Root stood at the side of the courtyard nearest the front foyer with Saly, who was a less aggravating conversational partner than many of Root’s other options. Which was not to say that he was a good one, as he’d been going on and on about budgeting for the past five minutes. If Root hadn’t already been sporting a massive headache, she’d have found one here anyhow, and at a nice discount.
Saly seemed to grow chattier the more his nerves took over. Or perhaps he always sweated through his shirts. Root could only hope it wasn’t that uncommon of a sight here in the desert.
Her eyes wandered through the courtyard, free to do as they liked while her ears handled tuning out Saly. She tracked David and Leslie and Syrus as they wormed through the crowds—David split in languid paranoia, Leslie keeping a nervous eye on David, and Syrus like a snake with sleazy eyes and a rattle she prayed kept silent. It was the most pious action she’d taken all night.
As Root surveyed the room, Saly tracked her gaze. “That’s the one to steer clear of, then?”
“What?” Root pulled herself from her thoughts, surprised to hear words that had nothing to do with investing. “Oh. Yeah. Syrus.”
“You had some… dealing with him?”
“Something like that. A brief… uh, partnership. Turned out to be a real creep.”
“I can see that. I don’t like the way he’s been looking at some of the girls.”
“He’s like that. Hit on all four of us at once, actually. Then tried to recruit us in the same conversation.”
“I see. Recruit you for what, exactly?” He tugged the front of his shirt as he spoke, fanning air in.
“Uh, I meant, like, convert,” said Root. She forgot the Order of Seekers was still a relatively underground branch of the organization, even to residents of Urk and members of the church.
“Hm. Yes, no surprise there. They do love to travel around having those sorts of conversations. Thought about doing it in my youth—you know, see the world and such. My parents were a lot more involved in all of this, you see, and my father thought it’d be a good use of my time…”
Root nodded along, but she was also keeping one eye on the front entrance past the security checkpoint in the foyer. A trundling ball of red and gold had appeared on the outside landing, hauling a box up the staircase after it. Root gestured to Saly with one finger and he trailed off.
“Beel’s here,” she said, both to him and as an announcement for the others via the whisper stones.
“Ah,” said Saly, his pale face taking on a doubled sheen of sweat. He adjusted his glasses, which returned inevitably each time to the precipice of his nose like a thrill-seeking daredevil, sliding about in their liquid courage (sweat).
“You’re up,” said Root.
“Of course.” He started towards the door, then glanced back at her. “You’ll be sticking back here, then?”
Root indicated Syrus with a flick of her eyes. “Keeping the suspicion off.”
“Right. Yes. Hoo. Here we go.” He took a deep breath and made his way into the foyer.
Beel resented being the one tasked with carrying a package up the palace steps. He was the smallest—temporary brick afflictions omitted—and a sizable staircase to the others was a mountainous staircase to him. Add a package half his size and weight into the mix, and it was an obstacle that would send even a marathoner back to bed. Not to mention that he used all four of his limbs for walking, so how did they really expect him to carry the package properly?
(In case you’re wondering, what this meant was that Beel took each stair one at a time—first climbing the step, then lifting the package up behind him. He repeated this a couple hundred times and yet still managed to arrive only six minutes behind schedule. This might’ve been an obvious reason to substitute in another member of the team for this particular duty, but no one really thought much about Beel’s feelings; it was a learned behavior that arose out of Beel’s habit of announcing his feelings with punctuated regularity and bluntness, which meant no one else needed to think much about him in those scattered moments in between. And, well, there’s just no denying that he was a perfect fit for what came next.)
Beel resented most of the situation and the people involved, in fact. Finally, he’d found himself back in a desert, but of course they couldn’t all just find some nice earthly comforts—a warm rock to bask on and a tasty bite to eat. No; back in a desert, why? To rob a church, of all things!
And he was presently wearing a little raincoat. In the desert! What a mess of good and normal things these people made.
Clipboard in his teeth, Beel pushed the package through the door, huffing and filling rapidly with a terrible anxious dread. It didn’t help matters that the others had picked, as contents of the package, a marble statue of a snake coiled around a rough-hewn stump. Wouldn’t a t-shirt have been just as sufficient?
All around, guards watched Beel. Eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve… He shook the numbers away. Force of habit. It didn’t matter, anyway. He was just one Beel, which meant even one guard was one too many.
A few checked over the package, one examined his clipboard, and another had him pass through a scary arch. It chimed as he crossed the threshold, and the guard soon took note of his whisper stone.
“For reporting back about my deliveries,” he said, feeling quite close to vomiting. The guard nodded and ushered him along.
“Just stepping out for a breath of fresh air,” said a voice. “Ooh, whoa! Sorry there.” Saly staggered as he nearly tripped over Beel. It was nothing Beel wasn’t used to.
Saly caught himself with a hand planted on the package and the clipboard atop it. When he lifted his hand, a small stack of checks had joined the papers. Beel shuffled them into the pile as Saly stepped out onto the wide terrace outside.
“A delivery?” said a man hurrying over from across the foyer, dressed in the manner of a palace staffer. “We have a proper door for that, you know. Here, I can sign…”
Beel, given his nature, could only do so much to keep his eyes from going wide, his voice from catching. “Um! The package is for… Leslie Sheridan…”
“Well of course; I can sign for it.” The staffer tapped a name tag impatiently and reached for Beel’s clipboard as Beel hastily reorganized the layers of paper.
“I, um.” Beel stammered. “You… could sign for it, being, uh, ‘Winan comma Palace Staff.’ But. Um.”
He caught sight of some motion near the doors to the courtyard. Root was just inside. She turned abruptly to look, listening to his words through the whisper stones. She froze.
“But,” continued Beel, “I have, well, strict orders from… the postal… boss… that only Leslie Sheridan is to sign for this package. Specifically. Strict orders.” He gulped. He hoped it wasn’t audible.
(It was. Winan heard it, the guards behind him heard it, and the others listening in through the whisper stones heard it loudest of all, like a frog croaking one final time as it choked around a well-fattened fly.)
The staffer raised an eyebrow. He looked down at the package with intense scrutiny.
Root turned aside. “Palace staffer trying to sign for the package,” said her hasty voice through the stones.
“I don’t think that was a convincing enough lie,” said Vit unhelpfully.
“We need to intervene.”
Chatter exploded through the whisper stones, overlapping and flooding through in a way that made it impossible to hear any one voice or even the staffer looming tall before Beel.
“Vit, we—”
“—jump in—”
“—blow everything—”
“—distraction—”
“Hey all—”
“—find Leslie, and—”
“—can see if I can—?”
“I’m going.”
“—Root and Azriah need to be ready—”
“Anjeanette, keep—”
“—Best, B. S., Senior Marketing, Strategy, and Operations Coordinating Analyst.”
“—hurry!”
Root started into the foyer. From the other side of the courtyard, Vit emerged from around the bar. Saly appeared back at the door.
Someone put a hand on the staffer’s shoulder and lightly maneuvered him away as Beel stood there, looking all around in fright, heartbeat hammering in his teeth, trying not to look up.
“Package for me?” said the newcomer. Beel looked up into the shaggy-haired face of Leslie Sheridan.
The staffer piped up. “I tried to sign, but—”
“Never mind that,” said Leslie quickly. “Go on—back to work. I can sign for a package just fine.” He waved to the guards who still had their attention on the fuss. “Go on, I’ve got this. Just a package.”
Beel stammered, then finished getting his clipboard in order.
“Sorry about that,” said Leslie. “Thank you for following those instructions. I’m glad I had someone to alert me you were here…”
Beel blinked.
“Uh…” started Root. “I think… I mean, Leslie’s there now. He’s sending the staffer away…?”
“We’re all set?” asked Vit.
“Guess so. Leslie looks almost as frazzled as Beel. What the hell…?”
“Phew. That’s a—”
“No!” cried a chorus of voices.
“Oops. Sorry.”
Leslie gestured for the clipboard, eager to sign. Beel bit his lip, then feigned an expression of casualness. It didn’t look right on his face, but then again, it was a new transfer and was still getting a feel for the place.
“Heard it’s going to rain,” said Beel, tugging the sleeve of his coat.
Leslie shrugged. “I heard. But here? I’ll believe it when I see it.”
Beel gestured to the courtyard. “Uh, big event going on?”
“Quarterly gala. Evening of Generosity. Big donors and such.” Leslie gestured for the clipboard again.
“You don’t say,” said Beel, who was pretending not to see Leslie’s impatient hand. “So, a big donor… that would be more than, probably, ten mantles, or…?”
“Yes, quite a bit more. Now—”
“More than, uh, twelve mantles, probably?”
“Yes, more than that. May I—”
“More than fifteen, even?”
“Fifteen hundred is more the ballpark. Ahem.”
“Fifteen hundred… uh, shells, you must mean?”
“Fifteen hundred—” Leslie clicked his tongue in irritation. “I’ll sign for that now.”
“Oh, sure,” said Beel, who made no motion to hand over the clipboard. “Are you, er, are you having quite a fun time at the party?”
“Fantastic.” Leslie made a grab for the clipboard just as Beel turned to the side, moving it out of reach.
“Well that’s so good. I’d always wondered about having fun. Seems, oh, uh, enjoyable. Would you say?”
Leslie straightened back up. There was an unbridled fury building on his face that Beel never liked to see staring back at him, as it meant some sort of yelling or hitting was building a nest for itself in his near future. Somehow he seemed to generate that expression on a lot of faces when he was around, though he’d never learned why. Perhaps they saw his red skin as a challenge to outdo him—or a pack to blend in with. Or perhaps the color made them irate, like… oh, what was the creature? Pigs? Was it pigs that got mad when they saw something red? He just avoided most animals to be safe.
“When…” started Beel, grasping for another topic of inane conversation, “… is your birthday?”
“Oh, just give me that,” said Leslie. This time, Beel let him swipe the clipboard. It only hurt a little bit when he wrenched it from his hands.
Leslie signed with a tremendous display of angry, forceful penmanship. He handed the clipboard back to Beel.
Beel flipped the ink-marred page up carefully. Beneath it was a check, signed by Leslie Sheridan in ink that, with the pressure, had bled straight through. Beel shuffled it away to show the next page.
“And here, please.”
Leslie furrowed his brow. He took the clipboard again, signing with the same disgust.
“And here,” said Beel, after repeating the process.
Leslie signed.
“And here… and here…”
If anything, Leslie only became more forceful with his signature, as if he could flick Beel with the tip of the pen and send him skidding off down the stairs.
“Aaaand… here…”
Beel continued the process. They had quite a few checks.
As Beel dodged the sharp tip of the pen—which he felt sure was aimed more and more pointedly for his fingers with each signature—Anjeanette’s voice came through the stone. “Taking a big tour to the far side of the courtyard. Hall of Relics about to be clear.”
A second later, Root said, “Beel’s distraction is working. Guards are focused on the commotion in the foyer.”
Oh, goody, thought Beel.
“Second Hall of Relics guard is distracted,” said Root. “Azriah: you’re up.”