Luthien thought "Tiny Alcove" the most ridiculous name he had ever heard for a street--until Oliver, leading him through the shabby avenues of dilapidated wooden buildings, turned a corner and announced that they were home. Tiny Alcove was more an alley than a street, barely eight feet wide and shrouded in the shadows of tall buildings whose main entrances were on other fronts.
The two walked down through the gloom of a moonless night, gingerly stepping over the bodies of those drunken men who had not made it to their own doors, or had no doors to call their own. A single street lantern burned in the lane above a broken railing and chipped stairs that led down to an ironbound door. As they passed, Luthien noticed other lights burning within and the huddled shadows of people moving about.
"Thieving guild," Oliver explained in a whisper.
"Were you a member?" Luthien thought the question per-fectly reasonable, but the look Oliver gave to him showed that the halfling apparently did not share his feelings.
"I?" Oliver asked imperiously, and he chuckled and walked on, out of the lamplight and into the gloom.
Luthien caught up to him across the lane and four doors down, on the top step of another descending stone stairway that ended in a narrow, but long landing and a wooden door. Oliver paused there for a long, long while, studying the place quietly, stroking his neatly trimmed goatee.
"This was my house," he whispered out of the corner of his mouth.
Luthien did not reply, caught up in the halfling's curious posture.
Oliver was tentative, seemed almost afraid.
"We cannot go down there," the halfling announced.
"One must learn to sense these things?" Luthien asked, to which Oliver only smiled and turned, stepping back up to the street level. The halfling stopped abruptly and snapped his fingers, then spun back and whipped his main gauche down the stairs. It hit the door with a loud thump and hung quiver-ing.
Luthien started to ask what the halfling thought he was doing, but the young man was interrupted by a dozen rapid clicking noises, the sound of stone scraping stone, and a sud-den hiss. He spun back toward the door, then hopped up next to Oliver as darts ricocheted off the stone stairs.
The bottom of the landing burned with a hot fire, and as Luthien stared on in disbelief, a large block of stone slid out from above the doorway, crashing down into the flames.
As though a giant had peeked over the edge of the stairs and puffed out a candle, the flames suddenly disappeared.
"Now we can go down there," Oliver said, and hooked his fingers into his wide belt. "But do watch where you put your feet. The darts were likely poisoned."
"Somebody does not like you," the stunned Luthien re-marked, slowly following the halfling.
Oliver grabbed the hilt of the main gauche and gave a great tug, but it did not pull free from the door. "That is only because they never came to know my most charming personality," he explained. He stood straight, hands on hips, and eyed the weapon as though it was a stubborn enemy.
"Too bad you don't have your main gauche," Luthien quipped behind him, seeing his dilemma. "You could disarm the door."
Oliver turned a not appreciative glare on his friend. Luthien reached over the halfling for the stuck dagger, but Oliver slapped his arm away.
Before Luthien could protest, Oliver leaped up, grabbed the hilt of the main gauche in both hands, and planted his feet on the door on either side of it.
A heave brought the blade free, and sent Oliver, and Oliver's great hat, flying. He did a backward somersault, landing nimbly on his feet, and caught his hat as he slipped the main gauche back into its scabbard.
"My most charming personality," he announced again, quite pleased with himself, and Luthien, though he hated to admit it to Oliver, was quite pleased as well.
The halfling bowed and swept his arm out toward the door, indicating that Luthien should go first. The young Bed-wyr almost fell for it, dipping a similar bow and stepping for the door. He reached for the handle, but then straightened and looked back at Oliver.
"It was your house," he said, stepping to the side.
Oliver brushed his cloak back from his shoulders and boldly strode past Luthien. With a single steadying breath, he yanked the door open. A smell of soot assaulted both the friends, and though the light was practically nonexistent, they could see that the inside wood of the door was black-ened. Oliver huffed and took a tentative step over the thresh-old, then quickly retracted his foot.
A double-bladed pendulum swung past, just inside the door jamb. Its supporting beam creaking, it swung back and forth several times, finally coming to a halt in a vertical posi-tion directly centering the door.
"Someone really did not like you," Luthien said again.
"Not true," Oliver quickly replied, and he gave Luthien a mischievous smile. "This trap was my own!" Oliver tipped his hat and gingerly stepped past the pendulum.
Luthien smiled and started to follow, but stopped when he realized the implications of Oliver's game. Oliver had bade him to go first, but the halfling had obviously known about the pendulum trap! Muttering with every step, Luthien en-tered the apartment.
Oliver was over to the left, fidgeting with an oil lamp. The halfling added some oil and finally got it going, though its glass was gone and its frame had been bent and charred.
Something powerful had hit the place. Every piece of fur-niture was smashed down and blackened, and the layers of carpets had been burned away to clumps of worthless rags. Smoke hung thickly in the stagnant air, though no traces of any heat remained.
"A magical fireball," Oliver remarked casually. "Or an elvish hot wine."
"Elvish hot wine?"
"A bottle of potent oils," the halfling explained, kicking aside the remains of what looked to have been a chair. "Topped with a lighted rag. So very effective."
Luthien was amazed at how well Oliver seemed to be tak-ing the disaster.
Though the light from the battered lamp was dim, it was obvious to Luthien that nothing remained of the place's contents, and obvious, too, that some of those con-tents had been quite valuable.
"We will find no sleep this night," Oliver said. He opened one of his saddlebags and fished out a plain, less expensive suit of clothing.
"You mean to start cleaning right away?" Luthien asked.
"I do not wish to sleep out in the street," Oliver replied matter-of- factly. And so they went to work.
It took two days of hard labor to clean out the debris and air out the smoke. The friends left periodically during that time, back to the Dwelf for meals, and to the stables to check on their mounts. Each time, they found groups of children hovering about and in their apartment when they returned--curious waifs, half-starved and dirty. Luthien didn't miss the fact that Oliver always brought back a good part of his own meal for them.
Tasman offered them a much-needed bath at the Dwelf that second night, and afterwards, Oliver and Luthien donned their better clothes again and went to the place that they could now rightly call their home.
Bare walls and a rough wooden floor greeted them. Oliver had at least purchased a new lantern, and they had retrieved their bedrolls from the stable.
"Tomorrow night, we begin our furnishing," the halfling announced as he crawled into his bedroll.
"How fare our funds?" Luthien asked, noticing that Oliver's pouches seemed to be getting inevitably smaller.
"Not well," the halfling admitted. "That is why we must begin tomorrow night."
Then Luthien understood, and his expression aptly re-flected his disappointment. Oliver wasn't planning on buying anything. They were to live the lives of thieves from the out-set.
"I had planned a burglary on a certain merchant-type's house," the halfling said. "Before events put me out on the road. The merchant-type's guards remain the same, I am sure, and he has not moved his valuables." Luthien continued to scowl.
Oliver paused and stared at him, the halfling's mouth turn-ing up into a wry smile. "The life does not please you," he stated as much as asked.
"You do not think thieving an hon-orable profession?"
The question seemed ridiculous.
"What do you know of the law?" Oliver asked.
Luthien shrugged as though the answer should have been obvious--at least as far as stealing was concerned. "To take another man's property is against the law," he answered.
"Aha!" the halfling cried. "That is where you are wrong. Sometimes to take another man's property is against the law. Sometimes it is called business."
"And is what you do 'business'?" the young Bedwyr asked sarcastically.
Oliver laughed at him. "What the merchant-types do is business," he replied. "What I do is enforce the law. Do not confuse the law with justice," Oliver reasoned. "Not in the time of King Greensparrow." With that, the halfling rolled over, ending the conversation. Luthien remained awake for some time, considering the words but uneasy nonetheless.
They made their way across the rooftops of the grand houses in Montfort's upper section, Luthien in his cape and Oliver wearing a tight-fitting but pliable black outfit and the harness Brind'Amour had given him underneath his purple cape. Cyclopians, mostly Praetorian Guards, walked every street, and a couple were up on the roofs as well, but Oliver knew the area and guided Luthien safely.
They came to a waist-high ledge, three stories above the street. Oliver smiled wickedly as he peeked over, then he looked back to Luthien and nodded.
Luthien, feeling vulnerable, feeling like a naughty child, glanced around nervously and pulled his crimson cape up higher about his shoulders.
Oliver took the small puckered ball and the fine line out of his shoulder pouch, stringing the cord through his hands as he went. He popped the unusual grapnel against the ledge and pulled the cord tight.
"Be of cheer, my friend," Oliver whispered. "This night, you learn from the master." Over the side went Oliver, slip-ping silently down the cord.
Luthien watched as the halfling stopped in front of a window, opened another pouch, and took out some small instrument that the young man could not discern. He figured out what it was soon enough when Oliver placed it against the window and cut a wide circle, gently popping out the cut piece of glass. With a quick look around, the halfling disappeared into the room.
As soon as the cord came back out, Luthien slipped over the ledge and eased his way down to Oliver's side.
The halfling held a small lamp, its directional beam fo-cused tightly.
Luthien's eyes widened as Oliver shifted that light about the room.
Though his father was an eorl, and well to do by Bedwydrin standards, Luthien had never seen such a collection! Intricate tapestries lined every wall, thick carpets covered the floor, and a myriad of artifacts-- vases, statues, decorative weapons, even a full suit of plate mail armor-- lit-tered the large room.
Oliver placed the lamp on the chamber's sole piece of fur-niture, a huge oaken desk, and rubbed his plump hands to-gether. He began an inspection, using hand signals to Luthien to let him know what was most valuable. The trick of burglary, Oliver had previously explained, was in know-ing what to take, both by its value and its size. One could not go running through the streets of Montfort with an open arm-load of stolen goods!
After a few minutes of inspection, Oliver lifted a hand-some vase of blue porcelain trimmed in gold. He looked at Luthien and nodded, then froze in place.
At first, Luthien didn't understand, and then he, too, heard the heavy footsteps coming down the hall.
The friends got to the window together, Luthien inadvert-ently stepping on the circle of cut glass that Oliver had laid to the side. Both cringed at the sound of the breakage and looked back nervously to the door. The vase still under his arm, Oliver jumped out to the cord and swung to the side.
Luthien had no time. He looked to the door and saw the handle turn--and only then remembered that the lamp was still perched upon the desk! The young man leaped across the room and blew out the flame, then fell back against the wall and stood perfectly still as two cyclopians entered the room.
The brutes sniffed the air as they moved in, milling about curiously.
Only their own lantern offered Luthien any hope that they would not detect the smelly wick of the extinguished lamp. One of the brutes actually sat on the desk barely two feet from Luthien.
Luthien held his breath, put his hand to the hilt of his sheathed sword, and nearly drew it out when the cyclopian turned toward him.
Nearly drew it out, but did not, for the brute, though it was obviously looking right at Luthien, did not appear to notice him at all.
"I do like the pictures of cyclopian victories!" the one-eye laughed to its friend, and Luthien realized that he was stand-ing right in front of
a tapestry depicting such a scene. But the cyclopian, though it continued to stare, did not seem to no-tice any incongruity within the picture.
"Come on," the other cyclopian said a moment later. "No one's here. You heard wrong."
The cyclopian on the desk shrugged and hopped to its feet. It started to leave, but glanced back over its shoulder and stopped suddenly.
Peeking out under the cowl of his hood, Luthien realized that, as chance would have it, the brute had spotted the bro-ken glass. The cyclopian slapped its companion hard on the shoulder, and together they ran to the window.
"The roof!" one of them cried, leaning out and looking up.
Again Luthien reached for his sword, but his instincts told him to hold back and avoid a fight at any cost.
The cyclopians ran out of the room, and Luthien went for the window--to be met by Oliver, swinging back in. The halfling slipped down and pivoted on the rope, gave three quick tugs on the line, and hauled in the magical grapnel. He started to set it on the windowsill so that they could slip down to the street, but the sound of more approaching foot-steps stopped him.
"No time," Luthien remarked, grabbing Oliver's arm.
"I do so hate to have to fight," Oliver replied, cool as al-ways.
Luthien moved back to the wall, pulling Oliver with him. He flattened his back against the tapestry and opened his cape, indicating that his little friend should slip under its camouflage. Oliver found little choice as the door began to open.
Luthien peeked from under the cowl, Oliver from a tiny opening in the folds, as a wiry man in a nightshirt and cap, obviously the merchant, and several more cyclopians, all bearing lanterns, entered the room.
"Damn!" the man spat out as he looked around and spot-ted the lamp on the desk, the broken window, and the empty pedestal where the vase had been.
He went to the desk at once and fit a key into the top drawer, pulling it open, then gave a relieved sigh.
"Well," the man said, his tone changing, "at least all they took was that cheap vase."
Luthien looked under the neck of his cape, and the halfling, glancing up at him, only shrugged.
"They did not take my statue," the merchant went on, ob-viously relieved, looking at a small figure of a winged man perched upon the desk. He dropped a hand into the drawer and the friends heard the tinkling of jewels. "Or these." The merchant shut the drawer and locked it.
"Conduct a search of the area," the merchant ordered the cyclopians, "and report the theft to the city watch." He looked back over his shoulder and scowled; both Luthien and Oliver held their breath, thinking they had been bagged. "And see to it that the windows are barred!" the man growled angrily.
Then he left, taking the cyclopians with him, even oblig-ing the friends by locking the room's door behind him.
Oliver came out from under the cloak, rubbing his greedy hands. He went right for the desk--the merchant had conve-niently left the lamp sitting upon it.
"That drawer is locked," Luthien whispered, coming up beside the halfling as Oliver fumbled with yet another pouch on the harness. The halfling produced several tools and laid them out on the desk.
"You could be wrong!" he announced a moment later, eyeing Luthien proudly as he pulled open the drawer. A pile of jewels awaited them: gem-studded necklaces and brace-lets, and several golden rings. Oliver emptied the contents in a flash, stuffing them into a small sack, which he produced from yet another pouch in the incredible harness. The halfling was truly beginning to appreciate the value of Brind'Amour's gifts.
"Do get the statue," he said to Luthien, and he walked across the room and put the vase back where it belonged.
They waited by the window for half the night, until the clamor of rushing cyclopians outside died away. Then Luthien easily swung the grapnel back up to the roof, and away they went.
The light in the room had been dim, and the friends did not notice the most significant mark they had left behind. But the merchant most certainly did, cursing and wailing when he returned the next day to find that his more valuable items had been stolen. In his rage, he picked up the vase Oliver had returned and heaved it across the room, to shatter against the wall beside the desk. The merchant stopped his yelling and stared curiously at the image on the wall.
On the tapestry, where Luthien had first hidden from the cyclopians, loomed the silhouette of a caped man--a crim-son-colored shadow somehow indelibly stained upon the im-ages of the tapestry. No amount of washing could remove it; the wizard the merchant later hired only stared at it help-lessly after several futile attempts.
The crimson shadow was forever.