Even at dusk the hulking shadows of Solveigard City feel familiar. Allayria looks up as they approach, pulling the thick hood lower across her face.

She can hear the solid crunch of two pairs of boots beside her, and when she glances around she sees Finn's wide eyes looking up at the dusty, gloomy city. She wonders how many places he's been like this. Somehow, she can't picture him in a place of brick and cobblestone.

"We need to keep it quiet—what you can do," she had told him in a stolen moment of isolation, watching as his brow crinkled. "Only use it if you absolutely must. Don't tell anyone. Not even the others."

She could hear his unasked question but he hadn't pushed it, only nodding as he turned away. She wonders if he understands how differently people would treat him if they knew; the price he would have to pay for being honest.

The boy in question scratches his nose. His hood is inside out.

Doubt it.

To her other side, Hiran holds up a mask, frowning at it as he turns the cloth this way and that, looking for the opening.

"Why am I wearing this again?"

Allayria glances over and raises an eyebrow.

"We're trying to blend in, Hiran."

She moves forward, checking for the vague outline of watchmen, guards, but catches him saying to Finn: "Did you hear that? The Paragon called me extraordinarily handsome."

"That's not what she said."

"Well, neither of you have to wear masks, do you?"

They slip through the gate as a trio of low travelers, dirty and sly enough to look like some less-than-virtuous inhabitants returning from Gods-know-what.

Inside, nothing has changed. This should be comforting, should be reassuring when so much of the world has altered beyond recognition for her, but it is not. It feels too familiar in here, too old and untouched and it sets her teeth on edge, this place of careful scheming and quiet triumphs. The shades of memories lurk here, walking through the streets around her and she doesn't want to look at them, doesn't want to remember their happiness, now soured in present light.

They pass the small shipping dock and it whispers at her:

"I could have really hurt you, if things had gone differently."

He had been angry and afraid, the root of his fear left unsaid between them as they walked away from Keno's test.

You would have saved yourself a lot of time and effort if you had killed me then, she thinks, her mouth tasting of bitterness as she sets her back to the scene. Though it wouldn't have been the way you wanted, would it? It wouldn't have destroyed me completely. 

She takes a route to the bar that bypasses the narrow, winding path she knows leads down to the Open Arms, and as they pass the flickering lights of seedy establishments a myriad of colors and glow casts light on things that weren't here before. Symbols painted on the walls, tucked into corners. A triangle, set below a pair of antlers, a coiling swirl in its center and three swipes on either bottom corner. It's like lead hangs heavy in her stomach when she looks at it.

It's a relief to slip under the low underhang into the Hanged Man, to feel the grimy stick of the heavy door and slide into the smoke and dust. She leans against the bar, tapping one of the empty bottles with a fingernail.

"I'm looking for Keno," she says from under her hood.

The bartender doesn't even look up.

"No idea who you are talking about."

Allayria plucks two gold coins on the bar.

"We're old friends," she continues. "The Brothers of Wren told me he was here."

The bartender glances down at the coins, then up at her half-concealed face. She can see him thinking about it.

"He's out tonight," he answers finally, his gaze flitting back to the coins for a moment. "Come back tomorrow."

But if he was out tonight, why did he glance down at the coins again, as if to reconsider?

Allayria withdraws the money and returns to Hiran and Finn.

"He's downstairs," she tells them. "Hiran, I need you to distract the bartender."

Hiran's hazel eyes sweep the room.

"Alright," he says breezily, and he tugs down the mask, throwing back his hood so the waves of brown-blond hair glint in the candlelight. He grabs the drink of an unsuspecting man and strides into the middle of the room.

Someone shouts and Hiran's drink goes flying into the back of the bar—right next to the bartender's head.

Allayria grabs Finn's shoulder and pushes him into the corridor behind the bar, past a room stacked with boxes and spider webs, and down into a dark cellar, lit only by a single candle.

There's a man sitting at the table, his dark head bent over some accounts, and when he looks up his long, pale fingers slide beneath the desk.

"The last uninvited guest who came down here ended up as a wall decoration."

She knows that he has one of his knives in his hand so she holds hers palms up and empty. When he makes no move toward her, she takes a step closer and pulls down her hood.

"Is that how you greet a friend?"

Keno's face freezes, his dark eyes widening in the low light as he stares.

"You're dead," he says blankly.

"Only half," she answers as she takes the seat across from him. "They did a shit job of it."

Keno gapes at her and then he blinks. His clever mind already spinning, adjusting.

"Tell your friend to close the door."

Allayria looks back and Finn goes up, his small feet padding against the stone stairs, and he pulls the door shut.

Keno begins to light other candles and Allayria takes her gloves off, calling up a pool of yellow-orange flames in her palms. He glances back at it, as if still unsure, and then lights the rest.

"I've never known Ben to fuck up," he says suddenly, and then he turns back and sits down once more. "But I can't say I'm sorry he has."

"Me neither."

He laughs at that, but his face is still tense and he folds his fingers together.

"So, lass, friend-to-friend," he says, and she knows what's coming, "is it really true? Was it you all along?"

She says nothing, but spreads her fingers across the table, cracks splintering their way from her fingertips as the wood breaks apart and then comes back together when her fingers contract.

The thief watches, wordlessly, and then sighs.

"I'll give it to you," he says, leaning back. "I never suspected. I don't think any of them did either. Well, not when you were here."

He looks up at her then and fixes her with a shrewd look.

"So what can the great, all-powerful Paragon want from a garden-variety thief like me?"

"Just some information," she answers, and then she smiles. "You're not the only old friend I want to find."

Keno stares—it's almost like he can't quite believe she's here, can't quite believe it's her forming these words.

"Most would say refusing the Paragon is more costly that a life is worth," he replies.

"But you've always been a somewhat loyal man," she answers. "It's why I forgave you for all those shitty beers you hoisted on me."

He cracks another smile, but it quickly fades.

"What are you going to do to them?"

It's not a question she expected, and she takes in his face, the seemingly blank expression.

What must you think of me, what must you think I am capable of doing to ask such a question?

"Beat them up and throw them in a cell so I can have some peace of mind while I go kill the Imperator," she answers.

He's silent for a long time, and then he stands, walking back to the shelf from which he had pulled those maps the last time she had been down here.

By Gods, it was less than a year ago. It feels like another lifetime.

"The rumor is that our band of merry, murdering renegades is going up to Helm's Hollow," he says. "There are some arms dealers there they plan on meeting before setting sail to Solveig."

"How long would you think they will stay there?"

"A week or two."

He turns back.

"Maybe less. They seem to have picked up the pace recently."

It's Allayria's turn to glance down, away from his gaze. The scar on her chest seems to stretch and itch.

"Well, then," she says, and she rises to her feet. "I suppose I should do the same."

She reaches out, and he grasps her hand, his grip warm and somehow reassuring, despite the wariness in his expression.

Allayria glances up to the top of the stairs where Finn sits, absorbing everything that has happened. He nods and stands too, opening the door.

"It was poor form, what they did," Keno says suddenly, and Allayria turns around. He has moved around the table and is watching her. His brows are furrowed in an inexplicable way, something like sadness lurking in the eyes beneath them, and his fingers curl into loose fists. "I thought so, ever since I heard it."

She swallows, looking anywhere else. Why do we have to talk about this now?

So she feigns a smile, feeling it twist in its bitterness.

"I was a fool," she tells the flickering lamp. "A fool to ever think it could have ended any other way."

Exhaling, she lifts her chin up, tilting her head as she looks back at him.

"Take care of yourself, Keno," she says, and her feelings turn bittersweet as she touches his shoulder. "Maybe I'll bring you back some secrets from the Jarles, for old time's sake."

The thief's mouth twitches into a half-smile.

"This time I want to know the price before I take them."

She laughs and, pulling the hood back over her head, she leads Finn back to the bar.

It's chaos here—shattered glass and sticky, bubbly beer coating the floor—but to her surprise Hiran is not amidst a bloody brawl of fists and feet, but rather a gaggle of bellowing, singing men, his arms draped across the shoulders of two big, burly-looking sorts. They're... they're chanting a drinking song. Some man is gripping his forearm, and appears to be apologizing while trying to stuff a drink into his hand.

"It's nothing!" Hiran shouts, clapping the man on the shoulder and embracing him with a flash of that deadly smile. "It's all forgotten!"

And the crowd around them roars.

"They're all wasted," Finn notes.

"He better not be," Allayria answers. She pokes Finn in the side. "You go get him."

He glances back, but flounces off into the mess of sweat stains and sour breath.

He's so small she can't see, but Allayria thinks he must have reached Hiran by the sudden burst of noise and calamity.

"My brother!" Hiran shouts, pointing down, and then sweeping his hands out in a grand gesture. "My poor, crippled brother!"

There's much shouting about this now, and Allayria has no idea why Hiran would tell anyone that Finn is his brother, much less a crippled brother. They look nothing alike.

"No, I must go!" he's yelling now, "I'm the only one he has left, but I will miss you all, I will miss you all, my dear friends." He pulls out the moneybag Allayria gave him and throws it down on the table.

"The next round is on me!"

They are ushered out by the cheering of the crowd. Out in the cool air, Finn looks flabbergasted, his clothes all ruffled up and his hair flying in different directions. Hiran, on the other hand, tilts his head back, breathing the night air deeply as he runs a hand through his golden hair, smoothing it back.

"So did you get what we needed?" he asks casually, as if they are discussing the current weather.

"Yes," Allayria answers. "I know where we need to go."

"Excellent!" he slaps Finn's back and pulls his hood over his head. "Great job, team. We got everything we came for."

"And we left so inconspicuously," Allayria notes sardonically.

Hiran grins at her and shrugs.

"What can I say? People love me."

A/N: And who said there's no honor among thieves? My sass queen returns again to make a slightly subdued reappearance, feeling a bit torn between two opposing forces that are careening toward a clash.

You might recognize the header artwork this week as the much-sought little black book, discovered to both Allayria and the Cabal at the prodding of our light-fingered friend back in Paragon.

Lots of other throwbacks this chapter: Ben's quote is from the "Ode to a Jarles Uniform" chapter of Paragon, Keno pays for lifting some secrets (but not the excellent porter) in "The Things We Never Wanted to Know," and there are so many references in Paragon to the shitty beer at the Hanged Man that I'd be here all night if I listed them.