Basysus, 12, 1278: City of Osidore, Belari Trade Alliance. River Junction Inn. Where I had something like a plan.

It really was a great plan.

“Wrong room!” I exclaimed and backed away, waving my hands in front of me. “Really. Didn’t see a thing!”

I slammed the dark wooden door shut, then tore off at a run through the hallway. The stairs out were at the opposite end, which seemed farther away the harder I ran. Panic was a jerk like that.

Most of the rooms in the River Junction Inn were rented out for the next few days. It was time for the late winter Riverfest celebration in Osidore with food carts, jugglers, and a river parade. It also meant there wasn’t anyone to hear me run like a madwoman through the second floor.

Well, almost no one.

A door ahead and to my right suddenly swung open, and a slender elven man stepped out. He was dressed in plain, simple workman clothes of earthy brown and tan colors. It made him boring and easily overlooked. He appeared irritated to his toes at the noise.

I skidded to a halt, glaring into his pale face and punchable hawk-like nose. That irritated, but puzzled look in his beady brown eyes widened in shock when he saw me.

It was Garrik “the Rat” Perlana. Master ruin poacher, second story thief, and the absolute donkey’s ass who stole what I was hired to recover.

Then I noticed the room numbers by his door, which didn’t match the dust stains that outlined them. I bit down on all my favorite curse words. No wonder my plan hadn’t worked.

Garrik had swapped the room numbers.

“You!” I snarled.

“Me?” Garrik squeaked back with fake shock.

“Where’s the Timebender Circle?” I demanded with a scowl.

“Turning me a profit,” Garrik sneered half-cheerfully. Daggers appeared in his hands as if by magic. I reached for my bullwhip.

A brutal crack of wood interrupted our riveting conversation. Half a hallway away, the door I left behind exploded off its hinges.

Three seething, rust-brown furred minotaurs exploded into the hallway with blood in their eye. A typhoon of wood dust and splinters rained bits of door over their tunics, trousers, and daggers. Time turned into cold molasses for just a moment.

How was I to know the Zildoreth brothers were going to rob a merchant today?

Garrik and I exchanged a look, before I slowly turned toward the angry wall of larcenous, furry muscle. I drew a slow breath.

“Just hold on,” I said cautiously while I held up my hands. Then I locked eyes with their leader. He was the oldest, and usually in charge. “Atha? I didn’t see a thing.”

“Hyu saw enough,” he rumbled back at me, voice like a perturbed avalanche.

Atha glanced over his shoulder while he pointed back at the room.

“Gurzi! Hyu move the chest. We split merchant’s money up later.” Atha fixed his glare back at me. “I gotz to take care of a little problem.”

Atha’s brother gave me a hearty grin and wave, then vanished into the room.

“Oh, damn,” I muttered.

They charged.

It was a solid wall of muscle, horn, and fur. The few brass hooded lanterns along the hallway shuddered on their iron wall hooks. Wooden floor planks complained about the stampede. I didn’t blame them.

Behind me, Garrik shrieked like a siren with a pinched tail and tried to run back into his room. I darted after him with a growl.

“Oh, no you don’t!” I snarled at him.

I beat him to the door, then gave him a real reason to yelp when I kicked him in the shin. Garrik dropped like a sack of screaming potatoes. I shoved him into the hallway, locking the door behind me. Then I turned around, eager to ransack the room for the relic. As it turned out, I didn’t have to look that far.

“Just great,” I muttered, feeling the day get longer.

The Timebender Circle was a brassy-looking pocket watch with a series of engraved, interlocking circles on the outside. It was sitting on a lone, brown wooden table pushed up against a window on the other side of the room. On either side sat Garrik’s buyers.

Said buyers were three pasty-pale, thin humans. They were pale enough, I figured they weren’t really on speaking terms with sunshine. All three wore dark charcoal vests, trousers, and blood-red shirts. They also glared hot hate at me with red-rimmed eyes.

Fateweaver cultists. Always fun at festivals, provided there was a lot of death and drowning. Neither of which was my idea of a good time.

I gave them my brightest grin, then held my arms out wide.

“Yoi T’kalo,” I said, using the traditional Ishnanori greeting. “No need to get up.”

My smile went stale when they pulled alarming long knives from their belts.

“Really. Don’t get up,” I sighed with a small groan.

They got up.

Also? They tried to stab me. A lot.

Now, I’m a little short. This is a known fact, like saying there are clouds in the sky. At best, I’m almost 5 nindel 4 sizu tall, or 1.6 meters by Ancient Order measurement. Not only that, I’m wiry. Odds are often against me in a fight.

Now against three guys who didn’t know how to work together in a small room? Those odds felt pretty good.

I darted one way, then the other, while the cultists tried to carve me like a swamp turkey. Finally, I side-stepped a stab to the chest and reached the table. I snatched up the relic with a grin, then turned for the door.

My stabby dance partners were in the way.

With a sigh and a shrug, I adjusted my goggles, then scrambled onto the table. The cultists ran at me. I kicked open the window. Knives stabbed wood as I dove for the outside.

Easy!

Sadly, I forgot I was on the second floor of the inn.

Not so easy!

Fortunately, the roof of the next floor down wasn’t that far away. I dropped and rolled onto the wide, slanted roof, then dashed over the red tiles for the far edge. Partway there, I glanced back with a grin.

It evaporated into another sigh.

“Of course, death cultists are somehow scary acrobats,” I groaned. “Of course, they’re chasing me out the window.”

Even better, back in the room, I saw Atha and his brother Oldac rush for the window like they might join in.

This was a red clay tile roof. One minotaur it could handle. Two? The inn gets a new sun-window.

I ran closer to the roof’s edge to look for a certain blue-skinned, brown-haired tiefling healer I knew way too well.

“Ki!” I bellowed.

Kiyosi Valchar jerked upright, and almost fell out of the hay wagon he sat in. He looked at me, then at the side door of the inn next to the wagon in a panic.

“What happened to the plan?” He shouted with a wild gesture at the door. It had been my original escape route.

“Needed a new one!” I shouted back while I ran. “Old plan had a wrinkle!”

Ki ran a hand through his short, reddish-brown hair, then slapped the wagon break loose with his tail. He snapped the wagon reins with a sharp crack. The pair of marsh caribou in front snorted eagerly, then leaped forward. People ahead of them cursed, shouted, or both while they dove aside.

I leaped onto the next roof. A dagger instantly sang past my ear. I skidded to a stop and glanced back.

“Hell and high tides, this isn’t funny,” I muttered.

It was the cultists. They were gaining on me.

The terrifying trio ran at a scary fast sprint over the clay tiles. Not much slowed them down, not even a gap between buildings. They leaped with all the delicate gazelle-like grace of death-loving acrobats with morbid fashion sense.

I ran harder.

There was a ladder ahead of me at the far end of the roof, leading to the street. It looked wonderful. I raced for it like a madwoman as another dagger bounced off a tile near my boots. I shot a glare behind me.

They were too close for comfort. With a yank, I pulled open my canvas shoulder bag to stash the Circle before I dropped it.

I didn’t see Garrik until he was right on top of me.

“I’ll take that!” he sang as he ran by and snatched the Circle out of my hand.

“No!”

I grabbed and missed, then stumbled to a stop. But so did the cultists. We stared venom at each other, then raced after the thief.

Garrik charged across the roof for the same ladder I spotted. I was hard on his boot heels, and the cultists were hard on mine. Clay tiles cracked in our wake.

Behind the chaos, I didn’t see the minotaur brothers anywhere. That really bothered me.

“Lady Deep and her Nine Misbegotten Children!” I snarled under my breath as I snatched the bullwhip off my belt. “We don’t have time for this!”

A quick stop and whip crack later, Garrik shrieked as the whip kissed his backside. Two more whip cracks behind me, made the cultists dive for the roof.

Two went flat, but the last cultist lost his balance, then careened over the side in a warbling scream. A merchant’s booth below broke his fall. That merchant’s flock of angry chickens let the man know they didn’t appreciate his unexpected visit.

I smirked while I chased after Garrik.

Ahead, Garrik’s fast, high-stepping limp was still bound for the ladder. I clenched my jaw and took a quick glance at the street below.

Ki had made good time with the wagon, despite the market crowd. Too good, really. My window of escape was as wide as an arrow slit.

“I can work with this,” I breathed, then charged right at Garrik.

There wasn’t time to stop him, trip him, or yank the relic back. Behind me, the last two cultists were back on their feet, more knives in hand. Really, just how many throwing knives did cultists carry, anyway?

I tackled Garrik as he reached the ladder, throwing us and the ladder away from the roof. We pitched headlong toward death by cobblestones below.

“You’re nuts!” he screamed.

“Quit stealing what I’m trying to steal back from you!” I retorted, then grabbed at the Timebender Circle, but missed.

Garrik threw a fist at my face, but punched the wooden ladder instead. The ladder wobbled, walking sideways. I shot a desperate glance for Ki.

He was close enough.

I leaned back and grabbed one edge of the ladder and pulled, throwing my weight behind it.

The ladder spun. Garrik screamed. We flew off the ladder.

Things got way more interesting once we crashed into the back of Ki’s hay wagon. All that hay, and Garrik, broke my fall. Though I think I bent Garrik a little in the landing. I scrambled over the hay toward him, despite my aches.

“I’ll take that!” I grinned and snatched the relic from the dazed thief.

Garrik made a weak grab to get it back, but I darted out of reach.

“I stole that fair,” he wheezed.

“I stole it back! This is going to the Archivist’s Guild and their museum where it belongs,” I snarled while I braced myself against the wagon’s wooden buckboard.

Ki chanced a quick glance back at us. I grinned like a pleased cat while I stuffed the Circle into my shoulder bag.

“Damn it, Tela! There was a plan!” Ki ranted, struggling with the reins. In front, the caribou galloped with gleeful caribou abandon down the middle of the merchant-lined street.

“What happened?” he added frantically.

“Something ugly!” I pleaded.

Suddenly, behind us, the side door to the inn slammed open. Its door lock was hurled to freedom across the dark cobblestones. Atha and Oldac Zildoreth stampeded out into the street after us.

“The Zildoreth brothers?” Ki’s cobalt complexion tuned sky blue pale.

Garrik struggled to his feet, then lunged at me. I put an end to that with a slap of wet hay across his face. He staggered back, spitting.

“Yes, them!” I exclaimed. “I had no idea they’d robbed anyone, let alone were up there counting the money.”

I braced myself as Garrik stumbled forward again. He swung a fist at me, but I ducked under his arm and to my left. Another wad of wet hay to the face sent him sideways, sputtering.

“Subtle!” Ki called back in a panic over his shoulder. “This was supposed to be subtle!”

“It was subtle…ish!” I retorted irritably.

“It really was not!” Ki replied wide-eyed.

“How far to the city gates?” I yelled, then slapped Garrik with two more handfuls of wet hay when he reached for me.

“Two minutes,” Ki called back, “if that!”

“Great!” I replied, then noticed an ugly rut ahead of us in the road and smirked.

Garrik spit out the last bits of hay, face a mottled mess of red welts, and glared from across the wagon. I wiggled my fingers at him with a smirk. He charged, madder than a wet demon hen.

I braced against the buckboard, then kicked out with both feet at the last moment. Garrik tried to jump aside, but slipped on some hay. My boot heels hit him anyway.

The kick slammed into his right hip, spinning him around like a whirlwind. Garrik stumbled back, losing his balance.

Just then, the wagon lurched as it hit the rut in the road with a loud crash. Garrik made a sound like a mugged goat, bounced off the wagon, and into Zildoreth brothers.

All three tripped over each other, then hit the cobblestones in a tangle of arms, legs, and angry horns.

“Sorry!” I yelled back as we reached the main gate. We rattled past the confused city watch for outside Osidore and safety. Dust devils sprinted after us while our wagon carried us away down the packed dirt road.

Far behind, I saw the Zildoreth brothers and Garrik disentangle themselves from the pile. Garrik raced off down an alley, chased by Oldac. On the rooftops above, the last two cultists stared poisoned daggers at me.

As for Atha, he simply raised a hand in our direction and shook his head with a smirk.