All carts and travellers riding horses or oxen funnelled towards the market street or stables. Tom followed them into the depths of Eldar’s Port.

Red-brick buildings and colourful storefronts welcomed us to the city. Most structures were only three stories tall, and flowerpots hung from window sills on the upper floors. Gnomes populated most of them, but I spotted the odd elf or human here and there. The city reminded me of the little village outside London, where my parents lived.

For a moment, it felt like I had visited a quaint little place from a fantasy book; like I had entered Diagon Alley or Rivendale. Unusual smells and shop displays called to me. Razmataz Arcane Emporium. Raj’s Kebab-In-A-Roll. Swords! Swords! Swords! The more ridiculous the name, the more people we saw waiting in line. We hadn’t yet visited the main market street and I could only wonder how congested they’d be.

Then, we turned a corner, and my perspective did a one-eighty. Stalls in several stages of disrepair lined the streets, and I saw entire families squeezed into little tents and cottages behind them. Almost all of them were human. The distinction in living standards made my chest tighten. It felt like we had entered the slums in a developing country.

The people had little to no protection from the elements. Though their feet weren’t as big and hardly like mine, the children wore no shoes. They ran around barefoot or sat on their bottoms, looking tired and uninterested in those playing. The temperature in Eldar’s Port was considerably higher than Dil’s Nook and Grog’s Table, but it didn’t feel like shirtless weather. However, the children had little more than trousers on.

Why would anyone want to live like this?

I’d only ever seen such levels of poverty on television when charities begged for donations to provide clean water or medicine in a developing country. “Poverty porn”, as they called it in the industry. Most of the poor and destitute seemed hard at work, though. Either they hadn’t given up on Eldar’s dream or had no other choice but to toil against the current.

At first, the many unaccompanied children alarmed me in the streets. They moved from stall to stall, shopper to shopper, begging for coin and food. My heart went out to the little boys and girls—most were my height or taller. Then I noticed their coordinated assault on the stalls. Though not immediately apparent, the urchins shared glances and occasional nods, flashing hand signs at each other when no one was looking—Gangs of Eldar’s Port. The city would’ve been the perfect setting for a Martin Scorsese film.

I had Tom slow the cart to watch them in action. A human girl, no older than ten, approached the largest fruit stall carrying a squash-sized bundle—I couldn’t tell through the crowd, but it looked like a baby.

“Please, sir,” she said, holding out her left hand. “Can I have an orange.”

“Shoo!” The fat shopkeeper smacked her arm away. “Keep your filthy paws off my fruit!”

“Me brother’s sick, sir. Don’t let him die.” The little girl didn’t back down. She held the bundle out towards the man, and he recoiled in disgust.

“Away!” he yelled. “Away, I say or to the prison-barges you’ll go.”

A few passing shoppers watched the drama, while several ragged boys and girls filtered through them. No one spotted the urchins grabbing apples, pears, and oranges from the nearby stalls as all attention was drawn to the fat shopkeep. If anyone saw them thieving, no one made a fuss. In fact, I noticed a neighbouring fruit vendor with a smaller stall watch the robbery and smirk.

For a moment, I thought she was taking pleasure in a more successful competitor’s loss. I’d expect more solidarity between merchants. No one likes shoplifters. Right? Then the sharpened senses from the growing Aspect of Control paid off. The wronged shopkeeper wore a palm-sized badge on his chest: off-balance silver scales with a pair of jewel-encrusted eyeballs. None of the other merchants had anything of the sort.

I noticed a pattern the deeper we headed into the city. Similar badge-wearing shopkeepers ran the biggest and most inventory-laden stalls. Not only did they appear better off than their competitors, but they also had more people lining up to peruse or purchase their wares. It wasn’t just customers flocking towards them. The areas featured the highest concentration of unaccompanied children loitering around as well. After spotting the third instance of robbery, I realised these merchants were being targeted. I couldn’t tell whether it had something to do with the badge or if the excess customers demanded more of their attention, making theft easy.

It was all good until I spotted a daring pair creeping on a merchant peddling merchandise similar to Hruk’s creations. We were approaching the riverside, and every second stall owner wore the unbalanced scales. Now that I thought about it, the gnome-run stores had the same crest hanging above their doors. They all worked for the Seekers of Oth.

Armoured guards policed the streets, and most shoppers wore colourful clothes and jewellery. It didn’t deter the children, though. They had less success with the stalls, but I heard more than one well-dressed pedestrian complaining to the guards about lighter pockets.

I spotted another practiced pair easing a stack of metal spheres off a side table. The merchant and his assistants had their backs to thieving children, and for a moment, it looked like they were going to get away with it.

“Thief!” shouted a large, purple-coated man, grabbing one of their wrists. The girl dropped the sphere, but the man didn’t let go.

“I didn’ do nuffin’!” the urchin yelled. “Let go of me, ya fat wanker!” She sounded like one of the rougher kids out of Oliver Twist.

“So, it’s your lot stealing my wares?” the shopkeeper asked, his face twisting into a menacing grin.

“The guilds will pay handsomely for these two,” the purple-coated man said. “The prison barges constantly need little hands.”

Perhaps his words made me jump the gun, but I couldn’t help but dislike the man straight away. When I first spotted him, he wasn’t perusing merchandise but watching the urchins with an almost predatory gaze. If the city officials or whichever guild ran the prisons paid rewards for underaged criminals, maybe he was looking to profit off the struggling masses. Then again, my assumptions could also be overly optimistic. What if the purple-coated man had worse intentions?

Back on Earth, perhaps I wouldn’t feel as much sympathy for the struggling masses and thieves even less, but now, on Arena Disk, I was one of them. As a regular practitioner of Sneaking and Sleight of Hand, I felt a strange kinship towards the little ones and something deep inside urged me to do something about the situation. Letting them end up in what sounded like a work camp felt wrong.

“Stay here,” I whispered, hopping off the cart.

“Don’t—”

I didn’t hear the rest of Tom’s protest as I slipped into the crowd. Films and books from Earth had filled my imagination with the worst possibilities. I didn’t have a plan, and my actions would likely put me on the wrong side of the law, but I had to help the little ones escape.

“Someone call the guards!” The shopkeeper yelled. He turned his attention to the little thieves. “The Seekers of Oth will want a word with you two. We know your lot have been targeting our stalls!”

“We didn’ do nuthin’,” one girl replied. She kicked the purple-coated man’s shin. When he flinched, she wriggled her wrist out of his grip and fled. The second girl tried to run too, but the man lifted her off the ground.

“You’re not getting away!” he snarled. “I’m going to get my payday, I am!”

It took a little nudging and pushing to make it to the stall, and my stature certainly didn’t help. After making sure no one had their eyes on me. A flick of my right wrist activated the Mage Hand, and I sent it floating through the crowd. It grabbed a pair of orange-sized aetherite spheres and gently placed them in the purple-coated man’s pocket. Struggling with the wriggling urchin, he didn’t appear to feel the change in weight. No one noticed me either.

Sneaking has progressed to Apprentice Rank 7!

Sleight of Hand has progressed to Apprentice Rank 0!

Dexterity + 2

Arcana + 1

I recalled the Mage Hand, glad no one had spotted me yet. While everyone focused on the shouting little girl, her captor, and the shopkeeper, I crept to the stall’s opposite side.

“Hey!” I shouted, deepening my voice. “What’s that bulging out of his pocket?”

“What?” the shopkeeper asked.

I had already slipped back into the mass of people and moved to another spot in front of the shopkeeper.

“That’s right,” I said. “Look at fatty’s pockets.”

“What are you talking about, halfling?” The purple-coated man shouted back. I couldn’t tell what had made him mad; me calling him fat or the accusation.

“Your pockets, mate,” I told him. “I’ve been waiting in line for quite a while, hoping to find a decent bargain. You, my friend, have been standing there all this time looking around suspiciously. Those bulges in your pocket don’t look right. That’s all I’m saying.”

The little girl and I made eye contact. She looked between her captor, ending her struggling.

“You some kind of vagrant, halfling?” The man demanded. “The cloak certainly looks like a vagrant’s. You don’t know who you’re accusing. The city has a problem with thieves, and I’m trying to solve it!”

The little girl stuck her hand into her captor’s coat and pulled out one sphere I had stashed. “He’s trying to stitch me up for his own crimes, he is!” she screamed before turning to the shopkeeper. “Help me, sir. Someone’s been snatchin’ girls like me. He’s a pervert!”

The crowd’s mood changed instantly. They went from bored onlookers to angry parents, cousins, and siblings within moments. All colour drained from the purple-coated man’s face when he sensed the shift.

“I’ve heard those stories too,” a woman in the crowd said.

“Trying to blame his theft on a child?” another voice spoke up. Barely taller than the children, I couldn’t see its owner. “Shameless!”

“They’re lying,” the man protested. I felt a little bad as he scanned the crowd, scared. Perhaps he wasn’t a pervert. Maybe he only wanted to line his pockets through human trafficking and kidnapping. I just didn’t like the idea of a child being forced into captivity. Sure, they were thieves, but the children needed guidance, not forced labour. More than anything, I hated any system—privatised or public—that would allow people to profit from making citizens’ arrests.

“She must have stuffed the orbs in my pocket when I caught her!”

No one believed him. When a burly member of the mob advanced towards them, the purple-coated man dropped the little girl. As soon as her feet touched the ground, she disappeared into the crowd. I took that as my cue to leave as well.