Kali nodded and walked forwards until she stood directly beneath the cage, craning her neck to look up.
"I have to inform you," Pim continued, "that to date not one of my would-be apprentices has managed this feat. Luckily for you, it is not success or failure that I will judge — only the originality of the methods employed in the attempt."
"A-ha," Kali said, not really listening.
"Please feel free to utilise any of the equipment in this room, and any of our tools to be at your disposal. There is a fine selection of gripgloves, pinshoes or spidersocks over here. Some even prefer the jumping jacks…"
"Okay," Kali said. Pim would have regretted turning his back to point out the selection because at that moment she was pulling off her tights.
"There is even a slight possibility of success with the…"
Tights off, Kali crammed the wine bubble she still carried into the toe of one leg, crouched, took in a few huffing breaths and then leapt, straight up. One arm outstretched above her, teeth gritted, she rose two and a half times her height, straight as an arrow, and then flicked the weighted end of the tights through the bars of the cage, grabbing it as it came out and dropped down the other side. Allowing the elasticity of the tights to drop her back down to the floor, she bounced with them, once, twice, three times, then sailed upwards to grab the base of the cage with a grunt. Swinging her legs up, she flipped herself over so that she was sitting on top of the cage, slid her arm in through the bars to retrieve the souvenir, then dropped it towards the floor. That done, she quickly wrapped the tights about herself, rolled down inside them like some carnival gymnast, flipping herself with a neat twist as she neared the floor, and then settled as lightly as a feather right in front of Pim.
The thieves guild leader stared at her through the dancer's tassel now draped over his head. Kali noticed it was labelled PROPERTY OF HELLS' BELLIES. Meanwhile, someone at the back of the room snickered.
"Original enough for you?" Kali said.
Pim coughed and, after a second, coughed again. "I don't know how you did that but you pass, Miss Hooper." He stared down at her now-bared legs. "By the gods," he breathed, "I could use someone like you on my team."
"Sorry, I work alone," Kali said, smiling. "Now, about your help. The Forbidden Archive. How the hells do I get in?"
Pim stared at her, knowing that, his agreement witnessed, he had no choice but to concede to her request. He nodded and led Kali back to the ballroom, but this time to a large table lain with maps and plans of all kinds. The pile reminded Kali of her captain's chest back home and, as was the case with her own papers regarding places that seemed too much of a challenge, Pim found what he was after buried right at the bottom of the pile. He swept away the less challenging plans to reveal a set of architectural drawings that looked to have been there for years, but that didn't matter because what they showed had not changed.
It was the inner workings of the League of Prestidigitation and Prestige.
Pim slammed a gloopy bottle on the corner of the document to keep it flat, and Kali wondered if it contained the remains of the Three Towers' last victim, perhaps kept as a reminder of the difficulty of the task at hand. He traced the confused patterns of lines on the paper — standard builders' marks and strange swirls that had to denote magical input — with his finger, frowning, remembering. "Big John Sinclair went in here… Hamish the Pumps here, and Nimble Neil Halliwell," his finger made a circle and stabbed down "right here. As I said, none returned. At least, not in their original condition."
"So we can safely assume that whatever traps took them down are still in place in those areas," Kali said. "That could be an advantage — knowing what to expect."
Pim drew in a sharp breath, shook his head. "You might know the what of them, but not the where or when. Whatever did for them did for them quickly, and the trigger could be anything — weight, motion, sweat, breath, noise…"
"Difficult to counter all of those," Kali observed. She studied the plans, the bridges that connected the towers, what appeared to be the location of the Forbidden Archive in the third tower, then lowered her own finger. "What about this conduit here?"
Pim smiled. "You have a good eye for possibility. That was exactly what I was going to suggest to you. Its purpose isn't specified on the plans but from what we can tell it's some kind of alchemical dump shaft that empties into the sewers — dangerous but potentially difficult to trap as any waste potions might have, shall we say, unforeseen side effects on the thaumaturgical triggers. But there's a problem — the laboratories dump their waste regularly, every half an hour. The length of that conduit, you'd need to move fast. Very fast."
"All those wands, you'd think they'd just make the waste disappear," Kali sighed. "All right, fast I can do. Question is, will it get me safely inside?"
Pim traced the conduit's route. "See for yourself. Once through the conduit you'll be inside their perimeter defences. I don't know what you'll find after that but, with luck, you should be able to reach the stairs to the third tower."
"Any guards to worry about? Patrols?"
"Trust me, this place doesn't need them. It's deadly, how many times do I need to tell you that? So I ask you again — are you sure you want to do this?"
"Mister Pim," Kali said seriously, "I really don't have any choice."
For once, Jengo Pim stared nowhere but at her eyes, and, whatever the thieves guild leader saw there, a new note of respect crept into his voice. "Fine," he said, handing her the plans from the table. "Take these in case you need them — it's meant to be a maze in there. Also take whatever equipment and tools you think you'll need for the job. There's just one other thing. Kris Jayhinch goes with you."
Kali stared at Pim's lieutenant. "What? No chance."
"Every chance, Miss Hooper. If you succeed in this suicide mission — which I seriously doubt — then the Grey Brigade gets a share of the loot you find."
"I'm not after loot. I'm after information."
"Then there'll be all the more loot for us." He gestured to Jayhinch. "There is no discussion in this matter — take Kris with you or you do not leave."
Kali sighed heavily. "Fine. But I lead and he follows. And he looks after his own back."
Pim nodded. In truth it was Jayhinch looking after her back that for some inexplicable reason had become his greater concern. "Understood." He waved his arm to indicate the equipment racks. "Now, is there anything you need?"
Kali pursed her lips, remembering Orlana Dawn at the Spiral of Kos. "You wouldn't, by any chance, have one of those dark silk bodysuits?" she said.
Kali and Jayhinch left after dark, negotiating alleyways doubly shadowed by the night's azure gloom, until they came to a sewer entrance beneath the looming towers. Jayhinch pulled back a cover with a grating sound, then staggered back coughing as the area was suffused with a cloying and unnatural stench. What materials made up the stench Kali had no idea, but whatever they were they made the hole before them pulsate with an array of colours that looked considerably less than healthy.
There was a flushing sound that began high above them and, giving it a little time to clear, Pim's lieutenant gestured for Kali to drop inside the hole. "Twenty nine and a half minutes," he said. "You did say you wanted to go first?"
Kali did, manoeuvring her landing to avoid a rainbow sludge that was evidently the result of the purge from the towers, then a half-splash from behind her signalled that Jayhinch had joined her not so successfully in the mire. Wiping something that fizzed like acid from his boot, he then moved with her to a grate at the sewer's end — a grate smeared with the thicker contents of discarded experiments from above. Avoiding contact, the pair prised it away with disgust, and then began to climb a conduit that rose upwards, aware that they had just entered the Three Towers' outer wall. The knowledge made them move with increased caution but, however cautious they were, there was no way to prevent what happened next.