“How do I look?” Lavana's fingers crept along the wreath of diamonds circling her neck. The heavy necklace on her shoulders had been in the safe until just a few seconds ago. Most of what she wore to get herself into the study was still on the lavish rug, so she was expecting a response that was some flavor of amazing. "Oh, right," she muttered to herself, tip-toeing over her dress to get to the man tied up in the middle of the room, eyes bulging because of course they were. She didn't think the gods were in on the plan but the moonlight was working for her that evening. She plucked her tights out of the man's mouth and it was like he'd been talking the whole time. "Stupid fucking thief! Do you have any idea who you're stealing from?! Put that back you d—!" Lavana struck him before he could insult her again, taking the wind out of him with a firm punch to the gut. She turned on her heel and returned to the bookcase that spanned the opposite wall. "Wrong answer," she said, her playful edge blunted as she rummaged through the short, wide safe concealed behind a row of fake books. "Of course we know who we're stealing from, Deputy Secretary." The man stopped wriggling, looked up, and frowned. His eyes narrowed, creeping anxiety distracting him from how distracting Lavana was from that angle. The silence made her look over her shoulder to watch the creases in his forehead deepen. "Yes, we. I didn't lure you up here just to take what's in your safe—all of which was very easy, for the record. You are dangerously desperate and, more important, need much better security. These mechanisms are at least a decade old." She tapped on the hinges with a chipped nail. "Custom made crap. Anyway, as much as this will fetch," she said, touching the necklace, "and, as good as it looks on me, it's incidental. You being here means you're too far from the vault." The chair rattled as the man shifted his weight, creaking as he struggled. They toppled over as one after a series of teetering back and forth. His side hit the plush carpet with a muffled thud but the fall freed him from the gag, at least. "Careful," Lavana said in a dull monotone as she walked over. She stepped around the chair-bound man, searching for the best grip to set both upright with, but jerked back before she could find it. A flash of white and her hip hit the floor before she realized her eyes were closed. There was something warm and wet on her heel when she grabbed it. "You bit me!?" She glared at him, jaw hanging in disbelief. "What the fuck is wrong with you!?" "With me?!" The man roared, saliva shining on his lips. "You tied me to a fucking chair, you thieving whore! You can't steal from Ducal's!" He gnashed his teeth and thrashed the chair against the carpet as best he could but the knots held tight. "Any one of our patrons would flay you and feed your parts to a frostfox... or whatever stupid fucking exotic pet is in vogue this month!" "Yellow-throated marten," she corrected under her breath as she kneaded her foot. "You don't get it! No one takes what's theirs!" "What's theirs?" The pain receded into the background as Lavana's fury boiled into its place. "What's theirs?" She asked again, louder, shuffling closer on hands and knees. "You know what isn't theirs?" The hate in her eyes made her crooked smile even more sinister. She reached for her bra and then flicked her wrist, producing a glint of silver. The knife was at his neck a half second later. "The bars they're storing in your vault. Where did they come from?" "I don't know!" He answered fast, wide eyes monitoring the tendons in her wrist. "It's not my business! We provide a safe and private means of storage! It's not private if we know!" "Bullshit," Lavana sneered. She dragged the knife, leaving a thin scarlet line in its wake. Then, she collected herself, standing up on one foot so she could hop back to the safe. "What's this?" She tossed a hardcover book at him, hobbled over, and then knelt down in front of it. "Well?" "It's... ah... additional record keeping. Yes! Redundancies. Just in case, you know?" "'Sixteen gold bars, stamped with the royal seal, to be stored with the rest of the lot that came from the treasury.'" She turned a page using the knife. "Recorded, instead, as a transfer from Glottàn—'profits from trade goods.'" For the first time since realizing he'd been tied up for the wrong reason, the man seemed uninterested in speaking. He just stared from the floor, confusion and fear reflecting in cool, dim light. "It was never theirs," Lavana continued. "That was money meant for the Lower Quartile. Money that is needed and was already accounted for. We're giving it back.” She pointed the knife at him. "This just happens to be the best way to do it.
Thieving is an honest trade, when you look at it like we do." "Honest?" He laughed—a brief bark of a thing—and then his voice chilled. "They won't kill you when they find you." He looked her up and down with hungry eyes. “No, they'll have fun with you. And after, when you beg for death, they won't give it to you. They'll keep you in a cage, show others what they've done to you so they can use the rumors as leverage in some future scheme..." Lavana suppressed a shudder and hauled herself back to her feet. The Deputy Secretary was still talking, still threatening as she stepped back into her dress. She zipped the back up as far as she could and looked down at her heels. Nope, not getting blood on those. She bent over and picked them, resting them on the ledger's cover. "You can keep those as a souvenir," she said, spotting her tights on the carpet between them. "Don't think they'll let you keep them, though. You know, when they find you here, tied to a chair with lipstick on your face, tights on the floor, an empty safe up here and down there." His facade crumbled as fast as he'd conjured it. "No, no, please!" He wriggled against the floor as she limped to the door. "Please! You have what you want! Untie me at least!" Lavana laughed, throwing her head back and reveling in the irony. "But you were so excited when I suggested it." She paused and gave him a moment to appreciate how much she was enjoying herself. "I do have to go, though. Job to finish and all that but maybe I'll see you around. Cellmates, if we're both unlucky." She turned to leave. "Please! I have a family!" Lavana's head snapped to the side, her pupils barely visible between the slits of her eyelids. "Be thankful they haven't been taken from you yet," she said, lobbing the words back into the study as she slipped out.