Date: Ninth of January, year 810 Post Seminal War (810 PSW

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The second day of the Fire Dance was the real party. There was music, dancing, and entertainment all day, with the usual sideshow of grifters, pickpockets, and panhandlers working the crowds too. After the sun went down, under the light of a new moon and the illumination of huge bonfires, and after the kids had all gone to bed, the serious fun begins. It isn’t uncommon for there to be a spate of births nine months later, and more than one Tremoran grandee has had to cover up a Fire Dance Bastard child.

This year, unlike the past twelve or so Job could remember, the City Guard were actively picking off the pickpockets and thieves. Several of the more popular (and more thoroughly rigged) game stands were noticeably empty or absent. And, while lurking on the edges of things, Job could tell that he had been thoroughly cased and checked out by at least two other law enforcement groups. He figured that one of them was the Ironbark Regiment, called in to assist the Guard. Job wasn’t sure about the other one, but they moved differently. The Guard were all street-tough strut, and the Ironbark Regiment had the swagger of truly elite troops, but this last group…

Job only spotted them because they almost, but didn’t quite, fit in. They had the dance steps down by the book, but missed some of the local variations. Their accent was almost perfect Treboran street drawl, but a few well-educated words slipped through. And most telling, they were spending gold coins, not copper or silver. That told Job that whomever they were, they were not local and had money. When Job spotted one casually talking to an Ironbark Regiment officer, he mentally marked them down as Althiem Crown Agents.

Job stuck to drinking water, wanting to keep his wits about himself, and drifted away from the festivities as the sun set. Sly, he decided, was right. The hammer was on its way down on the Sirens, and not just Lord Trebor but also the Queen of Althiem had a special interest in seeing them arrested with more prejudice then gentleness.

“Sly girl, what in the nine hells have you dragged me into?”

Date: Tenth of January, year 810 Post Seminal War (810 PSW)

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After spending the night hidden away in a stable loft, Job set about scavenging the fairgrounds for make-work, looking to earn a few coins and hear a bit of gossip. The gossip wasn’t hard to find, but it was hard to believe. The Ironbark Regiment had raided several buildings in the warehouse district, with Lord and Lady Trebor, High Priestess of Kuko Talae, and Paladin Ancient Ussi leading the charge on the Siren’s headquarters in person. It had turned into a rolling battle lasting most of the night and sprawling out into the streets.

Job quickly made back the few coins he had spent the night before, then headed down to the warehouse district to get a look at the damage. Six warehouses were still smouldering, the fire brigade keeping a wide perimeter around the wreckage. Several of the religious orders had established an encampment to tend to smoke inhalation victims, and what looked like freed slaves. Job shook his head, hoping that Sly had managed to get out from under all of this. The Trebor City Guard was bad enough, from the perspective of the poor lawbreaker on the street. The Ironbark Regiment, Crown Agents, and all of the Adventurer-grade firepower that Lord Trebor and his friends could bring? The Sirens were toast if they were lucky, and somewhere between extra crispy and ash in the wind if they were not.

Job fell back into the comforting embrace of Trebor’s back alleyways and sunlit rooftops. All he could do was try to meet up with Sly tomorrow, and hope that Head Archivist Innoch had work for him and Sly both.

Job sat on the steps to his old dorm and waited. The sun was climbing towards noon, and Sly should be along soon. She appeared from an alleyway, hair slightly mussed, dirt on her street clothes, soot on her boots.

“Rough night Sly?”

“You could say that. I haven’t slept on a rooftop in twelve years, and I don’t miss it.”

“Here, hold still a sec. Let’s get you cleaned up some.” Job reached out with his magic, a simple Prestidigitation cantrip whisking away the soot and grime, rinsed, combed and dried her hair, and shined her boots. A Mending cantrip touched up the few cuts and snags in Sly’s apparel. “There we go, presentable.”

“That tickled Job!”

“Better a few moments of being tickled then to walk into the Trebor Library looking like you crawled out of the mess down in the warehouse district. You heard the gossip?”

“Nah, not really. Was too busy trying to not get robbed.”

“The Sirens are gone.”

“Bullshit, they had ships in and out of the bay every day.”

“When the Ironbark Regiment, Crown Agents, Lord and Lady Trebor, the High Priestess of Kuko, and the Paladin Ancient want something wiped out, they do it themselves, and they don’t do it by halves.”

“Light above and Dark below… I knew a hammer was coming down, but that…”

“It’s done and over with, so don’t think about it. Now, let’s go see the Head Archivist.”

Job knocked on the door to Head Archivist Innoch’s office. The semester was over, but Job knew the Head Archivist never really stopped working. “Head Archivist?”

“Job! Come in, come in! I’ve a graduate student that I’d like you to meet.” The old warforged was as jovial as ever, his fine-scaled metal hide flexing like skin as laugh lines crinkled his face.

Job quickly claimed his favorite overstuffed chair by the fireplace, with Sly drifting behind.

“Job Arseoth, this is Enra Thallia. Miss Thallia, Job Arseoth.”

Job looked over the graduate student, though it was a short look on account of the high elf’s height. Job himself was of average height at a few inches short of six feet, but Erna was petite at five feet tall on her tiptoes, and couldn’t be more than a hundred pounds fully dressed and soaking wet. She dressed well for a graduate student, with a fine robe in forest green to match the small emerald studs in her knifelike ears and her sun-yellow hair. “How do you fare, Miss Thallia?”

“Just Enra, and I am well indeed. And I see you’ve brought a lady-friend with you.”

“Head Archivist, Erna, this is Sly Malon. Sly, Head Archivist Innoch Warforged, and Erna. And no, She is not my girlfriend, simply a friend from when I lived on the streets.”

The Head Archivist nodded, steepling his fingers in his lap, “and by any chance are the two of you looking for work? Miss Thallia could use some paid assistance with her thesis work, extracting some old texts from the lower archives of Varr Barak. It shouldn’t be anything that you can’t handle, and I think Miss Sly here can handle it too.”

Job nodded, “I think we can do that.”

There was another knock on the door, the crack of wood on wood. Sly jumped a little bit, but none else did. Just as Head Archivist Innoch was the only all-metal Warforged in the entirety of Althiem, there was only one wood-skinned being in that same kingdom.

The Head Archivist sighed slightly, “Its open dear, you can come in. Sly Malon, meet Inalia Warforged, my daughter.”

“Please, just call me Index” the cheerful warforged replied. She was tall, standing right on six feet. Dark Irellian oak limbs protruded from a simple dress and sandals, and her physique could best be described as statuesque, given that Index was indeed shaped like a wooden statue or a highly detailed mannequin. Her face was set in her best impression of puppy-dog eyes, if a puppy ever had two glowing blue sapphires for eyes. “Erna is heading out today, right? Won’t you please let me go with her?”