As confounded as he might seem to an outside observer, Malden was in his element. This was what he had been born for, he now knew. There were two kinds of thieves in the world, in his experience. There were those who turned to crime because they wanted money and they didn’t want to work for it. Those were the kind of thieves who ended up very quickly swinging from a rope. The other kind were the sort for whom a perfectly planned burglary was a labor of love—a work, in fact, of art. The planning, the considering of angles, the second-guessing of one’s own abilities and of one’s opponents’ motivations, the sudden inspirations that made the impossible seem, at least in theory, possible—these were what drew Malden to his profession, and in a way, he was quite happy poring over his maps.

Then again, perhaps he was just glad that for all of a day no one tried to kill him, or chase him across the rooftops, or threaten him with baneful sorcery. It was a nice change of pace.

The day fled, and night came all too soon. For hours he’d been thinking through every angle of his plan without bothering to rest or even eat. Now he took a pickled fish from a pot and chewed on its cold flesh without even tasting it. “Tomorrow morning,” he said, “we’ll have four days until Ladymas. I’d like to get this done as quickly as possible. We don’t know what will come in the next few days. Anselm Vry might have tricks up his sleeve still. Hazoth might be aware already of our scheming, and be taking steps to forestall us. So it behooves us to get it done soon, rather than later.”

“Agreed, lad, yet ye mustn’t rush,” Kemper said. He had his deck of cards in his hands and he was rubbing each one with his thumb, which he said always brought him good luck. “That’s been the endin’ o’ more thieves. This’ll be hard enough.”