There were a lot of glum looks around the table for my second morning meeting.

“So,” Cloridan said, after Aubert and I had finished talking. “It really is demons, and there’s riots coming as well.”

Janie was looking a little hunted. “I need…”

“You can’t tell them, Janie,” I said. “Oath of secrecy, remember? Even if its going to get out eventually, it can’t be us that starts it.”

“My father will keep things from getting out of hand,” Aubert said. “He’s aware of the problem, and called in the levies.”

“I suspect they might be too busy dealing with the demons,” I mused.

“Unlikely,” Aubert scoffed. “For all the menace, they haven’t shown up since that one time.”

“Thats exactly why,” I said. “They’re biding their time, but for what? For the moment when your father is weakest.”

Cloridan cleared his throat. “Thats, uh, not what demons do.”

“I know,” I replied, “But these have been very unusual demons. Everyone says, they start out small, in some out of the way area, and then escalate.”

I looked over at Aubert, who’d given us the report from the Count’s soldiers. “Instead, we have one attack with a dozen demons, and then nothing.”

“It could be a mid-stage demonologist on the move,” Cloridan suggested.

“That would be good for us if it’s true, as it would mean they aren’t here any more,” I said, “But it doesn’t hold up. Where did they come from, where did they go?” There haven’t been any reports from the outlying areas, right?” I looked at Aubert again who nodded. “So there’s no one crying for help, no one complaining about having driven out a demon… they’ve come out of nowhere and disappeared.”

“We can’t go to my father with ‘they’re probably gone’,” Aubert countered. “He needs something more certain.”

“So we assume they’re still here,” I said. “Where does that leave us? With demons that don’t behave like demons, or who aren’t demons at all.”

“They weren’t ordinary monsters,” Aubert asserted. “The soldiers used [Identify] and got no results.”

“Does [Identify] work on illusions?” I asked. Everyone looked at me.

“You’re the [Illusionist],” Janie said.

I shrugged. “Never had to try,” I said, and used [Static Image] to produce a dagger on the table. Everyone looked at it.

“[Identify] tells me its a dagger,” Cloridan said, and the others agreed.

“Let me try something else,” I said, cancelling the illusion. I re-cast it, concentrating on the result I wanted.

An identical dagger appeared, and everyone looked confused. I took a look with the skill myself.

[Identification]: - (Illusion) - Call it what you want

“Do you guys see the Illusion tag?” I asked.

“No,” Janie said, “But its called ‘Call it what you want’, so I guess you can control what goes in there.”

“Now, lets try something else,” I said, casting [Disguise]. I turned my skin and clothes jet black and made a sort of black mist come off my skin.

“[Identify] isn’t going to give you anything on me, right?” I said. I made my voice sound like Darth Vader’s for kicks, and they all jumped.

“Ugh, thats creepy,” Janie said. “But yeah, that could be how they’re doing it.”

“Or,” I said, cancelling the illusion, “They could be a normal race that we don’t know about.”

“That seems unlikely?” Cloridan said. “We don’t get much foreign traffic these days, but these guys probably would have been contacted during the Empire’s era.”

I shrugged. “Maybe, but its a big world out there. The point is, there's at least two things it could be, and probably a third we haven’t thought of. Oh, and it could be very unusual demons.”

“So how does this help us?” Aubert said. “It seems to me we now know less than before.”

“Well, if we assume they’re acting according to a plan, then we can try to figure out what that plan is.”

“Based on one attack?” Aubert asked sceptically.

“Based on the results so far.” I said. “Which is your dad mobilising, and the incipient riots.”

“Given the timing, so close to the ball, should we assume that there's something planned for that date?”

“Could be,” I said.

“They can’t control when the riots start,” Aubert objected. “Thats going to depend on when the rumour gets out of control.”

“Ah, but they can control that, by spreading it themselves.” I countered. “Since the rumour is there already, you won’t be able to tell unwitting rumourmongering from deliberate seeding.”

“Lot of foreign nobility at the ball,” Janie said. “No Dukes, or other Counts, but their children, or representatives. An attack while they’re all there would make the Count look bad, even if it doesn’t succeed.”

“Could be an attempt at one of the guests,” Cloridan speculated. “Demons and riots to draw the guards away, leaving them free to make a targeted strike.”

“Father can just increase the guards to cover either of those possibilities.” Aubert said dismissively.

“Ah, but he can’t ignore a riot, can he?” I countered, “Or a demon attack. Even if he thinks its fake demons, its still real people behind them. Our adversary can drain his troops away with feints until he’s vulnerable to the real strike.”

“What do you suggest then,” Aubert said, eyes narrowed.

“Fill your father in with our speculation - I’m not going to tell him what to do. What we should do is what we were paid to do - eliminate the problem before the trap is sprung.”

“How?” Janie asked.

I considered. “They must have troops inside the city.” I said. “Either to pretend to be demons, or to conduct the actual strike. They can’t keep them completely hidden, right?”

“Unless they were smuggled in, they should have had their names and professions recorded as they entered,” Aubert said. “I can have recent entries reviewed.”

“There are actually a number of new faces in the Delver taverns,” Janie said. “The delver community is a good place to hide armed men in plain sight. I can check out just how many new people are around.”

“Which leaves the two of us to check out a suspicious warehouse I found.” I told Cloridan.

“You know I can’t just break in, don’t you?” Cloridan said, as we watched the warehouse in question from a safe distance. “I may have some skills that would help, but I’m not actually a criminal.”

“Thats disappointing,” I said, only half joking. “How would you suggest we find out whats going on in there then?”

“If we can find a place to camp out, we could keep a watch on it,” Cloridan said, looking around. “See who or what comes and goes…” he trailed off, then lightly grabbed my arm.

“Trouble,” he whispered. “Don’t look around, just head this way.” We headed off down the street, headed away from the river, and towards the better part of town.

“Whats going on?” I said in a low tone.

“Thieves guild was keeping a watch on the place, now they’re looking at us.”

“Thieves guild?” Part of my induction into the Iron-workers guild was a brief listing of the other guilds, informing me of which were fellow respectable tradesmen (Jewellers), and which were cut-rate swindlers (Blacksmiths). The Thieves guild hadn’t appeared on that list - but I suppose it wasn’t an official one.

“I’m not a member or anything, but if you’re a Rogue in Anchorbury, you need to know enough about them not to be dragged in. They’re the only ones going to be following someone via the rooftops.”

“So… we want to lose them?” I asked.

“That’d be ideal,” he whispered forcefully, “But they aren’t easy to lose.”

“Oh, please,” I said scornfully. Taking charge, I steered us into the nearest shop. It looked empty from the outside, and when we entered, I was pleased to see that there was only a single attendant and no customers. Perfect.

“My husband would like to look at your… hats,” I said, quickly ascertaining the contents of the store. I didn’t wait for the attendant to respond though, as I was already silent casting [Unseen Sound].

A crash of broken glass and ceramic came from the door leading to the back, and the man serving the store got a green look on his face.

“Excuse me for just one moment gentlepeople,” he said, and rushed to the back room.

Next was [Greater Invisibility], cast on Cloridan. “Right, you’re invisible, follow me back to the house.” I cast [Disguise] on myself, making sure to change to a visibly different dress. We then left the store before the man came back.

“Nod if you think it worked,” I said, as we got to a clear street and I could speak to the air without being overheard. He nodded, so we continued on.

“Well it means the building is definitely suspicious,” Cloridan said, back at our base.

“Do you think they’re watching it for the same reason we were?” I asked. “Are they going to rob whatever's there?”

“No. Well maybe, but they were interested in us.” Cloridan said. “People interested in the building. That means it was either one of theirs, or they were paid to watch out for it.”

“Eyepatch guy was shady looking enough to be in a Thieves guild,” I mused. “That would mean Guillaume was working with them on something. Although…” I paused for thought.

“What?” Cloridan asked obligingly.

“Guillaume went right into that house, no knock or anything. I thought it was his. If I was dealing with thieves, I wouldn’t leave one in my house while I made social calls. I think Eyepatch works for Guillaume… probably.”

“Well this puts paid to the surveillance idea.”

“I was thinking of hiring some kids to do stuff like that.”

“Not a bad idea,” Cloridan sighed, “But the guild have already thought of it. Any street kids you hire will probably work for them already.”

“I was thinking of Iron-worker guild orphans, actually.”

“Well… they’re probably more trustworthy. They’ll run into problems going around the city though, street kids have territories, and those guys probably don’t get to go outside their Quarter.”

“What, really?”

“Yeah,” he said, his eyes growing distant. “They don’t bother the adults, but any kids are fair game. You need to be able to fight, or make some accommodation with whatever gang you find yourself living in the territory of.”

“And do all the gangs report the Thieves guild?” I asked, fascinated.

“Just some. Those are the worst ones, since they have someone nasty to back them up if they get into trouble.”

“So either way we need to deal with the Thieves guild.”

“Not sure if you mean negotiate or ‘deal’ with them, but either one's a bad idea.” Cloridan said glumly. “Best idea is not to mess with them.”

“Just how tough are they?” I asked.

“Not so tough, in a stand up fight,” he admitted. “No one gets into thieving to do hard work. Mostly level threes or fours. Probably got a level five or two. They’re rumoured to have a Level 6 Assassin, but I doubt thats true.”

“Then-“ I started but he kept talking over me.

“Problem is, they won’t give a stand up fight. You manage to corner them, they’ll surrender, but you’ll never corner all of them. The rest will get you while you’re sleeping, bust the ones you caught out, and they all go right back to crimes.”

It took a long while to convince Cloridan to make the break-in. It was an exercise in not using [Persuasion] as well, since I didn’t want to force him into it. I managed to avoid turning it into a Social Contest at least, by keeping it light and not pressing my case.

The fact that he could go in under invisibility at night, and that he just had to see what was in there and not take anything helped a great deal. I was close by for backup, though I wasn’t sure what I’d do if something went wrong. Nothing did go wrong as far as I could tell. He went up the wall and in through the roof, lifting up tiles away from the line of sight of the watchers.

It wasn’t long before I saw the outline of his invisible form making its way back to me. I clapped him on the arm to let him know I was there, and then we headed back to base.