This is stupid.
I'm clinging to a sandstone villa wall like a lizard in heat. My toes are curled around a ledge the width of a fat finger, my fingertips wedged into the chipped seam of the one above. Every muscle in my body is trembling like a whore at a tax audit.
My slippers are in my mouth. Because yes, I'm that professional. I can't risk them falling and alerting the guards below. Fishnet bag over one shoulder, hair in a messy bun stabbed together with stolen chopsticks, I must look like the most deranged spider this city has ever produced.
No light in the room ahead. Just that window, open a crack like an invitation. Or a trap. But if I let myself think like that, I'll piss myself and fall.
It's three stories down to a cobbled alley. If I slip, I break both legs and maybe a hip. If I scream, someone hears. If someone hears, they'll find me with a thief's kit and bruised pride, and best case, I get caned. Worst case, I get fingerless.
But the window is open. And I saw silver candleholders on the sill earlier from the street. Silver means a shrine. A shrine means trinkets. Trinkets mean coin. Coin means breakfast and sandals with real leather soles. Maybe even cheese.
I inch sideways, bare feet scraping across dusty stone, breath held so tight my lungs feel stitched shut. One wrong move and I'm fucked. Not the good kind.
My fingertips start to slip on grit. I stop. Reset. Breathe through my nose around a mouthful of cheap slipper.
Almost there. A few more finger-lengths and I can reach the frame. One hand on the sill. Grip it. Shift weight. Other hand joins. Now one foot. Then the other.
I'm crouched like a jungle cat on the edge of the world. The window gapes like a secret.
I spit out my slippers. Whisper: "Showtime." And slither in.
Gods help me if it's a pantry. I'll still rob it blind. But I'll be furious about it.
I'm in.
Fast like lust, quiet like shame.
My feet kiss the cool marble floor. Toes curled, ready to bolt. The air inside smells of stale incense and rich people's boredom. No creaking, no barking dogs. Just thick silence. Good. Maybe the gods are taking a nap.
I scan the room like a starving rat in a pastry shop. Wall shelves, altar table, dressing cabinet—yes, yes, yes. I pounce.
Silver candlestick? Bagged.
Little lacquer box with inlays? Rattles when I shake it. Good sign. Bagged.
Bracelet left on the washbasin? Ugly, but gold. Bagged.
Perfume vial? Sniffed—smells like horny peaches. Bagged.
Fruit bowl? Real figs. Not even dried. I eat one on the spot. Bagged the rest.
There's a half-unfolded tunic on a bench. Silk. Cream-colored, embroidered with sea serpents. Gaudy and probably expensive. I stuff it down the side of the fishnet bag and hope it doesn't smell like man. Or worse, priest.
Someone snores in the next room. Gods. I freeze. One breath. Two. No change. Still snoring like a fat merchant full of wine and roast goat.
I keep going.
Makeup mirror—cracked, but framed in mother-of-pearl. Bagged.
A pouch hanging from the bedpost. I sniff it. Mint and coin. Jackpot.
Bagged.
I move with speed, but never haste. Each item touched like a lover, stolen like revenge.
By the time I'm done, the bag bulges like a pregnant mule. I catch my reflection in the bronze plate on the wall—hair askew, cheek smudged, eyes glowing.
"Who's a naughty little goddess of acquisition?" I whisper to myself.
Outside again. Same window. Same ledge. Same risk. But now, heavier. Richer.
Now I just need not to die on the way down.
One breath. Let's go.
Gods.
I'm hanging by my fingers from a crumbling stone lip two stories above a piss-stained alley. My fishnet bag groans with the weight of other people's valuables. My tunic, gods bless its brevity, flaps just enough in the breeze to remind me I skipped underwear tonight.
Below—bootsteps.
Guards.
I hear the rattle of spears and the lazy drone of their voices. One's talking about soup. Soup. As if the fate of my thighs isn't dangling directly above their dumb heads.
I press flat to the wall, cheek scraping dusty plaster. My breath halts. My heart doesn't—it's throwing a riot in my chest.
If they look up, they'll see:
– One suspiciously barefoot girl.
– In a tunic barely fit for a harlot's day off.
– With a bag full of shiny shit.
– No plausible excuse for any of it.
They pause. Right below. One of them hawks phlegm and spits. Misses my foot by a goddamn miracle.
I close my eyes.
Not because I believe in mercy.
Because I can't bear to see my doom walk by with soup breath and a lantern.
Moments pass. Ten years, maybe. My fingers scream. My shoulders twitch. I whisper promises to all the gods I never pray to.
Then—bootsteps again. Fading.
Gone.
I exhale. Shudder. Nearly drop the bag.
Two more minutes and I would've let go. Not even gracefully. Just a splatter of bones, figs, and shame.
I wait another ten heartbeats. Then ease myself down onto the next ledge. Shimmy. Drop. Roll.
My feet hit the alley with a soft thud.
Alive. Unjailed. Unbroken.
Also—still pantyless.
Which is, somehow, the least indecent part of tonight.
***
I drop the bulging fishnet bag onto the ground like a proud alley cat presenting a dead pigeon.
The Dragon looks up from his fire, one eyebrow ridge arched, eyes glowing faintly in the dusk.
He pokes the bag with one claw. Silver clinks. Perfume leaks. A fig rolls out.
"You stole all of this," he says, flat as a frying pan.
I beam. "Crime of opportunity. The window was open."
He scoffs. Actually scoffs. The kind that starts deep in his throat and ends in a sigh that smells faintly of scorched rosemary and smugness.
I start pulling out the loot one by one like it's story time.
"One lacquered box with rattly things inside."
Clink.
"One tunic, cream-colored, slightly man-scented but salvageable."
Plop.
"One silver candlestick that may or may not be holy."
Clink.
"I only hit one chamber. Didn't even go into the main rooms," I add, kicking off my slippers and stretching my aching toes. "They're probably still snoring in satin sheets, none the wiser. I need this stuff more than they do. And I don't even have sheets."
The Dragon narrows his ancient eyes at me. Not angry. Not amused. Just judging.
"Look, lizard," I say, wagging a finger. "You fly around torching village granaries and melting barns until they cough up gold. I do the same. Just with less fire and fewer corpses."
He blinks slowly. "They call me the monster."
I toss him a fig. "They call me a whore. And yet here we are. Sharing dinner."
He catches the fig mid-air, snorts, and mutters, "Remind me to search your bag before we leave town next time."
I grin. "Remind me to stop you from burning the bakery just because they didn't bow fast enough."
He grumbles. I stretch out on my cloak, arms behind my head, the stolen tunic as my pillow.
Stars above. Loot beside me. A cranky dragon near the fire.
Honestly? It's starting to feel like home.
He eyes the pile like it might be contagious.
"So," he rumbles, "what exactly do you intend to do with all this crap?"
I sit up, fish the lacquered box from the pile, flick it open. Inside—trinkets. Pins, rings, a brooch shaped like a seahorse humping a shell, maybe. Gaudy. Perfect.
I slide a thin bracelet over my wrist. Too big. I push it higher up my arm, adjust. Nice. Tacky, but in that expensive way that makes it look like I murdered someone important for it.
Then I fish out a toe ring. Delicate, silver, etched with tiny runes I can't read. Probably says something like Modesty is virtue or Property of some priest. Whatever. I slide it on my second toe, wiggle. Cute.
I grin.
"Keep the ones I like," I say, lifting my ankle to admire the sparkle. "Hawk the rest to a pawnshop in the next town over. Preferably one run by someone with cataracts and low standards."
The Dragon stares, unimpressed. "So your great treasure haul is fig-stained silk, ugly jewelry, and some poor priest's incense burner?"
I smirk. "You say that like it's a bad thing. This bracelet tingles. That's probably magic."
He leans in, sniffs it. "It's cursed."
"Oh," I say, rotating my wrist. "That's even better. Maybe it'll finally kill off my conscience."
He groans and flops back down by the fire, wings spread wide like a tragic widow. "Why do I even ask."
"Because you love me," I say, flinging a stolen sandal at his tail.
He huffs smoke. "I tolerate you. Barely."
I grin. "That's just your way of saying you'd die without me."
He mutters something draconic and unrepeatable.
I settle back down with my box of shiny things, humming softly. Tomorrow I'll pawn half of it, maybe trade the rest for dates, cheese, and a new hairpin. One that doesn't come loose mid-climb.
Tonight, though, I sleep glittering.