“An excellent question. The payment is high because it is crucial that nothing else at the location be stolen, and because if you can actually manage the job, it’ll be a miracle.”
Jubilee angled her head and tried to look only vaguely interested. “A miracle.”
Shit. Jubilee was a sucker for a challenge. Briona knew it too, because she looked way too casual now. “It’s difficult. It’s a rush job.”
That was exactly what to say to Jubilee to make her interested. “Rushing costs extra.”
Briona snorted. “That’s funny. You need money, and you need it now.”
Saeldian lifted their chin and shrugged. “A vault could have a single nib in it, once we got it open.”
“Luckily for you, I have a deposit receipt. Compare it against your key’s stamp.” Briona pulled a folded square of paper from her sleeve. “This sum is behind each vault key.”
Saeldian unfolded the paper and forgave themself for losing control of their eyebrows.
“How much?” Jubilee asked.
Saeldian didn’t answer. They kept their focus pointed on the deposit slip, the embossed paper, but they were concentrating on what they could see at the corner of their vision: the edges of Briona’s shadow had moved in a way that Briona did not.
Jubilee leaned closer. “Sheld! How much?”
Briona hadn’t really moved, but her shadow had leaned back inrelief before it snapped back to what it should be. And Saeldian couldn’t look right at it to be sure, but Briona’s shadow was projecting on the wall wrong, as if it were taller than Briona was.
Jubilee reached for the deposit slip. Saeldian jerked it away without thinking and turned to study the muralist’s rendering of Deepwater Harbor, where the stars were tiny and familiar among the forest of masts they peeked through. Mariel landed in the corner of their vision. Did the bodyguard sparkle, or was that the Light spell on the wall sconce next to her?
Jubilee thumped the table with one palm. “Is it enough to fix the roof?”
Illusion. It had to be. Both of them were in disguise. They could be anyone. Why had the amulet beat? Were they really supposed to agree to this?
“Sheld!”
Was it enough to fix the roof? It was enough toreplacethe roof. Pop the whole lid off, retimber it, and rebuild it with the fancy rain-collecting system Jubilee had admired on the way in. It was enough to replace the roof and the leaky pipes in the bargain. It was enough for all of that, with a decent start on new windows.
Damn them to the Nine Hells. “It’s enough to fix the roof.”
Jubilee darted in and stole the deposit slip from Saeldian’s hand. Saeldian didn’t even fight back this time.
Jubilee’s breath came out hitched in awed disbelief at the sum. “We’re in. We’ll retrieve your item.”
“Jubilee!”
“We willtryto retrieve your item,” Jubilee amended. “If we can’t succeed without getting caught, we’re not going to be heroes.”
That wasn’t true. Jubilee would do dangerous things to get that money. “We don’t even know what the job is.”
“We want you to recover a stolen item,” Briona said. “We don’t expect you to kill anyone or do anything your conscience would balk at. The job is rushed, as I said, and it’s risky, as you guessed. And that’s all I will tell you before you agree.”
Saeldian looked at the paper again. A bearer vault’s worth of coins, meaning the coins weren’t registered in an account, andthere was no reason to go telling anyone about them if you wanted clean money to spend. It was too much to carry away in one trip. And Jubilee wanted it so she could pour every clinking dragon into Righthoof Manor.
But Briona’s shadow didn’t match. It didn’t match. Saeldian’s tongue was dry and tasted of tannin from the wine, and if the amulet would just give them a sign—
“Sheld?” Jubilee asked, quiet as a prayer.
Fuck.There was no way to say no. Jubilee, who believed that lanceboard was life, would say that Saeldian had been pinned. Unable to move, not because their piece would be eliminated, but because their piece guarded Jubilee’s.
No way to say no, and this move just cost Saeldian everything.
“All right.” Saeldian let their shoulders fall under their sigh. “We’ll try. But we’re not getting caught, and we’re not taking the fall.”
