Cat Mother scratched gently at the cheeks of one of the many felines she kept in what she fancifully referred to as her lair, the top floor of the Lower Harbor District Thieves' Guild. Cats roamed freely throughout the squat, ramshackle building, but especially enjoyed congregating near their mistress. The upper section of the Guild was replete with tapestries, many of them ragged from application of various needle sharp claws. When they deteriorated too far, they were replaced, so the look of the lair was constantly mutating. It smelled of rich incense with a faint undercurrent of cat piss.
"Boy," she said imperiously, "You're late."
Foxglove kept his face impassive, but his hackles rose at the "boy." He had been a runt, slow to develop while his fellow street urchin cutpurses matured into burglars, thugs and killers, but now he was as skilled a thief as any in the guild, maybe more than most, he thought.
"Sorry, Mother," he smiled sweetly. "Town watch came by early. I had to wait them out." He tossed a packet wrapped securely in waxed cloth on her desk. The tabby she was petting meowed peevishly and jumped to the floor. Cat Mother took a tiny knife, razor sharp, and sliced open the top of the packet carefully, dipping an elegant fingernail into it and bringing it up to a nostril.
"Yes. As good as I was told. Pure. Well done." She opened a drawer and the packet vanished into it. She drew out a small bag of coin and tossed it to him. He caught it deftly, and it seemed to disappear into thin air.
"You've been practicing, I see." Foxglove nodded. "Most people wouldn't have seen it go up your left sleeve."
"Your gaze is inescapable as always, Mother."
"Never forget it." She gave him a hard look, but then smiled. Her slender, handsome face had a kindly cast at first glance, shrewd but grandmotherly. Only if you paid close attention would you see the merciless coldness of her eyes. "I found you in the garbage, boy, I can always toss you back if you wrong me. But you wouldn't do that, now would you?" She gave a warm smile that chilled him to the bone.
What the fuck did she know?
------
Tokk was a big man, over six feet tall and seemingly made of gristle and irregular steel bands. His swarthy features, snoutish nose and upsettingly large teeth bespoke a mix of something human and something rather more sinister. He casually flipped an evil looking dagger end over end, not looking at it, as he grinned down at the cutpurse he had backed against the alley wall.
"Mother says you ain't bringin' in enough monnnney," he drawled. "What's wrong, little friend? Are ya sick?"
The teenaged pickpocket tried to burrow into the wall with his shoulder blades.
"I asked you a quessssstion, boy."
"No. No, not sick." he stammered.
"Mmm. Good. Gooood." Tokk smiled warmly. That was the apparent intention, anyway. The actual result of the expression was something that made the boy want to cover his eyes and scream. "I'd hate to think you were ill." Something seemed to come to him, and he looked thoughtful. "You wouldn't...no, of course not. You wouldn't be...skimming Mother's take?"
"Oh gods. No. Never. I'd never."
"You have no idea how relieved I am to hear that. I've always had the highest opinion of you, umm..."
A voice called down the alley, half weary, half amused, "Tokk!"
Tokk kept his gaze on the squirming boy. "What was your name again?"
A dark skinned slender shark of an elf appeared in the gash of moonlight cutting through the space between buildings. "Stop playing with your food, Tokk, we have somewhere to be."
Tokk sighed dramatically. "Never time for any fun." With a near-imperceptible flick of the wrist, the dagger flew abruptly into the cutpurse's eye. The boy had just enough time to gasp. "He was lying, of course," he said to the elf. "Never steal from Mother."
"Of course." The dark elf spared the body a glance as it slid down the wall and Tokk retrieved his blade. "Speaking of which..."
"Yessss, Xandor?" Tokk wiped the dagger on the cutpurse's clothes. "Is it Foxglove? Please tell me it's Foxglove."
Xandor chuckled indulgently. "It is."
"Finally." Tokk grinned like a child presented a long awaited new toy. "I am going to drink that little shit's blood. Let's go."
-----
The Laughing Pig was busy when Foxglove sidled through the loose hanging front door. It was always an effort to close and lock it, so the tavern's owner, Epotepp, just stayed open most of the time, even in the sparsely attended daylight hours. According to legend, the door had been broken in a bar brawl that had included first a hobgoblin, then as time passed, a goliath, then a troll, and most recently a hill giant. The offending party seemed to get a little bit bigger every time Epotepp told the story.
Foxglove slid into the back booth and whispered into Raven's delicately pointed ear. "Is this a good idea, meeting here?"
She leaned in to him and whispered, "Who would have the nerve to spend time at the tavern right next door to where they had perpetrated such an audacious crime? No one, of course." She took his pale, long fingered hand in both her dusky, elegant ones and squeezed, her breath hot at his neck.
"You're too reckless, little bird," he hissed. "That old fool Lacoul may not suspect, but Mother knows something. I can feel it."
Raven raised an eyebrow. "Did she say something?"
Foxglove glanced around the room nervously. "Not exactly. At least nothing specific. But I've known her a long time, and I know when she's angry. She's angry about something."
"Maybe it's nothing to do with you. She knew about the opium, and you gave her that. But she said nothing about any allnight powder, right? And that's worth enough to get us out of this garbage city."
"Right, right. I just can't shake the feeling that she knows something."
"You worry too much." She danced the tip of her tongue around his ear, which was also slightly pointed. "Have a drink, my love." She released one of her hands and lifted her mug to his lips.
He grumbled, but took a sip. "It's good."
"Only the best for the best thieves in the city."
-----
(Five years earlier)
"C'mere, runt!" bellowed Tokk.
Slightly younger than his quarry, he already towered over him by more than a foot. The smaller boy tried to run, but Tokk's long arm reached out and clotheslined him, sending Foxglove down to the Guild floor in a puff of cat hair. "Nice try."
He put a foot on the boy's chest and peered down at him. "Aw, just a baby." he said. "No hair, no muscles, no dick."
"Leave me alone, you tower of shit!" screeched Foxglove.
"Foul words for such a tiny boy," sniggered Tokk, holding the squirming boy down with ease. "Will you ever sprout hair,I wonder? Or will you just be a baby forever? Don't bother calling for help. No one is going to save you. Not even Mother. She doesn't want us to be soft, you see."
He lifted his foot, and Foxglove tried to scurry away, but Tokk was too fast, grabbing the little thief by his collar and dragging him out the front door of the Guild into the street as he struggled helplessly.
The Lower Harbor District had once been home to some of the city's wealthiest, and boasted an advanced sewer system. However, when the Lower (as most denizens called it) fell on hard times, the maintenance of the labyrinthine sewers fell by the wayside quickly. The tunnels were no longer cleaned, and many of the access points lay open as a hazard to those walking the streets. One such hole gaped in the road in front of the Guild, and Tokk dragged Foxgove toward it with grim purpose.
Unceremoniously, the boy was dumped into the foul-smelling tunnel with a pitious shriek. Tokk laughed. "Bye, bye, now. Hope you find your way out." He slammed a previously hidden lid down on the hatch. "If something doesn't eat you first."
Foxglove, stunned by the long drop, lay panting on his back in a shallow stream of putrid sewage.
"Now what?" he muttered.
It built slowly, first a murmur, then a sort of low moaning, then a basso profundo sort of vibration, that made his guts tremble. His stomach lurched and his vision blurred as an acidic panic started to burn through his body.
Something was coming.
----
Foxglove writhed helplessly in the waste water, retching painfully. The small amount of food in his stomach gone almost immediately, he found himself unable to stop vomiting, gasping and weeping as dry heaves shook his body, and the low groaning chorus grew closer and louder. He tried to get up, but as he pushed himself up to his knees, the world lurched violently, and he fell forward on his face, foul water entering his mouth and nose.
Something grabbed him around his waist.
He tried to scream, but only succeeded in swallowing more sewage. Some weirdly quiet part of his brain thought, well, at least that's something to throw up...
And then he was being dragged out of the water. Huh, so this is how I die?
He fell on his back onto something solid as whatever it was released him. His blurred vision saw a shape above him, and he tried to swing at it.
"Put your hands down, idiot, I'm trying to help you!"
What?
Suddenly, something soft shoved its way into both his ears. The horrible moaning all but vanished.
The vomiting stopped, his eyes began to focus. A ragged looking girl with large eyes and pointed ears appeared in his vision, skinny, all arms and legs. Better? she mouthed. Can you get up?
Foxglove sat up abruptly. He nodded, eyes wide with fear.
Then run, stupid!
She grabbed his hand and pulled him up. They ran.
-----
While Raven, her laughter ringing out across the room, drunkenly made the rounds with friends and strangers in the Laughing Pig, Foxglove stared into his wine and went over the heist again and again in his head.
So we climbed up to the third floor of Lacoul's shop, where the office and storage was. Had that brief slip, but didn't make much in the way of noise.
Didn't see any guards, didn't trip any traps. No torches or lanterns, just went by natural night vision, a gift from forgotten fey parentage on his part, and from Raven's full sylvan blood.
He rewound the scene again in his mind, concentrating on details, trying to push past the parts he already knew. What was his memory missing?
Wait.
When they had popped the little access door on the roof (it was remarkably easy, it had merely required a crowbar...not even reinforced with steel. Lacoul likely wouldn't make that mistake again in the future), he had half seen a shadow move out of the corner of an eye.
Looked around, though, nothing.
Then they had moved like ghosts into the office, and Raven had picked the lock on the desk while he watched for any problems. Nobody came, no cry of alarm. If one of Mother's thugs had followed them, surely he would have heard or seen them. The most stealthy of that bunch may as well be wearing plate armor made of pots and pans to either his or Raven's senses.
But that shadow still nagged at him.
None of Mother's thugs, no way...
But what about one of her cats?
Oh, shit.
Foxglove bolted to his feet, wobbling a touch from the potent top shelf wine they had been drinking.
He moved quickly across the floor, weaving through the crowd to Raven's side. She was whispering something salacious into the ear of a plainly captivated dancer, who was all curves, with a light frosting of nearly nonexistent silken clothing. He grabbed Raven's arm.
"We have to go."
"Foxglove darling, meet Melissandre," she grinned, "She's my new girlfriend, I'm afraid I'm done with you now." The dancer laughed, a trifle nervously. "Oh, fine, you can share me." She put one arm around Foxglove while still hanging on to the dancer. She leaned in to his ear. "Can we take her home? I like her. I think you'll like her."
"Normally I'd be keen, of course, but we really must go. Right now." He dragged Raven to her feet.
She pouted. "So. Serious. What is it, my love?" Her eyes, soft with wine and lust, stared up at him...and then flickered behind him. "NO!" And she shoved him, hard.
Foxglove found himself on the tavern's filthy, sticky floor, looking up at Raven, who had suddenly sprouted the hilt of an ugly looking dagger just below her collarbone. Melissandre screamed and tried to scramble away, as Raven slowly collapsed on her.
"I'll take that," hissed Xandor, the dark elven assassin, shoving the weeping, terrified dancer out of the way, and letting Raven fall into his grasp. "Naughty girl, that dagger wasn't for you." He met Foxglove's eyes with cool detachment. "This one was."
And with a single, fluid move, he sliced her throat open and blood gushed from it like a tiny crimson waterfall.
NO! RAVEN, NO!
Foxglove struggled to his feet, and grabbed for his own blade. He pulled it out but was jostled by the crowd around him, all running from the deadly assault happening in the crowded tavern. A hard impact to the back of his head rattled his teeth and his vision rolled wildly around. The dagger left his nerveless fingers and sailed harmlessly off into space.
He whirled, and backed up diagonally, trying to keep track of Xandor's position in his periphery. He saw Raven slump lifeless to the ground and the killer stalk slowly towards him through the fleeing crowd.
Tokk stood before him, grinning crookedly down at the much shorter man, flipping another dagger in his hand, a match for the one in Raven's chest. "I knew thissss day would come, runt. You were always too smart for your own good. Now your bitch is dead, and you're gonnnnna die too."
Tokk approaching from one side, Xandor coming up on my flank. One dagger down. He gritted his teeth and shook his head, trying to clear his vision form the blow to the head and the tears that he was trying desperately to hold back. Then a pop of each wrist and deadly knives appeared in each hand as if by magic. The thief hurled both with all his might, one at each assailant. The dagger thrown at Xandor flew like a hawk at a mouse and sunk with extraordinary force into the dark elf's eye. Dead almost instantly, he went down like a felled tree.
The dagger thrown at Tokk picked up some unfortunate spin, and hit him in the face, but with the hilt, not the blade. The half-orc thug cursed and clutched at his broken snout-like nose.
Run, stupid!
A sob wrenching itself from deep in his chest, he ran.
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