There wasn't much to do once I was taken back to my cell. The Prince hadn't posted anyone to watch me, so there was nobody to talk to, nothing around that provided a distraction.

Despite being a fairly social creature, solitary confinement has never bothered me much. Then again, once you've lived through a two-year quarantine with nothing but books and your family's graves to keep you company, spending a couple of days inside a jail cell is pretty much a walk in the park.

And so I spent most of my time relaxing, just enjoying the peace and quiet associated with having nobody around all day long. The only interruption came around mid-afternoon, when one of the palace's prison guards came around with my rations for the day.

Prisoner rations, he told me, were identical to the rations that were served to the rest of the palace knights. Today's dinner turned out to be a tragic affair consisting of a rock-hard wafer of black travel bread, a decanter of water, a thumb-cup of rose hip jelly, and a stew made of salt pork, cheese, corn, and white beans, all of which had been cooked together in the same pot to save time. Despite my better judgment, I actually tried a bit of the stew.

I really need to trust my better judgment more often. I mean, I'd heard that Crown Knights were a hardy bunch, but really, I had no idea they were that hardy.

Eventually I shoved most of my 'dinner' into an unoccupied corner of my cell where it wouldn't hurt anyone, and then stretched out on the floor, trying to get comfortable. When I wasn't napping I was staring up at the ceiling, recalling everything I could about my audience with Tenarreau, making certain I hadn't missed anything.

Aside from my periodic whistling, the hours passed in perfect silence. The shadows from my barred window lengthened, cast interesting patterns across the floor, crept over to the far wall of my cell in order to make even more interesting patterns on the bars opposite the window, and then disappeared entirely as night fell. The whole thing was kind of poetic.

When I finally estimated the time to be around twelve bells, I got to my feet, spent about ten minutes or so stretching, and then got to work.

The first thing I did was stare at the stone wall and consider my options. I had seven caches of tools for breaking out of my cell - five hidden in various places inside my cell, and two just outside of it but well within reach. I'd smuggled them inside the night I was arrested, because I'd discovered long ago that being locked up in a jail cell is a much more tolerable experience when you know you can leave it whenever you like.

My eyes fell on the long, nearly invisible strip of material that was wedged up along the floor where it met the wall, which had been part of my cloak trim until very recently. When folded in half, it became as sturdy as an inch-thick wooden pole, and was long enough allow me to reach my cell's outer lock, located about two feet beyond my reach. If I combined that with the explosive putty that was currently masquerading as a large gemstone in my cloak brooch, I could easily disable the locking mechanism and open my cell doors. The only problem with that solution was that it was messy and permanent - the lock for my cell would be useless afterward. That wouldn't be a problem if I were merely trying to escape, but the guards had to find me here the next morning, sitting in my cell, as if nothing unusual or out of the ordinary was going on.

See, the plan wasn't to break out of jail. Not exactly.

Think about it - if the guards came in the next morning and discovered an empty cell, I'd probably just find myself in even more trouble with Tenarreau. And besides, where could I go if I did break out? It wasn't like I could just pack up Tucat Keep and leave Harael, was it?

No, they had to find me waiting patiently in my cell, like I'd never left. Which of course meant breaking out, then breaking back in, all without leaving a trace. Destroying the lock would be done as a last-resort sort of emergency only. So, one option down, several to go.

Eventually, I decided on which exit strategy to use and began gathering the necessary elements. The hidden bundle containing my climbing spikes was easy enough to locate, but the other cache of items I needed turned out to be so well hidden that I had to count bricks along the wall just to find it again. Once found, I pulled the loose brick out of the wall and retrieved the small pouch that I'd stashed behind it. I emptied the contents of the pouch into my free hand - a few coils of metal ribbon, a small vial of a gel-like substance, and a nondescript grey lump of putty.

Whistling cheerfully, I put the lump of putty into a pocket and hopped over to the cell bars on the side nearest the window. Then, after measuring the bars and doing some quick mental calculations, I uncorked the vial of gel and began carefully applying its contents around the top and bottom of one of the sturdier-looking bars. That done, I re-corked the vial, put it in a different pocket, and began winding one of the pieces of metal ribbon around the bar and overtop the gel I'd just applied. I could feel heat radiating from my work by the time I was done wrapping the bottom of the bar. By the time I was halfway into wrapping the top with a second piece of ribbon, I could see and smell smoke coming off the first one.

Once I'd finished the task of wrapping the bars, I retreated a safe distance and just stood there, watching.

Within about five minutes there was a soft, steady hissing noise, and could see thin gobbets of glowing metal slag trickling down the hot metal bar and pooling on the stone floor underneath it. The unmistakeable smell of molten metal filled the room, but with the window being so close it would only linger for a few hours or so.

Once the hissing had died down and I'd judged enough time had passed, I retrieved my gloves from a pocket and loosely wrapped them around the middle of the bar, allowing me to grab it without scorching my fingers on the hot metal. Then I gave the whole thing a short, sharp yank. At that precise moment I gave a very loud cough as well, just in case someone was listening nearby.

The bar snapped free in my hand with a 'tang', both ends of it still glowing a dull reddish color. I placed it carefully on the cold stone floor to give it a chance to cool off, then took the decanter and began splashing water on the top and bottom edges of my new escape-hole, which produced some light hissing and the occasional plume of steam. I continued doing this until the two broken segments of bar were wet and no longer steaming, at which point I did the same to the piece of bar on the floor.

It wasn't strictly necessary I cool off the metal first - if I went through headfirst with my shoulders on a bit of a diagonal, I could have probably cleared the heated metal edges quite handily. Still, why risk burning yourself if you don't have to?

I retrieved a few more things from various other hiding places and secured them on my person, still whistling cheerfully. A couple of minutes later I was standing on the other side of the bars of the cell, assessing the damage I'd done to my cage with a critical eye.

The slag on the stone floor could be covered with some mortar dust and stone chips, and the melted metal on the bar I'd removed probably wouldn't be too obvious once it had cooled. All I really needed to do was to put the bar back into place, apply some putty to hold it there, use a little more to smooth out the imperfections along the cut lines and make it appear as a single, unbroken bar, and voila . . . I'd have a reusable and nearly undetectable way of getting in and out of my cell.

I rolled up the sleeve of my shirt far enough to reveal the nearly invisible white-thread-on-white-linen map of the palace hallways that I'd stitched on it, and I inspected the layout. Sadly, I couldn't simply take the hallway that led directly to where I needed to go, as I could remember spying two guard checkpoints between where I was and where I needed to be. I looked at my possible options and selected the best one.

Once I had my bearings and was satisfied that no guards had been posted immediately outside of the room, I headed out through the main doors and into the well-lit main corridor. I turned left, walked on the left side of the carpet for a few dozen feet, then turned left again, making my way over to the area that held the living quarters for guards that worked the evening shift. I didn't encounter anybody in the hallways on my way there, and when I arrived I found the door not only unlocked, but wide open as well. I quickly peeked inside. Nobody around.

Here's the really interesting thing about palace security - it's ridiculously good and ridiculously bad all at the same time.

See, the security around the perimeter of the palace is unbelievably good. It's jam-packed with lethal traps, vicious animals, sensitive movement alarms, and has hallway checkpoints staffed by Crown Knights armed to the teeth with all manner of sharp, pointy things that are bad for your health. It's ridiculously hard to circumvent, is more or less what I'm trying to get at here. It's so good, in fact, that once you've actually made it past these various safeguards and are inside these heavily secured areas, everyone just sort of figures you must belong there.

And so, breaking into the palace? Impossibly hard. Getting out? Nearly as difficult. Going from one secure location of the palace to another when both places are located inside of its fiercely-guarded perimeter? It's so easy, it's a joke.

Still whistling quietly to myself, I walked into the cool, empty guard-room and looked around. I located a palace guard uniform in practically no time at all and tried it on. It ended up being too loose, so I hunted around for another few minutes until I found one that was a passable fit. I put it on, tied my hair back, and inspected myself briefly in the large, shiny metal mirror located near the door.

There's probably a very good reason why the phrase "As stylish as a guardsman's uniform" has never caught on . . .

Once I was done inspecting myself, I slipped my hands into my climbing spikes, and carefully left the guard quarters via one of the nearby open windows.

It was about eighty feet above the ground . . . or what little ground existed between the palace wall and the ocean. There was a light Autumn breeze outside, and it was mostly cloud-free. The view was spectacular. Both moons were nearly full and high in the sky, reflecting off the sea waves and providing enough light that I could easily make out the features of the stonework that made up the exterior palace wall. The smooth, massive stone bricks were both fitted together snugly and almost perfectly vertical, a combination of factors that made climbing the rest of the way up this two-hundred-foot high wall an insanely risky proposition.

Thank goodness I wasn't actually planning on climbing up it . . .

I stepped carefully onto the four-inch seam of rock that formed a passable ledge, which was located a couple of feet underneath the window. It continued along the outside wall to several of the other windows that were now in view, and in fact went around the entire perimeter of the building. Not many people knew of this ledge, and the very few who did know about it often argued over whether it was a mistake made by the palace architect, or if it was an intentional design feature. All I know with any degree of certainty is that there's no mention of the ledge in the original building plans, which could be why nobody at the palace has ever addressed the issue of its existence.

I could hear the ocean waves crashing against the spear-like slivers of rocks that made up the shoreline far, far below me. I looked down.

Then again, maybe the reason why this seam of rock was still there is that people thought nobody'd be crazy enough to try walking on it.

I slowly shimmied along the wall about an inch at a time, pressed up against the stone as closely as I could manage, attempting to ignore the fact that I was six stories up in the air with nothing but jagged rocks and rolling surf below me. My climbing spikes couldn't hook onto enough stone for me to pull myself up or attempt climbing, but they gave me enough of a grip on the wall to keep me from falling backwards as I crawled forward along my narrow precipice.

I had to remind myself to keep a slow, steady pace every time I felt like speeding up. If this were a regular burgling I'd have all sorts of little tricks on my person that I could use to ensure I wouldn't fall to my death. Not the case here.

Left foot, right foot. Left foot, right foot. Remember to breathe.

"It'll all be fine," I whispered. "Just don't look down, Vince."

After ten minutes or so of this, I arrived at the window I'd wanted and allowed myself a quiet, celebratory sigh of relief. I also tried not to think about the fact that I was just going to have to make the exact same perilously dangerous trip back in about an hour or so.

I peered through the pane of glass and into the room that served as the living quarters for several guardsmen. There was no specific light source, but the night sky was bright enough for me to make out most of the room interior. Unlike the one I'd just left behind me, this room was for guardsmen who worked the day shift.

Also unlike the one I'd just left, this room had at least a dozen sleeping Crown Knights in it.

There are people who, for whatever reason, get extremely nervous when attempting to sneak past people who are sleeping. That doesn't make much sense to me - it seems that sneaking past someone who's awake should be far more stressful. Then again, when I'm breaking in to someplace in the dead of night I'm usually in possession of one or two things that will put someone back to sleep fairly quickly in the event they do wake up, so that could be the reason why I think like that.

Still, I could hear some fairly loud snoring from inside, so I probably didn't have to worry about noise waking them up.

Just then, it occurred to me to wonder if I snored.

Scanning the rows of sleeping knights on the other side of the glass, I reminded myself to be extra quiet. The charges against me had been dropped, true, but getting caught breaking out of my cell and wandering around the royal barracks probably would likely bring several new charges that might prove inconvenient.

I spent a few minutes working the window open, keeping my movements slow and careful. Once that was done I took a quick breath, crawled into the room through the window, and lowered myself gently onto a guardsman's equipment trunk that was located below it.

I looked around. Aside from the pair of loud snores coming from two separate bunks, nothing stirred. So far, so good.

Holding my breath, I carefully closed the window behind me and stepped down onto the stone floor. I quickly located the exit that led to the hallway I needed to get to, and I crept cautiously towards it.

Halfway there, I noticed one sleeping guardsman was drooling onto his pillow. I stifled a chuckle.

Easy as pie, I thought to myself.

At which point, I guess the god of fate decided I might be getting a little too cocky.

Mid-step, I heard the snore nearest me cut off abruptly.

"Nnnthgk? Wha? Whozzat?" a quiet, bleary voice called out from behind me and to my left.

I froze.

Seconds ticked away in uncomfortable silence.

"Who's there?" the voice asked again, sounding much more awake than the first time. I heard the rustling of bedding being shifted.

Heart pounding in my chest, I thought furiously.

"Bethany?" I called out in a whisper. "Beth, are you ready? We've only got a couple of hours!"

A few moments later there was a disgusted-sounding groan, followed by the sound of someone adjusting their pillow and trying to find another comfortable position to lie in.

"Wrong quarters, asshole," the voice muttered. "Women's is other side of armory."

"What? Oh . . . geeze!" I whispered apologetically. "I'm sorry! I must have got turned around at-"

"Just shut up and leave, will you?"

"Right. I . . . sorry!" I said, backing away from him, towards the exit.

Once I was out in the hallway, I breathed a sigh of relief. It took a few moments to compose myself, glad that he appeared to have bought my impromptu 'bumbling guardsman midnight romance' narrative. I'd heard fraternizing between guardsman wasn't exactly uncommon, but ad-libbing something like that out if thin air had been hugely risky. If I'd used a name he recognized, he might have become interested enough to become fully awake.

I rolled up the cuff of the guardsman jacket and inspected the map on my shirt sleeve once more. Then I took a deep breath, turned left, and casually walked down the hallway, making as if I owned the place.

There's a trick to not being noticed, if you don't already know. And I'm not talking about not being seen, either - that's a different sort of trick entirely. I mean, anyone can hide, right? Not everyone can allow themselves to be in plain view and still be unnoticeable. The differences between the two activities are legion.

See, while hiding simply requires a good hiding spot and a willingness to remain still, not being noticed requires reasonably steady nerves, a quick mind, and a very good stone face. The important thing to remember is that you're not actually trying to blend in with your environment - you're projecting the idea that you belong there in the first place.

For example, simply walking down a hallway you shouldn't be in while silently praying that people don't notice you is one of the quickest ways to get noticed. Anyone who runs into you can't help but pick up on the dozens of small things you're doing that practically scream the words 'I'm not really here, please don't notice me'.

However, busy people who feel they belong someplace tend to ignore other busy people tiredly, or scowl at them, or almost walk into them, or dozens of other actions that all say 'I'm busy. What I'm doing is important, and you're not.' That's the kind of person you want to be in these situations.

It helps if you've actually got something important to do, because you can tap into that energy and project it at people. It's a different kind of stealth entirely, where keeping your eyes on the floor makes you more memorable, and a tired, confident assertiveness allows you to be forgotten instantly.

Get good enough at it, and when you're roaming around a strange place you can actually give people a look that makes them wonder if they're the ones who are someplace they shouldn't be.

So when I rounded the second hallway corner and encountered a bored looking sweeper cleaning stone tiles, rather than attempt to walk past him unnoticed, I decided to ask him something I wanted to know.

"Hey," I called out tiredly, striding right up to the short, nondescript fellow. "Do you know if there's any cooks in the mess hall right now?"

He stopped sweeping for a moment and gave me a tired look, like he was trying to convey the fact that I'd just added another superhuman task to his ever-growing 'to-do' list.

"Haven't been that way a while," he said, leaning on his broom.

I sighed frustratedly. "Guy can't work without snacks and his special tea. 'Not that tea, but the other kind. With that stuff on top.' I swear, I should have learned my cyphers, become a scribe."

His expression softened, and he chuckled.

"Yeah, they got the life, neh? Hey, look at me . . . I can push ink around on a piece of paper."

"Heh. You said it," I said.

The fellow cocked his head to one side and gave me a curious look.

"Why you coming from that way?" he asked, hooking his thumb over his shoulder. "Most of the scribes are over yonder."

Argh.

This is where having a 'quick mind' enters into it.

"Well," I said smoothly, chuckling softly, "I don't know if you've ever had a scribe 'demand' you go find him some tea, but it's the strangest thing - I suddenly remembered a bunch of other stuff I had to do first."

He grinned at that and gave me a quick bob of his head. I nodded back, smiled, and continued on my way, hands in my pockets, whistling and making a show of walking slowly. His quiet chuckle was followed by the equally slow, soft sounds of a broom being pushed over stone tile.

The only other people I encountered en route to the mess hall was a fellow who was too busy polishing a brass torch-holder to look my way, and a chambermaid in a well-pressed dress who curtsied when she saw me. I offered a quick bow in return, and smiled at her in an overly friendly manner as we walked past each other. She didn't even hold my gaze for a two-count before blushing, lowering her eyes and continuing on her way.

There were three guardsmen in the mess hall itself, all standing next to a table near the kitchen entrance and talking quietly to each other. All three turned and looked at me at the same time.

"Ave," I said tiredly, giving them the sloppiest salute I could.

"Ave," the tallest of the three said, quickly tapping two fingers to his brow and sketching a salute that was easily twice as sloppy as mine had been. The other two simply nodded as I walked over to them.

"Any tea about?" I asked.

"Brewed not five minutes ago," the youngest-looking of them said.

"Any good?"

"Standard issue vimroot and chicory," said the beard-sporting fellow. "Just like mom used to make."

I sighed. "That bad?"

"Worse," chuckled youngest-guy.

"Puts hair on your chest," tall-guy said.

"You know, I always wondered about mom's chest-hair," I grinned.

The three of them guffawed quietly. I got a cup and saucer, and poured it full of tea from the nearby pot. It actually smelled quite good, I thought. Then again, I also hadn't eaten anything all day.

"Workin' late?" bearded-guy asked me. "Didn't have time to change?"

Giving him a blank look would probably be the worst thing I could do under the circumstances. I was playing up the fact that this was routine to me, so being confused by what was probably a casual comment could potentially make these guards suspicious. So, instead, I kept my attention on the tea container I was putting back on the table and said, "Sorry, what?"

"Your jacket. Bristle-butt'll have your pips if he catches you running around in that at this hour."

I looked at my guardsman jacket, then looked at the ones being worn by the guardsmen in front of me. There was a slight difference in both cut and color.

I thought quickly and furiously.

'Have your pips' . . . demotion . . . someone in authority. Bristle-butt. Boars had bristles . . .

Borshank. He might still be around. Crap.

The jacket I was wearing was identical to what was worn by the guardsmen who'd escorted me that morning, I was sure of it. Was this uniform specific to a certain area? No, it looked the same as all the other guard uniforms I'd seen, regardless of the area they were in. These fellows were night-shift, obviously, but so was the guardsman I'd lifted this jacket from, because the guard room had been empty, and-

Night shift.

They were on duty, and wearing their night uniforms. I'd stolen one of the night-shift guard's daytime uniforms.

Widening my eyes slightly, I gave them a look of concern that wasn't entirely feigned.

"He's still around?" I asked urgently. "Gods, what time is it? I'd completely lost track!"

Tall-guy's eyes softened a little. "Oh, I wouldn't worry about the preceptor - I haven't seen him since eleven bells. He was hanging around late tonight for some reason, dunno why. Still, you'd probably be wise to hurry back to barracks and get changed."

"I'll do that . . . just got an errand to run first." I motioned at the cup of tea I held. "I'll be glad when things get back to normal around here. I didn't sign up for this so I could be some scribe's personal lackey."

"Well, the good news is that we can expect things to settle down in a couple of weeks, or even days," bearded-guy said, shrugging one shoulder. "That's what I've heard, anyways."

Indeed?

"Oh? Why's that?"

"Don't know, really. Just heard today that things would be settling down. Something about that one Lord who attended court this morning."

I nodded as though I was satisfied by that answer, then I gestured to my uniform. "Thanks again for the heads up. Safe night, fellas."

"See you," said tall-guy and youngest-guy simultaneously. Bearded-guy nodded solemnly at me.

I casually walked out of the mess hall with my tea, turned right, walked a few paces, and, after a quick check of the map on my sleeve to see where I was, I proceeded to walk down the hallway.

So, the guards and everyone else figured things would be back to normal soon, did they? Not if I had anything to say about it . . .

Almost five minutes later, I'd arrived at my destination - an important-looking wooden door that led to the Hall of Records.

Armed with my cup of tea, I gave the door two quick knocks before opening it slightly. I peered in and whispered, "Hello?"

Several oil lamps were lit, illuminating dozens upon dozens of old, antiquated writing desks and workstations, all of which bore signs of use. Everywhere you looked there was parchment, ink wells, drying sand, and other scribe-related whatnot. Nobody appeared to be working this late - all of the chairs were empty.

Well, I guess Borshank actually did know a good scribe after all. I'd been half expecting to find a frazzled scribe still doggedly working on the precept he was rewriting from scratch. Not an easy task, considering all of the fancy flourishes and calligraphic work most Crown precepts merited.

On the plus side, I could now drink the cup of tea myself instead of drugging it and offering it to some hard-working scribe. I took a quick sip. Hearty and strong, the kind that could keep you up and alert for hours. Good thing I'd thought to nap earlier.

I spotted a very large, important-looking desk near the center of the room - a desk that may as well have borne the words 'very important stuff gets penned here'. On it lay an elaborate scroll case, as well as a brand new re-written precept that had been left unrolled so that the gold-flecked drying sand might be allowed to set firmly with the ink as it dried. The prince was right - this was one of the bigger ones. The parchment was nearly five feet long, and a foot and a half wide.

Inspecting it closer, I whistled in appreciation.

Having penned several book pages myself, it wasn't hard to appreciate the effort that had gone into this particular document. There was a precise, even border of space that ran along the edges of the parchment, the ends of the words aligning themselves perfectly to it on both the left and right. Whenever I'm writing, the right-hand side always seems to form a bit of a ragged edge, since the words I use never seem to fit perfectly on the lines of text they're on. Lining them up to the edge like this had to have been devilishly difficult.

The ink had almost completely dried, too. It looked just about ready to be rolled up and tucked away into the elaborately embossed scroll case that lay on the table less than a foot away.

Taking another sip of my tea, I allowed my eyes to linger over the document for a little while longer before inspecting the scroll case, and then the contents of the desk. Once I'd found what I was looking for, I took another look at the magnificent piece of parchment.

Flourishes and detailed drawing around the first letter of each sub-section. Different colored inks. Deliberate hatching for shaded areas, none of that sloppy, sketchy stuff. The first word of one section began with the letter 'T', which the scribe had somehow transformed into a detailed picture of a tree. Magnificent.

Truly, this legal document had been a labor of love.

"Pity," I said aloud.

I carefully put down my cup and saucer on the desk, and picked up the very sharp-looking trimming knife next to it.