He patted down each of his pockets to make sure everything was in place. Cooper’s respectable day suit had been replaced for want of extra room. After some cajoling of Laurel after dinner, he was also wearing a storage ring she had obtained after a fight on her resource gathering mission. The sensation was unlike anything he’d ever felt. If he focused, he could feel everything in the large space, but there was no interaction between the different items. More like he had dozens of new body parts floating in space. The rushed instructions from Laurel indicated this was a temporary feeling. With practice he would be able to visualize the space as a room or storehouse that he could pull things out of. If he eventually got one of those tattoos it was more like a full index he could access whenever he wanted. Cooper checked one more time. Rope, yes. Paper and pens, of course. Water and food, just in case. Ibsen’s Survey of Indexing, From the Bardiuex Dynasty through the Present. Some secondary references on each technique mentioned in the Survey. A lantern. A glow stone. Two changes of clothes. Once he was convinced he had everything he went back through again just to be sure.

  A hand coming down on his shoulder with a gentle squeeze jolted him out of the cycle. Leander gave him a small shake and he stood up to join the others.

  “Where’s all your stuff?!’

  Leander shrugged and patted the knife at his side. He flashed a pen in his pocket and patted his belt, which Cooper realized was a tightly wound cord. At least Eric joined them wearing a satchel popular among the shopkeepers and apprentices of the city, along with a broad-brimmed hat that flopped over half his face.

  “Fine, let’s go over the plan one more time.”

  “No time, we need to be in the upper districts by nightfall if we don’t want anyone noticing us leaving the Flats.”

  Cooper trudged out after the other two, patting down his pockets and running through the ring one more time.

  They settled in at a bar in the same district as their target to wait until it was late enough for the guards to be settled in for their shifts. This time they would be limiting the actual drinking and nursed the same tankards of weak ale as long as possible. He felt his hands clamming up, and he had to constantly force himself not to peer behind him, as though someone would read his thoughts and expose him in front of the crowded taproom.

  “How are you so calm about everything?” He looked across at where the others were watching the bar behind him. Leander was in what Cooper was beginning to recognize as his peak cultivator-mode, manifesting some combination of Laurel’s confidence and Martin’s attitude. Eric could have been any young man enjoying an after-work drink with his friends. Not, notably, someone getting ready to steal from the city government.

  “I did a few jobs for some people down in the Flats when things were tight. Nothing high stakes but after the first one or two, the nerves go away.”

  “What? How are we only hearing about this now?” A sharp look from Leander made him realize how loud he’d gotten at the end. “Sorry. But really, how?”

  Eric looked off to the side as his cheeks heated. “I don’t like talking about it. James doesn’t know and I plan to keep it that way.”

  They lapsed into less fraught topics as the bar grew rowdier and the street outside turned dark. As dancing picked up, they slipped outside and faded into the night. Cooper forced himself into a cultivation breathing pattern to stop from hyperventilating. When they got to the closest alleyway to the archive building they turned as though it was a normal route to take late at night. The street was as empty as the day before, though the shop on the corner had lights still on inside. Maybe an owner working late or stocking the shelves for the following morning.

  It was as clear as it was going to get. They made their way through the back alleys to the door behind their target. Every instinct screamed at Cooper to run as fast as he could across the street. Or even better, run all the way home. A pat from Eric and force of will kept him in the moment. They sauntered like they had every reason to be where they were. No sudden moves or anything to make them memorable. Behind the building they paused and looked around once more. The alley was dark, the doors opening onto it were locked this late, and only a few windows faced out. They saw no movement, no voices called out to question them. Cooper felt his hands shaking as they tried the door.

  Locked.

  Not unexpected, but for whatever reason he had hoped this would be easy. They could just walk right in and pick up the sheet of paper with the information they needed.

  Cooper flattened himself against the wall, leaving Leander to keep a lookout and giving Eric enough room to sidle up to the door. His back kept Cooper from watching the process, but he flinched at each plink of metal from the lock., imagining guards several blocks over using it as a signal to come running. An interminable time later, the door opened with a devastating screech. He froze, along with the others. The only sound he could hear was his heartbeat pounding in his ears while he held his breath. When nothing happened, they eased inside. Eric pulled out a bottle of oil and dabbed the hinges before moving deeper in the room. Maybe reference books weren’t the most useful things to bring on a heist.

  He sneezed. And again, and again. Leander shoved a cloth in front of his face as he tried to get himself under control. His eyes watered and he blinked to clear them, trying fruitlessly to see in the pitch black. A low glow started up to his left. Eric had produced a glowstone wrapped in a white cloth. Just enough to let them make out their bearings.

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  “I can’t believe you know how to pick locks,” Cooper whispered when he had calmed down enough. “That seems more advanced than just a few jobs.”

  Eric just shrugged. “Needed places to sleep sometimes too. Let’s get on with it.”

  Cooper took a deep breath. This would be his part. They were in a dusty back storeroom, rows of shelves dominated the space, stacked with boxes that hadn’t been touched in months or years. He jogged to the front of the room and pulled out his own dampened glow stone. The boxes were labeled, giving him something to skim along to get a feel for the contents.

  “Thank all the stars above, they’re using a standard system.”

  “How can you tell? It’s just random letters.” After their adventure the previous day, Leander was determined not to lose control of his speaking stone again. The monotone voice was a whisper in the darkness. Had he not spent so long getting used to it, that voice coming through the dark would have sent Cooper running, mission or no.

  “My course at the University included training for government positions. I learned the index systems, but none of this is what we want.” He kept scanning to be sure, but these were all for the noble districts, where land hadn’t changed hands in centuries. That might explain the dust. “Next room, come on.”

  With Eric’s lockpicks leading the way, they moved room to room. Their target was near the front, the business districts having constant sales that needed to be queried or recorded. They had already been in the building for a quarter of an hour. Cooper had lost track of when the guards went by and how much time they had.

  The others took up posts to the side of the windows facing into the main road while Cooper got to work. He found the box for the lot housing the Verilian Express and rifled through. There was far, far more documentation than he expected, all written in court shorthand. He sent a pulse of mana into the ring and held out his hand, only to watch his paper and pens scatter around the floor. Laurel made that look a lot easier.

  He went to the most recent set of documents and started copying. Only a few pages into the project, the room went dark. Before he could open his mouth to speak, Eric’s hand clamped over it, while he nudged the glowstone further away with his toe.

  Pulse hammering, he waited. After several agonizing minutes, the ambient night filtering through the windows was enough to see Leander’s slim frame, where he peered out. Another few breaths and the unmistakable sound of footsteps was audible through the glass. Voices joined in, not loud enough to make out.

  A pair of silhouettes passed by the windows. The one on the left held up a lantern, the light of which shone through the windows and over the shelves Cooper had been standing in front of. He froze. Not breathing, not blinking, not even thinking. The light moved on. Before they passed entirely out of sight, the lantern reflected off the gleam of a well-oiled pistol grip.

  They held in that tableau of anxiety until a wave from Leander’s hand released them. Cooper took gasping breaths, his hands shaking so hard he nearly fumbled the pen.

  “That was close.” He panted out. They should leave. Just gather up their things and try to get the information a different way.

  “No, that was exactly what we wanted,” Eric said. The younger boy was entirely unbothered by their brush with the authorities. “We have another half an hour before they get back, and they didn’t see us, get as much as you can and then let’s get out.”

  Another few calming breaths and Cooper was back at it. He didn’t try to parse the shorthand or make sense of what he was reading. Instead he pretended he was in a timed exam and copied everything as fast as he could. A pulse of mana kept his hand from cramping as he sank into the mindless task. A whisper jogged him out of his trance.

  “...too soon.” Eric muttered.

  Their glow stones were cut off, tucked into pockets. This time it was easier for his eyes to adjust to the gloom.

  “They’re moving faster than the other pair, and there's three of them. I don’t like this.” Eric’s voice was a bare whisper. Without the slight enhancement to his senses that a year of cultivating had brought, he wasn’t sure he would have heard it at all.

  “That’s it, we’re leaving. Cooper, pack everything up, we’re getting out.”

  No time to waste with questions, Cooper sent light tendrils of mana to put everything back in the ring. He only hesitated when he got to the last quarter of the crate, which he’d yet to copy. Leander shoved at his back. Eric hissed a warning. No more time to think, he sent the rest of the records into his ring and closed the box. A heartbeat to straighten it on the shelf and he followed the others out of the front room.

  The maze of cramped hallways had felt like an adventure earlier. Now it was one more obstacle, all the while Cooper imagining them bursting into the alley and the waiting barrels of the guardsmens’ guns.

  By the time they reached the back exit he was a moment from full panic. They slipped through the door, still propped open with a small rock, one by one. The group paused once more in the back alley. They could hear the guards around the front and didn’t dare make their way through the side streets where they might catch a glimpse. Leander, still quieter than the others from a lifetime of sticking to the edges of the world, crept as close to the edge as he dared.

  After a few more minutes, how many Cooper was too anxious to count, beams of light lanced into their alley from the windows behind them. Crouched low to the ground, every muscle tensed for a sprinting escape. He sent a quick thanks to Laurel and Martin, who insisted they all train physically, even in harsh weather. A well cultivated body housed a well cultivated spirit, or something to that effect.

  “Paranoid, I tell you. Not used to the night shift yet.” The voice was gruff with age and experience.

  “You know we need a full search,” another answered.

  Lights danced through the windows as the guards moved about the room. Looking for evidence, his brain supplied. He wracked his memory for anything he might have dropped, or left out of place. Something pulled on his sleeve and he turned his head slightly to see Eric gesturing towards the far end of the alley, the one with the fewest windows. Then he began to crawl. After a quick check of all his pockets, Cooper followed.

  They stayed low until they reached the corner. Eric’s head peeked out just far enough to see down to the main street. He tossed a thumbs up back to Cooper and hopped onto his feet. Cooper followed suit, and from a crouch, they both darted across to the next alley. Still avoiding the attention running might bring, they hurried at a fast walk down a few more blocks, before taking a short cut back towards the bars. Cooper looked behind him and confirmed the two of them were alone.

  “Leander –” he said, tone low but no longer worried they were being followed.

  “He’ll follow the plan and meet us there,” Eric murmured in reply. “Now come on, this is the place.”

  This part of the plan, more than the hiding, sneaking, or contingencies they discussed, was what grated most against Cooper’s instincts. The primal part of his mind was shrieking after all the stress of the day. Run home, get to the sect house as quickly as possible. Or better yet, his parent’s estate. Crawl under the covers and nothing will get you. Instead, he trusted his friends, and the new path his life was on, as he followed Eric’s lead back onto the main thoroughfares. They slowed down, added a wobble to their gait and pointed themselves towards the rowdiest bar in the district. Pedestrians began appearing as they got closer to the strip of bars, still oozing revelry this late into the night. Leander joined them without warning, simply appearing at Cooper’s side and clapping both him and Eric on the back.

  They had done it. In and out and no one the wiser. The relief hit him in a wave, leaving him drunk on the high of tensions resolved and a plan well-executed. The drink they all ordered once inside felt like more of a victory toast than anything he could remember. They stayed until last call, their long trek home a stumbling, giddy mess, until they collapsed in their beds with plans to sleep in and use their privilege for the occasional missed lesson.