Beyond the Western Deep

The Mark

“Surely you must know this by now, but I’m a baron’s daughter from the farmlands west of Lake Verodun.” Beck waved a paw in what she believed was an elegant manner, nearly knocking over a bottle of prized Vulpin wine. “My father’s been looking for a suitor for years, but wouldn’t you know it? No luck. Zero luck!”

Rook rolled his eyes at the Lutren thief, saving the bottle of wine from the bar top and settling down at one of the tables in the Abadis Tavern. “Don’t say ‘farmlands’, it makes you sound like a country bumpkin. Your mark moved away from the countryside into the city, remember? He hates anything that’s rural.” Rook popped the cork on the bottle with his teeth and spat it onto the table. “Try again.”

The two of them were alone in the tavern that afternoon. A parade in the city center had drawn most of the normal clientele away, and a masquerade ball was planned that evening in the home of Alona Vennik, one of the wealthier members of the Vulpin Council. Anyone who was anyone was to be in attendance, which meant easy marks for the thieving Sand Spiders. Rook had his cover story for the evening down pat: he was an ex-pirate turned thief with a cynical air. He didn’t need to practice it because it was the truth — and lucky for him, his entire species came pre-equipped with masks. His target for the evening was down the street from the ball: the basement vault of a certain Lutren merchant who Beck would be distracting.

The problem, of course, was that Beck needed to keep this Lutren and his personal guard at the ball long enough for Rook to break into the vault and steal the valuables within. Under normal circumstances, their young Ermehn lockpicker, Asha, would be on call for such things — but she was busy that day scouting new job opportunities with their fixer, Theo.

Beck waved her paw again — had Rook not liberated the wine bottle earlier, it would have careened off the bar. “Surely you must know by now,” she repeated, “but I’m a baron’s daughter from an estate just outside Lutra. My name?” She feigned confusion. “Oh! My name is, uh…” She looked to Rook, who shrugged.

“I dunno,” he said. “Ah… A, uh… Atoa?”

“What!?” Beck threw her arms apart in an angry shrug. “What the hell kind of name is that?”

“It’s an old Polcan name.” He shrugged. “Not a very popular one, I’ll grant you.”

“No, I can’t imagine it is,” Beck grumbled. “What’s a good Lutren name? Tess?”

Rook took a swig from the wine bottle. “Ruddertail? Fishbreath?”

“We’ll go with Tess, thank you.” She turned and was immediately back in-character. “Tess, my dear. My name is Tess. So very pleased to make your acquaintance.”

The Polcan nodded toward the front door of the tavern. “Alright, he’s leaving. What do you do?”

Beck swung around the imaginary mark, stepping between it and the door. “Oh, m’lord, but we’ve just met! I would love to introduce you to, uh… my father-”

“Your father isn’t at the party,” Rook corrected. “You just suggested introducing him to somebody who doesn’t exist.”

“Yeah, but he doesn’t know that!” Beck gestured to the imaginary Lutren mark before her. “Dragging him around to find him would take a few minutes.”

“Sure,” Rook said. “But then after those few minutes are up, he’s fed up with you and is leaving. That’s a last-ditch thing.”

The Lutren thief sighed, nodded, and started again. “Oh, m’lord, but we’ve just met! You never told me about your holdings here in the city-”

“Good,” Rook said, taking another drink. “Good, that’s good.”

“You must have all sorts of fun stories about Nessa,” Beck continued. “Lutra can be so boring. I want to know everything there is to know about this city.”

Rook stood, setting the wine bottle on the table. “Alright, that buys us enough time I think. He goes off on a few stories, you keep him going until he’s either run out of stories or run out of patience for you. Either way, we’re good.”

“Good.” Beck smiled. “What am I wearing to this thing?”

“The pink dress,” Rook said, walking over to the bar. He pulled a familiar pink robe out from under it. “Ageless. Peerless. Tasteless.”

Beck grimaced. “Ugh, I hate that thing. And the hat?”

“With the feather.” the Polcan smiled. “But there’s a mask now. See?” He reached behind the bar again and pulled out a large sequin-laced fabric masquerade mask. It was bright blue, and the shape suggested some kind of bird beak.

“I’ll poke someone’s eye out with that thing,” Beck said. “Alright, so, I’ve got the disguise and the cover story. This sap won’t know what hit him.”

Rook hid the items back under the bar. “Those aren’t our biggest problems, actually.”

“Huh?” Beck raised a brow. “What do you mean? What’d I forget?”

The Polcan stepped behind Beck and turned her head toward a mirror behind the bar. “Smile, please.”

Beck rolled her eyes. “Oh, har har.”

“I’m serious.” Rook shook her head a bit. “Smile, you goon.”

The Lutren smiled. Rook grimaced.

“There, see?”

“What?! What is it?” Beck frowned. “My smile is fine.”

“Your smile frightens small children. Your smile ends worlds.”

Beck pulled away from her Polcan counterpart. “Alright, so I’ve got a, ah… active smile. What am I supposed to do about it?”

Rook shrugged and snatched up the wine bottle. “I don’t know. Don’t smile?” He started for the door. “The ball begins at fourth toll. Don’t be late. Also,” he gestured to the mirror. “You’ve got something in your teeth. More reason not to smile.”

“Why did you say that!?” The Lutren hurried to the mirror. “I don’t see anything!”

“Oh, I definitely saw something,” Rook said. “Make sure it’s gone before you leave.”

The door opened and shut. Beck scowled and dug out a fresh bottlebrush from behind the bar.

*      *      *

Rook laid down a heavy bag of valuables. The job had gone off without a hitch. Beck had returned shortly before, and had already extricated herself from the pink dress.

“Nice work,” the Polcan said with a satisfied grin. “I’m guessing your mark was receptive to your little cover story?”

“Nooooot quite.” Beck snapped the hat off her head, dropped it, and kicked it into place behind the bar. “So, I spent the entire afternoon brushing my teeth.’

Rook laughed. “I’m sure you did.”

“You know I’m sensitive about my teeth.”

“I wouldn’t have said anything if you weren’t.”

“I hate you.” Beck grinned. “And also it made me forget my entire cover story.”

The Polcan sat down at his table, putting his feet up on another chair. “This ought’a be amusing.”

“Right, so.” Beck swung a chair around and leaned against the back. “I was fumbling all my lines. I tried to introduce him to my nonexistent father. I told him I was from the countryside.”

“And?”

“And he was so distracted by my shiny teeth that he missed everything I said.”

“Aha.” Rook looked rather amused. “That’s a, uh… new strategy. I’d never considered that before.”

“Anyway,” Beck said, making her way to the door, “I’m done for tonight. We’ll split the haul tomorrow when Asha and Theo get in.”

“Fine.”

“Oh, and also?” Beck held at the door. “Rook, my dear, you’ve got something in your teeth.”

“No, I don’t.”

“You’re right, of course you don’t.” The door slowly shut. At the very last second, it

burst open again. “I lied! You really do!” She slammed the door and cackled her way down the alleyway toward the city center.

Rook rolled his eyes and leaned back in his chair, alone in the Abadis Tavern. He sighed. Then finally stood up and wandered over to the mirror behind the bar. “Stupid Beck with her stupid teeth.” He squinted into the glass. It was too dark to see anything.

“Darnit.” He looked around for a candle or lamp, but there was nothing he could bring closer to the mirror. After a few minutes, he settled back into his chair. “She’s probably lying.” He muttered uneasily to himself. “Probably.”

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I hope you enjoyed this first prose Western Deep story (and amazing gif image)! As I mentioned last week, we’ll be running three stories, one each week, until April 1st. On the next Saturday, we’ll be resuming our regular pages.

For guest art this week, I wanted to share some fun little page alterations that Rachel put together! She’s been doing an incredible job on getting our volume 2 pages ready for print, but the constrained workload may have, to quote her own words, “cost me a bit of my sanity.”

The result is this fun pair of images, inspired by the amazingly catchy “History of Japan” Youtube video that’s been making the Internet rounds!

XD