Chapter 1: The Sharessan
While this story is written in the Forgotten Realms fantasy setting, having no prior experience with said setting will not hinder your enjoyment and understanding of the story, plot and characters. Here's some boring stuff you probably already know and don't really have to read but i've got to write down.
Dear readers: This story features creative sex and violence; if this offends you, or if you're not legally eligible to read this material, do not continue.
Legal Disclaimer: This work is set in the Forgotten Realms setting owned by Wizards of the Coast. No copyright infringement is intended in the writing of this story, which may be considered fan fiction written for recreation instead of profit, as well as a parody. However much of the story, its plot, scenes and characters are the result of my creative input and thus copyrighted material i lay claim to.
Whew. With that out of the way, enjoy the story.
~valerisque
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Gazing high on night sky, Valeria admired the endless expanse of shimmering stars through emerald eyes. Tears of the moon, they hung ponderously upon a depthless canvas, meaningless motes of glory in sad eternity.
"Val! Stay alert! We're on a job." Kaitlyn, or just Kat, whispered harshly, her breath fuming in the chill of night.
"Keep your eyes on the road. The city watch should come around anytime now."
"You're just being silly. They won't see us. We could've been done with this part long ago if you weren't so jumpy." Val waved her hand dismissively.
"It can't hurt to be careful. Look, they're coming."
Peering round a corner, they watched the telltale glow of the night watch's approach. Their lantern's wavering white shone ghostly as the silhouettes of ten men waded through the wispy mist, their boots shuffling over the cobblestones. Closer, so their light stung the women's eyes, they were visibly armored head to toe, decorated with the regalia of the city watch, swords and bows in hand.
Clad in crimson mage robes, a utilitarian one-piece outfit many traveling wizards favored, Kat saw once more that the redhead's frivolous style showed through the partings of the robe high up her thigh and the low neckline. Val brushed her shoulder-length mane and then felt Kat press her by the shoulders into a shadowed alcove as the watchmen passed slowly but surely, oblivious to the hiding women.
In silence the duo hurried across the street, disembodied footsteps in the murky night. Their target was a noble's miniature castle, which even featured a drawbridge over a wide but shallow drain passing for a moat.
"How pretentious." Val remarked.
"Aye. Cast your spell now, we're going to have to climb in." They waded across the false moat.
Kat crouched to fish for her grappling rope from her tool bag slung at her side. Unlike the sorceress, she was attired for stealth, in all black leather breeches and vest, complete with a hood that covered her bright blonde bob. Seeing perfectly well thanks to Val's night vision spells, the world as clearly illuminated as if in bright daylight but in shades of black and white, she flung the grappling hook high and true, and it caught onto the wall with a grate of steel on stone. Meanwhile Val had already completed her castings with a flourish and a chant. To all but themselves, they were utterly invisible.
Kat took to the climb with natural agility, scaling the vertical stony wall with ease. Val followed slowly but surely. Passing a snoring guard they followed the spiral stairs down a watchtower back down to the ground. The statuette of a nude woman adorned a mossy central courtyard, vines having crept from the ground across her breasts and thighs.
The only way deeper into the noble's abode was a steely double door, bolted shut from the other side. Both girls could hear the gruff small talk of guardsmen on the other side.
"Can you teleport us over?"
"I've told you before. That only works when we're going someplace I know, someplace I've a mental image of. We don't want to end up in limbo."
"I know, but I was just hoping. We could climb over, but it'd make too much noise. The guards are too close."
"Let's just lure them out."
"Sure, I'd thought of that too, but then they'll be crawling all over the place looking for us. A noble this rich could have a wizard in employ too. Maybe you could dominate one of them?" Kat suggested an enchanting spell to leash the will of a sentient.
"I can't, I need a clear line of sight again. I'll summon something to distract them."
"Of course."
Kat and Val crowded snugly into a shadowed corner as Val waved her hands in mystic passes, muttering arcane words of power, the standard motions of spellcasting. When she'd finished a skeleton donning a rusty horned helm and a two-handed sword materialized with the clichéd puff of smoke.
"We're not supposed to harm anyone. This was supposed to be just sneaky. Make it drop the sword."
"Well I've never tried that before, but alright."
Directed by Val's will the undead creature tossed its sword aside and rapped naked knuckles on the locked steel double door. Val and Kat could hear the guard's rough responses.
"Uh, I hear sound. Loud sound on door."
"That's called knocking you dumb dolt. Go get it." The women shared a look and Val rolled her eyes. The guardsman flung the doors open to be greeted by the sight of a standing skeleton tipping its helm.
"Dead man! Dead man at door!" He bolted off, scared more witless than usual.
"Prepare to taste steel undead scum." The worldlier guardsman's sword unsheathed with a short rasp and he was up and after the undead creature, which Val had set running in circles around the statuette. The guard called out to his companions who promptly stomped into the courtyard. At that point, the duo snuck away, their footsteps muffled by the moss.
The double doors led into the posh interior of the noble home, the corridors lined with plush carpet. Just past the doors lay a table of ruffled cards, the guards' nighttime pastime. They paused some way around a corner.
"I know a spell to sense scrolls. Useful for us mages to find spell scrolls. It'll detect the tomes in the study." Val whispered. Kat nodded, and Val cast it with a flourish of her left hand and an arcane word. Val then led Kat briskly through the carpeted corridors, passing any number of doors in the oversized home, stopping at the one to the study.
"This is it?"
"Sure. There's a concentration of scrolls and books in here."
Kat was a member of the Silent Network, a guild of rogues in the city of Raven's Bluff that focused on collecting information for well-paying clients without actually stealing anything. Kat had been tasked with sneaking into this place, finding the noble's business records, and making a copy for the client.
Kat plucked her lock picks from her utility belt and crouched to fiddle with the lock, which turned out to be of a standard variety, and Kat's practiced fingers made short work of it. They entered the study room and locked the door shut. The sparsely decorated small room probably reflected the noble's typical disregard for what the room stood for. Beside a dusty table, the books on the first of three shelves appeared to be gem-crafting manuals, while those on the second seemed labeled in some foreign script. Fortunately the third shelf held the tome 'Records'. Kat crouched and slowly tugged the desired tome from the shelf.
"Hurry, open the book and put it on the desk, any page." Val whispered, and Kat eagerly complied. Placing her left palm flat on the record book, and her right on an opened blank book she'd brought along, she whispered the words to a spell to copy the records. Scant seconds later, Val was done, stuffing her copy of the records into the sleeve of her robes. Replacing the original, Val gripped Kat on her shoulder, and muttered something. Before she knew it, they were back outside the mini-castle where they started, under the starlit sky.
"That's got to be the most useful spell you know, Val." Kat remarked as she recovered her grapple rope. Val's dimension door was very useful for extracting them from any hazardous situations. The cobblestones rang with seemingly disembodied footsteps as they left the crime scene.
* * *
Winding their way through the veritable maze of streets, the duo found themselves once again in the closest place the Network had to a guild headquarters – the Crescent Moon Inn, and Val dispelled the invisibility as a courtesy. The simple taproom's most eye-catching feature was a huge stone fireplace that rose from the floor like an aged redwood with numerous warming shelves, linked to the floor by winding rail-less staircases.
Karl was the leader of Kat's cell. The Silent Network worked in cells, or operative groups, with each cell never knowing what any other was up to, for confidentiality. The women found him in his room, poring over scraps and pieces of parchment. With a thin, gaunt face and bony forearms, he looked the part of an impoverished scholar.
"I've found the record book and made a copy." Kat handed it to him.
"Well done. You'll be paid as usual. You may leave." His voice kept in a strict monotone; he never looked up from his scrolls, even as he took the records from Kat, with the air of curt professionalism that Kat had come to expect.
"Well. That's a bookworm if ever I saw one." Val remarked, once well out of Karl's earshot.
"You might never know; he could be a mage like you. Weird."
"I'm not weird! Drinks are on you this time."
