“There you are,” Ariana said as she sat next to me. It had been a few days since they’d been able to find each other to eat. Their mornings were busy with training, and Tibs spent the afternoons walking around the tents or the perimeter, marked by the spikes in the ground and the adventurer patrolling it. Every few days, it was extended as a new tent needed space. Tibs hoped that it would reach the lake and the stream he could see now that the trees around it had been cut down. He’d never touched so much water.
“I did a second dungeon run today.” She looked at her slop, then ate it unenthusiastically.
“How did it go?” Tibs was on his second bowl.
“Even after you told me about yours, I didn’t expect I’d get one. When I asked my instructor he made it sound like there was a roster and that I’d only go after everyone else had. Rogues are different, he said, because they keep dying.”
“Seems to me it’s everyone else that keeps dying,” Tibs said morosely before eating again. He hadn’t told her about how the sorcerer had tried to get him eaten by the rats. He shuddered at the memory. “I don’t think there’s a roster. They just throw people together like they did with me and your group. Maybe they ask what you are to make sure they cover all the classes, but that’s it.”
She nodded, “there’s four classes here, so it makes sense they want them evenly represented. Then it doesn’t matter who the fifth is. I was hanging among the people waiting for their turn in the clearing when one of the adventurers asked my class and put me with a group.” She smiled and leaned in, lowering her voice. “The rogue didn’t know how to tell what tiles were triggers. I had to point out the symbol to her.” Her smile fell. “We lost our sorcerer, the other archer, and fighter in the boulder room. We didn’t try to go further. I did notice something I want to verify the next time we go in.”
He waited for her to elaborate, but she made a face at her food and went back to eating
“Why do they put five people in each team is there’s only four classes?” he asked.
She looked like she’d ignore his question, continuing to eat, but then stopped. “eventually they’re going to let clerics take part. When they’re like us, they train at a different dungeon, one set up just for them.”
“Oh.” That explained it, not that he knew what a cleric was, but by her discomfort answering him, he decided not to ask and went back to eating too.
As they left the mess hall, yells of ‘thief!’ and ‘someone stole my coppers!’ sounded behind them. Ariana looked at Tibs, who shook his head. He put his hand in his pocket both to avoid the temptation as they were jostled as adventurers entered and to make sure his bundle of wrapped coppers was still there.
* * * * *
“Excuse me,” Tibs asked the adventurer who was looking over the knives spread on a display before a merchant’s tent. There was now a wooden building in the town, but it was a tavern. Tibs hadn’t been able to go inside; there were people lining out the door for the taste of a tankard of ale after weeks of whatever the mess hall served, but he had climbed the wall to sit atop the roof and had gotten an even more amazing view of the countryside. The woods were bigger than he thought, and the stream leaving the lake continued down the gentle hill until the horizon.
The man looked him over, his utterly black eyes taking him in and going back to looking the knife over. “I know you from somewhere,” he said, placing the knife back.
When the man looked in his direction again, Tibs discretely tapped his left wrist, hoping the rogue adventurer hadn’t shown that to every other thief he met.
He frowned, then smiled. “Mister Light-Fingers. I’m glad to see you’re still alive, and with both hands. Can I help you with something?”
“Do you know how to fight?”
The man turned to face Tibs and crossed his arms over his chest. “Surviving dungeon crawls is hard if you don’t know that.”
Tibs felt better now that he’d confirmed that, but he wondered where the man kept his knife. Every other adventurer, well most adventurers, carried their weapons openly. The few he’d noticed without any were fighters and he had the sense their fists were their preferred weapons.
“Can you teach me?”
The man studied Tibs, then took a knife, handing the merchant a few coins too fast for Tibs to see them. “Come with me.”
The man led Tibs through the crowd and around tents until they reached a patch of construction material, but no one around to watch over them. Tents hid them from the others. Tibs hesitated. Once in there, no one would see what happened to him, and with the sounds of the crowd, maybe no one would hear him scream either.
The rogue smile. “I’m not going to hurt you.” He motioned to the crate opposite the one he sat on. “I never enjoyed hurting people unless they do something wrong. And you don’t have enough coins for me to bother with. You should find a place to hide them, keeping them on you is bound to tempt one of the other crawlers.”
Tibs put a hand in his pocket, closing his fingers over the bundle. “I haven’t found anywhere safe.”
The rogue looked around, then nodded. “I’ll give you that. With all the people and the construction, even the ground isn’t safe. I guess what you’ve done is the best you can do at the moment.”
Tibs tightened his hand over the bundle.
“How many crawls have you been on?” the rogue asked and Tibs frowned, trying to understand what he meant. “In the dungeon, I know you’ve been in once, since that’s when we met, have you been after that?”
“One more time.”
“Did you return equipment that time too?”
Tibs shook his head.
The rogue considered something. “How do you feel about taking clothing off the dead?”
Tibs shrugged. Where did the man think Tibs had gotten what he wore? It wasn’t like any tailor would dress him, even if he’d had the coins to pay.
“Next crawl you’re on, when someone dies, if what they wear is better than what you wear, take it for yourself.” The man smiled and Tibs looked at what he wore, even he knew it was little better than rags at this point. Most of what others wore weren’t much better, but some…
“We can’t steal,” Tibs said, remembering the warning and the adventurer rushing into the mess hall. The glee in their eyes.
“The dead can’t complain. Your group-mates might, but I doubt they wear anything much better than you do, so you can offer to share. Do you know how to sew?”
Tibs nodded. “I haven’t had Mama to fix my clothes for a long time.”
“Then invest one of those coppers for a needle and offer to fix your group’s clothing. It should help them get over the outrage if they object to you taking from the dead. Don’t make a coin pouch, that just attract too much attention.”
Tibs eyed the rogue. Did he think he was an idiot? The man raised an eyebrow and Tibs kept his thought to himself. Instead he asked. “Why do you say crawl?”
“What do you mean?”
“You said dungeon crawl. You called us Crawlers. Everyone else I head says dungeon run and calls us Runners.”
The rogue sighed. “Showing my age, I guess, but never mind that.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “The advice I gave you was the only free help you get. No one here is in the habit of working for free. If I train you, what’s in it for me?”
Tibs bit his lower lip, then pulled the bundle out of his pocket and offered it to the rogue. “It’s all I have.”
“Put that away, I told you, I don’t bother with copper.”
Tibs did as told and fixed his gaze on the man’s eyes. If he didn’t want copper, he had a good idea what other kind of payment he’d want. There were very few ways for an urchin like him to pay a man like the rogue. “What do you want from me?” he asked, doing his best to keep his voice from trembling. He’d do it, he wanted to survive, he had to survive, and if offering himself to—
“Get that look off your face,” the man said, sounding disgusted. “I’m definitely not into that, and if anyone here ever suggests you pay them that way, tell me about it. The dungeon doesn’t care all that much if who it eats is dead when we throw them inside.”
“Then how am I going to pay? I don’t have more coins.”
“Look, kid.”
“My name is Tibs.”
The rogue seemed annoyed at Tibs giving him his name.
“Tibs, this isn’t the streets you came from. The dungeon might kill you, but the people out here don’t have the right to treat you like you were treated there.”
“Sure,” Tibs answered doubtfully. The first rule of the streets was that those with power used it to get what they wanted. He’d seen it happen to others, to Mama, and he would never forget it, forget them.
The rogue looked amused. “What I could use is someone who can move about town freely.”
Tibs narrowed his eyes. “You can go anywhere you want, even outside the town.”
The man tapped his left wrist. “That does more than mark us. It leaves a trail of where we’ve been. If I hurt you and you complained, or I left your dead body and it was found. It wouldn’t matter where I went. The mark would ensure they found me.” He paused. “Even us talking like this might come back to cause me trouble, but so long as we’re careful and don’t give anyone a reason to look, we’ll be okay. So that’s my price.”
“So you want me to move about town, to take and put things in places they weren’t,” he added, why else get a thief like him? “And you train me?”
“To fight, the rest of the rogue stuff I leave to your teachers; with and without a knife.”
“A sword?”
“The only times I’ve touched one of those was to pull it out of my body. Why would you want to use that?”
Tibs shrugged. “They’re bigger, so they’re better in a fight?”
The man laughed. “Don’t listen to those fighters. It’s not because it’s big that it’s better.” He stood. “Come on then, let me show you why a knife is better than a sword."
“And what if I still want to use a sword?” Tibs asked.
The man looked at him, considered something, then shrugged. “Alright, catch.” Out of nowhere the man lobbed a sword at Tibs, who stepped out of the way and it landed on the sand.
He looked at it, then the man. “Where did you get that?” He narrowed his eyes. “You said you only touched them to pull them out.”
“Doesn’t mean I throw them away.”
Tibs looked at the man. He had no pouch, no bag, no scabbard.
“Come on, pick it up, show me just how much better one of those is.”
Tibs looked at it, grabbed it by the hilt and raised it until only the point was in the ground. The pommel was at the center of his chest. “It’s too big.”
“That’s a small sword. If you want smaller, you are going to have to settle for a knife. You said you wanted a sword. You need to raise it if you’re going to swing at me.”
Tibs did as he was told. It was nowhere near as heavy as he thought. He raised it over his head, then found he was staggering back as it’s weight pulled on him. He managed to steady himself and the other thief was looking at him, bored.
Annoyed, Tibs stepped forward and swung. The man was no longer where the sword passed, and Tibs found it was carrying him with it, making him turn until a foot landed on his ass and pushed him in the sand.
“You’re dead, kid.”
“Of course I’m dead!” Tibs yelled, standing. “I’ve never used one before, you’re supposed to teach me.”
“You think you have the time to learn? When’s the next time you’re going in the dungeon?”
Tibs shrugged. It wasn’t like anyone told them ahead of time.
“You want to use a sword, you need to build up your strength, you need to build up your endurance. Worse of all, for someone like you. You need to stay still to use it, or its own weight’s going to pull you down.”
The man raised a hand and he had a knife in it. He threw it without looking away from Tibs and the point embedded itself in a crate.
“You notice something different from what you did?”
“I can’t throw that sword.”
The man closed his eyes and let out a breath. “I didn’t have to get close to what I hit.”
Tibs crossed his arms over his chest. “I only get one knife when I go in the dungeon. I can’t throw it, the dungeon’s going to eat it.”
The other thief opened his mouth, then closed it. He tried again, but still said nothing. “You know. It’s been so long I actually don’t remember what my first dives were like.” He chuckled.
He went and picked up the sword. He turned to face Tibs and it was no longer in his hands. Tibs looked around. He couldn’t have thrown it away; he’d have seen that.
The man looked where Tibs looked. “Did I miss something?”
“Where’s the sword?”
“I put it away, we’re not going to need it.” He offered Tibs a knife. Where had it come from?
Tibs took it and turned it over. It felt real enough. He looked at the crate and prepared to throw it, but the man grabbed his wrist.
“This one isn’t meant to be thrown. We’re going to start with something that’s going to be more useful to you at this time. Striking and dodging. You’re going to try to strike me and you’re going to try to dodge me.”
“Aren’t you going to use a knife?” He indicated the man’s empty hands.
“Do you want me to kill you?”
“How are you going to strike—Ow!” Tibs staggered back from the finger the man had shoved in his shoulder.
“I think I’m going to manage.”
“I gave you my name,” Tibs said, rubbing his shoulder. “What do I call you?”
The man said something in an unflattering tone under his breath, then smiled at Tibs. “I guess it depends on where you’re from. Master is a popular one, Teacher’s good too. Some places use Sensei.” He looked at Tibs, “but you don’t look the type. Lemuel refers to people who give instructions as Coach, so we can use that if you prefer.”
“No one’s my master,” Tibs replied, voice hard and gripping the knife tightly. “There’s already a lot of teachers here, how are you going to know I meant you?”
“That leaves the other two,” He smiled, placing his hands behind his back.
“I’m not using them until I find someone other than you to explain what they mean. I’m not going to agree to being your servant just because you say they mean something else.”
The man smiled. “Cautious, that’s good.” He stepped back. “You can call me Bardik.” He smiled. “My friends call me Bardik of the Silver Tongue and Sticky Fingers.”
“Just Bardik then,” Tibs said. He wasn’t going to be friends with this man. He was only going to learn from him.
“Just Bardik then,” Bardik said leaning down, hands still at his back. “So, try to stab me with the knife.”
Tibs tried.
He tried hard.
He didn’t manage it.
But by the time the training ended, Bardik had poked him hard enough, often enough, everything hurt.
“There you are,” Ariana said as she sat next to me. It had been a few days since they’d been able to find each other to eat. Their mornings were busy with training, and Tibs spent the afternoons walking around the tents or the perimeter, marked by the spikes in the ground and the adventurer patrolling it. Every few days, it was extended as a new tent needed space. Tibs hoped that it would reach the lake and the stream he could see now that the trees around it had been cut down. He’d never touched so much water.
“I did a second dungeon run today.” She looked at her slop, then ate it unenthusiastically.
“How did it go?” Tibs was on his second bowl.
“Even after you told me about yours, I didn’t expect I’d get one. When I asked my instructor he made it sound like there was a roster and that I’d only go after everyone else had. Rogues are different, he said, because they keep dying.”
“Seems to me it’s everyone else that keeps dying,” Tibs said morosely before eating again. He hadn’t told her about how the sorcerer had tried to get him eaten by the rats. He shuddered at the memory. “I don’t think there’s a roster. They just throw people together like they did with me and your group. Maybe they ask what you are to make sure they cover all the classes, but that’s it.”
She nodded, “there’s four classes here, so it makes sense they want them evenly represented. Then it doesn’t matter who the fifth is. I was hanging among the people waiting for their turn in the clearing when one of the adventurers asked my class and put me with a group.” She smiled and leaned in, lowering her voice. “The rogue didn’t know how to tell what tiles were triggers. I had to point out the symbol to her.” Her smile fell. “We lost our sorcerer, the other archer, and fighter in the boulder room. We didn’t try to go further. I did notice something I want to verify the next time we go in.”
He waited for her to elaborate, but she made a face at her food and went back to eating
“Why do they put five people in each team is there’s only four classes?” he asked.
She looked like she’d ignore his question, continuing to eat, but then stopped. “eventually they’re going to let clerics take part. When they’re like us, they train at a different dungeon, one set up just for them.”
“Oh.” That explained it, not that he knew what a cleric was, but by her discomfort answering him, he decided not to ask and went back to eating too.
As they left the mess hall, yells of ‘thief!’ and ‘someone stole my coppers!’ sounded behind them. Ariana looked at Tibs, who shook his head. He put his hand in his pocket both to avoid the temptation as they were jostled as adventurers entered and to make sure his bundle of wrapped coppers was still there.
* * * * *
“Excuse me,” Tibs asked the adventurer who was looking over the knives spread on a display before a merchant’s tent. There was now a wooden building in the town, but it was a tavern. Tibs hadn’t been able to go inside; there were people lining out the door for the taste of a tankard of ale after weeks of whatever the mess hall served, but he had climbed the wall to sit atop the roof and had gotten an even more amazing view of the countryside. The woods were bigger than he thought, and the stream leaving the lake continued down the gentle hill until the horizon.
The man looked him over, his utterly black eyes taking him in and going back to looking the knife over. “I know you from somewhere,” he said, placing the knife back.
When the man looked in his direction again, Tibs discretely tapped his left wrist, hoping the rogue adventurer hadn’t shown that to every other thief he met.
He frowned, then smiled. “Mister Light-Fingers. I’m glad to see you’re still alive, and with both hands. Can I help you with something?”
“Do you know how to fight?”
The man turned to face Tibs and crossed his arms over his chest. “Surviving dungeon crawls is hard if you don’t know that.”
Tibs felt better now that he’d confirmed that, but he wondered where the man kept his knife. Every other adventurer, well most adventurers, carried their weapons openly. The few he’d noticed without any were fighters and he had the sense their fists were their preferred weapons.
“Can you teach me?”
The man studied Tibs, then took a knife, handing the merchant a few coins too fast for Tibs to see them. “Come with me.”
The man led Tibs through the crowd and around tents until they reached a patch of construction material, but no one around to watch over them. Tents hid them from the others. Tibs hesitated. Once in there, no one would see what happened to him, and with the sounds of the crowd, maybe no one would hear him scream either.
The rogue smile. “I’m not going to hurt you.” He motioned to the crate opposite the one he sat on. “I never enjoyed hurting people unless they do something wrong. And you don’t have enough coins for me to bother with. You should find a place to hide them, keeping them on you is bound to tempt one of the other crawlers.”
Tibs put a hand in his pocket, closing his fingers over the bundle. “I haven’t found anywhere safe.”
The rogue looked around, then nodded. “I’ll give you that. With all the people and the construction, even the ground isn’t safe. I guess what you’ve done is the best you can do at the moment.”
Tibs tightened his hand over the bundle.
“How many crawls have you been on?” the rogue asked and Tibs frowned, trying to understand what he meant. “In the dungeon, I know you’ve been in once, since that’s when we met, have you been after that?”
“One more time.”
“Did you return equipment that time too?”
Tibs shook his head.
The rogue considered something. “How do you feel about taking clothing off the dead?”
Tibs shrugged. Where did the man think Tibs had gotten what he wore? It wasn’t like any tailor would dress him, even if he’d had the coins to pay.
“Next crawl you’re on, when someone dies, if what they wear is better than what you wear, take it for yourself.” The man smiled and Tibs looked at what he wore, even he knew it was little better than rags at this point. Most of what others wore weren’t much better, but some…
“We can’t steal,” Tibs said, remembering the warning and the adventurer rushing into the mess hall. The glee in their eyes.
“The dead can’t complain. Your group-mates might, but I doubt they wear anything much better than you do, so you can offer to share. Do you know how to sew?”
Tibs nodded. “I haven’t had Mama to fix my clothes for a long time.”
“Then invest one of those coppers for a needle and offer to fix your group’s clothing. It should help them get over the outrage if they object to you taking from the dead. Don’t make a coin pouch, that just attract too much attention.”
Tibs eyed the rogue. Did he think he was an idiot? The man raised an eyebrow and Tibs kept his thought to himself. Instead he asked. “Why do you say crawl?”
“What do you mean?”
“You said dungeon crawl. You called us Crawlers. Everyone else I head says dungeon run and calls us Runners.”
The rogue sighed. “Showing my age, I guess, but never mind that.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “The advice I gave you was the only free help you get. No one here is in the habit of working for free. If I train you, what’s in it for me?”
Tibs bit his lower lip, then pulled the bundle out of his pocket and offered it to the rogue. “It’s all I have.”
“Put that away, I told you, I don’t bother with copper.”
Tibs did as told and fixed his gaze on the man’s eyes. If he didn’t want copper, he had a good idea what other kind of payment he’d want. There were very few ways for an urchin like him to pay a man like the rogue. “What do you want from me?” he asked, doing his best to keep his voice from trembling. He’d do it, he wanted to survive, he had to survive, and if offering himself to—
“Get that look off your face,” the man said, sounding disgusted. “I’m definitely not into that, and if anyone here ever suggests you pay them that way, tell me about it. The dungeon doesn’t care all that much if who it eats is dead when we throw them inside.”
“Then how am I going to pay? I don’t have more coins.”
“Look, kid.”
“My name is Tibs.”
The rogue seemed annoyed at Tibs giving him his name.
“Tibs, this isn’t the streets you came from. The dungeon might kill you, but the people out here don’t have the right to treat you like you were treated there.”
“Sure,” Tibs answered doubtfully. The first rule of the streets was that those with power used it to get what they wanted. He’d seen it happen to others, to Mama, and he would never forget it, forget them.
The rogue looked amused. “What I could use is someone who can move about town freely.”
Tibs narrowed his eyes. “You can go anywhere you want, even outside the town.”
The man tapped his left wrist. “That does more than mark us. It leaves a trail of where we’ve been. If I hurt you and you complained, or I left your dead body and it was found. It wouldn’t matter where I went. The mark would ensure they found me.” He paused. “Even us talking like this might come back to cause me trouble, but so long as we’re careful and don’t give anyone a reason to look, we’ll be okay. So that’s my price.”
“So you want me to move about town, to take and put things in places they weren’t,” he added, why else get a thief like him? “And you train me?”
“To fight, the rest of the rogue stuff I leave to your teachers; with and without a knife.”
“A sword?”
“The only times I’ve touched one of those was to pull it out of my body. Why would you want to use that?”
Tibs shrugged. “They’re bigger, so they’re better in a fight?”
The man laughed. “Don’t listen to those fighters. It’s not because it’s big that it’s better.” He stood. “Come on then, let me show you why a knife is better than a sword."
“And what if I still want to use a sword?” Tibs asked.
The man looked at him, considered something, then shrugged. “Alright, catch.” Out of nowhere the man lobbed a sword at Tibs, who stepped out of the way and it landed on the sand.
He looked at it, then the man. “Where did you get that?” He narrowed his eyes. “You said you only touched them to pull them out.”
“Doesn’t mean I throw them away.”
Tibs looked at the man. He had no pouch, no bag, no scabbard.
“Come on, pick it up, show me just how much better one of those is.”
Tibs looked at it, grabbed it by the hilt and raised it until only the point was in the ground. The pommel was at the center of his chest. “It’s too big.”
“That’s a small sword. If you want smaller, you are going to have to settle for a knife. You said you wanted a sword. You need to raise it if you’re going to swing at me.”
Tibs did as he was told. It was nowhere near as heavy as he thought. He raised it over his head, then found he was staggering back as it’s weight pulled on him. He managed to steady himself and the other thief was looking at him, bored.
Annoyed, Tibs stepped forward and swung. The man was no longer where the sword passed, and Tibs found it was carrying him with it, making him turn until a foot landed on his ass and pushed him in the sand.
“You’re dead, kid.”
“Of course I’m dead!” Tibs yelled, standing. “I’ve never used one before, you’re supposed to teach me.”
“You think you have the time to learn? When’s the next time you’re going in the dungeon?”
Tibs shrugged. It wasn’t like anyone told them ahead of time.
“You want to use a sword, you need to build up your strength, you need to build up your endurance. Worse of all, for someone like you. You need to stay still to use it, or its own weight’s going to pull you down.”
The man raised a hand and he had a knife in it. He threw it without looking away from Tibs and the point embedded itself in a crate.
“You notice something different from what you did?”
“I can’t throw that sword.”
The man closed his eyes and let out a breath. “I didn’t have to get close to what I hit.”
Tibs crossed his arms over his chest. “I only get one knife when I go in the dungeon. I can’t throw it, the dungeon’s going to eat it.”
The other thief opened his mouth, then closed it. He tried again, but still said nothing. “You know. It’s been so long I actually don’t remember what my first dives were like.” He chuckled.
He went and picked up the sword. He turned to face Tibs and it was no longer in his hands. Tibs looked around. He couldn’t have thrown it away; he’d have seen that.
The man looked where Tibs looked. “Did I miss something?”
“Where’s the sword?”
“I put it away, we’re not going to need it.” He offered Tibs a knife. Where had it come from?
Tibs took it and turned it over. It felt real enough. He looked at the crate and prepared to throw it, but the man grabbed his wrist.
“This one isn’t meant to be thrown. We’re going to start with something that’s going to be more useful to you at this time. Striking and dodging. You’re going to try to strike me and you’re going to try to dodge me.”
“Aren’t you going to use a knife?” He indicated the man’s empty hands.
“Do you want me to kill you?”
“How are you going to strike—Ow!” Tibs staggered back from the finger the man had shoved in his shoulder.
“I think I’m going to manage.”
“I gave you my name,” Tibs said, rubbing his shoulder. “What do I call you?”
The man said something in an unflattering tone under his breath, then smiled at Tibs. “I guess it depends on where you’re from. Master is a popular one, Teacher’s good too. Some places use Sensei.” He looked at Tibs, “but you don’t look the type. Lemuel refers to people who give instructions as Coach, so we can use that if you prefer.”
“No one’s my master,” Tibs replied, voice hard and gripping the knife tightly. “There’s already a lot of teachers here, how are you going to know I meant you?”
“That leaves the other two,” He smiled, placing his hands behind his back.
“I’m not using them until I find someone other than you to explain what they mean. I’m not going to agree to being your servant just because you say they mean something else.”
The man smiled. “Cautious, that’s good.” He stepped back. “You can call me Bardik.” He smiled. “My friends call me Bardik of the Silver Tongue and Sticky Fingers.”
“Just Bardik then,” Tibs said. He wasn’t going to be friends with this man. He was only going to learn from him.
“Just Bardik then,” Bardik said leaning down, hands still at his back. “So, try to stab me with the knife.”
Tibs tried.
He tried hard.
He didn’t manage it.
But by the time the training ended, Bardik had poked him hard enough, often enough, everything hurt.
