A Willingness to take surprisingly bold Risks

"You surely have noticed the signet ring that I wear. The one with the gryphon on it."

I certainly have, Jesha, I most certainly have.

"This ring signifies membership in our guild; most merchants around here possess one. Everyone of importance in attendance at this reception will be wearing one. Your job this evening is rather simple: collect as many of them as you can until my subordinate comes to pick you up."

Collect my ass! The audacity of this man! He expects me to steal rings right from wealthy merchants' fingers; I will be either flogged or killed outright if I am caught. And yet he acts like he's only asking me to walk his dog.

"You'll be rewarded in kind. Collect enough for me, and you won't have to fret about feeding your family for quite a while. Or I might even tell you what you 𝘳𝑒𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 want to know..."

Yes, Jesha, keep taunting me like that; I'm sure that will end well for you. I'll play your stupid game for now; I know how to steal things rather well after all, with the experience I gained the past few years.

Though I can't say I've tried stealing something directly from someone's finger.

We now reach the entrance to the manor. It too is largely comprised of sandstone bricks. Those, however, are already all decorated with a unified pattern. Unsurprisingly, it seems like the whole effort of beautifying the facades started with this building.

Entering, the interior resembles more what I’d imagine an older European mansion to look like from the inside. The ceilings are up quite high; curtains of a vibrant purple obscure the tall windows.

The floors are what I assume to be marble, inlaid with something darker to give it a bit of contrast. All the furniture is made of a darker wood, clearly imported from far away. Great care must've been taken during transport; there's not a single blemish to be found on them.

Without a doubt, the owner places great care that this living space of his looks immaculate. When compared with the exterior, the inside must've been looking this gaudy for some time already.

The outside renovations are clearly a newer addition. If all you do is administer a city and grow fat on ill-gotten gains, I imagine the look of your mansion’s interior is the only thing you really care about.

Walking these halls, I spot quite a few more elves. All female, all beautiful and all wearing maid dresses rather similar to mine.

I get now why Jesha would put me in this thing. There are even a few servants close to my age; one wouldn't be remiss to just think of me as another junior maid.

I should have free movement on my own in here, so long as I make myself look busy.

"What does this subordinate that'll get me look like?"

"Ah right, she's a redhead, and she wears glasses."

"That seems rather vague of a description."

"You wouldn't know, but red hair is something only people of a faraway country possess. Even among the travelling merchants, seeing someone like that is a rarity. If a redhead wishes to escort you to me, it's definitely her."

Very well, if he says so...

"Behind that door lies the servant's quarter. Just introduce yourself as someone's maid-in-training, and they won't question you any further. Over there you'll find the main hall, where everyone will be gathering, waiting to be addressed by Zareth. I too have to join them now. You're smart, though; figure out the rest yourself..."

He trusts me an awful lot now, doesn't he? Leaving me all alone to my own devices. Though he can always just deny any involvement if I get caught, I suppose...

With those words, he leaves, waving as he turns his back to me.

I proceed as well; I shouldn't waste what little time I have. There should be something akin to a servants' kitchen around here. So long as I walk through that soiree with a tablet filled with drinks or snacks, no one should question my being there.

But I certainly have no clue where I should go here. I'll just ask the next servant hurrying by me.

"Excuse me, where's the kitchen?"

She looks at me in surprise. Oh, right. I'm supposed to be a girl right now; I need to sound like one as well.

I clear my throat and give it another go:

"𝐸𝑥𝑐𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑚𝑒, 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒'𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑘𝑖𝑡𝑐ℎ𝑒𝑛~?"

"Ah, right over there."

That's a better reaction. Gotta remember to keep that up, though.

In said kitchen, it doesn't take me long to find a polished silver platter filled to the brim with almost overflowing glasses of perfect wine.

I ask one of the cooks.

"𝐶𝑎𝑛 𝐼 𝑡𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑠𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑚𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑠~?"

"Sure, go ahead. Don't you dare drop them!"

I just nod and get on my merry way. Walking towards the main hall, Isha chimes in to give her two cents on the situation.

"Rinah probably was a servant just like these here..."

She's right though. Furthermore, Jesha implies he knows exactly who she had to serve.

"If we are to ever avenge her, we need to know who hurt her like that. If working with Jesha is our only way to gain that information, so be it."

Isha clearly has her reservations about working with Jesha but doesn't object any further.

For the record, I do not trust this man either. But I have to at least try and use him as much as he is using me.

The large door to my destination is barred and manned by two guards, one on each side. They glance at me without a word, and the left one opens the door for me.

What a gentleman...

Stepping inside, a rather large hall stretches out before me. A chandelier hangs above, dimly lighting the room.

It is currently filled to the brim with quite a few dozen merchants all dressed in what I'd assume to be the finest robes they own. They all talk, drink and make merry in all sorts of ways.

Now who's to be my first victim?

I stalk through the halls, serving drinks to opulently dressed men and women while scouting the first sucker for the evening.

Luckily, I spot a rather large fellow currently drinking like he does not want to remember this evening. Who am I to deny him his cravings?

I deliberately walk through his field of vision a few times while serving drinks to those around him. Just as expected, it doesn't take long before he spots me and calls out to me.

"Girl! Come over here! I am rather parched!"

Like a good servant, I obey and gracefully make my way over to him. The next few minutes I spend in his company, watching him clear half my plate.

It doesn't take long for him to find a place to sit away from any prying eyes. As soon as he started blabbering incoherently, I took off his ring. His 'opulent' lifestyle made it quite a struggle to get that ring off of his fat finger, but he was too drunk to notice anyway.

In similar fashion, I use my wits and 'charm' to rid these fools of their precious rings.

"What did he say about me? I ought to teach him a lesson!"

To a rather surprisingly muscular merchant, I 'confessed' I've overheard another man make rather nasty remarks about his choice of clothing.

Being not quite sober himself, he immediately gets into a brawl with him, giving me ample opportunity to rid both of their rings.

"Factor Ishmael wants to meet me by the balconies alone?"

A woman of middling beauty, trying to mask the fact with too much makeup, kept staring at a rather dashing fellow across the hall.

To her I penned a quick love letter, claiming it was from the object of her obsession when handing it to her. This being a gathering of merchants, ink and paper were in no short supply, after all.

So she, too, lost her ring to me as soon as she stepped out of the public's view.

"Be more careful, you stupid girl! Now my robes are all wet."

One fellow wore gloves, all of his rings threaded over them. I deliberately spilled some wine on his hand, then apologized profusely as I wiped it up with a rag.

By the time he noticed that his most important ring might've vanished in our interaction, I was already gone.

In a stealing spree like that, I quickly accumulated a dozen rings. By now some of the ring-less people have started to notice and are now searching for me.

Not the first one, though. He's still soundly asleep in that very same chair. Gotta be more careful to stay out of sight now.

Just as I was on the lookout for my 13th victim, I spotted a lady with red hair. The redhead I'm supposed to go with now, I assume; she does have glasses after all.

She too wears a black robe with golden accents, just like her master. She is rather pretty as well, if I may say so.

She spots me rather quickly in turn, heading right towards me now. I gesture towards a more secluded area; I don't want to be spotted after all.

She nods, meeting me there.

"How far along are you with your assignment?"

She speaks in a rather blunt way, reminding me of a certain someone. This is Jesha's subordinate alright.

"A dozen."

I am unsure if this is too much or too little; this woman's expression is rather hard to gauge.

"That'll do. Please follow me. Master Jesha is ready for us."

That doesn't sound ominous at all. Definitely doesn't give me shivers down my spine. But I follow all the same.

We head to a place on the second floor, passing by a whole dozen of guards. We are stopped by every single one of them, only being let go once my redhead companion mentions the name of her superior.

Whoever we are about to meet is certainly important.

We stop in front of a door. She hands me a small sack. It is soft to the touch and shares the very same black and gold colour scheme as her robes. Probably worth quite a lot.

"Put them in this pouch. When you enter the room, immediately to your right is a table with fine wines. You are to serve both the rightmost bottle and the rings to the individuals Master Jesha is currently talking to. Afterwards you are to take your place next to the Master, attending him further as needed. Do you comprehend?"

I place the rings in the pouch. I nod to her, though I get the feeling she isn't quite convinced.

She sighs and leaves, returning to the other merchants.

Nothing left to do but enter.