What he found made his heart sink: this Sark had at least ten safes, all of them lined up along the walls, all of them locked and, to Gregor, impenetrable.
He sighed. If there is evidence in there, he thought, I can’t get to it. So I must find any evidence outside of the safes, then.
He searched the rooms. The space looked like something adapted for an invalid: lots of canes, lots of handles, lots of low seats. He also found Sark had little in the way of crockery and cutlery and pans. He apparently did not make his own food much at all, which was not terribly unusual. Few Commoners could afford all the materials that went into the preparation of food.
Gregor was about to move past the cooking stove and into the living room when he paused.
“If he doesn’t have plates or spoons,” he said aloud, looking down, “and if he doesn’t eat at home…then why does he have a stove?”
Certainly not for heat—Tevanne had no shortage of that: the city’s two seasons were hot and wet, or unbelievably hot and unbelievably wet.
Gregor squatted before the stove. There was no wood ash inside—which was odd.
Grunting, Gregor reached down and felt the back of the stove, until he found a small switch.
He turned it, and the back of the stove popped open. “Oho,” said Gregor. Inside were four small shelves, and on those shelves were many precious items.
He looked at the safes around him. These are just a distraction, aren’t they? Make any interlopers focus on them, while the real safe sits hidden right in front of you…He suddenly thought this Sark a very clever man.
There was a small bag on the top shelf, and he opened it and carefully looked through it. “My goodness,” he murmured.
Inside were four thousand duvots—paper duvots, no less—and multiple documents, almost certainly forged, that would allow the holder to secure quick passage on any number of ships. One of them even granted the bearer the powers of a minor ambassador from Dandolo Chartered—and even though Gregor had little to do with his family’s house, he couldn’t help but feel insulted by that.
He looked through the rest of the bag, and found a knife, lockpicks, and other unseemly tools. He’s definitely the fence, he thought. And the man was ready to run in a heartbeat.
He searched the rest of the hidden safe. It contained small sacks of gemstones, jewelry, and the like. On the bottom shelf was a small book. Gregor grabbed it and flipped through it, and found it was full of dates, plans, and tactics for Sark’s many jobs.
At first the notes were extremely detailed—methods of entry and escape, tools required for breaking a specific lock or safe—but at one point, about two years ago, the jobs suddenly got a lot more frequent and the payouts a lot higher, but the notes became far sparser. Gregor got the impression that Sark had made a connection with someone good enough that they didn’t need much of his help.
He flipped to the last entry and found Sark’s notes on the waterfront job. He felt a bit pleased to see that his defenses had frustrated this Sark immensely—one scribbled line read: This bastard Dandolo is going to make S work double-time!!
Gregor made a note of that—“S.” He doubted it stood for “Sark.”
That must be the thief—whoever they are.
But there was another note at the end that he found deeply curious—scrawled in the margins of the paper were two words: Dandolo Hyp??
Gregor stared at the words.
He knew that they did not refer to him—they had to be shorthand for “Dandolo Hypatus.” And that was very, very troubling.
A hypatus was a merchant house officer who acted as something akin to a head of research, experimenting with sigillums to dream up new methods, techniques, and tools. Most hypati were madder than a speared striper, mostly because they often didn’t survive long—experimental scrivings had a tendency to inflict gruesome death on anyone involved with them. And then there was the backstabbing the position attracted: since every scriver on a campo wanted to be a hypatus, betrayals and even assassinations were common hazards of the job.
But the Dandolo Chartered hypatus was Orso Ignacio—and Orso Ignacio was notorious, if not legendary, for being an amoral, arrogant, duplicitous, and fiendishly clever campo operator. He’d lasted nearly a decade as hypatus, which had to be a record in Tevanne. And he hadn’t risen from within the ranks of Dandolo Chartered—he’d originally been employed at Company Candiano, though Gregor had heard rumors he’d departed that house under leery terms. It was a known fact that the whole damned merchant house had almost collapsed mere weeks after his departure.
Yet as unsavory as Orso Ignacio’s reputation might be—would he be willing to hire an independent thief to rob Gregor’s waterfront? Since Gregor was the son of Ofelia Dandolo—the head of the entire Dandolo Chartered merchant house—this seemed totally insane. But then, hypati were generally agreed to be insane, or close enough to it.
Gregor considered what he knew. Only one thing had been stolen that night—a box, entered into the safes under the name of “Berenice.” Which could have been a false name, for all Gregor knew.
So—was Orso Ignacio the buyer? Or was he the one being robbed? Or is this small note here just nonsense, a complete coincidence?
He wasn’t sure. But he now intended to find out.
Gregor heard something, and sat up. There were footfalls in the hallway—all heavy boots. And it sounded like there were a lot of them.
He didn’t wait to listen and see if the new arrivals came to Sark’s door. Instead he took Whip out and walked quietly into the bedroom, where he hid behind the open door, peering through the crack in the hinge at the living room beyond.
Could this be Sark? Has he returned?
There was a tremendous crack as someone kicked the door down.
Ah, no, he thought. Probably not Sark.
Gregor watched as two men in dark-brown clothing and black cloth masks walked into Sark’s rooms. But what really caught Gregor’s eye were their weapons.
One bore a stiletto, the other a rapier—and both were scrived. He could see the sigils running along the lengths of the blades, even from where he was.
He sighed inwardly. Well. That’s going to be a problem.
* * *
Gregor was familiar with scrived weapons. Scrived armaments, though prohibitively expensive, were the primary reason why the city of Tevanne had been so successful in warfare. But you couldn’t just glance at a scrived weapon and know what it was scrived to do. It could be anything.
For example, the common blades used in the Enlightenment Wars were scrived so that they’d automatically target the weakest part of whatever they were swung at, and then target the weakest part of that weakest part, and then to target the weakest part of that weakest part of the weakest part, and then strike that exact area. Operating off of these commands, the blades would be able to cut through a solid oak beam with little force.
But that was just one possibility. Other scrivings convinced the blades they were hurtling through the air with amplified gravity—this was what Whip’s head was scrived to do, for example. Others had been scrived specifically to break down and destroy other metals, like armor and weapons. And still others burned incredibly hot when whirled through the air, giving them the possibility of setting one’s opponent alight.
All of these possibilities ran through Gregor’s head as the two thugs stalked through Sark’s rooms. So what I need to do, he thought, is make sure they never get to use them.
He watched as the two men examined the open back of the stove. They crouched and peered in, then exchanged a glance, perhaps worried.
They turned and approached the balcony door. One gestured to the other, silently pointing out that the lock had been broken in. Then they started walking toward the bedroom, with the one with the rapier in the lead.
Still hidden behind the door, Gregor waited until the first of his opponents had stepped into the bedroom, with the second one right behind him. Then he kicked the door as hard as he could.
The door hurled shut, smashing the second thug in the face. Gregor could feel the wood resonate with the blow, and felt satisfied with the damage done. The thug with the rapier turned around, raising his weapon, but Gregor snapped Whip forward and cracked him in the face.
But the man did not crumple, whimpering, as Gregor had been expecting. Instead the thug stumbled back, shook himself, and charged forward again.
The man’s mask, thought Gregor. It must be scrived to deflect strikes. Maybe all of his scrumming clothing’s scrived!