Tibs ran out of breath. Even running as fast as he could he hadn’t caught up to other runners, passing only those not in a hurry. Slowing to a walk, following the path of now trampled grass, he could take a better look at the tents being put up. They were large, hastily put up, and far from the stone platform where he’d arrived.
A series of signs caught his attention, a sword, a bow, a hand with sparks around it, and a hand reaching into a pouch. Each had an arrow indicating further along the trampled path that wound between the platform and the tents. He peered into one tent in passing, rows and rows of cots; in another, the first thing he caught was the scent of food, then noticed the tables and the cooks at the back. His stomach growled, but he didn’t enter. He didn’t want to risk another of the adventurer guarding them finding him where he had no business being.
He passed tents with displays setup and slowed, looking at what they showed. Armor, weapons, ropes, bandages. Adventuring equipment, Tibs realized. He looked around for anyone watching him. It wasn’t like anyone would miss any of it, was it?
“You?” a woman in armor called to him. Their eyes met. “What are you doing?” she wore armor like the ice adventurer and a sword at her belt. Her eyes were a deep green, and she didn’t look happy.
Tibs forgot about the bandages as she took a step in his direction and he ran. He only stopped on the other side of the tents encampment, with more symbols drawn on planks and hurriedly looked around for the guard. He’d expected her to be right behind him, but he only saw more of the people like him going to the left and right of the signs.
They were the same sword, bow, hand with sparkles, and hand with fingers into a pouch. This time the arrows for the sword and bow pointed to his left, while the one with the sparks and pouch pointed to his right.
“If you don’t know where to go,” the woman said, and Tibs nearly ran away in fright as her hand landed on his shoulder. “Go with the fighters.” Her green eyes looked him over. “How old are you?”
Tibs shrugged, trying to pull away.
“Are you sure you’re with this bunch and you aren’t one of the worker’s kid?”
Tibs pulled harder, but she didn’t even seem to notice his effort. She let go, and he staggered. He glared at her and she chuckled.
“Fighters are that way.” She indicated to the left.
“I’m going that way.” He pointed to the right.
“Suit yourself. Watch where you put those fingers, kid. It would be a shame for you to lose them so early in your life.” She turned and walked away.
He walked by a man in red and gold robes who eyed him suspiciously, standing next to the sign with the hand and sparkles. A woman only a little older than Tibs, he thought, stepped to him and he had her hold a crystal, before nodding and directing her to the groups beyond. The man leveled his suspicious gaze back on Tibs as he tried to figure out what they were doing, and when sparks appeared on the tip of the man’s fingers, Tibs moved on.
The man standing next to the sign with the hand and the pouch was a few years older than Tibs, and a thief, he had no doubt of it. The way those stone gray eyes looked at anyone walking by, the too-casual way his hands were folded together. He was successful, by the quality of his clothing, but Tibs was sure he’d still pick his pockets if there was anything in them.
“Move on, kid, go back to your parents,” he said, sounding bored.
“I’m one of them,” Tibs replied defiantly, indicating the people beyond that man. Where did he get off calling him a kid? Couldn’t he tell he was a thief too? Maybe he should dip his fingers in those pockets and keep whatever he pulled out to show him.
“Really?” the man said with a snort. “Go ahead, pick my pocket.”
He watched the man’s face and only saw mocking disbelief. Tibs looked around for guards, considering how he’d do it.
“Don’t worry about them.”
Tibs looked the man over. “No.” He tried to pass him again.
The man stepped before him. “You’re not going in unless you do it.”
“Get out of my way,” Tibs demanded.
“Not happening unless you pick my pocket.”
Tibs shoved the man, who barely took a step back. “I can’t do that when you know I’m going to do it!” He shoved him again, harder, his fingers slipping into the jacket’s pocket in the process. The man staggered out of the way and Tibs stepped past him, something hard and with angles in his hand. Not a coin.
The hand on his shoulder stopped him before he reached the group; some of the men and women at the back turned to watch the exchange. The man turned Tibs and he prepared himself for the blow.
When it didn’t come he opened an eye. The man’s gray eyes were leveled on him, amusement in them. “That was actually pretty good, considering how young you are. The shoving was a clever distraction under the circumstance. Now open your hand and show me what you took.”
Tibs considered proclaiming innocence. He could always flick whatever he held away before bringing his hand forward, but the man’s eyes weren’t focused on Tibs face, they flicked around, his face, his hand, to the left and right of them. Tibs figured the man missed nothing.
He opened his hand. He held a crystal; like the one the man in the robe had handed to the woman. It was clear with a few cracks in it. Not particularly valuable, Tibs thought.
The man took it from him. “Go on and join them.”
Tibs made his way to the front. This time he wanted to see whoever did the talking. Around him, he made out thieves and beggars, as well as a few older ones Tibs was sure had been enforcers before they were caught. They should be with the fighters, not here.
“What d’you get caught on?” someone asked in a whisper.
“Breaking in a house,” was the whispered answer.
“Stealing bread,” whispered another.
“Fingers in a pocket,” another.
“Me too.”
“Coming out of a house with rotten pears in my hands.”
Tibs felt eyes on him and glanced to see a woman in rags looking at him expectantly. She wanted him to add to the conversation.
“Pockets,” he answered, not bothering to whisper and those around him nodded knowingly.
Picking pockets was the simplest way to survive the street if you were talented enough. And the fact they had both hands showed they all had been, even if, like him, they hadn’t been good enough not to be caught this one time.
A tall and regal woman stepped before them. She wore some sort of cloth armor, a heavy-looking shirt and pants, in pale green. Her hair was long and so black that it seemed to form a hole around her head and shoulders. Her eyes were strange, the color in them seemed to shift as she moved. She looked them over and people took a step back under the gaze, which seemed to amuse her.
“My name is Tirania,” she said in a soft, but strong voice. Tibs shuddered as the image of her suffocating him with a pillow came, that soft voice soothing him as she killed him. “You don’t know me, but I’m the only person in this entire…” Tibs thought she was looking for the right word, but instead she lost a fight for control as her face became a mask of disgust. “Town, you need to concern yourself with. I am the final authority regarding what happens to those of you who will survive the coming trials. I am the one you need to impress if you want to proceed further.”
She walked to one side of the large group, then the other, looking them over, frowning and nodding. She paused slightly as she looked Tibs over, who was a good head and a half smaller than anyone around him, before continuing.
“You called yourselves light-fingers, pick-pockets, lock-breakers, roof-artists, thieves,” she said with disgust, “and many other fancy names that made you feel better about being the waste of space you had been.” She stopped and fixed her gaze on a woman in the process of opening her mouth. “If you’d been worthy of a better title,” Tirania said, “you wouldn’t be here; you wouldn’t have been caught.”
She returned to the center of their clearing, placed her hands behind her back, and looked them over. “You are among the fortunate who get a chance to speed through the hardship most of our kind need to go through to earn the noble title of Rogue.” She paused, seemed to expect something, then continued. “Others will do their best to convince you the Rogue is the least important member of any group. That all you’re interested in is getting a larger proportion of the rewards. That greed is all that drives you. Don’t listen to them.” She waved dismissively. “Without you, no group can survive a dungeon, not even the simplest, because it is you who will be able to tell if an empty room is filled with traps. If the attacking monsters are there to push you into a tricked corridor. And yes, if there is a hidden cubbyhole where more treasure hides. If your party doesn’t give you the respect you deserve, feel free not to tell them about that treasure. They won’t miss what they don’t know is there.”
Tibs chuckled with the others. He didn’t think of himself as a bad person. He picked pockets and broke into houses to survive and for a place to sleep, not to hurt anyone, but he had no problem returning mistreatment of one form with another.
“On any day you are not going into the dungeon, you will be spending the mornings with a trainer. They will evaluate your skills, then teach you what you need to know to round them up and increase your chances of survival.”
“How often are we going in the dungeon?” someone asked, sounding nervous.
“That will depend,” she answered, not looking at that person. “The dungeon is new, so for the first few days, we’ll send one team per hour. As it grows, clearing it will take longer. Then there’s the number of people here. Teams will be five people strong, and as potential Rogues, one of you will be called on to be on each of those teams, you will be rotated, but as more and more people don’t exit; those of you still alive will be called on more often. Based on previous dungeons, half of everyone here will be dead within a month. We will not bring anyone new until after the dungeon graduates, so take full advantage of this opportunity.”
“Is it true a new dungeon can make someone rich?” someone asked.
“How many coppers do you need before you consider yourself rich?” she replied.
Tibs tried to find who asked the question, but while he couldn’t, he saw others considering what she asked.
“The answer is,” she continued, “that if you think coppers are enough for you to be happy with, you aren’t right for this class. If copper’s enough, go join the fighters right now.” She waited. Tibs heard shifting, but he didn’t think anyone left. “The pickings are always horrible the first few days, so hope you’re in a later team. Dungeons need some experience to grow enough to provide anything worth mentioning, but even the first team should be able to find a few coppers. But don’t get attached; coins go to the guild.
Outrage exploded among the crowd and Tibs shared it. They were going to do the work, they deserved the coins, but her expression kept him quiet. She was amused. “Do you prefer being back in your cell, waiting to lose a hand? This isn’t employment,” she said harshly. “It’s an alternative to you dying on the street.”
“What if I don’t want to give what I find?” a voice asked, sounding far. The distance provided an illusion of safety, Tibs figured. “What are you going to do about it?”
“Me?” She shrugged. “Nothing. It’s the adventurers who will be searching you when you exit you need to worry about. Feel free to try to hide a coin from them if you want, it’s good to weed out the idiots early on, and they’ll be happy for a reason to work out their anger on you.”
She waited. “Good. Now, I’m not here to indulge you, so don’t bother asking more questions. I’m here to tell you what will happen, nothing else. You know about the dungeon and your mornings. During the afternoons you will assist with the building of the town. If you cause problems, I will not hear about them. The guards will deal with you directly and permanently. Your continued survival depends on more than walking out of the dungeon. This is your town now. You will only survive if it does. So don’t get in the way of that.” She turned and walked away.
Tibs waited until the crowd thinned enough before moving and aimed to leave. “Kid,” the man by the sign called to him and indicated a group to the left. “You’re going there.”
Tibs joined the group with an older man in worn leather looking at them in disappointment. He led them away from the others, then distributed locks and other contraptions, demanding they open them or take them apart. Tibs spent the rest of the day working on locks and traps. All under the annoyed attention of the older thief.
When they were finally released, the sun was low over the distant tree line. Tibs wanted to head to the lake he could just make out, but his instructor stopped him. They weren’t allowed outside the town, so he turned and headed to the mess hall, where the food was no better than Tibs expected.
Then he carried himself to one of the large tents with cots and fell asleep as soon as he laid down.
* * * * *
A commotion woke him in the night. Screams, fighting, then quiet again. In the following silence, as Tibs tried to fall back asleep, he overheard a whispered conversation. A group had tried to run, had been caught and killed.
He fell asleep considering the implication of there already being fewer people.
Tibs ran out of breath. Even running as fast as he could he hadn’t caught up to other runners, passing only those not in a hurry. Slowing to a walk, following the path of now trampled grass, he could take a better look at the tents being put up. They were large, hastily put up, and far from the stone platform where he’d arrived.
A series of signs caught his attention, a sword, a bow, a hand with sparks around it, and a hand reaching into a pouch. Each had an arrow indicating further along the trampled path that wound between the platform and the tents. He peered into one tent in passing, rows and rows of cots; in another, the first thing he caught was the scent of food, then noticed the tables and the cooks at the back. His stomach growled, but he didn’t enter. He didn’t want to risk another of the adventurer guarding them finding him where he had no business being.
He passed tents with displays setup and slowed, looking at what they showed. Armor, weapons, ropes, bandages. Adventuring equipment, Tibs realized. He looked around for anyone watching him. It wasn’t like anyone would miss any of it, was it?
“You?” a woman in armor called to him. Their eyes met. “What are you doing?” she wore armor like the ice adventurer and a sword at her belt. Her eyes were a deep green, and she didn’t look happy.
Tibs forgot about the bandages as she took a step in his direction and he ran. He only stopped on the other side of the tents encampment, with more symbols drawn on planks and hurriedly looked around for the guard. He’d expected her to be right behind him, but he only saw more of the people like him going to the left and right of the signs.
They were the same sword, bow, hand with sparkles, and hand with fingers into a pouch. This time the arrows for the sword and bow pointed to his left, while the one with the sparks and pouch pointed to his right.
“If you don’t know where to go,” the woman said, and Tibs nearly ran away in fright as her hand landed on his shoulder. “Go with the fighters.” Her green eyes looked him over. “How old are you?”
Tibs shrugged, trying to pull away.
“Are you sure you’re with this bunch and you aren’t one of the worker’s kid?”
Tibs pulled harder, but she didn’t even seem to notice his effort. She let go, and he staggered. He glared at her and she chuckled.
“Fighters are that way.” She indicated to the left.
“I’m going that way.” He pointed to the right.
“Suit yourself. Watch where you put those fingers, kid. It would be a shame for you to lose them so early in your life.” She turned and walked away.
He walked by a man in red and gold robes who eyed him suspiciously, standing next to the sign with the hand and sparkles. A woman only a little older than Tibs, he thought, stepped to him and he had her hold a crystal, before nodding and directing her to the groups beyond. The man leveled his suspicious gaze back on Tibs as he tried to figure out what they were doing, and when sparks appeared on the tip of the man’s fingers, Tibs moved on.
The man standing next to the sign with the hand and the pouch was a few years older than Tibs, and a thief, he had no doubt of it. The way those stone gray eyes looked at anyone walking by, the too-casual way his hands were folded together. He was successful, by the quality of his clothing, but Tibs was sure he’d still pick his pockets if there was anything in them.
“Move on, kid, go back to your parents,” he said, sounding bored.
“I’m one of them,” Tibs replied defiantly, indicating the people beyond that man. Where did he get off calling him a kid? Couldn’t he tell he was a thief too? Maybe he should dip his fingers in those pockets and keep whatever he pulled out to show him.
“Really?” the man said with a snort. “Go ahead, pick my pocket.”
He watched the man’s face and only saw mocking disbelief. Tibs looked around for guards, considering how he’d do it.
“Don’t worry about them.”
Tibs looked the man over. “No.” He tried to pass him again.
The man stepped before him. “You’re not going in unless you do it.”
“Get out of my way,” Tibs demanded.
“Not happening unless you pick my pocket.”
Tibs shoved the man, who barely took a step back. “I can’t do that when you know I’m going to do it!” He shoved him again, harder, his fingers slipping into the jacket’s pocket in the process. The man staggered out of the way and Tibs stepped past him, something hard and with angles in his hand. Not a coin.
The hand on his shoulder stopped him before he reached the group; some of the men and women at the back turned to watch the exchange. The man turned Tibs and he prepared himself for the blow.
When it didn’t come he opened an eye. The man’s gray eyes were leveled on him, amusement in them. “That was actually pretty good, considering how young you are. The shoving was a clever distraction under the circumstance. Now open your hand and show me what you took.”
Tibs considered proclaiming innocence. He could always flick whatever he held away before bringing his hand forward, but the man’s eyes weren’t focused on Tibs face, they flicked around, his face, his hand, to the left and right of them. Tibs figured the man missed nothing.
He opened his hand. He held a crystal; like the one the man in the robe had handed to the woman. It was clear with a few cracks in it. Not particularly valuable, Tibs thought.
The man took it from him. “Go on and join them.”
Tibs made his way to the front. This time he wanted to see whoever did the talking. Around him, he made out thieves and beggars, as well as a few older ones Tibs was sure had been enforcers before they were caught. They should be with the fighters, not here.
“What d’you get caught on?” someone asked in a whisper.
“Breaking in a house,” was the whispered answer.
“Stealing bread,” whispered another.
“Fingers in a pocket,” another.
“Me too.”
“Coming out of a house with rotten pears in my hands.”
Tibs felt eyes on him and glanced to see a woman in rags looking at him expectantly. She wanted him to add to the conversation.
“Pockets,” he answered, not bothering to whisper and those around him nodded knowingly.
Picking pockets was the simplest way to survive the street if you were talented enough. And the fact they had both hands showed they all had been, even if, like him, they hadn’t been good enough not to be caught this one time.
A tall and regal woman stepped before them. She wore some sort of cloth armor, a heavy-looking shirt and pants, in pale green. Her hair was long and so black that it seemed to form a hole around her head and shoulders. Her eyes were strange, the color in them seemed to shift as she moved. She looked them over and people took a step back under the gaze, which seemed to amuse her.
“My name is Tirania,” she said in a soft, but strong voice. Tibs shuddered as the image of her suffocating him with a pillow came, that soft voice soothing him as she killed him. “You don’t know me, but I’m the only person in this entire…” Tibs thought she was looking for the right word, but instead she lost a fight for control as her face became a mask of disgust. “Town, you need to concern yourself with. I am the final authority regarding what happens to those of you who will survive the coming trials. I am the one you need to impress if you want to proceed further.”
She walked to one side of the large group, then the other, looking them over, frowning and nodding. She paused slightly as she looked Tibs over, who was a good head and a half smaller than anyone around him, before continuing.
“You called yourselves light-fingers, pick-pockets, lock-breakers, roof-artists, thieves,” she said with disgust, “and many other fancy names that made you feel better about being the waste of space you had been.” She stopped and fixed her gaze on a woman in the process of opening her mouth. “If you’d been worthy of a better title,” Tirania said, “you wouldn’t be here; you wouldn’t have been caught.”
She returned to the center of their clearing, placed her hands behind her back, and looked them over. “You are among the fortunate who get a chance to speed through the hardship most of our kind need to go through to earn the noble title of Rogue.” She paused, seemed to expect something, then continued. “Others will do their best to convince you the Rogue is the least important member of any group. That all you’re interested in is getting a larger proportion of the rewards. That greed is all that drives you. Don’t listen to them.” She waved dismissively. “Without you, no group can survive a dungeon, not even the simplest, because it is you who will be able to tell if an empty room is filled with traps. If the attacking monsters are there to push you into a tricked corridor. And yes, if there is a hidden cubbyhole where more treasure hides. If your party doesn’t give you the respect you deserve, feel free not to tell them about that treasure. They won’t miss what they don’t know is there.”
Tibs chuckled with the others. He didn’t think of himself as a bad person. He picked pockets and broke into houses to survive and for a place to sleep, not to hurt anyone, but he had no problem returning mistreatment of one form with another.
“On any day you are not going into the dungeon, you will be spending the mornings with a trainer. They will evaluate your skills, then teach you what you need to know to round them up and increase your chances of survival.”
“How often are we going in the dungeon?” someone asked, sounding nervous.
“That will depend,” she answered, not looking at that person. “The dungeon is new, so for the first few days, we’ll send one team per hour. As it grows, clearing it will take longer. Then there’s the number of people here. Teams will be five people strong, and as potential Rogues, one of you will be called on to be on each of those teams, you will be rotated, but as more and more people don’t exit; those of you still alive will be called on more often. Based on previous dungeons, half of everyone here will be dead within a month. We will not bring anyone new until after the dungeon graduates, so take full advantage of this opportunity.”
“Is it true a new dungeon can make someone rich?” someone asked.
“How many coppers do you need before you consider yourself rich?” she replied.
Tibs tried to find who asked the question, but while he couldn’t, he saw others considering what she asked.
“The answer is,” she continued, “that if you think coppers are enough for you to be happy with, you aren’t right for this class. If copper’s enough, go join the fighters right now.” She waited. Tibs heard shifting, but he didn’t think anyone left. “The pickings are always horrible the first few days, so hope you’re in a later team. Dungeons need some experience to grow enough to provide anything worth mentioning, but even the first team should be able to find a few coppers. But don’t get attached; coins go to the guild.
Outrage exploded among the crowd and Tibs shared it. They were going to do the work, they deserved the coins, but her expression kept him quiet. She was amused. “Do you prefer being back in your cell, waiting to lose a hand? This isn’t employment,” she said harshly. “It’s an alternative to you dying on the street.”
“What if I don’t want to give what I find?” a voice asked, sounding far. The distance provided an illusion of safety, Tibs figured. “What are you going to do about it?”
“Me?” She shrugged. “Nothing. It’s the adventurers who will be searching you when you exit you need to worry about. Feel free to try to hide a coin from them if you want, it’s good to weed out the idiots early on, and they’ll be happy for a reason to work out their anger on you.”
She waited. “Good. Now, I’m not here to indulge you, so don’t bother asking more questions. I’m here to tell you what will happen, nothing else. You know about the dungeon and your mornings. During the afternoons you will assist with the building of the town. If you cause problems, I will not hear about them. The guards will deal with you directly and permanently. Your continued survival depends on more than walking out of the dungeon. This is your town now. You will only survive if it does. So don’t get in the way of that.” She turned and walked away.
Tibs waited until the crowd thinned enough before moving and aimed to leave. “Kid,” the man by the sign called to him and indicated a group to the left. “You’re going there.”
Tibs joined the group with an older man in worn leather looking at them in disappointment. He led them away from the others, then distributed locks and other contraptions, demanding they open them or take them apart. Tibs spent the rest of the day working on locks and traps. All under the annoyed attention of the older thief.
When they were finally released, the sun was low over the distant tree line. Tibs wanted to head to the lake he could just make out, but his instructor stopped him. They weren’t allowed outside the town, so he turned and headed to the mess hall, where the food was no better than Tibs expected.
Then he carried himself to one of the large tents with cots and fell asleep as soon as he laid down.
* * * * *
A commotion woke him in the night. Screams, fighting, then quiet again. In the following silence, as Tibs tried to fall back asleep, he overheard a whispered conversation. A group had tried to run, had been caught and killed.
He fell asleep considering the implication of there already being fewer people.
