Chapter Five

Kruppe dreams of fleeing Darujhistan but meets six beggars—manifestations of his own hungers, doubts, virtues, and gifts—who press him to act for the city and a fated youth. Acknowledging the Coin’s imminent fall and the gods’ arrogance, Kruppe decides to return to the city’s center of events.

Meanwhile, atop Darujhistan’s gas-lit maze, thief Crokus Younghand infiltrates the D’Arle estate, steals jewelry and a fête turban, and departs unseen. Across the district, assassin Talo Krafar is struck by a heavy quarrel, realizes a Guild war has begun, and struggles to the K’rul Temple belfry to ambush his stalker.

As Crokus crosses a nearby roof, a coin clatters before him; when he ducks to snatch it, a quarrel misses. In the belfry, Talo is slain by a tall killer wielding paired grooved daggers. Crokus sees the body fall and flees as multiple sorcerous hunters descend from the belfry.

Crokus races the rooftops while two hunters pursue—one with crossbow, one with knives—using magic to slow their falls. He escapes a shot by dropping from a thieves’ guidewire into a brutal tumble through clotheslines, then cuts through a tenement, narrowly evading a pursuer and reaching the roof again as more bolts strike around him.

Wounded and singed by near misses, Crokus finally leaps to an awning and reaches the street, ducking into the Phoenix Inn. Across the way, the hunters regroup, note the unnatural “parting” of power and Ascendant meddling that aided the thief, and, on their commander’s order, withdraw to avoid witnesses—leaving Crokus alive, a potential asset in their hidden war with the Guild.