Re-entering the city was fairly easy. The walls were designed so the average person couldn't jump them, but Zanya and Shiina weren't average. A quick leap and they were inside the walls, moving quickly to an alley so their entrance wouldn't be questioned.

  After a quick look around Zanya turned to Shiina. "So can you stick to the plan this time?"

  Shiina wilted under Zanya's glare. "Sorry sorry. It just was there, and I really thought it was the best choice," she muttered.

  Delilah shifted uneasily. "It did turn out okay in the end."

  "Yes, but we can't count on that. We need some way of letting you contact us without you breaking your cover," Ife said. The woman's tail bristled before relaxing. "No time for that now though."

  Zanya sighed. "Yeah." She gave another check to make sure the alley they'd jumped into was clear. "Well let's go over this plan again."

  "So we gotta get you into the royal vault," Wessle said. "Pretending to be part of what we owe the fuckers was a good idea. But it won't work. That goes to the city to be counted before part of it goes to the vaults. No way to be sure they'd take the box we give them into the vaults or if they empty it out. You'll have to get it into the Sultana's hands directly."

  "Don't suppose we can just leave it outside her palace as a gift," Delilah asked.

  Ife shook her head. "That would make people a little suspicious. No, we need to buy something from her. Something that could justify spending massive amounts of gold."

  The tribal leader next to Wessle spoke up. "You seem to have the air of nobility, Miss Fox. Al Jirtea's falcons are famous. That would justify a large purchase."

  "I never learned much about the art," Ife admitted. "I wouldn't be able to keep up the pretense."

  Shiina thought for a moment. The only high ticket item they could justifiably buy were probably slaves. "Uh, there was that sword dancer I saw the first day we showed up. Catgirl, large chest, very skilled. Would someone like that require a whole chest of gold?"

  The woman in the back perked up. "Do you mean Hafsa? Yes she'd require a very heavy price."

  "You'd have to explain why you wanted to purchase her," the halfling said.

  Zanya considered it. "How good was she?"

  "Uh," Shiina considered it. "She managed to keep performing while cutting down about half the coins the crowd were tossing at her. That's gotta take some skill."

  "We could justify it by saying we wanted another fighter," Zanya said. "Maybe hint at Ife being a libertine and Delilah hating slavery."

  "Would that work?" one of the leaders asked Wessle.

  The warrior nodded slowly. "Yeah they get off on do gooders buying a slave to 'save them'. Or people falling in love with a slave and having to pay them for the privilege of getting together." His eyes flickered back to the woman standing behind the group.

  Delilah grimaced. "At least it'll be easy to play the part."

  "You'll need that fragment of honesty," the woman said, walking to Wessle's side. "The Sultana's bargaining room is designed to give her a considerable advantage. She'll be able to see your blatant lies, and she'll be protected from most attacks. The only good part of the room is it will enforce any trades made."

  "You're saying so as long as we give them real gold, the trade is magically enforced," Ife checked. "I think I know of that spell. Easily manipulated, but still powerful."

  "Yes. It's a safety measure to keep the sultana from taking advantage of people in negotiations," the woman said.

  The tribal leaders all snorted at that. "Not that they haven't figured out every loophole. Bastards."

  "That will get Shiina into the treasury." Zanya said. "That leaves the tower and the courtyard."

  "Our people can take the courtyard. The tower is more troublesome." Wessle looked over the group. "I don't suppose you have any Arbiter tricks you can use there?"

  Ife shook her head. "No, because we can't use anything Arbiter related for this job. Zanya, how is your climbing?"

  "If I can crack the walls it should be doable. But you'd be better off sniping the statue," Zanya replied.

  Wessle shook his head. "Can't. The palace is protected from the outside. If you break the statue inside the treasury we'll start looking for a way to breach the palace wall. It'll cost more lives than I like, but if that's the price that needs to be paid, so be it. Better than trying to fight into the treasury."

  "I can help boost Zanya's magic and climbing skill," Delilah said. "But you'll want to have a backup plan."

  Shiina waved. "I could try to get up there."

  "It'd be pretty hard. Better to stay safe unless you get very lucky," Zanya replied.

  Wessle leaned on the table. "Hm... It's workable. The most important part is getting into the vault. The outer statues are mostly distractions and backups in case a lone rebel got lucky with the treasury statue. They're not meant to protect against a skilled strike team, and my crew isn't the best adventuring group in the city for nothing. You've got half an hour after the first statue falls. If you can't break the tower statue we'll handle it."

  The woman put her hand on Wessle's shoulder. "Dearest..."

  He placed his own hand on hers. "Gotta get done. And it's a chance to get out of this without a price on our heads," the man said quietly. He turned back to them. "So, on that note, you need a couple big sacks of gold right?"

  Delilah looked over Shiina's disguise. "Let's spread the gold a little more up top. It's too obvious they're in bags of holding right now."

  "They'll know we're using bags of holding because otherwise none of us would be able to carry it," Zanya pointed out. Shiina silently agreed. The piles of gold were heavy enough even WITH the bags.

  "We'll need the bags as part of the price too," Ife said. "On that note, replace that steel with silver Shiina. You need to look like a box worthy of royalty, and gems only go so far."

  Shiina followed Ife's suggestion, mimicking the softer metal instead of the harder. Fortunately she didn't need to actually be sturdy. Construction was a problem for actual objects. The potion's power was helping tremendously too. She felt certain no one could tell she was a mimic.

  "Well I think that's as good as we're going to get," Zanya said. She closed Shiina's 'lid' gently before picking her up. "Everyone ready?"

  "Always," Ife said with a tail swish.

  "As much as I can be," Delilah said, fiddling with her staff.

  Shiina settled for a shudder in Zanya's hands since she didn't want to be talking.

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  "Then let's go buy a slave." Zanya began towards the Sultana's palace.

  The sun was heading towards the far horizon, causing long shadows to fill the streets. They'd decided to move in near nightfall so the actual attack would happen in the dark. It'd take some work getting the timing right, since they needed to have enough time to convince the Sultana to meet them and make the trade. But Shiina was decent at guessing the time when she was paying attention.

  As they went through the streets Shiina kept getting confused glances, but they quickly shifted away from her. Everyone was wondering what was in the box, not suspecting she was a mimic. Soon the people giving her the questioning looks were the Sultana's guards.

  "What is your purpose here?" asked the gatekeeper.

  Ife took the lead. "One of the sultana's slaves caught our eye. We were looking to purchase her. The dancer Hasfa."

  The gatekeeper gave a crude laugh. "You need both eyes to properly look at that wench! But unless that box is half full of gems you don't have enough to buy her."

  "Actually the box is full of bags of holding. The bags have the gold and gems," Ife replied casually, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

  Delilah lightly pulled on Shiina's lid and she opened up to show the piles of cash. The gatekeeper and the guards sobered up at that. Though Shiina had been hoping for a little more surprise. Apparently big sacks of gold were too common here.

  "We will see if the Sultana has time today. She is a fairly busy lady," the gatekeeper said before hurrying to speak to a runner. Somehow Shiina didn't think the Sultana was that busy. What was the point of being stupid rich if you couldn't laze around all the time? And it's not like the woman worked for her money.

  After a few minutes a runner came back and the Gatekeeper bowed. "The Sultana will see you. Please mind your manners." The guards opened the gates, and a slave led them into the palace.

  Shiina had mixed feelings about the place. Shiny works of art were cool. But the sheer amount of gold on display kinda ruined the vibe. There needed to be some other colors for contrast. Anyone trying to sneak in could probably wrap themselves in cloth of gold and just pretend to be an art piece when people walked by.

  The meeting room was still super gaudy, but at least had gems and cushions to spice things up. She guessed this was the meeting room for 'people the Sultana doesn't think much of' because one side was higher than the other. More than required to bring a halfling up to eye level.

  Zanya put Shiina down up front as the group sat down and began to wait again. Fortunately the sultana didn't seem to be too interested in wasting their time to prove herself. It was only a few minutes later before the guards entered along with Hafsa.

  Shiina paid closer attention to the woman they were going to be 'buying' for the plan. Hafsa had the sandy hair and dusky skin that suggested she was related to the local catfolk tribes, and generally an athletic body. Of course her scant dancers outfit worked to draw attention more to her chest, which eclipsed even Ife's. The woman was giving them a judging glare, which was fair given she thought they were slave traders, but Shiina was surprised she was so open about it.

  As Shiina finished inspecting the woman a herald entered and proclaimed, "Her magnificence, Sultana Zabi."

  The Sultana was honestly a kinda uninteresting woman, her chubby figure overshadowed by her ridiculously baggy clothes and layers of jewelry. Shiina was kinda disappointed. She'd been hoping for a more imposing villainess. Sure there were defensive wards all over the jewels but that was par for the course for a wealthy ruler.

  Her friends all bowed as the Sultana took her seat looking down on them. "Well, I hear one of my kittens has caught your eye. Might I ask what interested you in her?"

  "We saw her perform. She's actually skilled with a sword. We can use another frontliner," Zanya said.

  "And she's pretty enough to associate with the rest of us," Ife added with a wink. Delilah gave the fox woman a sour side eye, but stayed quiet. Hafsa seemed similarly unimpressed.

  The sultana meanwhile preened. "I see. Well those are quite good reasons. Before we go further however I have to tell you, Hafsa here isn't civilized enough to take care of herself, so her loyalty is enforced by magic. If you have any delusions of freeing her, throw them away. Of course that would be a stupid idea to begin with, but so many dullards complain about the matter I have to spell it out."

  Zabi's eyes narrowed and she leaned forwards. "You weren't planning on freeing her were you?" Shiina felt the magic in the room ripple with the question.

  To her surprise Delilah spoke up. "It'll be an interesting magical challenge. I could probably use it to get an apprenticeship with a grandmaster."

  Apparently that wasn't what the sultana expected either. After a moment the halfling ruler laughed. "How amusingly foolish. Well mages will do mage things. If she slits your throats don't complain to me. Ignore my words and your fates might be quite messy." The sultana sat there for a moment, thinking about something.

  Ife broke the silence. "I'm sure the gods of law and chaos will reward our actions and prayers. It will turn out for the best."

  The sultana's smirk turned wicked. What had she seen in Ife's words? Shiina tried to figure it out, but the trade continued on. "Well, I'm a busy woman, so I don't do haggling. Tell me your offer and I'll tell you if it's enough to take Hafsa off my hands. She might be a barbarian, but she has valuable skills. And several charm points."

  "We noticed," Zanya said dryly. "As for the offer," she opened Shiina's lid. "Two tons of gold and a thousand lapis lazuli gems."

  The sultana thought for a moment then nodded slowly. "I think that will do. Scribe, fill out the contract." She waved her hand to one of her minions who started scribbling away. "Who will be the owner?"

  "It's all our money," Ife said, "so we will share control of the slave. Make it out to the adventuring party financed by Mage Adjunct Zalaty."

  The scribe finished quickly, with the sultana quickly adding her signature. "If you would?"

  Shiina wished she could read the paper from where she was, but all she could see was the back, and the thick parchment didn't let her see the ink even when the light hit it directly. Ife, Delilah, and Zanya all read it over and after a quick agreement Ife signed.

  "Well," Hafsa suddenly spoke up from where she'd been standing, "you dunces really fucked up now."

  "What?" Shiina and her friends all stared at the catgirl. Shiina was really glad her surprise wouldn't show because she'd have botched the whole operation right there.

  The sultana rolled up the document while glaring at Hafsa. "Ah yes. My restriction on that foul mouth of yours would have worn off. Well, no matter." The woman's evil smirk returned as she stepped back behind her guards. "And now we need to discuss your fine for heresy. I believe ten thousand gold will suffice. Payable immediately."

  Delilah swore in elvish, while Ife's ears and tail bristled. "Heresy? You're accusing a priestess in good standing of heresy?!"

  "Indeed. One cannot speak for the gods of law and chaos at the same time," Sultana Zabi said smugly. "It must be punished. Of course if you don't have the money, we'll have to enslave you and confiscate your possessions."

  Zanya's eyes narrowed. "And of course you waited until we spent all our gold to remember this rule." So that had been the play.

  "Oh don't be such whiny slaves," the Sultana said. "The tribes are getting uppity again, and we need soldiers to handle them. Adventurers are great for that. Especially adventurers that are working with the tribes to get information on my palace. Did you imagine we didn't know you fools got this gold from our mines?" Shiina wanted to reply that this gold wasn't all from her mines but she forced it down.

  "She was planning to fuck you no matter what," Hafsa said. "This is just her excuse."

  "I knew this was a bad idea," Delilah muttered.

  Ife was still bristling. "You won't get away with this! The gods will see your transgressions!"

  Zanya put a hand on Shiina's lid and gave a gentle squeeze. "You will regret this. Trust me." Shiina tapped the inside of the Ophedian's hand. She'd gotten the message. It didn't matter if everyone else got taken as prisoners. Shiina could still complete the mission by herself.

  "Guards take them," the sultana said. "Feel free to be rough if they resist. After that, Hafsa show them to their new quarters. After all, they went out of their way to become your friends. Why not get friendly with them?"

  "Yay, such great friends," Hafsa muttered. "Well at least I can enjoy being able to fucking curse for a bit."

  Zanya gave Shiina another pat before the guards shackled her and led her out. The sultana exited as well, leaving Shiina in the room with a couple of guards. "Get some slaves to carry that down to the vault," the likely leader said.

  Soon a few slaves arrived and roughly lifted Shiina before carrying her further into the palace. It was annoying, but Shiina kept a tight lid on her urge to jump them. There were bigger surprises ahead. Much bigger surprises.

  After a long walk through the tacky halls, Shiina was placed in front of two massive doors. Judging from all the trap runes scribbled all over it, that was probably the vault. The two outside guards waved the slaves off. The guard outside used a large key to unlock the door, then knocked on a gold panel three times. After a few moments the doors opened.

  The room inside was a storybook cavern of riches. Gold pieces piled high, artwork everywhere, and a large statue in the back looking down on it all. The only thing missing was a dragon to lay on top.

  Two guards came in from inside. "New delivery huh?"

  "Sultana tricked some stupid outsiders."

  "Hah! Well not our problem." The inner guards picked up Shiina and entered the vault, the massive doors closing behind with a heavy thud.

  Shiina prepared for an excellent surprise as the two guards moved her towards the other chests at the base of the statue. Then she stiffened as her eyes fell on the one person hiding among the boxes.

  "You fools," the other mimic roared out, "Why have you brought one of my kin in here?!"

  Of course the Sultan would have a mimic guard.