He slipped off one glove, and felt along the floorboards for the tell-tale crack that would show him where the edge of the lid was, and whatever sort of mechanism there was to lock it shut.

He was the last of the old lot; Deek had undergone an unexpected growth spurt that turned him into a young giant and made his intended occupation of house thief entirely impractical. He served as a guard for a traveling gem merchant now—who better to watch for thieves than a former pickpocket? Last Skif had heard, he was on his way to Kata’shin’a’in.

Raf had gotten caught, and was currently serving out his sentence on the Border with Karse, for he’d made the mistake of getting caught with his hand on the pouch of a Great Lord.

Lyle had given up thievery altogether, but only because he’d fallen in love instead. He’d gone head over heels with a farmer’s daughter one Fair Day in the cattle market, and she with him, and over the course of six weeks had managed to charm her old father into consenting to marriage. Lyle had taken to country life as if he’d been born to it, which amazed all of them, Lyle himself not the least.

Bazie had gotten two new boys just before Lyle fell to the love-god’s arrows, and it was left to him and Skif to train them up. That was why Skif was going for a big stake now; the boys weren’t up to the lifting lay yet, and only one was adequate at swiping things out of laundries. Skif had the feeling that Bazie had taken them more out of pity than anything else; Lyle had brought them in after finding them scouring the riverbanks—mudlarking—for anything they could salvage. Thin, malnourished, and as ignorant as a couple of savages, even Bazie wasn’t about to try and pound reading, writing, and reckoning lessons into them. That fell on the head of some poor priest at the nearest temple.

Skif traced the last line of the lid of the safe-cupboard and found the keyhole easily enough. No one had made any effort to hide it, and he slid his lock pick out of a slit pocket in his belt and went to work by touch.

Before very long, he knew for a fact that Kalink had been cheated, for this was the cheapest lock he had ever come across in a fancy house. It wasn’t the work of more than a few moments to tickle it open, and ease the lid of the safe-cupboard open.

With the lid resting safely on the floor, Skif reached into the cupboard and began lifting out heavy little jewel cases, placing them on the floor until he had emptied the cupboard. What he wanted was gold and silver.