Thieves of Islar: Book One of The Heirs of Bormeer by James Shade Page B

and perhaps it is time to lay it all out.
    “To your point, we need to find a real place to stay. Somewhere that we can start collecting our gear and we don’t have to hide every time we hear a little noise. Without knowing what we are really up against in the city, I think we should look into staying in Peakinaw.”
    “Peakinaw?” Chazd asked. “We can’t run a guild from outside the city!”
    “It wouldn’t be permanent. But it does have a couple of advantages. No one knows us there. That would allow us to avoid questions. There is a lot of traffic through Peakinaw due to both the mine and supply shipments to the warfront. We could easily keep up on current news from Islar.”
    “It’s still an hour’s walk away, and we need to spend more time in Islar trying to figure out who killed Father,” Chazd said around a mouthful of bread.
    “Chazd, we'll be safer in Peakinaw,” Jaeron began to explain.
    “Safe from who, Jaeron? We don't know that anyone is after us!”
    “Chazd-” Jaeron looked closely at his brother. Then he gave up. “We can make this decision later. It’s not important, anyway. I also want to find out what happened to Father. I think we all agree on that?”
    Both of her brothers were looking to her. Pain reflected in their eyes, but with resolve behind. She nodded.
    “So we need to understand why Father was killed in order to figure out who did it. It's not what he wanted, or he would have told me. It didn't look like anything was stolen, though I didn't really have time to look around. We have to assume that it was either the jewelry job,” Jaeron continued.
    He pulled the elegant wooden box out of the bag he collected.
    “Or it's because of these,” Jaeron pointed to the cloth bundle around the wooden toys.
    “You're joking!”
    Avrilla tensed in preparation for another argument, trying to figure out ahead of time a way for her to intervene and diffuse the situation. She could see Jaeron’s posture stiffen. He was getting tired of the constant dispute.
    “Father wasn’t killed because of a bunch of toys,” her brother did not back down.
    “Chazd, listen to me,” Jaeron said.
    He lifted the latch on the jewelry box and threw open the lid. Then he unwrapped the cloth bundle.
    “Assuming we’d have to fence that necklace, which do you think we’d get more money for?”
    He gave his brother time to consider, but spoke again before Chazd answered.
    “It’s close, right? You're better at this than I am, but they’re close?”
    Chazd chewed his lip. He picked up one of the toys and examined it. Finally, he nodded.
    "Aye, Jaeron. It would be close. We’d probably get more money for the toys once we found a buyer. Assuming we could prove they weren’t stolen, but family gifts. A collector would pay more.
    “But what about the letter?”
    Avrilla understood at once that Chazd meant the letter pressed into the lid of the jewelry box, not the one from Nana Sarah. She looked at the folded parchment and wax seal. She was convinced that the letter was the real purpose behind the grab from the Dockpads, but had so far resisted cracking the seal to read its contents.
    Jaeron ignored him, cleaned his knife, and put it back in its sheath. “As far as creating a guild, I don’t know what plans Father had. But if we are going to find out who killed him, then my feeling is that we cut as many old ties as we can. We should assume that someone betrayed him. I don’t know whether it was because of the Dockpad job or the wooden toys, but we need to figure that out. With that in mind, who do you think we can continue relations with?”
    There was silence, other than Chazd’s munching on a quince. Avrilla sat down, leaning forward to help herself to another wedge of cheese.
    “So, we’re going to do this?” she spoke quietly. “We’re going to build a guild?”
    “It’s what we’ve been trained to do,” Chazd said.
    “That doesn’t mean we should,” she said.
    “It’s what Father