The rug had been rolled up, the chairs and mattresses pushed to the edges of the room. Kieran's books had already been moved; he was rather protective after Hirik's last 'experiment' had damaged a few of the covers. Evie didn't ask what the last experiment was. She valued plausible deniability in her friendships. She sat on one of the chairs against the wall, chin resting on her drawn-up knee as she watched Hirik cradle a small, metallic sphere like it was a very precious, very dangerous egg.
"I call it the Crow Snare," he announced proudly.
"It looks like someone punched a meat pie and gave it trauma," Tai said, perched backward on a chair that groaned in protest.
"It's supposed to look harmless," Hirik replied. "Disarming. You wouldn't run from it, would you?"
Evie tilted her head curiously. "If I knew it came from you, I would."
Hirik beamed. "Thank you."
"It wasn't a compliment," Kieran muttered from the table, still scribbling notes, though he kept half an eye on the sphere.
"I'm sorry; have you all forgotten the time it rained bees?" Evie said mildly.
"Controlled bees," Hirik said. "Very controlled."
"They were in my hair, Hirik."
"I said I was sorry. Anyway." He cleared his throat, pulling them back to the moment with the unearned gravitas of a stage performer. "The Crow Snare. When triggered, it releases steel-weighted bolas to trip enemies. Great for evasion, capture, and chaos."
"Say chaos again like you're not enjoying this," Kieran muttered.
"It's for the mission."
"It's always for the mission. Until someone loses an eyebrow."
Evie lifted her head, curiosity piqued. "Can we test it on Tai?"
"I volunteer!" Tai said at the same time.
Kieran just sighed, closed his notebook, and moved behind a crate like he had done this before. "This is going to end in a concussion."
"Wouldn't be the first time," Tai said, flashing a grin. "And anyway, Hirik's gear only blows up half the time now. Odds are decent."
Zevran, who had been silently watching from the wall with the amused expression of a man waiting for the wine to kick in, simply folded his arms and nodded in approval. "Do proceed. This seems promising."
Evie drew her other leg up, a makeshift sheild of shin, bracing herself.
"Alright, Tai. Stand there," Hirik said, pointing to the centre of the room. "Don't move."
"Love it when you're so commanding," Tai purred.
"Shut up and stay still."
Evie smirked as Hirik wound a small gear on the sphere, then gently rolled it across the floor. The moment was quiet, almost reverent. The internal mechanism was barely audible, then there was a click. The bola lines exploded outward with a sharp hiss and tangled Tai's legs, sweeping them out from under him with far more force than they would have expected of the small device. His yelp was somewhere between triumphant and surprised as he was yanked off his feet and landed on his face on the floor hard enough to shake the building. A half-second later, the room filled with a crack of light and a gout of thick smoke, white and oily, curling like fog.
Kieran coughed behind the crate. "You didn't say anything about smoke."
Evie got up to open windows before they were all blinded.
"It was a surprise. Smell the subtle lemon?" Hirik asked proudly.
"Subtle like a punch to the face," Evie coughed, waving smoke away from her face and lingering by the window.
As the smoke cleared, they could see Tai still face down on the ground, and when he lifted his head, his nose was bleeding and a big red mark on his forehead that was already starting to swell.
Evie laughed, the others following suit. "Add it to the kit," she declared.
"You all mocked me," Hirik muttered, chest puffed like a particularly smug pigeon.
"This one's brilliant, I'll give you that," Kieran conceded.
Zevran offered slow, sarcastic applause. "A beautiful demonstration. Functional and fashionable. I am moved."
Evie glanced back at the remnants of smoke, the now-silent Crow Snare gleaming faintly near Tai's boot.
"These could so easily ruin someone's day," she said softly, mostly to herself.
-
The house was too small for this many minds. That was Zevran's first thought as he leaned back in a creaky chair near the hearth, arms draped lazily over the back, one boot braced against the table leg. The floor was littered with curling scraps of parchment, half-burnt candles, and a faint trail of ash from someone's failed attempt at fire-starting. Probably Evie's. It felt like home.
They were all talking at once - arguing, refining, tossing out wild ideas like children with rocks to skip, except every one of these children had knives tucked into their boots and vendettas in their pockets.
Hirik sat cross-legged on the floor, a small box of metal pieces and wire cracked open beside him. He kept turning one of the smaller pieces over in his fingers as he talked, distracted but listening.
Tai, as always, had claimed the armrest of the setee and was currently using it as a platform to lecture the room. "Look, if we hit just one safe house, they'll shut down the others, scatter. But if we hit four, five, six at once - "
"Eight," Kieran interjected from his corner by the window. "There are eight we can confirm with what we have. I finished cross-referencing the courier drop patterns with the ledger."
"Eight, then," Tai allowed with a theatrical wave. "Point is, we make it public. Fast. Loud. Hard to deny."
Evie lay on the mattress, propped up on her elbows, feet up and crossed at the ankles, one of Kieran's scribbled maps in front of her. She hadn't said much yet, but Zevran recognised the look on her face, the quiet calculation of someone whose mind was three moves ahead.
She reminded him of Mareven like this. And he felt, not for the first time, a strange tug in his chest. He had thought they were children when he found them. And maybe they still were, but not in the ways that mattered.
"I assume you do not mean public as in bards singing about it in the taverns," Zevran said dryly, raising one brow. "Though I must admit, I could write a rather compelling ballad if pressed."
"Word of mouth, courier drops, some magically etched messages in the right places. Subtle, but fast. We want the nobles to hear about it. The merchants. The guards. Everyone the Crows depend on for coin and cover," Evie said.
"You want them shunned," Zevran murmured. "Turn their own clients against them."
Evie looked up at him and smiled, and it was something fierce and bright, and let out a simple "Mm."
Zevran leaned forward, hand rubbing across his jaw. "It's bold. Beautiful."
"The plan, or my face?" Tai muttered with a smirk.
Hirik, without looking up from the contraption in his lap, snorted and flipped him off in perfect deadpan.
Kieran unrolled another map, this one rougher and smudged. "We plant evidence in the right places. Send pieces of the ledger. Arrange for some things to be found - guard barracks, merchant stalls, a few estate cellars. Enough to expose the safehouses, not enough to reveal how much we've taken."
"We give the Crows no time to clean up after themselves," Evie added. "They'll be scrambling to evacuate, deny, and re-secure - every person they send to do that is one less guarding something else."
Zevran felt himself grinning. "You have learned well, my little murderlings."
"As if we need to kill anyone," Tai scoffed. "They can all be alive when we make their world crumble."
Zevran let a chuckle settle before speaking again, more seriously this time. "There will be retaliation."
"We know," Kieran said quietly.
Evie nodded. "But if we do this right, it'll take them weeks to recover. And they'll be too busy cleaning house to chase us."
Zevran looked at them - truly looked. Tai, smirking, brave and cocky and too sharp for his own good. Oh how he reminded Zevran of himself. Kieran, haunted and brilliant. Hirik, who somehow made little metal toys that could knock a man unconscious. And Evie, beautiful and a little bit broken, who carried a king's blood and a soulbond's burden. He didn't say it out loud, but in that moment, Zevran felt something like hope and pride settle in his chest. They could actually do this. They could shake the Crows. Maybe even break them with enough time. And if they couldn't... well, they'd go down laughing.
Alistair was going to kill him for allowing this.