A Man of Experience

The wind whipped at the shutters as it ran through the cobbled streets. The wind was neither the end nor the beginning, but it was a beginning. Richard stepped out into the street pulling the hood of his cloak up over head, hiding his features. Two little lights glinted within his mysterious cowl. Few had looked into those glints, like cold distant stars, giving light but no warmth. Even fewer had lived to speak of those stars.

A cold rain had picked up, the wind forcing it into the faces of men and women walking the crowded street. Richard stalked the streets, waiting for the last light of day to plunge behind the horizon. The streets crisscrossed the city making it difficult for a man with less experience to find his way. Richard was not a man with less experience. An alley here, cutting through a shop there. Hopping a stone wall, crossing across a sewer exit. A man with less experience would say that it was impossible to follow the man in the hood, then again it was not men of less experience Richard worried about.

He found his mark a mere ten minutes after sunset. The palace was difficult to find, despite being large and ornately designed. Guests flooded the courtyard and even wound through the surrounding streets and intersections. Richard ignored the gate leading to the large courtyard and instead hoisted himself over the low wall surrounding it. He prowled through the well tended garden. A garden many argued was to well tended.

Richard pressed his hand against the cool stone of the palace’s west wing. His eyes scanning for a means of ascent. His eye was caught by a string of vines clinging to the wall, weaving their way up to an open window on the second floor. Richard couldn’t help but smile, despite knowing that no one could see it. ‘Perhaps…’ he thought ‘the queen had been to concerned with her garden. So concerned she had not even seen her own walls weakening.’ Richard climbed quickly, wasting no time. He pulled himself through the window masterfully, finding the room withing empty. The maps he had reviewed flashed through his memory. He knew exactly where to go.

The queen’s bed chamber was large and ornate. As was deemed necessary for a woman of her office. Richard scanned for the lock box his client had described to him. He found it quickly even in the dark. Striding towards it he pulled the key he had been given from a pouch on his belt. Turning the key gently he pulled the lock box open. Inside was a strange medallion with a large octagonal hole in the center. Richard couldn’t help but feel like a pawn in a larger game as he stuffed the object in another pocket on his belt. Richard heard the door knob turning, the door pushing open.

“A noise complaint? From up here?”

“I suppo…”

One swipe, then two. Two dead guards lay face down on the floor. A threatening message to the queen to be sure, but it was of no concern. It didn’t matter if the queen knew of the missing object or not. What did matter, is that she knew it was too late.