Training Teresa

[Trillian]

Ridley was distracted.  The colourful displays of the market stalls and the noise of the people around him weren\'t enough to keep him amused.  The girl at his side was called Teresa, and Ara had been adamant that he was to show her the ways of the thief.  He wasn\'t happy about it but because Ara had given him time and space to woo the Captain, he\'d not made any protests, though his expression had given away the fact that he didn\'t want to be a babysitter.

He was thinking of Mia as well, on her own at Lord Dagger\'s house, wondering how much she would be trusted, how patient he would have to be before his own plan was put into action.  There were a lot of things that he had on the boil as well as juggling the jobs Ara threw his way.  No sleep for the wicked, and the five hours he managed a night was beginning to show on his somewhat handsome face, making him look grumpy and weary.

His hand was around Teresa\'s, declaring that they were to present as a couple to remove suspicion from the stall owners.  Couples were rarely picked as thieves, unless they were caught in the act.  Couples were also harder to make an escape, because there was a better chance capturing two than one.  Guards were everywhere, but he wasn\'t nervous about that.

"Something simple," he told her, pulling her along behind him as though she were a ragdoll, though she might\'ve weighed as much.  He was strong, from all his athletic tasks, though he couldn\'t judge his strength too well today, from being tired.  He wondered how well he would be able to teach the girl.  Despite Ara\'s warnings for Teresa to watch her skirts around the well-known womaniser, Ridley hadn\'t made a single advancement toward her.  He had his hands full after all.  "Distract with one thing to take another," he said as he moved through the crowds, shouldering people out of his way and choosing a stall that didn\'t have many precious goods on it.  This wasn\'t as closely watched as others and would make better practice.  There were scarves and wooden bracelets at the very front.  "Make as if to buy one of the scarves, they\'re bright, colourful, and float on the breeze.  A good distraction.  Take your time over it.  When the merchant is distracted with another customer, pocket one of the bracelets without putting down the scarf in your hands.  Make a flag of it, a cover."

He finished talking just as he thrust her towards the stall, sighing and rolling his eyes like any man might who has a beloved who got distracted at every stall.  He looked around with apparent disinterest, though he was watching her closely.

[Morwen]

Teresa woke up fairly early, and slipped on one of the simple outfits Ara had left her, only to have the slip right off again. A few minutes of careful knots in the right places left her with a descent looking dress, over a pair of pants (it was the best compromise she could find). She ran her fingers through her hair to neaten it up, and then went up-stairs to find Ridley. On her way out the door, she spotted a little knife in one of the piles, and decided to borrow it for the day.

Pocketting the knife, she climbed up the steps and entered into the office from the night before. It looked so different... sunlight and her refreshed clarity of mind had brightened the room and made it seem larger.

Leaving the office, Teresa found herself being introduced to Ridley and shoved out the door in almost the same moment. Before she could fully register what had happened, the thief was holding her hand and pulling her into the market place, giving her instructions as to proper thieving procedure under his breath.

When Ridley pushed her to one of the brightly coloured stalls, Teresa looked blankly at everything in front of her. Forcing a light smile to her face, she shyly picked up a large necklace- one that would never fit her slim features- and asked the stall owners to put it on for her. As he came around to do so, she leaned against the table, curling her fingers around a small, but expensive looking broach without picking it up.

She chatted with a bit about how the necklace was ever so pretty, but really not her style, and then concluded, \'Oh dear, it looks as though my um... love? is getting impatient with me. I had best be going, but I shall certainly come back later.\'

Joining Ridley again, she slipt her hand with the broach into his, saying, \'Sorry I took so long, dear.\'

[Trillian]

Seeing this little display before him, Ridley blinked his surprise when he realised that Teresa wasn\'t green.  She\'d obviously done such things before, but he disliked the show-off way she\'d shown him.  He said nothing until they were far from the stall, turning to walk down an alleyway where a salve shop was open but stopping before he reached it so he could turn on her.

"When I tell you to do something a certain way," he hissed, "that is the way you\'ll do it, or by Talon\'s hand I\'ll make sure that you\'re made."  With his eyes narrowed and pink blotches on his cheeks, a once-handsome Ridley could look downright ugly.  "If you want to learn from me, then you\'ll learn my technique as well, you stupid girl.  Do that again and you can spend the day without me, and I\'ll let Ara know that you can\'t follow instruction."  His hand still held hers, squeezing it though not quite painfully, not wanting her to blame potential inability to thieve because he\'d squashed her fingers.

[Morwen]

Teresa made a small noise of pain as he squeazed her fingers. She hadn\'t meant not to follow instructions, she just hadn\'t thought she would be able to use misdirection as well with a scarf as she did with the necklace. Looking away from her teacher\'s angry face, she whispered and apology, \'I\'m sorry I really didn\'t mean to be rude... \'

...but what did I do wrong? she continued to herself. She had gotten the ice, and there wasn\'t anyone chasing them down. Didn\'t that mean she did well? She would simply have to follow all instructions to the letter, from now on. After all, Ara had said Ridley was one of the best thieves, and he certainly had far more experience than Teresa could ever hope to aquire. If she wanted to become a good thief, she had better keep to the line and learn without improvising.

[Trillian]

Ridley, Teresa would soon learn, was a bully.  He released her hand from the hold as soon as she hissed pain, disappointed that she would be so delicate that even when he was being careful it wasn\'t enough not to hurt her.  He glared at her and then held out his hand, palm up, for her to give him the broch.

If she gave it to him, he would pocket it and pull her back out of the alley, back into the market stalls, moving back the other way so she could demonstrate what skills she had at a stall that was positioned near a city guard.  If she didn\'t give it to him, well... something else would happen.

[Morwen]

Teresa had been told to stand up to Ridley, but it was one thing to agree to do that in private conversation, and another thing entirely when he was staring down at her. Meekly, she held ou the broach and put it in his hand, not meeting his eyes. She wished she was better at this thieving business, or at least that it was an easier one to break into. The threat of being arrested on her first day out may have been good incentive for her not to mess up, but it also scared her silly.

Looking up, but still avoiding Ridley\'s eyes, she asked, \'So what should I do now? Do you want me to try again?\' Half of her wanted to prove that she could, while the other have was trying to run away and hide. Unfortunately for the latter half, the former made a good point. She had no where to run, so she had better get used to this.

[Trillian]

He didn\'t respond, merely acting as he intended, and soon enough they were browsing the stalls on the way to an amateur fletcher.  Weaponry always earned itself a watchful guard, stationed by the Captain herself no doubt, a savvy woman who knew that pretty things stolen weren\'t as important as weaponry.  Merchants with pretty or more expensive things often recruited their own pair of eyes, and Ridley himself had once been on the other side of the stall, paid well to ensure no thieves raided.

A man at a weaponry stall would be watched more closely than the woman at his side, so Ridley immediately began to inspect the bows before looking down at Teresa and declaring quite openly to her: "Whatever you can."

It was an invitation for her to use her judgement.  There were full arrows and arrowheads.  There were small vials of poison to help wound wolves and have them die quicker and with fewer arrows (and truthfully, Ridley would\'ve made for the poison than anything else).  Arrowheads and flints, knives and bows, plus assorted bits and pieces for mending kits, as well as the full kits themselves.  It would be interesting to see what Teresa would take, and if she\'d noticed that Ridley\'s exaggerated motions with the bow - stepping back and twanging it, was drawing quite a few stares, though not yet the guard\'s, who was more concerned with the fellow on Teresa\'s other side, studying a knife.  The vendor was trying to sell him on it.

[Morwen]

Teresa shied away from the deadly assortment of weaponry in a way that was not entirely feigned. She tried to make her eyes look larger and kept a small distance between herself and the table. Whatever she could pinch... well, obviously she couldn\'t steal anything large like an arrow or bow. Even a hunting knife would be too hard to conceal.

She kept her eyes on Ridley, pretending to watch him playing with the bow, while she went over an inventory of the tables wares... The only things she could definately palm would be the arrow heads, charms, and vials of various darkly coloured liquids. The first two were awfully cheap, and not worth the risk they were plainly taking. But the third? They might be worth something, right?

Unfortunately, the vials were not near the edge of the table, but rather were a bit further in: within reach, but not subtly so. Letting her eyes wander over some of the nearby products. There were a few knives that were obviously mostly decorative... they wouldn\'t be too suspicious would they?

She leaned over the table, reaching to pick one up, as she let her long hair fall over her shoulder and onto the table. Just as she touched the grip, the shopkeeper\'s assistant, a young man of his middle teen years (probably the keeper\'s son?) rushed over. \'Miss, can I help you?\'

Teresa pulled backwards, intentionally knocking over several objects with her hair along the way. \'Oh yes I was just looking at that lovely sword, and- oh no I\'ve made such a mess! I\'m so sorry.\' Her face turned cherry pink without her having to force it to, and she began picking up trinkets, knife stands, bowls of arrow heads... and vials. She slipped one of the latter into her hand as she finished helping the boy pick up. \'So sorry about that, I can\'t believe I was so clumsy!\'

[Trillian]

Clever girl

Ridley\'s respect for Teresa rose somewhat when she used her hair to distract, for it seemed a genuine accident.  Because some of the vials had rolled off the table\'s edge, he made a point of kicking one against the stall leg so that the vial cracked.

"Be careful, sweet," Ridley warned, stepping back and dropping the bow on the table so he could pull back on her shoulders, and motioned for the guard to approach.  "I think you\'d best help us, sir, there\'s poison on the ground."  He gestured to the dirt road and the guard\'s gaze followed.  "Do you mind if we step away?  I don\'t particularly care to step on poisoned glass with my soft shoes," he said, and the guard nodded, much to the fletcher\'s disdain, for the stall owner was about to demand payment for what was broken.  With permission from the guard whose priority was to make the area safe for those walking by, Ridley and Teresa could make a hasty exit.

He led her back into the alleyway they\'d gone down before, and he eyed the mouth of it and also checked the doorway of the salve shop before removing the pouch that held the broch she\'d originally swiped.

"I\'ll swap you, sweet," he said, his nickname for her sticking as he grinned at her.  All ugliness from their prior meeting in this area had disappeared as he became his charming self.  "You can have the pretty shiny thing, if you give me that vial out of your apron."

He studied her for a moment.  "You up for one more thing?  We must present a bounty to our exotic boss-lady," he explained, "or she\'ll slice your fingernails off."  The threat wasn\'t so much to scare her as to let her know how things worked under Ara\'s rule.

[Morwen]

As Ridley made a clever escape for the two of them, Teresa tried to make a show of looking embarressed and avoiding the small pieces of glass and poison. By the time they made it back to their alleyway, her face was flushed with excitement. \'Did I do well Ridley?\' she asked, hoping that he approved of her performance. She was amazed at how cleanly he had managed to get them away, he even made it look as if they were the ones in the right!

\'That was amazing, the way you had the guard on our side, how did you do it? I was sure that I would get in trouble for making a scene, if not stealing!\' Gratefully, she dug in her sleeve for the vial she had hidden. Passing it to Ridley, she grinned and put the broach in one of the many pockets of the dress. She hadn\'t been expecting to keep anything at all, not until she was on her own, at least, so getting to keep the broach was a pleasant surprise.

Not wanting to go back with so little to give Ara, Teresa quickly agreed to go for another run. \'Of course I\'ll try, if you think it is a good idea? I mean, I don\'t want to get cockey and get caught or anything...\' She was so glad that her tutor was not angry at her any more -- Ridley was scary when he was being nice, when he was mad he was downright terrifying.

[Trillian]

He smiled a lopsided smile at her when she gushed at him, hiding away the small vial she\'d stolen and making sure it was in a place where the glass wouldn\'t easily break, nor do any harm if it did.  Poisons were rather hard to come by, as the guards began to inspect the quality of plants they let into the city walls.

"Many citizens have the impression that the markets are made mostly of travellers or locals who have no other way of selling their hobby trade, or perhaps even their livelihood," he began, leading her further into the alley and past the salve shop, which he took time to smell just inside the doorway, an odd action to anybody who didn\'t understand that the sense of smell was most important in distinguishing different things, where eyes might see just a mess.  "That\'s not really true, in fact, most of the stalls are operated by merchants who can afford their own shops.  It\'s a way of dominating the market.  The thing is, most of these merchants have to decide between opening their shop for a day or going to the markets.  A lot of the time they split their time into halves.  Have you noticed that the market stalls seem lengthier on the sixth day of the week, before the Day of Worship?"  He led her down a few back streets as he lectured.  "That\'s because they all come out of the woodwork then, for that is a peak business for the markets and the merchants go where the money is.  Thing about merchants though," he said as they neared a shop and Ridley looked up and down the street.  "They can\'t be in two places at once."  Ridley grinned and moved around the seemingly empty store to a side door, where he pulled out a kit of wires.  "Keep watch," he declared.

[Morwen]

Teresa listened to Ridley\'s explanation, commiting it to memory, but not understanding what he meant until he pulled the kit of wires out of his pocket. \'You are going to pick the lock? We\'re going to-\'

-rob the store? She cut herself off, almost afraid to say the words out loud lest it bring the law down on them. Shoplifting and even pickpocketing couldn\'t be too bad, you could always claim it was an accident or something. Breaking and entering was a whole new idea. Despite herself, Teresa was rather intrigued.

\'Do you think I could learn to pick locks too, sometime I mean, not right now of course.\' She chattered quietly, leaning against the doorframe so she could easily see both directions without swiveling her head suspiciously. In her wish to look non-chalant to any passerbys, but watchful to Ridley, she probably looked very silly.

\'Is it hard picking locks? I always thought it looked so easy whenever I saw Ara do it, but when I tried getting into one of Rosaline\'s cupboards with a hair pin I just couldn\'t get it to work, no matter how I tried.\'

Movement to her left brought Teresa out of her ramblings. A man was just about to turn the corner onto their street. He didn\'t look like a copper, but she was supposed to keep watch well, so Teresa whispered, \'Man at 9 o\'clock, Ridley.\'

[Trillian]

He didn\'t like doing this sort of thing in daylight, despite how bold he usually was.  A risk-taker was Ridley, but stupid he was not.  He liked not living in the dungeon, and the instant he heard a click of the lock turn (a simple lock too, he was surprised to find), and grabbed Teresa with both arms and spinning her around so she was trapped between him and the doorframe of the store, ensuring she wouldn\'t fall into the store proper.  He moved his face into the base of her throat, though didn\'t nuzzle.  Rather he remained there, peeking around her face as he had a look as to who was approaching.  He didn\'t expect the new thief to struggle.

[Morwen]

Hearing no response, Teresa turned to see if Ridley had heard her... just in time to see him grab her shoulders and sweep her into the doorframe. She was about to protest when she noticed that Ridley was looking over her shoulder. She tilted her head in an attempt to see what he was watching, and saw that the man was still walking their way.

The man had a plain outfit on, but it was clean and well cut. He looked like the servant to a household who\'s owners were not overly rich, but still respectable. His age was perhaps ten years or so older than the two thieves, making him in his mid-thirties. As he neared the door to the shop where Teresa and Ridley were standing, he turned to look at them, first with curiosity, and then tolerant amusement. Teresa quickly turned back her head and pretended to be involved.

Out of the corner of her eye, Teresa saw the man walk past their door, and then she lost sight of where he went. A few seconds later, she could hear a knock a few shops down, and the sound of a door opening and closing.

[Trillian]

Ridley listened to this sound as well, then pulled his face back from her neck.

"Nice perfume," he commented before gesturing that she move away so he could turn the doorhandle and enter the shop.  It was a furrier\'s shop, which seemed a strange place to steal from, but Ridley would not go to where the coins were most protected.

He knew this particular merchant was a coin collector.  He\'d also come in here once before under the guise of a noble\'s servantman, staking out the shop for a future job.  New targets had come up and other things had kept Ridley busy (like the Captain and Mia), and so he\'d forfeited this store in order to keep his tasks to a minimum, but hadn\'t forgotten about it.  Which was why he was here now, with Teresa.

Inside was a collection of fur coats and stoles, handwraps and even fur-lined boots.  A few taxidermied creatures in a hissing pose, and on the walls some of the furrier\'s coin collection.  At the back of the shop along its length was a wooden counter, with some smaller pieces draped across the top of it and a door off to one side and behind the counter itself.

He walked to the middle of the store and stood there, turning on his heel so he could fold his arms and look at Teresa.

"Check around," he told her, to see where she would go first.