Ficbit: Undercover

Talid glowered at the half-full tavern, muttering a few obscenities as he levered himself up onto the less-than-clean bar. He hated this part of his job, especially when the "customers" couldn't bother to clean up their establishments, at least to the point where he didn't stick to whatever surface he ended up standing on.

It was really obnoxious that spell circles worked best out of reach and that most people knew that, since more often than not that meant he had to stand on something or contort himself in unnatural ways to mark the circle against whatever surface he was applying it to.

In this case, he was ostensibly spelling the ramshackle tavern to be better insulated against the winter winds. It was an extensive and therefore expensive spell. Talid was doing it for cheap, but the woman who owned the bar shouldn't have been able to afford it, even done cheap.

Skirting a few abandoned, mostly-empty wooden cups that should probably be burned rather than used again, Talid approached the wall the bar butted up against. Loise—the tavern owner—was watching him, he knew, but Talid ignored her, focusing on the wall where he'd be working. Brushing away dirt and dust and who knew what else, Talid scowled because Loise hadn't even bothered to have the wall cleaned, and he'd told her where he'd be casting.

Not that it really mattered, Talid conceded, since he wasn't going to be actually casting the insulating spell, but it was the principle of the thing. Pulling out his chalk case, Talid popped it open and picked out one of the most worn pieces of chalk. It'd have to be thrown away after being used on this wall, and Talid wasn't going to waste a full, new piece of chalk on this dingy wall.

Brushing the wall down again, this time with his sleeve, Talid scowled but finally gave up on it getting any cleaner. He studied the wall for a moment before beginning to sketch out the circle slowly, dragging it out because he didn't know how long it would take before he got the signal to move.

The noise of the tavern patrons was a low murmur behind him, but he paid it as much attention as he did to sketching out the circle. This tavern had the worst reputation in the area, and he didn't want to get caught in a bar fight simply because he wasn't paying attention. That would just make everything more complicated.

He'd only barely gotten the circle drawn out when the caterwauling began. Talid scowled, making a note to kill Piate for suggesting that song in particular as the signal—it was a love song, stupid and soppy and overly dramatic, and Talid hated it for its prose as much as he did the unnecessary high notes. The wannabe bard hit one of those high notes, badly, and Talid pressed the stub of chalk too hard against the wall, snapping it in half.

That singing was probably most of the reason this place was half-empty at this time of night, Talid thought, and while it was a good thing the tavern was less crowded, he'd much prefer to keep his ears intact.

Talid scowled at the useless stub of chalk he held—too short to do anything with. Stooping to retrieve the other end of the chalk from where it had clattered against the bar, Talid brought himself face-to-face with Loise.

She was a handsome enough woman, not pretty, and she'd look much better if she smiled instead of squinting at everyone and everything suspiciously. She wasn't slender, but she wasn't stocky, but a nice middle ground that gave her some heft without much stoutness. She also, stupidly with the reputation her tavern had, wore more jewels than most of the nobles Talid had met in his lifetime.

Though perhaps it wasn't so stupid, considering that most of those jewels held complicated spells that only she could set off. She wasn't a mage and so the spells had to be expensive, since weaving a trigger into a spell with Civomic was incredibly tricky and more often than not made the spells unstable enough they could go off at any point, triggered or not.

"Having trouble?" She asked idly, never blinking as she stared up at him with narrowed eyes. She scooped up the broken bit of chalk, but made no move to return it.

"Your singer is terrible," Talid said flatly, deliberately dropping the stub of chalk he still held on her bar.

"He's got other talents," Loise said, smirking in a way that made Talid want a bath, moreso than the dingy surroundings of the tavern already did.

Glancing over to where the singer was sitting by the hearth, just wrapping up his song, Talid had to concede that he certainly looked pretty enough tonight to make up for his abysmal singing. The singer winked at them, but Talid just rolled his eyes, standing up and fishing out his chalk case for another piece of chalk.

"It's going to take a while," Talid said, trying and probably failing to keep his tone neutral. "Like I said last week, it would have been easier to do during the day, when you have fewer customers—"

"Just do it and stop bitching," Loise said shortly, collecting the other half of his broken chalk. "Else I'll cut your pay in half."

"Yeah, yeah," Talid muttered, picking out another piece of chalk and turning his back on her to face the wall again.

Loise wouldn't let anyone in during the day; not messengers, not early deliveries of tavern supplies, nothing. That was also when she shuttered all the windows in the place and kicked out everyone but the indentured servants, who legally couldn't speak out against her.

She was their forger, Talid was sure of it, even though he hadn't seen any concrete evidence to that effect. Piate had the evidence, thankfully, so they could finally wrap up this month-long affair and get back to their normal jobs.

Talid added a few more whirls and pretty symbols before deciding it was good enough. Stepping back slightly, Talid glared at the circle, pretending to inspect it for flaws. Loise didn't like mages; she didn't understand Civomic so the casting set her on edge, so she'd be watching him. Nodding after a moment, Talid tucked the chalk away, pleased when the caterwauling from across the room faded away, replaced by a barely-competent lute song.

Talid took a deep breath, forcing his gaze to remain on the spell circle, and then started to chant, speaking the Civomic words rapidly so that it would be harder to pick out the intent of the spell. He was pretty certain that Loise didn't know any Civomic, but he'd rather be safe than sorry in case she could pick out some of the spell words.

Finishing the spell quickly, Talid only barely managed to jump down from the bar instead of falling from it when Loise lunged at him.

"What did you do?" she shrieked, hitting a higher note than the terrible singer had hit earlier. Talid straightened up slowly, wincing as his knees ached in protest. He was getting too old for this.

"Cast a spell," Talid said shortly, because really was obvious, wasn't it? Most of the tavern's patrons were thankfully taking this as their cue to make a well-timed exit, which was good—he'd been half-afraid someone would try to start something.

Loise made a frustrated noise, looking quite like she wanted to scale the bar to get at him and strangle him. "Just who do you think you're dealing with?"

Talid rolled his eyes, because really, that was the best she could come up with? Pulling a neatly folded packet of papers from his pocket, sliding off the red ribbon wrapped around them. He unfolded the papers and thrust them in her direction, not getting any closer .

"Loise del'Armen, by the authority of the Crown, you are under arrest for the forging of a number of state documents, including treasury notes, shipping manifests, and King's orders," Talid intoned, staring straight at her as he spoke. She'd bold to try to attack him, as most of the perpetrators usually did, but it was a toss-up as to which. "I know exactly who I'm dealing with. Remove your jewelry and step around the counter."

The color fled from Loise's face, but she was still glaring at him with narrowed eyes—then in the next second she moved, throwing the closest thing to her—an abandoned cup of beer sitting on top of the bar.

Talid ducked, barely missing being hit by the flying cup, but getting liberally doused with the terrible beer. Loise took off, heading out the back. Talid ignored her—Piate had better be back there, doing his part of it—and plucked at the front of his sodden shirt. He smelled like a drunk now, and a cheap one at that. Lovely.

A moment later, Loise sullenly marched back through the door to the back, the bar's singer right behind her, smiling cheerfully.

"Lose something, Talid?" Piate asked, as though he hadn't been waiting out back of the tavern for her make a break for it.

"No," Talid said shortly, more pissed than he should be, but he was covered in cheap beer and it had been nearly a month since he'd been able to acknowledge he knew Piate at all. "Where are the guardsmen?"

"On their way," Piate said, still cheerful as he dragged a scowling Loise around the bar. Her clothes were streaked with dirt and she had a small cut on one cheek, and she didn't say a word, just scowled at Talid like it was all his fault she'd been caught. Talid ignored her easily. Thankful she was being quiet. He hated when the crooks they caught tried to threaten or bribe or wheedle their way to freedom.

"Let's take her outside, then," Talid said, scanning the room. Apparently the rest of Loise's patrons and servers had had the good sense to take off once he'd produced the papers for her arrest. "The Guardsmen can get whatever else they need later."

"Sure," Piate said easily, jostling Loise a little to get her moving. He'd shackled his hands behind her with the magical cuffs Talid had given him, so any magical charms she'd picked up on the way out of the tavern would be nulled until those came off.

Shutting the tavern door behind him, Talid chanted a lock spell for the entire building, then pulled out the notice for all but law enforcement to stay off the grounds and stuck it in place on the door. Shuffling through the arrest papers, Talid noted down the rest of the pertinent details—the lock code and that Loise might have active spells under the cuffs—before moving to join Loise and Piate on the dilapidated lawn in front of the tavern.

Piate was chatting easily to a handful of men dressed in the uniform of the city Guardsmen, and Talid joined them slowly, trying to sort the paperwork into some semblance of order as he went.

"Are any of you mages?" Talid demanded, breaking into the conversation without remorse. He was tired and smelly and really just wanted to wash his hands of this affair already.

"I am," one of the Guards said, and Talid thrust the papers at him.

"The place is spell-locked, but the code is in there. Watch her carefully; she likes to use charmed jewelry for spell casting," Talid rattled off. "If you need anything more from us, we'll be staying at The Golden Bear for the next two nights; after that contact the head office in the capital."

"Okay," the Guard said, looking startled at Talid's abruptness, but Talid really couldn't bring himself to care.

"Let's go, Piate," Talid said, walking away without looking back to see if Piate was following him. There really was no need to be so short with the Guardsmen, but he was covered in beer, his knees still ached from the jump from the counter, and he was tired of assignments that required he and Piate split up.

Piate caught up to him after half a block, but waited until they turned the corner away from the tavern before lacing his fingers with Talid's.

"You okay?" Piate asked. "She didn't get you with any of her spells, did she?"

"No," Talid said, sighing and forcing himself to calm down some. He didn't want to snap at Piate, not when they'd been working separately for almost a month. "She just hit me with a cup of her cheap-ass beer."

"Ah," Piate said knowingly, smiling sweetly at Talid. "We can hit the bathhouse as soon as we get back to the inn, get you all clean again, sweetie."

"Shut up," Talid said, rolling his eyes. Piate only used stupid pet names when he thought Talid was being a baby about something. "You'd want to bathe too if you got hit by that foul brew."

"Yes, but the bath wouldn't take me two hours," Piate said, then abruptly pulled Talid off the street and into the shadow of a nearby building.

"I fell asleep that time," Talid protested, scowling half-heartedly. He liked being clean, but he wasn't overzealous about it.

"Right," Piate said, obviously not meaning it. "I missed you."

"I didn't miss your singing," Talid muttered, going easily when Piate dragged him close in the shadow of the building. Piate laughed softly, but didn't reply, apparently more interested in kissing Talid.

Not that Talid could blame him—they'd both spent a month with a cold bed because of this stupid assignment, and Piate's kisses had never been finer. Grabbing a handful of Piate's shirt, Talid dragged him closer and kissed him like his life depended on it. Piate kissed back just as desperately and Talid groaned—he'd missed Piate, even if it had only been a month.

They were both breathless when Piate finally pulled away—not too far—and said, "We should get back to the inn."

"Why?" Talid muttered, stealing another kiss before making himself step back before he couldn't. They weren't exactly well-concealed here; anyone who walked down the street could see or hear them easily enough. "Hurry up, then."

Piate laughed, and he was even more handsome now, flushed with kiss-swollen lips. Talid smiled, finally feeling whole again, which was stupid and sappy, but he didn't much care at the moment.

"Stop smirking," Piate said, making a face as he dragged Talid from the alley. "It's unsettling. Did you still want to visit the bathhouse before we get to our room? I'm going to call you fussy if you do."

"I'm not fussy," Talid said, rolling his eyes but still smiling. "If you don't care that I smell like cheap, stale beer, then a bath can wait until later."

"I don't care, because I'm not fussy," Piate said, then added thoughtfully, "And I'm a lot more concerned with seeing you naked than I am with how you smell."

"I'm not sure if I should be flattered or offended by that," Talid said dryly, grabbing Piate's hand again as they started down the street again and walking closer to Piate than was really necessary.

"Flattered, definitely," Piate said, squeezing his hand and giving him a heated look. Talid shook his head, but he smiled again and picked up his pace, wondering how he'd managed at all in the last month without Piate there.