They had to sneak around the Higher City main alleys for about an hour. Through bushes and thickets, they finally reached their destination, the back wall of a private residence.

“Make me a ladder,” ordered the thinner of them, Sirinn, to one of his companions, the plump Rusick.

“Seriously? You have me with you, and you ask him to make you a ladder? I can just grab you and throw you over the wall.”

Frey’r had become somehow a friend of Rusick and Sirinn in the few days he had spent at the Casino as a guest.

“Yes, typically barbarian. Here we need finesse, and Rusick is a good ladder; he has experience.”

“Sirinn, please, let’s forgot this. It’s pure madness! They’ll skin us alive if they catch us,” pleaded the said Rusick.

“Nobody will do anything. Their Archipelago flotilla had just arrived. Everyone is on the docks, sorting the merchandise for the Festival. She’s all alone.”

“Wait for the Festival,” suggested Frey’r. “Everybody’s partying, masks and all, why take the risk now?”

“I’ve made other arrangements for the festival, mate. I know you Norse clean your matriarchs sandals with your tongues for years before you even get a kiss, but we are people of action here. Let’s go. Rusick! Ladder!”

Rusick obeyed reluctantly, gathering his hands together and taking the right position. Stepping with the right foot in his friend’s hands, Sirinn jumped up and caught the margin of the wall, going over it in a split second.

“Can you make me a ladder, please?” asked Rusick.

Frey’r didn’t bother to answer. He jumped on his own, raised himself on the wall, bent downwards, and grabbed Rusick by his collar, lifting him with one hand until the croupier was sitting on the wall too.

“You’re strong!” appreciated Rusick.

Sirinn jumped down, and they followed, Rusick the least graceful of all. They were in a small thicket and had to sneak again between branches and trees. The Game Master was silent as a shadow, the other two noisy as elephants.

“For Sweet Southern Sea’s sake, sneak more silently!” he admonished his friends.

“We Norse don’t sneak!” replied Frey’r through his teeth. “We run to the enemy shouting, so they freeze with fear in their bones.”

“You’ll do a good impression on the Ohst girls doing that, indeed!” replied Sirinn, rolling his eyes and continuing onwards. The two tried to keep up and make less noise. In two minutes, they were behind the house. Only twenty yards of well-cared lawn, interrupted only by two large oaks, stood between them and the back entry. But the moons were both full.

“Let’s recapitulate,” ordered Sirinn. “I’ll climb the rain pipe to her window. As soon she opens it, I jump in. She’ll do snobby stuff initially, telling she’s afraid that someone’s coming, the usual repertoire. I’ll use the 1st scheme, which works best. I’m not afraid to die if she kisses me. I have ten more variants but never needed more than three. After the kiss, I’ll stay around half an hour - I’ll make you a drawing, Norseman, if you don’t know what we’ll be doing – then we go together to a restaurant where we’re meeting that seamstress and her two friends for a nice late supper.”

“You’ll be back in under a minute. I can’t imagine a girl falling for something so stupid. No logic whatsoever.” frowned Frey’r.

“Logic is the last thing woman wants from a lover!” replied Sirinn.

“Please, Sirinn,” pleaded Rusick again. The Valditriadis are one of the Grand Families. Relatives of the Royals.”

“Distant relatives. And their women are the hottest in the City. But they are merchants, Rusick. They carry some weight in the Islands, but here they are just merchants; they have no soldiers. Just keep watch with our good friend Frey’r here, who will take care to break the legs of any misguided servant or relative who’d bother us.”

“Now I see why you took me with you. And I thought it was a sincere friendship,” joked Frey’r.

“It is, it is. Do your part, and then we’ll meet some nice girls and have supper together, as I've promised. I guarantee you’ll not still be a virgin at forty like your barbarian colleagues use to be.”

Without letting any more place for arguing, Sirinn strode forward on the lawn. He threw a small pebble in the appropriate window, with a lot of skill, and the window opened, letting a white-dressed woman appear in the moons’ light. Tall and very, very beautiful, appreciated the two improvised guards while their friend started to climb the rain pipe. The woman leaned towards him offering her arm.

“I’m good, my love,” sussured Sirinn.

Only the barbarian’s training saved him.

“TRAP!” shouted Frey’r. “RUN!”

Both the shout and seeing suddenly that the woman held a little crossbow in her hand made Sirinn lose grip. He managed to land on all fours on the lawn, like a cat, though, with only a scratch on his elbow.

“Aaah!” wailed Rusick. The bolt destined to Sirinn had ricocheted on a branch and hit him deep in his inner thigh.

“Surender!” someone shouted.

Two men, the brother and the father of the woman Sirinn courted, emerged from behind the oaks, armed with mechanical repetition crossbows. The trio's path back was cut. Frey’r had a knife on him, but he knew better. There was no chance he could deflect and outrun crossbow bolts. He raised his hands, and Rusick did the same. Sirinn tried to fight, but a boot in his stomach and stock in his face ended his struggle very fast. All three had their hands tied and were drawn on the lawn into the full moons’ light.

The woman arrived. She was even more beautiful than they thought. First, she kicked Sirinn with her elegant but very pointy boot, several times, in his ribs. Then she tore his shirt apart, letting his upper chest bare.

“Does the name Grabiela means something to you?” she said and spit on him. “Our new maid. She seems to know you well. Broke her heart, too. She described quite well your tattoos, little red ants all over the body. Dog. You’re not worthy of being loved. Kill them!” she ordered.

“You want to let us go free!” said Sirinn in a melodious tone.

“Yes, like the Voice spell would work on descendants of the First King,” she spat. “Kill them! What are you waiting for?”

“Why the hurry? The fat one is already dead,” stated her brother. “Bled out. He had a painless death, and the barbarian will get the same. But for the dog, we can take our time. You’ll feel it, Beauhemian!”

Turning his head painfully towards his comrade, Sirinn met his still gaze, the body’s eyes only at a hand distance from his.

“I’ll kill you all!” he hissed and started mumbling a spell. For a second, his hair went straight, his skin shivered. Then his forces vaned, and only a wind carrying some early dead leaves caressed his year.

It’s your fault. It’s your fault.

“Sorry, my lords, my lady. I don’t know this wretched Beauhemian; I’m just a guest of the Casino. Please, let me go. I promise I’ll keep forever the secrets of this night.”

Even in these dire straits, Sirinn jaw was able to fell, aghast by the Schiavon's shameful cowardice.

“I’m afraid this is not on the table, barbarian. But rest assured, you’ll not feel much.” said the brother while preparing a long and very sharp dagger.

Frey’r had already made a desperate plan, to use his formidable core muscles to jump up and take the woman hostage somehow, even if he had his hands tied.

While he tensed, a man’s voice, a servant's voice, interrupted all.

“Sir! Sir! There’s someone to see you.”

“I’ve ordered not to be disturbed,” angrily responded the father, his raucous voice a testament of both his anger and his displeasure to be interrupted. But on the lawn, there were already soft steps approaching.

“Princess Estella? What are you doing here?” asked the Valditriadis clan chief severely. “This is not a place or time for young girls.”

“But it’s a place and time for a Royal,” she replied. “I’ve felt the drama unfolding from our villa, just a few minutes ago. I felt Frey’r’s fate, the one I wove for him, falter. He is in my care; he’s a Schiavoni prince from the North, more important for me than for you. Please, let him go.”

Frey’r’s hands were freed. He rose, rotated his wrists to get rid of the numbness, noded a big thank you to the princess, and was ready to go. She still stood there, looking intently at Sirinn, who was looking instead at his downed friend, crying.

“Will you let him go too, please?”Estella asked.

“He’s ours, replied the woman. By the Higher City law, we can kill him. Let him die, dear cousin; he does not deserve your pity. I have to have his blood on my hands and feel his last breath while I’m strangling him!”

While her words did not make a lot of sense, their violence did not make Estella falter.

“Your honor is safe; is it not what it matters most? The Providence had spared you the shame to be lured in bed by this low life snail. I can feel your pain; I understand you. Your desire to be loved and your worth as a woman were cheated tonight. All women earn for true love... but you’ll find it soon enough, trust me. I swear. You think that all is lost, but it is not; it’s just a bad experience you’ll forget about in a month. When true love will come for you. If you kill him, though, his memory will taint your mind forever, like poison. He’s not worth it. Please, let him go, in the name of our common blood, in the name of the true love by whom our branch of the family saved yours!"

Sirinn was cut free. There were no goodbyes. Princess ahead and the two boys following their head down, one trio went towards the main gate. In a second trio, the woman, crying and supported by her brother and father, went to the mansion. On the lawn, Rusick laid still, and the unfortunate servant who had brought the princess looked at him, scratching his head, as he knew it was now in his charge to dispose of the body and had no idea how.

After a few hundred yards, when they reached the Royal Villa, and it was clear that they will be left on their own, Sirinn finally talked.

“Thank you, Estella! I feared a moment for your life… Those monsters…”

“NO! No, no, no, Sirinn. You are the monster!” she shouted back, with her eyes filled with fury. “Do you know what was my first reaction when I’ve read the tragedy tonight? Nausea, Sirinn. You make me retch! Just hearing you speak now is appalling. For the first time, I saw you like you are, and it makes me sick. I’ve read Frey’r being in danger because of you, Rusick being killed, and her pain, oh, Providence… So much pain… she hoped for love and found only a vile slime instead of her Prince Charming. It’s you, Sirinn, you, that have killed your friend, not them. I saved you for uncle’s sake, but mostly for hers too. I’ve spoken the truth. If she had killed you, she would have to carry your memory as a burden all her life. Better to be forgotten, and slimes are easily forgotten, don’t you worry. And don’t you think that you escaped so easily. I’ll think of a proper punishment for you. Just wait. I’ll think about it all night because there will be no sleep for me now. As for you, I hope you’re big enough to find your way home.”

She entered her royal home like a storm while the two, head down and tail between their legs, continued their walk into the night like they were marching to the gallows.