"...Really?" Amal demanded the shock evident in his voice. He shook his head as though he couldn't quite believe it. Delphine waited long enough for it to be clear it wasn't associated with the game, then picked up the bottle and took a slug of the stomach warming brandy. She was about to ask another question when a noise downstairs interrupted them. Delphine stood up and peered down to see a non descript man in a black cloak on the ground floor.


"Hello up there," he called up.


"Hello yourself," Delphine called back down, exchanging a look with Amal. She didn't know everyone in a city the size of this of course, but she was pretty sure the man was a stranger.


"I think the bar is closed," she called. The black cloaked man shrugged his shoulders, the gesture revealing the curved hilt of a sword concealed by his cloak.


"And yet here you are," he observed.


"Here we are," Delphine agreed, her tone neither hostile nor exactly friendly.


"Mind if I come up and join you?" he asked. Delphine shared another frightened look with Amal. The thief was impassive, his face closed. Delphine wondered if bounty hunters might be tracking the Red Guard.


"I think we were just leaving," Delphine called. The black cloaked man drew a pouch from his belt and tossed it up. Either by luck or skill it landed on the railing, skidding a few inches before coming to rest without falling off. Delphine didn't touch it, the clink of coin inside was advertisement enough of what was inside. She didn't open it or reach for it just yet, there was always the chance there was a potion or some other thieves trick inside.


"What do you want?" she asked, her hand leaving the hilt of her sword for the first time. To her surprise the bottle of brandy was still in her hand and she took another mouthful.


"I'm always on the look out for people like you, people that can handle themselves." Delphine cocked her head to the side.


"This is a job offer?" she asked, genuinely surprised.


"An interview," the black cloaked man replied. He moved so fast that even though she had the high ground he was nearly up the stairs before she could react. She threw out her palm and a bolt of lightning leaped between them, the black cloaked man flicked his hand up for a second and a shield shimmered into existence just long enough to divert the blast to left and right. The balustrade exploded and a section of the wall crisped in lines of black ash. Delphine hurled the bottle of brandy at him and called fire, the spilling brandy fireballed out in a shower of liquid flame. Wrong footed the attacker had to bring his shield back long enough for her to draw her sword and whip it up into a guard. The charged into her, his own sword appearing in his hand as if by magic, drawn back to strike. Amal hit him across the shins with a chair as he cleared the stairwell. The black cloak screamed in pain and went over in a sprawl that he turned into a roll. Delphine cast her hand out called ice, spreading the floor with frictionless ice. Whatever acrobatic trick the man had expected to play devolved into a graceless slide across the frosty conjuration, as he hit the end of the slide he sprung up, twisted around and raised his blade in a guard. There was an audible creak as Amal drew Delphine's bow back, having snatched an arrow from her quiver as she turned. He sighted down it at the interloper's heart.


"Seems like I have come to the right place," the man gasped.