Tag: Adventure

No. 5: Mittens: Ninja at Large

Write about the secret life of your pet.

She watched and waited. The hooman was still in the room and hadn’t noticed her and she had no intention of getting caught. This hooman liked to mess with her fur and she didn’t like that. She worked hard to get every bit just how she liked it. She still had time before she needed to go on with her mission. The hooman sat down and played with the shiny glowey thing that made the cool noises when she sat on it. Now was her chance. She popped out of her hide out and dashed through the room.

She wasn’t seen. The hooman didn’t even notice that she was there. Hehe, she was awesome.

She wasn’t sure of what her mission was going to be today, but no matter what it was going to be awesome. Everything she did was awesome. That was why she was the queen of the place. Everything here belonged to her just because she was so awesome.

Oh, what was that smell? Now that is way more delicious than the tribute the hoomans put out for her and the old one. It smelled… divine. She snuck under the desk. No one ever saw her hear. Her fur blended perfectly into the shadows. She slid around the soft fuzzy thing, and there is was.

It was displayed perfectly on the black pedestal. This wasn’t for her. She knew that, but she had to have it anyways. She crouched low and waited. Patience was the key here. She waited as the picture box changed rapidly. She waited as the hooman set a drink aside.

The hooman got up. Now was her chance. She slinked up to the pedestal and carefully hooked a claw into the treat and pulled. It was way bigger than she thought. She started eating it as fast as she could. It was juicy and wonderfull.

“Hey!” Hands wrapped around her middle and lifted. “That was mine. Bad cat.” She was carried to the door and tossed out. “You can stay out.” She licked her lips. Banishment. She had survived banishment before. She licked her claws and started grooming herself as the door shut her out. It was totally worth it.

No. 2: Enter the Star-Father

Write about a frail mobster searching for his lost friend in an asteroid.

The lock clicked and a slow hiss echoed through the airlock. He waited for his bodyguards to give the all clear before proceeding. He waved his attendant away. He was old, but he wasn’t stupid. One did not become the head of the family by being stupid.

The airlock opened into a dimly lit corridor. Why would anyone want to live here? He didn’t want to spend any more time on this godforsaken rock than he had to. There was business that needed his attention on Titan, and he didn’t dare send any of the ungrateful brats that called him father. As always there were somethings that one had to do himself, like coming here.

Vinnie flashed the all clear and stepped away from the door. He strolled down the ramp and took in the site. This place was a real shithole. The grey rock seemed to stretch on for forever, and the lights flickered. People actually lived here?

He tapped his comms. “Search this rock. I want him found and I want him alive and unharmed. I want you to treat him with respect.” Good help was hard to find these days. One had to make do with what one got. These were eager to please, and all to often, were more than a little trigger happy.

It was essential that he was found alive. He had given his word a long time ago and he intended to keep it. These kids, they didn’t know the first thing about honor. That is what made a man successful, the value of his word.

“Come back into the ship and let me get you out of that suit boss.” His attendant said. “It isn’t healthy for a man of your years to be out here.”

He shrugged him away. “I am fine.” They were worried about what will happen to the family if he died without a clear heir. That was why he was here. They came without question to this lifeless rock.

It didn’t take more than an hour or so. This wasn’t a big asteroid after all. He was perhaps the last alive who knew the true name of the man that they were escorting. This was a man to whom he owed his life.

“Morgan.” He smiled, offering his hand. Morgan accepted and pressed it to his lips. “It’s been a long time.”

“Yes,” Morgan replied. “That it has.”

“Come. It is time for you to come home.”

Northren Lights

Again?

Are you fucking kidding me?

Alright. I will tell you again, from the beginning. I will warn you, though, you are not going to like or believe anything I say. You are not going to believe a single fucking word.

Why? Well, because, I don’t believe a single word that is about to come out of my mouth and I was there. I saw the whole thing. I know exactly how it sounds, but I swear to you. Everything I am about to tell you is the god awful truth. I am not crazy. I wish I were, but unfortunately for both of us, I am not.

I can’t tell you the exact day when I first saw him. Or, even where. I was hitching along the northern stretch of highway one going through northern Ontario. There is little that I can say about exactly why I was there. A ride went bad and I got out of the car, and yeah it was bloody cold. If you have lived all of your life within city limits, it would be hard for your to imagine just how fucking cold it gets up there in the middle of winter. When it is that cold, you don’t stop moving. It doesn’t matter how tired you get or how long you walk on that road, you keep the fuck moving, because, it you stop, if you rest, you won’t ever wake up again. It won’t matter how many layers of clothing you are wearing. If you stay still for long enough, that bitter cold will worm its way through to your bones and suck the life right out of you.

So, yeah, when the car stopped for me, I got in. It didn’t matter where he was going at that point, or if he was safe, or if he was drinking or if I smelled some good shit, I was getting in that car. I needed to at that point, because after a few nights of walking through bugger fuck no where, I knew that I wasn’t going to make it through one more night. What can I say? People like me don’t have anything to loose. Sure, he could have killed me, but if I stayed out there I was fucking dead anyway.

I got in the car first. Fred or whatever his name was stopped for that guy sometime after he picked me up. I climbed into the backseat with my pack and let him ride shotgun.

Right from when I first set eyes on him, I didn’t want him touching me or my stuff. Picking him up wasn’t my call, it wasn’t my car. I don’t even know how he was alive. You see, an experience traveller like me comes prepared. You don’t need to be a genius to know that 40 below zero is fucking cold and to put on the layers, but this dude, he was fucked in the head. There just isn’t any other way for me to explain it. All he had on was a windbreaker over a t-shirt. He didn’t even have a toque on. I don’t know how he got all the way out there without his ass getting frozen off.

“Where are you heading?” Fred asked the guy.

“Just up the road a bit. I will show you where to let me off.” He replied. “I have to meet someone up there. I just hope that they will wait for me.”

“Good friends of yours?” I asked.

He nodded. “Yeah, you could say that.”

Fred turned his attention back to the road. “We will get you there. You just sit back and get your self warm there. Just be sure to”

Our new comer smiled weakly and settled in. I did to for that matter. It would literally be hours before we reached a town or something. Okay, I admit it. I dozed for a while. It’s not the safest thing to do while hitching, but sometimes you gotta catch a few winks while you can. It was sometime later when I woke. It wasn’t so much the car slowing down that woke me as much as it was Fred quietly arguing with the guy.

“But there is nothing here.” He was saying. “I don’t even see a car or anything parked here, and it is going to get bloody cold after dark.”

“This is the place.” The dude replied. “They are expecting me to be here. It doesn’t look like they are here yet, but I will be fine.”

“I am just not comfortable with just leaving you out here.” Fred sighed.

“I’m with Fred here.” I had to put my own two cents in. “You can die out here if you’re not careful. It won’t take long for your ass to wind up frozen solid, and no one will find you till spring, if ever.”

“I will be fine.” He insisted.

“Just be sure that you want me to drop you here.” Fed said. “This is like the middle of nowhere. There isn’t even so much as a telephone pole out here.”

“And you are going to freeze man.” I quipped. “Or get eaten by wolves or something. Come with us to Sudbury or what ever the next town is called.”

He shook his head and continued to bundle up. I passed my spare gloves to him and he pulled those on to.

“I am going to be late.” He said. “I wish that I could take you too, both of you, but you need an invitation. They don’t like strangers.”

Fred and I exchanged looks. It was pointless to argue with the man as that point. You can’t argue with fucked up in the head, crazy like that. You just never know when someone like that is going to turn on you.

“Alright then,” Fred said. “Alright, I will let you out. But we are going to wait.” Fred and I exchanged looks and I just nodded. Leaving a man out in the cold like that, in the middle of winter, that is like a death sentence. “If you get too cold, come on back and I will take you somewhere, where you won’t freeze your ass off.”

I don’t know what he was thinking and I am not sure if I really wanted to know, to be honest. That man, he didn’t hang out on the road, or start walking along the highway. He climbed over the snowbank and headed into the bush. He didn’t have the gear for that sort of thing and I knew then, or at least I thought I knew, that he was a goner. He got right to the edge of the trees and that is when everything got weird.

The world got bright, and even though, it was still daylight, the northern lights came out to play.

Those lights were the most beautiful this you could ever see. Look, I’ve been around. I’ve even been up north and by up north I mean far up north. So, I can tell you that I have seen the northern lights and they don’t even come fucking close to what I saw that night and I have never seen anything like that. Those lights, they came down from the north and jived. They blocked out the sun and jived. Those colours danced so bright that you couldn’t see anything else. We couldn’t help but loose site of the guy. We couldn’t see anything other than those lights man. It was all just dancing colours, I don’t even think that there are names for any of those colours. So, yeah, since we couldn’t see shit, no snow no trees, not even the hands in front of our faces, if we even cared to look.

Then just like that, is was gone. Nothing was there, and everything was back too normal. Except for that dude. He was just gone. I asked Fred to wait and he said that he would. That Fred, is a really good guy by the way. I got out of the car and went to see where he went. I am not a tracker or anything like that, not how hard can following tracks through three feet of snow can be?

They didn’t go far. I followed his trail maybe, I don’t know, fifty feet into the bush. It didn’t lead anywhere, it just stopped, in the middle of clearing. You might want to get some experts or something out there to take a look, cause, from where I was standing, there was no where he could have gone. Three feet of snow remember. I know that sounds fucked up, but, I would have seen where he went. It was still daylight and, okay, I just don’t what else to say.

We stayed there for quite a while. It was getting dark when Fred decided that it was time to get moving. We didn’t say a word. Neither one of us wanted to just leave him there in there in the middle of nowhere, but we had to get our asses moving if we were going to make it to the next town before a blizzard or something hit. I went and found myself a bottle, as soon as I climbed out of the car and got shit faced. I don’t know what happened to that dude, and I never saw Fred ever again. Never wanted to, if I am going to be honest. I just want to forget what I saw that night. I am not crazy, but that is what happened. I am not going to try to explain it.

The Harvesting by Melanie Karsak

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Have you ever picked up a book thinking that is was one thing, only to discover that it was something better? The Harvesting is that book. It is balsamic reduction on ice cream. There is no logical reason why those two should go together, but they just do. And they are delicious. The Harvesting starts out as a typical zombie apocalypse yarn in much the same style as the Walking Dead, but very quickly, supernatural elements creeps in and gives the over all work a whole different flavor. The Harvesting is a beautiful blend of horror and supernatural fiction. Karsak did such a masterful job in the blending of the two genre that there is no sense that it is contrived at all. It made for a very compelling read which sucked me in, despite a few flaws.

One of the best things though about this book is it’s heroine. Layla is unapologetically a warrior spirit. The most refreshing thing about her, is that she doesn’t fit into the over done trope of the female fighter with the tragic past. Karsak has successfully moved beyond the age old idea that a woman warrior needs to have some sort of trauma as a trigger for her to take up the sword. Layla is a warrior, just because she is a warrior and nothing more. This makes her a delightful character with a strong voice which draws the reader in. Unfortunately, the rest of the inhabitants of this world fall a bit short.

The characters which inhabit the Hamletville are very well rooted in reality. This makes it very easy to believe that they are ordinary everyday people who have been tossed into an impossible and horrific situation. Every kind of person that one can find in a small town, even the kindly priest and the town gossip can be found there. While, they are all believable, most are so ordinary as to be bland. This is their downfall. There just isn’t any, even those who are instrumental to the movement of the plot line, that are truly memorial, or stood out in any way. Most simply became a mass of faceless people which Layla needed to save and protect.

Though, the most disappointing thing about this work, is the fact that the emotional content is flat. The reader should have been devastated right along with the heroine of the story, when the grandmother died and even more so when Layla discovers that the old lady knew what was coming. Furthermore, for a heavy angst story arc of a love triangle between Layla and two brothers, it just feels empty and contrived. There is no angst or anguish and everything is simply a matter of fact. Even at the ending when Ian become vampire destroys himself to save her. We should have been weeping at that point.

Over all, there are good point and bad points. I wasn’t my intention to focus on the negative, but they were there. It was a damn good read with a really good narration. It just wasn’t above average in any way. I would give it 3 stars out of 5.

All the Crown Jewels. Part Two

“Okay,” He breathed, still being careful to keep his voice low. “We are in. You have an idea of where the treasury is right?”

Kara shook here head. “No. Where would the fun in that be?”

He stifled a groan.

“Don’t worry.” She went on. “We will find it. It will be where the most guards are.”

Stark sighed. They kept their ears open and strolled through the passage. It opened abruptly onto a rather large cavern which had been fashioned into a training yard. Barracks and what appeared to be the armoury was embedded in two of the three walls that faced them and a gate dominated the third.

There was considerably more light here as well. The flickering gaslights and torches of the city were gone. In their place were bright glowing orbs. They filled the empty space with eerie blue and green, unwavering light.

“We can’t stay here.” Kara murmured. “There is no cover. That gate must lead into the palace proper, but where are the guards?”

“I don’t know.” Snark replied. “And I don’t care. It’s bad luck to look too closely at found coin. Let’s go.”

The pair dashed across the open space to the gate. Even here, there were very few shadows. The gate had been cut into the wall seamlessly and all the stone had been polished to a mirror shine. All the better for maximizing what little light there is underground. In all of the known world, there was no one better at stonework than a dwarf, and it seamed that only the best laid hands on this gate and the palace beyond.

Their luck was holding. Not only were there no guards stationed at this gate, it had also been left open. Snark followed Kara through and gently closed the gate behind them. Open gates, especially those leading into the homes of kings, had away of drawing unwanted attention. He didn’t pull the bar down though. It was always best to leave possible escape routes open. One never knew when one was going to be needed.

They kept to the shadows as best they could. It wasn’t long until they found their way into the palace proper, and the place was filled with more of that eerie blue and green light. There was far more light here than Snark had expected, and it was quiet. It would have been easy to avoid any patrolling dwarves because they would have heard them coming. The average dwarf wouldn’t be able to sneak up on a man if his life depended on it. Dwarves simply just didn’t know how to move quietly.

Which made the silence of the palace corridors grate on Snark’s nerve all the more. Where were the courtiers? The dukes? The earls? Or whatever passed as nobility here in this nation? And the servants, where were they?

This is wrong. Kara signed. It feels too easy. There is no way these halls should be empty like this. We should have seen someone by now.

Agreed. He replied. Let’s just find that treasury and get out of here. I don’t want to get caught up in whatever is going on here.

The layout of this place is starting to feel familiar to me. Her fingers twitched as her she looked around. I think that the treasury should be close to the royal apartments.

Just lead the way to the gold. He winked. I will follow.

Snark followed her as she lead him through the grand halls of the palace. If there was one thing that he could appreciate about dwarves, it was this. They liked to build in a nice ordered fashion. This made it difficult to get lost and much easier to find what one was looking for. They kept off the main corridors as best they could. Kara had a good sense of direction and a almost supernatural knack of ending up exactly where she wanted to be. Snark, well, he did get lost in his own house once. In his defence, he was awfully drunk at the time.

They came to a junction where several corridors came together and it was here that their luck gave out. Heavy footsteps bounced off the marble walls, making it impossible to determine the direction that they were coming from.

“Crap.” Kara swore. “Where are they coming from? They are coming closer.”

“Damned if I know.” Snark replied. “I have an idea.”

He ran to nearest lamp and blew it out. Kara, following his lead did the same and the pair of them crowded into the shadows behind one of the columns. Snark hoped whomever it was would pass by without noticing them.

A pair of kolbolds rounded the corner, followed by another pair. Snark wasn’t up on kolbold livery, however he could guess that the over large goblinoid creature that loomed over the rest was a person of importance, a chieftain or maybe a shaman perhaps.

Next came the dwarven king. He was paced by two kolbold warriors, one on either side of him. He still held the emblems of kingship, the jagged crown that shown from his brow, and a sceptre which was heavy and little more than a heavy mace. It was quite clear that the king was no longer running the kingdom. His once proud head hung and his gaze rarely left the polished floor. Lines of magic threaded themselves through the dwarven king’s aura and seemed to be feeding from him.

The entire procession marched pasted Kara and Snark and didn’t seem to notice anything at all amiss.

Kolbolds! Her fingers quickly flashed in front of his face. What the hell are kolbolds doing here?

He shrugged. How the hell am I supposed to know? He signed. I think the better question would be, what are they up to and how can we get in on the action?

Kara crossed her arms and glared at him.

Isn’t it obvious?

Okay, dumb ass. Her fingers flashed. Explain.

Snark sighed. Dwarves in general do tend to have a lot of coin. While it is true that they don’t mine a lot of it, they do mine a lot of other metals. Iron, copper, silver and of course mithril. Mithril is worth more than gold. We shouldn’t forget that people pay a hell of a lot for dwarven crafted weapons. Even the stuff that the dwarves throw away as junk is far better than what the most skilled blacksmith can make.

Her eyes went back to the scaly bat like creatures. So, she replied. They are here for pretty much the same reason we are.

Pretty much. He agreed. But hey. This doesn’t change anything. We are still trapped here. The entire dwarven nation is still hunting the city and the countryside for us. That hasn’t changed, though I suspect that we had disrupted their plans by swiping the idol.

What are we going to do now?

Snark grinned. Did you see the size of that diamond?

Kara’s sudden grin matched his own. And that crown looked pretty shiny too. I don’t think that the king really needs it anymore now that the kolbolds are running things.

They took extra care as they moved away from the door. Kolbolds in more civilized lands are seen as brutish creatures, and for the most part that was true, it was never a good idea to underestimate them, or dismiss them as purely vermin. Those ears of theirs could hear almost as well as the bats that they resembled and they were known to have powerful shaman’s among them.

Snark knew for a fact that there was one close by. He didn’t know the purpose of the lines of energy that snaked through the stone around them; there was no way for him to know, but it was a good solid guess that it wasn’t anything good.

Shuffling steps echoed from the stone around them. Snark grabbed Kara and pulled her with him through the nearest door.

“Mine!” A high pitched squeaky voice protested.

They slowly turned around.

A short kolbold stood in the centre of the room with a dwarven child dangling from his arms. Blood pooled around the creature’s feet and soaked into the rug. Small limbs and the occasional torso were piled high off to one side. In the farthest corner from the grim scene, a dwarven woman was bound hand and foot. She struggled fiercely against the ropes that bound her while a small group of children cowered behind her.

The kolbold dropped the corpse. Snark flinched. “They were given to me,” The kolbold pounded on his chest. “Grimloch. Grimloch the bold. Grimloch the sneaky. You no take them.”

The Grimloch creature pulled a squealing infant from the arms of its sibling and cooed as he caressed the child’s head. He opened his mouth wide revealing jagged teeth and moved to pierce the baby’s skull.

Kara let fly. Her dagger buried itself to the hilt in the kolbold’s eye. Instantly Snark rush forward and caught the babe before the body could hit the floor. He breathed a sigh of relief as he cradled it in his arms and looked the little one over.

“I bloody well hate kolbolds,” Kara muttered under her breath. She plucked her blade from the cooling body and wiped it clean on it’s rags.

Snark looked up from the baby in his arms and glanced at the group of dwarves. “So much for not being seen. What should we do about them?”

Kara shrugged. “Leave them as they are. We can’t take them with us and we can’t let them roam about on their own. They would just raise the alarm to our presence and they probably would just get eaten by the kolbolds out there.”

The dwarf maid squealed and shook her head vigorously. She tried to tell them something around the gag that was clenched between her teeth.

Snark blinked. “I think that she can understand us.” He stepped closer to get a better look at her. “You know, this might be the queen.”

“Really?” Kara went over to stand beside him. “Are you sure?”

“I am pretty sure.” He replied. “No servant or underling would wear any of those jewels. That ruby is flawless. I think that is diamond dust in the grooves of those hair things that she is wearing.”

“Clips.” Kara corrected him. “They are called hair clips.”

“Whatever.” Snark brushed the hair from the dwarf’s eyes. “That is a royal circlet. If that isn’t a sign of royalty them I am a orcish bard.”

Kara snickered. “You are an orcish thief. That is almost the same thing.”

Snark leaned over the queen and examined the ropes that bound her. He adjusted them, making them both more comfortable for the dwarf and more secure at the same time.

“It’s too bad that we have to leave them here.” Snark said. “We can’t afford to get caught and between the kolbolds and the children, she is going to have more than enough to worry about than what we are up to.”

“What are we going to do with this little guy?” Kara waved her hand at the baby in his arms.

Snark looked around the room. “Give me a few moments.”

It didn’t take long for the pair of them to scrap together a make shift bed for the babe. They placed it next to the queen and placed the now drowsy child within it.

After that was done, Snark pulled a spare dagger from his boot and thrust it into a near by table. One that was just out of the queen’s reach. Kara arched a brow. “Are you sure that you are not going to need that?”

“No.” He replied. “But she is going to need something in case one of those kolbolds wander in here looking for their buddy over there. If she is smart, she will get herself and those children some where safe as soon as she manages to get herself free, and forget that we were here at all. I don’t want to leave her defenceless. I am just buying us some time. We should be long gone before she has managed to cut herself free.”

“Makes sense.” Kara shrugged.

He turned towards the door, then stopped. “Just one more thing before we go.” Snark smiled at the queen and her eyes narrowed. “I think that we should take our reward for saving them now. Since, we have no intention of ever coming back this way.”

Kara nodded and went to listen at the door. Snark’s slender fingers plucked the circlet from the queen’s brow. He held it up to admire it a moment before adding it to the idol that was stowed in his bag. Her rings and the golden chain that held the ruby quickly followed. The worry and desperation in the dwarf’s eyes quickly turned to astonishment, then rage.

Snark merely shrugged at her expression. “Nothing is free in this world. This is a small price to pay for the life of the little one. Don’t you think so?”

The dwarven queen snarled at him.

“Are you done yet?” Kara asked. “I can hear movement in the corridor. We have to get our asses out of here before we get pinned down.”

“All done.” Snark saluted the queen and turned away. “Time to move on.”

The dwarf screeched at him as he silently slipped through the door leaving her and the children behind.

All the Crown Jewels. Part One

The entrance to the tunnel was his only way out, and it was filled with dwarves. He told her that this was a really bad idea and like always, she managed to wrap him around her little finger.

This was going to be an easy score, she said.

They won’t even know that they were there, she said.

Don’t be a coward, she said. This was going to be the heist of a lifetime.

Yeah right.

Now like always, he was left holding the bag, quite literally at the moment, and Kara was nowhere to be seen. Typical. One day he was going to learn that she was going to bring him nothing but trouble and that she was going to be his downfall. He knew this in his head, but damn it, other parts of his body disagreed and here he was yet again. All she had to do was smile that smile and like a bloody fool, he would end up doing whatever it was that she wanted doing. Kara knew exactly how to play him and he was starting to hate her for it.

One thing was in his favour, they didn’t know that he was here, yet. It was only a matter of time before some one discovered that the idol was missing. He had planned on being far away when that happened, but right now, there were a dozen or so dwarves standing between him and freedom.

He shrank back into the shadows and prayed to the laughing god for away out of this mess alive. He didn’t even want to think about what they would do to him if he got caught. After all, this was the most sacred relic of their faith and not only was he a heretic, he wasn’t even of the same race. He smiled to himself. If, by the blessing of the laughing god of thieves, he could pull this off, he would be named as one of the greatest thieves who ever lived.

This wasn’t the time for dreaming though. Everything had to happen in the right order. Never count the gold until you are away and free, Snark, he told himself. Stopping to count the gold when you have the constables on your trail is what gets good thieves caught.

He watched then from the shadows and cursed. The dwarves were calm and there was no sense of urgency or alertness to their actions. The theft hadn’t been discovered, but they were not moving on either. What he really needed was something to get their attention. For that kind of thing, he really needed his partner in crime and she was nowhere to be seen. The idea of going deeper into the underground didn’t appeal to him, it might be days or weeks before he would see the sun, if ever again, but there wasn’t really another choice. This was still the only way out, and it was only a matter of time before one of those dwarves looked in his direction at the wrong moment.

Snark jumped out of his skin when a hand tapped him on his shoulder. He spun around, his hand automatically going for his dagger, and meet laughing emerald eyes. He slowly let his relieved breath out.

She tilted her head and smile impishly. Her slender fingers flittered about in the intricate silent language of thieves. What are you still doing here? I thought that you would have left long before now.

He motioned towards the gaggle of dwarves milling about between them and the tunnel’s entrance in answer.

Her gaze followed his gesture and she shrugged. So? She rolled her eyes at him. What of them?

Snark shifted the weight of the bag so that he could reply, scowling all the while. The movement of his fingers flowed as gracefully as her’s despite their burden. They are between us and the way out. There is no way to sneak past them. The passage is too well-lit.

Details, details. She signed back.

Kara, as much as he loved her, was going to get him killed. The marker for his grave was going to read, “Here lies Snark. A good man who was lead to his death by a woman’s wiles. May he rest in peace.”

Do you know what they do to heretic’s here? Snark frowned at her. When it comes to their religion, dwarves are not a forgiving race.

Oh shush. Her fingered danced in fount of his face. It isn’t as bad as all that, besides. She tilted her head and graced him with her most beguiling smile. I have an idea.

Oh gods, he thought. I am surely going to die.

This wasn’t a typical dwarven city. It was much smaller and less grand than the great crags that he was accustomed to seeing in the north. He wouldn’t have dared to even attempt to steal anything from there. Foolish, he might very well be, however suicidal he was not. The dwarves their selves didn’t even speak the same language and everything else just felt more primitive. They had just as much treasure though. Gold was gold no matter what shape it was in and jewels sparkled just as much. The tunnels and pathways wound just as deep into the mountain, Now, that is what was really bothering him the most.

Snark just wasn’t built to spend any great deal of time underground. The mere though of the tons of rock that hung over his head was enough to send his heart racing and make his hands shake. It just wasn’t natural for any sane person to like having stone rather than sky above their head.

He did his best to put all thought of the ceiling from him mind and concentrated of following Kara back into the depths of the dwarven city. He followed her fleeting form as she kept to the fringes and found pathways that even the dwarves seldom used. The shadows were their friend and of those there was no shortage. He wasn’t a tall man by any means and Kara was just a mere slip of a girl, however, there was no chance of either of them being mistaken for dwarves should they be seen. They were both too tall and too slender.

It wasn’t until they came to the great iron gates of king’s palace loomed before him in all of their glory that he realized just what might be going through that pretty little red head of hers. Snark skidded to a halt and stared at the sight. The gates were thick and heavy, heavy in the way that only dwarves would build, which was bad enough. What really caused the hair on the back of his neck stand on end were the thin lines of eldritch force that shimmered before his eyes.

These were not the elegant spidery thin lines and glyphs that he was accustomed to seeing. These were set in blocky runes. They were solid, square and utterly impossible for him to read.

Snark snatched at Kara’s cloak and spun her around to face him.

“What?” she asked. He cringed as her soft voice bounced though the darkness and he clapped a hand over her mouth as fast as the words had left her lips. Laughter shone from her eyes as she gently pried his fingers from her face. “No one here can hear us silly.”

“Are you insane?” He growled at her in a hushed whisper. “Do you really want us to break into the palace?”

“Well, no.” Kara tilted her head in thought. “The treasury is where the crown jewels are kept. I think.”

His hands flew to his own mouth and he stomped his foot. It took every inch of his will power and training to keep himself silent.

The distant sounds of boots hitting the pavement caught their ears. Kara pushed them both deeper into the shadows and sighed.

It’s a great plan. She signed. Any minute now they are going to discover that the idol is gone. This is the middle of their high holy days after all. When that happens every dwarf is going to be out for blood.

Yeah. He agreed. Ours.

Yeah. Kara continued. And when that happens all but the most minimal guard will be sent to the gates and every other way out of the city. Why? Because that is what a good thief would do. No one would ever dream that we stayed to rob the royal treasury, much less steal the crown. It would be almost unthinkable and that is why they wouldn’t even think to look for us in the palace itself. We could swipe them, lie low and when they are searching the city for us.

A slow grin started to creep on to his face. We use the shock and confusion to escape the city.

Exactly. She grinned.

Okay, he thought to himself. It wasn’t that bad a plan. It would give them a far better chance of freeing themselves from the dwarven city with their necks intact. The odds just went from impossible to slim.

They turned their attention to the iron gate that arose before them. The new-found plan was simple, but implementing it wasn’t going to be. Snark studied the gates more closely with practiced eyes. It was clear that they would not be able to slip in through the front, which wasn’t a surprise. With the extremely rare exception, it was never a good idea to walk in the front door. A good thief always slips in through the most unexpected way, and that was what he was looking for.

He was ready for the challenge. They couldn’t go around, because the gate was set within the substance of the mountain itself. There was no wall to climb over and no window to climb into. It was a puzzle that was starting to fascinate him, if only because his life was depending on it.

The city shuddered with the sudden sound of blaring horns and pounding drums. Kara swore under her breath and pulled Snark back into that ally by the scruff of his neck.

They appeared almost from nowhere. Dozens of dwarves marching two a breast, sometimes three where the passage would allow it. Their armour was polished to a near mirror shine and the light from the lamps glinted from the sharp edges of their axes. On each chest the stamp of the royal house could be seen. There was a good chance that these solders were those who served and protected the king. They would be the elite, the best of the best, and they were marching away from the palace.

Snark peered around the corner of the building, taking care to not be seen. He didn’t need Kara’s tugging on his shirt to remind him that he shouldn’t stick his head out too far.

What are you doing? She frowned at him as her hands flashed the words before his eyes. Do you want to get us killed?

Snark shook his head and signed back. No, he replied. I just need to see where they are coming from is all.

Why?

He rolled his eyes at her. Because, his hands moved very slowly and deliberately as if he were signing to an apprentice who had yet to master the silent language. I think that this is the royal guard and the are marching from the palace. Not towards. They are coming from somewhere.

So?

He blinked. If they have a way out besides the gate, then we have a way in without being seen.

Kara’s eyes lit up, and he turned his attention back to the marching dwarves. He didn’t get a good idea of how many of them there were, but that didn’t really matter. What mattered is that they appeared to be going away from the palace and towards the centre of the city where the high temple stood. Some clever thief did steal their most holy artifact after all.

When the last of them passed by the pair of them slide from the depths of the shadows to peer down the passage. It looked like every other street in the city and at first glance it appeared to be unchanged. But as they watched, a pair of guardsmen surveyed the area and went back to their posts.

“And that is our way in.” Kara whispered into his ear. “We just have to get past them.”

“Easier said than done.” Snark murmured. “I think that we are going to need a distraction of some kind. I would suggest that you get their attention and lead them off somewhere, but that would give the plan away, and both of us need to get through those doors besides.”

“Or we could look for another way in.” Kara suggested. “If there is one door, there are bound to be others. In a cavern this size, there is bound to be vents to bring the air in. Maybe we could use one of those.”

Horn’s blared somewhere in the city again. The cavern walls of the city bounced the sounds around and made it difficult to pin point exactly where they were coming from. They couldn’t see the dwarven solders and guardsmen, but from the rhythmic pounding of boots on pavement that echoed through the ally, Snark could tell that they were getting close. While the dwarves were not searching for them within the heart of the city, it just wouldn’t do for the pair of them to be seem. It was absolutely essential that they remain unseen. Snark wanted the dwarves to think that they had escaped the city and to take their search out there.

Kara nudged him in his ribs. “Look.” She whispered. “I think that they are leaving. Foolish dwarves.”

Snark turned his attention back to the gate. She was right. While he was distracted by the blaring horns, a commander of some sort had arrived and was furiously yelling at the guards at their post. He couldn’t understand a word of what was being said, but it was clear from the waving of arms and stomping of feet, that the commander wasn’t having a good day. While it was impossible for him to understand exactly what was being said, Snark had a fairly good idea of what was going on. When the commander was done, he and the two guards followed the path of the column and disappeared into the shadows.

“Quick.” Kara whispered into his ear. “How fast can you pick a lock?”

Snark smirked. “Faster than you.”

They took a moment to be sure that no dwarven eyes were peering their way, then darted over to the door. It was made from a solid wood. Snark suspected that it was iron oak, but he couldn’t really tell because of the poor light. He didn’t really care much about the door. What interested him more was the stout lock that was embedded in it.

With dwarves being a paranoid lot, the locks that they make are the best of the best. High merchants, aristocrats and anyone else with anything of value for that matter, always paid top coin to get their hands on good dwarven locks. Which was why, Snarl had spent countless hours learning the art of opening them without leaving a trace. He pulled the specialized picks from his pocket and moments later they were inside with the door closed and secured behind them.