nodded simply. "I thought he did. He's smart. Should I kill him?"

"Not yet," Clover said. "What he said and did in here hinted he's willing to ignore what he knows in favor of continuing his association with us. We need to find out if we can trust him, Lightfoot, and you have the most contact with him and his people. Find out for us."

She gave a single nod.

"Given what you know of him, what's your inclination right now?" Kyven asked her.

"Kill him," she said simply. "The dead don't talk."

"So you don't trust him?"

"I trust him. I just think it's safer killing him."

"Well, Shario proved that he can be very useful to us. The information he brought to us about the operation was detailed and thorough, and we couldn't get that kind of information from anyone else. That's why we need to know if we can trust him not to run to the Loremasters."

"He wouldn't," she said simply. "He hates the Loremasters. They did something to his family long ago, and he has never forgiven them. But that doesn't mean he wouldn't sell us out to someone else."

"Then it's up to you, my friend," Kyven told her. "Find out if we can trust Shario. The matter is entirely yours. We'll abide by your decision."

She nodded simply.

"I hope you don't need to talk any more today. That had to be your quota of speaking for the entire week," Kyven noted.

She smiled. "I'll start tonight. I'm going out with him tonight."

"Has he really been teaching you burglary?"

"Personally. He has this childish love of it. He's very nimble-fingered. I've learned how to pick pockets and pick locks already." She licked her chops. "Locks were difficult."

"In just a couple of weeks?" Kyven asked in surprise.

She shrugged. "I'm still learning." She reached into her belt, along the inside of it, and pulled out a small metal tool that looked strangely like a tiny awl. "Shario gave me my own set of lockpicks. He says I have the hands of a thief." She patted her belt. "They're all in here."

"Well, that's about the only place you could put them," Kyven noted, looking at her unclad form.

She reached into her bone-white hair, just behind her ear, and withdrew a tiny little flanged tool, a slight smile on her muzzle.

"I stand corrected," Kyven said mildly.

Lightfoot replaced her tools and left them, leaving them to their debate. They talked about Shario for over an hour, fully voicing all their fears and concerns even as they explored the possibilities of the benefits that leaving him alive might bring. Shario was clearly vastly connected, and was able to gather information from all of Noraam. What was more, he was very intelligent, able to read into what information he gathered and ferret out the truth. After all, he had correctly reasoned that the Masked was behind what was going on, but still had investigated many leads, and laid out alternate theories that someone without the same information he had might adopt.

Clover summed up something both of them were thinking. "Shario would be an outstanding asset to the Masked," she said. "Even if he's not a member. If we can buy his silence, his connections would be of great use to us. He's shown that he's willing to work if we pay him and treat him with respect."

"But it's such a risk," Kyven grunted. "He knows about us. He could get us all killed."

"He has known quite a while, but has done nothing," she reminded him. "Let's leave it to Lightfoot, my friend. We can trust her judgment."

"If we can't trust each other, who can we trust?" Kyven said, to which Clover nodded simply.


Shario did indeed come for dinner, and it was a very curious, nervous, and enlightening dinner.

They'd told Patches and Tweak that Shario knew about them, and that made the two youngsters very nervous when Shario arrived. He seemed aware of the tension, but he was his usual chatty, charming self. He brought a bottle of wine, as was his custom. But he was also much more open with them, in ways that weren't like his usual observant, quietly curious self. He set the table for them, then sat at the table with Tweak and Lightfoot, breaching something that he'd never asked before. "So, Tweak. What's it like being an apprentice to Kyven?" he asked directly.

That flustered the ferret something awful, and sent him fleeing from the table.

That set the tone for the dinner. Shario was quite willing to ask all kinds of questions that he'd never dared to ask before, showing that the man had quite effectively guessed out at the entire structure and behavior of the entire shop. He seemed to know that Patches and Tweak were his apprentices, not his servants. He knew that Clover was Shaman, and asked her quite a few questions about what magic was like, which she deflected with her usual charm and wit. And in the most curious and frighteningly insightful question, he looked right at Kyven and asked, "so, how did an Arcan come to have the cutting skills you possess, Kyven? You are certainly one of the masters of your craft. How did an Arcan manage to convince an artisan to give you such training? I've never heard the like."

"I'm sure you don't believe that an artisan would ever do such a thing," Kyven said calmly.

"You are," he smiled. "Those two benches you're always so careful to keep covered, yet also show signs of use, belong to Patches and Tweak, or I will eat this table. Are they any good?"

"Shario," Lightfoot said in a mild voice. The Flauren looked at her, then chuckled.

"Yes, yes. I will stop asking such questions now," he promised.

Clover moved the conversation to more mundane matters, skillfully fencing with the Flauren to make him focus on the events in the city more than the things within the shop he was most curious to discover. The Loreguard patrols were still very heavy, and none of them were allowed to go out by themselves. Kyven had been accompanying Patches to the market every day since Sunday so she could tell him what she needed, and almost every time, Kyven had to keep a firm grip on her and hurry her past eight-man patrols of angry Loreguard that looked to stop anyone for any reason and interrogate them. The city was still on edge, but it was all because of the Loremasters and their heavy-handed reaction to Kyven's invasion of their headquarters. It was almost as if they were sure they'd catch the invader if they kept up the heavy patrols and constant searches of people in the streets. Kyven's shop hadn't been searched yet, but he figured it was just a matter of time before they did. But, they were ready for that. The vault was hidden behind the secret wall, and Kyven had viable reasons for having everything else in the shop. The only thing he had that was unusual was more Arcans than what would be normal for a single shop owner, but that too was easy enough to explain. Patches and Tweak were his servants, and Clover and Lightfoot served him in… other ways. It wasn't entirely unusual for young men to keep a female Arcan or two for their personal pleasure. In fact, quite a few female Arcans were sold as sex slaves because they were attractive to human men, and many of them ended up in "beast brothels" which were somewhat common in larger cities outside of Avannar, and existed here in Avannar underground. Avannar law made using Arcans in brothels illegal, part of the Arcan reforms that also banned Arcan fighting and racing.

"Another fine meal," Shario said with a contented sigh, patting his belly. "I swear, you're going to make me fat, my little chef," he said with a smile.

"I'm glad you liked it, Shario," Patches said with a bright smile. "I wasn't entirely sure about this recipe. I've never had to do so much preparation before. I was afraid I did it wrong."

"You did magnificently," he told her. "Now, I'm afraid I don't have much time for our usual talk after dinner. I have some things to look into, and some things to prepare for tonight. I have no doubt that Lightfoot will grill me tonight, in her own special way," he said, smiling at her, "so I must be ready for it. Allow me to clear the table, and I'll be on my way."

"I'll help you," Kyven said. The two men worked to clear away the dishes, then carried them into the kitchen while Tweak lured Clover into a game of posts, Lightfoot looked on silently, and Patches decided she needed to scrub the table clean. Once they were in the kitchen, Shario gave him a calm look.

"I'm sure you'll have Lightfoot inspect me over the next couple of days."

Kyven nodded without changing the expression of his illusion. "I don't think I need to mention what she'll do if she finds you lacking."

"I wouldn't be able to stop her. She's very special, my friend. She could be the best. The best ever. I find in her an apprentice that I can finally teach what my other thieves could never quite master. They don't have her innate skill and aptitude. In just a week, she learned the art of lockpicking that outstrips some of my young ones who have been practicing for over a year."

"This isn't about her, Shario. You said once we were in a position to hurt each other."

"We are."

"I'll be honest in this, my friend. You are in a much better position to hurt me than I will ever be to hurt you. When you told us what you thought you knew, I almost had you killed on the spot. The only thing that held me back was my friendship with you. That, and Clover believes you could be of tremendous use to us."

"I knew revealing myself would introduce risk, Kyven," he said honestly. "I know what kind of people you are. The Masked has survived this long because of secrecy and discipline. You are the only members of the Masked I have ever uncovered, and I believe I would never have found you if I were not so close to you."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because whatever it is you do that hides you, Kyven, it is amazing. But that is only how you appear. The other half of it is that you seem human, far beyond some magical trick that hides your appearance. I would never believe you are an Arcan, not in a million years. You look like a human, you have a job no Arcan could ever do, you even act like a human. There are some fundamental differences between my kind and yours, my friend. Those differences don't make one of us better, they just make us different. I am very intimate with Arcan society, so I know what those little things are, what to look for. I see none of them in you. You are so well versed in the nuances of human behavior that you feel human. Almost as if you were raised human instead of Arcan. Does that make sense?"

"It makes sense," he admitted. If Shario only knew just how right he was, and it amazed him anew at just how intelligent and observant Shario was. He was almost as clever as Danna. But then again, both of them were highly trained to notice the tiny details, Danna through her job, Shario to survive.

"So, I'm sure you wonder why I decided to take this risk, knowing that you could easily kill me. I stand no chance against two Shaman, no matter how deep a hole I find to hide in."

"It did cross my mind."

"I sense something major coming, my friend," he said seriously. "I have my own sources, ears to the ground. Something is… wrong. The Loremasters are acting strangely, and have been for over a year. They know something, something that has changed them from their usual activities, but I just can't put my finger on what it is they know. And it seems that the Loremasters themselves do not know. The orders come from the Circle, and while the lower ranks sense something is going on, they don't know the reason behind it. Their activities in the southern kingdoms has increased, and they have been sending armadas of message ships out to Eusica, even to the tribal kingdoms of Friia. They've also been stockpiling supplies, goods, putting in orders with alchemists, recruiting Loreguard by the platoon, building up an arsenal of both conventional and alchemical arms. It is almost as if they were gearing up for war. But war with who? They have no enemies here aside from the Shaman, who are too mysterious and disconnected from the affairs of humans to be much of a threat. And now this, where the Masked and the Shaman have finally made a move, and the most audacious and bold move I have ever seen out of them, far beyond anything I ever dreamed they'd do. Was this what the Loremasters was waiting for, or is this some kind of reaction by the Masked to what the Loremasters are doing? What do your people know, my friend, that has caused you to try to pull your people out of Noraam so quickly, so daringly? Something is going on, but I have no clue what. And it drives me mad," he fretted. "I'm honestly afraid, my friend. I fear for my Flauren brothers and sisters."

"You're a patriot."

"If that's what you want to call a man who loves his country, then I'm a patriot," he said simply. "But I'm afraid for more than just Flaur. I'm also a businessman, Kyven, and I fear that what's coming will impact my business. My people depend on me to know where to send them and what to do, which corners are the most profitable for beggars, which houses are easy marks. My people depend on me knowing everything about this city, and quite honestly, social turmoil is bad for business. If there is trouble on the horizon, I want to know as soon as possible, so I can take steps to protect my business, and protect my people."

Kyven was silent a very, very long moment, so long that Shario seemed to get nervous. Shario truly did know what was going on. He could read the signs, he knew much of what the Shaman knew… that the Loremasters were preparing to act. But he didn't know why, and without that critical piece of information, their actions would indeed seem strange, out of character to him. Clover was right; Shario was a very, very valuable man to have on your side. He was much, much more intelligent than he thought, since now he was being honest, not dancing around subjects he wouldn't dare bring up before.

"My revealing my knowledge to you was done mainly so I could hopefully gain more understanding of what is going on, my friend," he admitted. "I'll be honest about that much. I hope that you might impart to me that last bit of information I might need to finally understand exactly what is going on. For something surely is, and whatever it is, it is big."

Kyven was quiet a long moment, and then the words escaped him before he even realized it. "The crystals are running out," he said, grimly, seriously. "The mines are running dry. In a year, maybe two, there will be a critical crystal shortage. The Loremasters know it. So do we. We're trying to save the Arcans for when there aren't enough crystals to power all their collars. When that day comes, we fear the Loremasters will order a mass slaughter of the Arcans."

Shario gave him a long look, then nodded soberly. "I… see. Yes. It makes sense. And if the crystals are indeed running out, then war will come to Noraam," he said, then he sighed. "Kingdom will fight kingdom over the dwindling supply, and the poor Free Territories will be an open battleground where every army in Noraam will battle to control the mines, to get what crystals remain. And the Loremasters intend to conquer us all, to rule openly rather than behind the scenes as they do now."

"We don't know about that, but it wouldn't be a stretch," Kyven told him honestly. "All we really know, or care about, is saving as many Arcans as possible. Because when this becomes public knowledge, you know what will happen."

"Chaos," he said, shivering his shoulders. "Thank you for being honest with me, Kyven. That more than anything matters to me. But this… I almost wish I hadn't heard it," he sighed.

"I know. But you have to do one thing for me, Shario, if you do nothing else."

"What?"

"Don't shout that from the rooftops. If the Loremasters find out that people know, they'll see what's going on and piece things together that much faster, which will stop us from doing what we have to do. You know how the Loremasters feel about Arcans. They'll never let them go, they'll never allow Arcans to go free, they'll kill them first. Every day we have is more lives saved. If you decide to do anything, do it quietly, and don't explain. Don't tell anyone, not even your most trusted business associates. Give us time to save as many as we can. Please."

"Of course, my friend," Shario said. "I understand. Believe me, I understand. As you know, I both own and employ quite a few Arcans myself. The thought of a death squad of Loreguard barging into my brothel or my warehouse and putting my Arcans to the sword–" he shuddered. "You will lose no time because of me, my friend. That is my solemn promise."

"I believe you," Kyven said seriously.

When Shario left, Kyven felt much more confident about him than he had earlier. Kyven believed Shario. He believed that the Flauren would honor Kyven's request to keep the revelation to himself, and would not interfere as the Masked tried to save the Arcans.

He was sure of it.


Lightfoot kept a very close eye on Shario over the next two days, which were very tense for everyone, both in the shop and in the city. The Loremasters were getting even more oppressive, and as Kyven had suspected, they began searching the city for information about whoever had invaded their headquarters. Most in the city grumbled at this, and many didn't see why they were going so crazy about it, but Kyven understood why.

It was because of how it was done.

The Loremasters knew that they were dealing with someone that was not normal. They knew it was an Arcan, and they were positive that Arcan had to be Shaman, and a Shaman using magic they had never seen before. That Shaman had walked right through every defense they had, even interacted with the guards and Loremasters, meaning that not only could he evade their traps and security, he could overcome their guards and their people, pass through them without raising an alarm. He had even talked to them, had gotten into the office of a Councillor and spoken to him without any suspicion, and that meant that he could do it to others. They were adamant about finding him or finding information about him to stop him, for they understood that someone that could do what he did could dig every secret they had out of their headquarters.

Yes, the Shaman had been caught, had been discovered by one of their defenses, but that had not stopped him. It had only told them that it happened. For all they knew, he could be in their building right now, learning their secrets, and they had to stop him, no matter what it took.

Two days after Shario had revealed himself to them, Kyven got a little visit from the Loremasters and a contingent of twelve Loreguard. They barged into his lobby as soon as he opened for the day, and he was surrounded by dour-faced men. "By order of the Loremasters and the Council of Advisors, we are conducting a search of this premises for possible treasonous activity," the Loremaster read from a parchment. "You have been identified as a potential seditionist due to your anti-Loremaster activities in the past and your ownership of Arcans."

"What? I work for the Loremasters!" Kyven said angrily. "I'm a contract cutter for them! Go ask them!"

"Yes, well, the complaint was issued by someone within that department," the man said smugly. "Now take us to your vault. We'll work out to the rest of the building from there."

Kyven yanked his arm out of the grip of a Loreguard. That bitch woman, she was the one that made the accusation in revenge for his humiliation of her! "I will, but you will mark me," he said in an angry hiss. "If your guards do any damage to my shop, I will be at the guild lodging an official complaint so fast you won't know what happened."

Kyven took them down to the cellar, already performing the action that he had prepared. Kyven saw the surprised looks when he moved the fake wall to reveal the door to his vault, a very cleverly hidden door, and then he created an illusion within in that moment when he could see inside, but no one else could. Instead of the huge room filled with chests, a desk, and many shelves, what the Loremaster and the four Loreguard that came in with him was an extremely tiny little cubby, not even big enough to enter, which held a locked chest on the floor and two plain shelves over it holding both cut and uncut crystals. Kyven had put a huge investment of energy and detail into the illusion, even giving it a dank smell of a damp place that was kept enclosed, which wafted over them as the door was opened. The walls were imparted with the sense of stone, how it would feel to the touch, how it smelled, even how it might taste, and that level of thorough detail was woven into the entire illusion. From the spotty, slightly grimy floor to the narrow ceiling crisscrossed with cobwebs, from the glint of light off the stones from the light behind them to the grain of the wood of the planks forming the two plain shelves set into the walls over the rusty chest, the place looked, smelled, even felt how it appeared. "Don't touch the chest, it's trapped," Kyven warned. "Outside of that, you see what you see."

"Open the chest," the man ordered. Kyven knelt and did so, his hands matching seamlessly with the illusion, as he seemed to open the lid and push it back, revealing a nearly empty chest that held only a few small, uncut crystals, a few pieces of folded parchment that Kyven unfolded to reveal the deed to the shop and some guild paperwork, and a small leather money pouch at the bottom.

"I don't really use this for anything but holding my commissions and bond money," Kyven told them. "And I only cut on commission, so I don't keep a stock of raw crystals. I don't need them."

"What does that mean?" one of the Loreguard demanded.

"He only cuts under contract with someone else," the Loremaster answered for Kyven. "He doesn't sell crystals, he only cuts crystals others bring him."

"Exactly. That's all this is for, to hold my commission crystals and my bond money."

The Loremaster gave the place a penetrating look, then reached inside. Kyven silently prayed when the man set his hand against the illusory wall, and it did not go through. Kyven had implanted into that illusion all the substance he could muster, the feel of the stone, the slight dampness, the cool touch of it, and it was so convincing that the man's mind would not allow his hand to pass through what was not there. The illusion didn't just fool him, it caused his mind to conform to a reality which was not real, caused him to touch what was not there and consider it to be solid, just as the fox once told him an illusion could cause. Kyven's conjured fantasy had actually intruded upon reality, or at the very least, the reality of a single man.

He gave it one final look as he removed his hand, then nodded gruffly. "Close it up," he ordered.

Upstairs, Kyven was shunted to the side, and the Arcans were roughly dragged from the various parts of the shop and made to kneel or stand in the main workroom as the Loreguard roughly searched his building. Kyven stood there with hot eyes and his arms folded before him as the twelve guards worked from the basement up, roughly opening doors, upending drawers, pulling things off shelves, searching for anything that might be hidden. They didn't give his vault the same scrutiny because they knew that Kyven would violently object to them putting their hands on valuable crystals, and also because the illusion Kyven created to hide the real vault was detailed enough to make it fool the five men that looked inside. They all saw a broom closet, so narrow and shallow that nothing could possibly be hidden within it.

"Why are there three benches when there is only one cutter?" the Loremaster demanded.

"I'm about to take on apprentices," Kyven answered, in an unfriendly tone. "Some of my apprentices from Atan. They need their own benches."

"From Atan?"

"I'm part owner of a shop there as well," Kyven told him with flat eyes. "I have apprentices there, and my partner manages that shop. I was going to bring a couple here once I was settled in and had steady income."

"I find that hard to believe, that someone as young as you owns two shops," he said.

"Go look it up," Kyven growled. "The guild has all the records to prove it."

"And why do you own four Arcans?" the man pressed. "They must cost you more than they provide."

"The two little ones are my servants," Kyven said bluntly. "The two older females are my servants."

"At least he's honest," one of the Loreguard snickered behind the Loremaster.

"You know that it's illegal to use Arcans for carnal purposes."

"Only for profit," Kyven said calmly. "I can't rent them out to my friends, but nothing stops me from enjoying them myself."

"So, you pay to keep two Arcans just to, to–that?" he asked, prudishly.

"I like variety. And women who don't say no," Kyven said in a way that made the guards behind the young Loremaster laugh. Clover, who couldn't seem to resist, sidled up to him and put her hands on his shoulder, leaning against him, her tail curling around his leg coyly. "You should buy one yourself. You might actually enjoy it."

The young Loremaster gave him a stiff, offended look.

"Now hurry up and finish."

They did seem a bit suspicious about upstairs, since it was clear that the Arcans lived up there with him, but he just glared when they asked him and answered "I can put them wherever I damn well please, and I like to have them handy when I want them," he said in a way that made the young Loremaster flinch, blush, then quickly change the subject.

One of the guards, however, wasn't quite so prim. "Then what's that room down on the ground floor for?" he demanded. "The room with the pallets that looks like an Arcan stable?"

"I tried keeping them separate at first, you know, the young ones down here and my girls up with me, but it didn't work out too well. I'd find them all in the same room in the morning, either up here or down there. So, I just put the two young ones up in the room with my girls and let the room down here go. When my apprentices get here, I'll convert it so they can sleep there, make it their room. Until then, it's just extra space, so I'm leaving it as it is."

The guard gave him a somewhat suspicious look, but didn't press the matter any further.

Thank the Trinity for their overt focus on his sexual habits, for it let him hoodwink them when it came to them searching his room. They scattered his things all over the place, but thankfully, only one guard searched his clothes dresser. That meant that he only had to focus in one place when it came to using illusion to hide the fact that his pants were all Arcan-cut, with a hole in the back for his tail and a strap that buttoned over it. Kyven had to maintain each illusion for his four pairs of pants, even though three of them were tossed front-up onto the floor as he searched the chest. Kyven kept his winter clothes (which had not yet been altered, since it was summer) in the chest at the foot of his bed, kept his unused coats, cloaks, and shoes in a small closet on the far side of the room, kept a pair of boots and a pair of house slippers by the bed, and kept shirts, pants, undergarments, and socks in the small dresser by the closet door. Kyven maintained the illusion of his humanity even here in his private domain in the form of owning shoes and socks, a necessary precaution that proved to save his ass now that the Loremasters were in here searching his personal space. The shoes he had, which he never wore, looked like they saw heavy use, not bought new and just left out, so the Loreguard that inspected them didn't give them a second glance. He covered his pants by angrily gathering up his clothes after they finished searching, then rather heatedly throwing them all in a bundle in the closet without folding them and slamming the door shut.

Outside of those small things, the Loremaster and his guards could find nothing unusual or suspect about Kyven Steelhammer. All they really had to report was that he had an unnatural sexual interest in Arcan females, but aside from that, his shop was legitimate. He was what he appeared to be, just another artisan crystalcutter, though a rather eccentric one. There was nothing hidden in his shop to arouse any suspicion at all.

That didn't stop them from interrogating him, though. He spent nearly two hours answering questions from the Loremasters and the Loreguard, always answering quickly and concisely, but using the simplest terms possible. Kyven lied like a son of a bitch the entire time, and had to concentrate to keep all his lies straight. In the end, he either satisfied them or bored them enough to make them leave, for they finally marched off with a stern warning to keep his nose clean, for they'd be watching him. Luckily, the Loremaster prejudice against Arcans worked in his favor. The Loremaster never once thought to interrogate any of the Arcans, for no doubt he believed they were stupid animals that would provide him nothing of value. The only thing they did was force Clover to give an ink imprint of her footprints, no doubt to check against the prints that Kyven had left inside the headquarters. But they would find that her feet were too small and the wrong shape to be the infiltrator, so Kyven wasn't worried about that at all.

This was a revenge search by that Loremaster woman he'd humiliated, and the searchers hadn't come armed with really serious search equipment. They had brought no alchemical devices to search for magic, for example, and probably hadn't even come expecting to find anything. This was retaliation for a woman's bruised ego and nothing more, meant to inconvenience him and give that woman a chance to have someone snoop through his shop and private life. Now, they would go back to her and tell her that they had nothing, that he was an upstanding member of society whose only black mark was his sexual interest in Arcan females… which was not itself illegal.

But he doubted that was the last he'd hear of it. The woman would latch onto this one aberration and try to run with it, maybe have him investigated for possible law violations concerning selling Arcans for sex. They might know that Shario came over a lot, given Shario had a somewhat unwholesome reputation among the Loremasters and they may keep tabs on him; they suspected he was an underworld figure. He would need to be ready to be attacked on that front as well, being accused of being in league with organized crime.

"That was nervous," Clover said quietly when Kyven finally got them out of his shop. He saw her open her eyes to the spirits, then felt her channel some kind of spell that swept through the entire building. "They left nothing behind," she reported to them. "No alchemical trinkets that might eavesdrop on us."

"Thank goodness!" Patches said, sighing explosively. "I thought I was going to faint when they came in. And they destroyed my kitchen!" she complained loudly. "It's going to take me all day to clean it up!"

"They scattered my clothes all over my room," Kyven grunted. "It made hiding the truth of them from them a little tricky."

"I'm quite glad you could," Clover told him with a chuckle.

"What now?" Tweak asked.

"Now? We give them a few more days to settle down, make sure I don't get searched again because of that woman, make triple sure they're not watching me or the shop, find out where Shario stands with us, then I go right back in," he announced. "We have to know what they know and how they're going to respond when they do find out. I can't let them scare me off. No matter how much extra security they put in, I have to go."


Things did settle down over the next three days.

The city was still in a state of high tension, but for Kyven and the shop, they calmed down considerably… mainly because Kyven had complained to Yoris about being searched, and how he was specifically told that someone in his department had leveled an accusation against him, when Yoris had come with a contingent of Loreguard to deliver another crystal for Kyven to cut, a whopping twenty-six point green, nearly the size of a baby's head. "Veralda," Yoris growled. "I'll take care of it, Kyven. Trust me."

"I'm surprised you brought something this valuable to me," Kyven said, holding the crystal up.

"See that flaw on the lower left side? That's why," he said. "What can you do with it?"

"I'm pretty sure I can work around that with minimal loss," he said confidently, turning the crystal over in his hand. "I'll know more after I give it a full examination."

"Fine, just have a written report on your complete exam and just what you'll do to the crystal sent to my office, or drop by and tell me yourself, so I know where things stand. The boys over at the Department of Health and Welfare have big plans for that crystal, testing an experimental large-scale alchemical device that cures disease in a large area, in the event of a plague or other calamity. The device has shown considerable potential, more than enough for them to risk such an expensive crystal testing the larger prototype. They need to know how many points you can save on it for their reports upstairs. How busy are you right now?"

"Four orders in front of yours," he answered. "None of them are particularly hard, though, just simple cuts. I can start on this either late tomorrow or the day after tomorrow, unless this is important. I can push you up and start on it today or tomorrow if you'd like, since it sounds like all they're waiting on is the crystal."

"Yes, I would like that, Master Kyven. Like I said, this crystal has some priority. If any of your other contracts complain, send them to my office."

"I may have to do that," Kyven chuckled. "The alchemists that contract me aren't used to having to wait for their orders."

"I'll give you an excuse," Yoris winked. "Same rate as last time?"

"Since when am I going to argue about getting double the standard fee?" Kyven asked, which made Yoris laugh.

"I'll have a page check in once a day until it's done," he informed Kyven. "But, I'll have a page drop by later this afternoon, around closing, as well, in case you have that report ready for me."

"I should," Kyven nodded. "Thanks, Yoris. And thanks for getting Veralda off my back, too."

"She's about to cost me one of the few cutters in Avannar with the training to handle these special orders," he growled. "If I have to choose between you and her, well, she'll find herself being transferred to some other department in a hurry."

"It's nice to have friends," Kyven laughed.

Yoris was a bright spot after a few days of worry, and worry on multiple fronts. Every morning when Lightfoot came home, Kyven would ask her about Shario, and she would just say "not yet." Kyven was very nervous about his Flauren friend, that Lightfoot would not change her mind and then they'd have to kill him. Kyven could accept that it might be necessary, but he would not like doing it, not one bit. Shario was about his only friend outside of the shop.

She did finally come home with an answer, though, the day after Yoris brought him the green crystal. She woke him up well before dawn, padding into his room and shaking him. Clover grunted and rolled over as Kyven sat up, and she sat on the bed beside him. "Kyven," she said, leaning over him, putting her hand down on his thigh.

"What is it, Lightfoot?" he asked.

"Shario," she said. "He slipped."

"Slipped? What do you mean?"

"He's much more than a thief," she told him. "He's a spy."

"Spy? Of course he's a spy," Clover said, rolling back over and looking at her. "He knows everything in this city."

"He's a Flauren spy," she announced. "I figured out how he does it."

"Does what?"

"Moves information. He uses Arcans," she told him. "Arcans and a kennelmaster, in the kennel he owns. They give the Arcans messages and ship the Arcans to Flaur. The Arcans relay the messages there, then get sent back. They use the same Arcans, ones Shario feels are trustworthy and loyal."

"Woah, start from the beginning," Clover ordered, sitting up.

She did. She told them about the short night she and Shario had breaking into some low-level guild functionary to get information about her to sell to a rival–all done under contract–and her following Shario after they parted ways. He went to one of the kennels that he owns, and there, Lightfoot heard him give several Arcans messages. They were then immediately put on a ship and sailed down the Podac River, on the way to Flaur, with a small contingent of Arcans that looked to be nothing but a shipment on its way to market. She then heard him ask about when his other ship would be coming back with word of what their response was to his last message, and she specifically heard him mention that he'd warned Flaur about the impending crystal shortage, and suggested in the strongest terms possible they begin stockpiling crystals for future use. He also broke his word to Kyven, Lightfoot had heard, because she heard him tell his kennelmaster partner that he hoped the Flauren Intelligence would not hinder the Masked as they continued their operation. "I told them to leave the Masked alone," Lightfoot repeated what Shario had said to the kennelmaster, "not to help, no matter how tempting it might be. The Masked have a good plan, I told them to just leave them alone and let them execute it. The Arcans are in terrible danger. We would be poor excuses for human beings if we tried to help, tipped off the Loremasters, and then caused a genocide by our good intentions."

"Well, fuck me," Kyven breathed. He'd never have believed it… Shario, a thief and a huge figure in the criminal underworld of Avannar, was a Flauren spy!

"He hides it well," Clover noted. "I would even dare say he allowed Lightfoot to discover his secret. I have no doubt he knows that Lightfoot knows, and that now we know. He is being as honest as he can be without breaking his own oaths."

"I'm not sure. Kyven, we should let him live," Lightfoot said immediately.

"Yeah. Shit, yeah," Kyven said. "He has more connections than I ever believed," he said in wonder. "And it sounds like he's on our side."

"Only so far as our opposition to the Loremasters and our concern for our people," Clover warned him. "But I doubt that Flaur will react any differently than the Loremasters when they discover the truth of Haven. He will be our ally until then, and then he will become an enemy."

"Then we use him as an ally until he becomes that enemy," Kyven said. "No wonder Shario can get such detailed information from so far away… he's not just pulling information from other thieves, he has the entire Flauren intelligence network to feed him information!"

"And if he works here, he must be good," Lightfoot said. "Would you entrust a novice to running your spy operation in the capitol city of your enemy?"

"You think he runs it?"

"Kyven," Lightfoot said with a steady look.

Kyven chuckled. "He is very smart. If he doesn't run it, I'd be surprised."

"So, we spare Shario," Clover announced. "And hopefully, his contacts and connections will benefit us, so long as we keep feeding him information he believes will be useful to Flaur."

"We can use him," Lightfoot said. "Feed misinformation, throw people off."

"It's possible," Clover said, tapping her muzzle in thought. "But that is not something we will decide. I'll send this message on to the council," she said. "Right now. They need to know, and what's more important, the Masked must be warned away from Shario. They must not interfere with him in any way. We don't want our own people causing him trouble until he is no longer our ally."

She climbed out of bed and hurried out the door, and Lightfoot watched her go. Then she stood back up and unbuckled her belt, then let it fall to the floor.

She only took that belt off for two reasons, and she was definitely not about to take a bath.

"This a good time for this?" Kyven asked. "I mean, after you just–"

"Clover can handle it," she cut him off, climbing into bed with him. "Now shut up and pay attention to me."

"Yes, ma'am," Kyven chuckled, pulling her down into an embrace.

Chapter 21