The tips of the intruder spikes on top of the steel fence glinted pointily in the evening light. Warded Lock wasn’t sure how, exactly, something could do anything pointily, but there it was. You saw the shine and immediately cringed and thought, “Yep. That’s pointy.” They glinted so pointily that it was almost enough to make her reconsider her course of action. Almost.

She adjusted her hind legs’ position on the top of the lamppost and glanced around one last time. The street was still empty. Of course it would be; it was dinnertime on Snootington Lane. She stared back at the spikes, which almost seemed to be taunting her. Their tops were about level with her and twenty feet away. Twenty feet ought to be good enough to keep groundbound ponies from jumping over the fence from the tops of lampposts. But Lock had some tricks up her sleeve. Keeping her front legs spread for balance, she wiggled her rear hooves around to get as not-bad a position as she could, tensed, and leaped.

Lock’s “trick” wasn’t much, to be honest, but it was often overlooked. Everypony knew earth ponies were strong and could pull stuff and knock stuff down. But everypony seemed to forget that jumping also involved strength. If a pony could casually pull a house, what was stopping them from channeling that energy into a leap and jumping across streets or up to the fourth story of a building? Of course, most earth ponies didn’t need to jump and didn’t know the proper technique (not to mention it simply looked dorky), so that skill was usually overlooked. Except in ponies like Lock.

Lock pulled up her legs as she soared over the spikes, but she needn’t have bothered; she still had a good foot of clearance. She landed in the mansion’s grounds cleanly, rolled to quiet the sound of impact, and scurried into a bush.

Twenty-five feet from a standing position on two legs in terribly subpar conditions. Not counting the extra distance she’d gotten as she fell. Very nice, very nice indeed.

Lock bolted across the unnecessarily hooficured lawn in spurts, flitting from ruler-trimmed bush to ruler-trimmed bush across shadows, never staying out in the open any longer than she absolutely had to. Logically, it was unnecessary — the street was deserted and all the residents and servants ought to be occupied with dinner — but being careful never hurt anypony.

Soon, she was right up against the wall of the mansion. She craned her head; four stories. Ledges ran along the walls at each story, level with the bottom of each windowsill (when there actually were windows, at least). Lock picked floor number three, as jewelry was usually higher up, in bedrooms, and floor number four was too high for most rich ponies’ bedrooms. Hypothetically, it could’ve been floor number two, but this section of wall didn’t have any second-story windows.

Lock didn’t get the point of jewelry. Or hoarding money in general beyond the usual rainy day funds. Really, what was the point of money if it was just going to sparkle on the end of a chain, or sit in a vault, or be reduced to a number on a financial table? If the wealthy weren’t going to do anything with their wealth, then she would. She didn’t think she was a kleptomaniac; she just wanted to be like a modern Robbing Hoof, stealing from the rich to give to the poor. She had the first part down pat, at least. And if she considered herself poor-

Don’t lie to yourself. That last job brought in over thirty thousand bits. One robbery got you over a million. That’s even with you only receiving ten percent of the jewelry’s value, remember. And your job as a locksmith is doing just fine.

Stupid conscience, interrupting her reminiscing like that. It didn’t even have the decency to always be there and convince her to to get out of this life altogether. Then again, Lock wasn’t sure she knew how to do much else. And she wasn’t sure she wanted to, either, particularly with how much money she was making.

So. Floor number three. Lock crouched, wiggled her rump (she imagined that action made her look like a cat), and leaped. She cleared the second-story ledge easily, hooking her hooves around it as she passed and pulling hard to give herself a little extra oomph. She landed awkwardly on the third ledge; her hooves scrabbled a little on the stone as she wrestled for balance, but she soon had herself plastered as flatly as possible against the wall. With the ledge only four inches wide, she’d need it.

She slowly sidled down the ledge, heading for the nearest window. She reached it, tugged at it. Locked. This high up? Oh, well. She examined it as best she could from her position. Looked like a simple mortise lock, probably even a sash lock. Of course, that was all that was needed physically; there were undoubtedly spells on the lock to prevent magical tampering and some kind of flight interdiction enchantment to prevent pegasi from hovering smoothly enough to pick it. After all that, what kind of thief would try to manipulate the lock while standing on a four-inch-wide ledge? Lock rummaged through her bags and pulled out a knife. The blade was too thin for stabbing, and Lock didn’t like violence, anyway. Keeping as still as possible so she wouldn’t fall off, she wiggled the knife into the gap between the two halves of the window and pushed.

Sometimes, Lock wondered if there were such things as “secondary talents” that came with the regular special talents. Side-effects that proceeded logically from special talents without being covered by cutie marks. Her own cutie mark was a traditional image of a lock, as her special talent was understanding the mechanics of and building locks. However, while she was almost unparalleled at making locks, her instinctual knowledge of them meant she was also quite good at picking them. She could look at any lock, understand the insides almost instantly, and know the best way to pick it in another second. She’d once bragged to a friend that she could pick a tumbler lock with a feather.

Compared to that, a sash lock was so trivial she wasn’t even thinking. The blade hit the bolt, slowed, then jumped forward as it flicked the sash open. Lock smirked as she restowed her knife, then pushed the window open and rolled in. She gave herself five minutes before she left, no matter what she found.

A personal library, and one of those big, old-money, two-story ones at that, with movable ladders and everything. It even had oil lamps, for that last bit of pointless atmosphere. But valuables-wise, nothing but books and some golden busts. Joy. This wasn’t going to be a good job. T-minus four minutes, fifty-seven seconds.

Lock was on a reading area on the second floor (of the library, not the mansion). She ran to the railing, vaulted over, and landed more softly than a leaf. She looked around, taking in the rows of bookcases, the decorations, and the crackling fire that seemed obligatory. Well, the good thing about lackluster places to break in was that it didn’t take long to case the joint. T-minus four minutes, fifty-one seconds.

Lock had sort of a sixth sense for shiny things, almost. She had hunches about where valuable objects might be kept, and those hunches tended to be correct. It could’ve been her special talent, except that her special talent involved locks. Whatever the case, she was around the room very quickly, grabbing a golden candlestick here, a platinum medal there, a small chestnut box that may or may not have held something, and so forth, stuffing them into her bags. A disappointing haul, altogether, but she couldn’t have everything. Maybe she could’ve gone further in, but one of her rules was to stick to one room, and one room only. Back out the window and into the Canterlot night she was going. T-minus four minutes, twelve seconds.

She clambered up the bookcase in a way that’d make a monkey envious, went to the window, pushed it open… and stopped. T-minus four minutes, eight seconds.

She looked at the floor beneath her hooves. Supposedly, this open space was just a place for rich stuck-ups to pretend to read whatever stuffy tome they had chosen, but it wasn’t over anything. Bookcases extended down from the lower edges of the balcony all around and there hadn’t been any windows on the outside. There was a large hole of unused space underneath the floor. That possibly held stuff. Very valuable stuff. T-minus four minutes, six seconds.

Stereotypically, libraries held secret passages. Who was to say there wasn’t a secret room below? Her shiny sense was tingling. And she still had time, right? T-minus four minutes, two seconds.

Right. Back over the railing, and Lock was on the floor, examining the bookcases. T-minus three minutes, fifty-five seconds.

It took her a while of close examination, but she found it: a cluster of books suspiciously close together. She tugged on one; they all rotated on a pivot — click — and an adjacent bookcase moved an inch forward. Lock poked at one of the books on the door; they were real books, but a spell was keeping them in place now that the door was open. She delicately tugged at the door and was rewarded with the wonderful sound of no squeaks. She slipped inside. T-minus one minute, thirty-four seconds.

The room was nearly pitch-black inside. Lock pulled an unfocused light gem from her bag and rattled it to excite its internal magic. It flared to life, revealing… nothing more than a tiny, cramped corner of the library that’d been hidden away. At first, Lock was disappointed, but then she took a closer look at the books. They were old, with strange binding materials and grisly covers and titles like Ars Tenebrae. Books on dark magic, secreted away from the authorities. Well, all the better that Lock was stealing from these ponies, then. Very Bad Things would happen to her if she got caught, but she wasn’t planning on getting caught. T-minus one minute, twenty-five seconds.

Her shiny sense was still digging into her skull. More than before, actually. It’d stopped poking her and started jabbing her. But when she held the gem aloft and looked around the tiny room, she couldn’t see anything. Just books, books, and books. And a dark passage extending from the corner. Lock’s shiny sense started screaming. T-minus one minute, nineteen seconds.

But she didn’t head for it. Besides going into another room, her time was running out. She needed to leave this place as soon as possible. Still… Lock pulled out the platinum medal and stared at it. This was, in all likelihood, the most expensive thing she’d take away tonight, and it was still rather pathetic. T-minus one minute, fourteen seconds.

Decisions, decisions. T-minus one minute, seven seconds.

Although… why not return? She knew where she’d found everything. She could put it back. These guys would never know they’d been burgled. She could come back tomorrow, and-

No. You’re pushing it. It’s against the rules. You’ve got enough. Leave it be.

Lock willed her conscience to shut up. Yes, she’d come back tomorrow. She needed a better haul, she told herself. This wasn’t enough, she said. She zipped back through the library, depositing every nicked object back exactly where she’d found it. T-minus forty-eight seconds.

She had forty-three seconds left when she was out the window, closing it behind her. A pity she couldn’t relock it. Hopefully, it’d go unnoticed.

Why do you think “never hit the same house twice” is one of your rules?

Lock dropped from the third story straight to the ground. A quick survey — there was nopony around — and Lock scrambled to a preselected tree on the lawn. Climb, jump, over the fence, easy. Lock strode off into the Canterlot night, shivering with anticipation. Tomorrow was gonna be good. Breaking one — just one — of her rules couldn’t hurt. Not for one night.

Lock’s route was unchanged from the day before. She entered the mansion exactly as she previously had, snatched up the decorations again, and opened the secret door. Easy peasy. T-minus four minutes, twenty-eight seconds.

She set off down the passage in the corner, a focused light gem shining a beam before her. It was narrow, but not claustrophobically so; she still had a good few inches on either side of her. Light gems dotted the ceiling, but weren’t lit up, and Lock assumed she’d missed their “on” switch. Far from being dusty and cobwebby, the passage felt well-traversed, if dark and narrow and possibly a little drafty. If she’d been a bit more alert, Lock probably would’ve been worried about a corridor to a secret library of black magic being commonly used, but her shiny sense was almost deafening. T-minus four minutes, sixteen seconds.

The passage ran straight for (Lock guessed) a few dozen yards before opening out into another room, some kind of small storeroom with another door on the other side. When she saw what was on the shelves, the word that immediately leaped into Lock’s mind was “paraphernalia”. Rituals required junk to function, and this place had a lot of junk. Crow feathers, certain types of wood, knives, pieces of clouds, eye of newt, flasks of blood, rainbows’ colors, the whole shebang. It was stacked to the ceiling, clustered tightly on shelves that ran all around the wall. If you named it, it was probably in here somewhere, legal or not. T-minus three minutes, fifty-nine seconds.

But what was there in particular abundance, because of their magical properties? Gems. Set in rings, necklaces, brooches, not set in anything, some even uncut. Her instincts had been one hundred percent right. She’d have to tell her fence, Gannet, to get it all checked for curses, which meant her fee would take a hit, but there was still easily more than ten times what she’d get from the items in the library. Lock skimmed the room, planning out her best route. T-minus three minutes, fifty-six seconds.

Her first target was an especially large ruby on a stand. A fire ruby, if she wasn’t mistaken. Five hundred thousand bits, right there, bare minimum. Lock tentatively touched it and waited; no alarms sounded. Lock tentatively lifted it off its cushion and waited; no alarms sounded. Lock nodded to herself and stuffed it in her bag. Every now and then, she ran into particularly valuable jewelry that had warning spells on it to alert somepony when it was touched or moved. Very rarely, but just often enough to make her cautious when she spotted something this expensive. T-minus three minutes, forty-one seconds.

She tested the next few jewels as well, but when no klaxons started blaring, she got less nervous. She was so thorough she might as well have gone over the place with a fine-tooth comb. She went over the room from top to bottom, nudging aside the ritual items on the shelves to poke behind them. And just in case, Lock went over everything twice. She had the time. T-minus two minutes, twenty-eight seconds.

By the time she was convinced she’d found everything worth finding, Lock was very satisfied. At least one, probably two million bits’ worth in jewels and jewelry. True, she’d end up with less than ten percent of that once she sold it to her fence, but that was normal. Definitely worth breaking a single rule. T-minus one minute, thirty-five seconds.

She was about to leave when she heard something from behind the door leading out. A sort of muffled, panicked scream, quiet enough that she almost missed it. It was enough to give her pause as her mind ran away from her. These guys had had a secret library of black magic; who’s to say they weren’t serious about it? And considering how much black magic seemed to involve equine sacrifice… T-minus one minute, thirty-three seconds.

Lock chewed her lip as she stared at the door. Another scream, quieter still. She had everything she came for. But leaving somepony stranded in her, if there was somepony, was just… wrong. But her five minutes were almost up, and it was against the ru-

If you still cared that much about your rules, you’d’ve taken yesterday’s weak loot and left it at that. One minute, thirty seconds, by the way.

Stupid stupid stupid conscience. It seemed to shift based on what she knew. Yesterday was different. Lock stepped to the door, ready to blow the joint, but still stopped and looked back at the door. Silence.

If you’re going to go, go. If you’re going to break your rules and look, look. Don’t waste time.

Deciding not to lie to herself anymore, Lock trotted to the door. There was a miniscule peephole there. Lock wasn’t surprised; if the room on the other side of the passage was a secret black magic library, then this room was probably a secret black magic repository, hidden from the outside by a secret door. And it wouldn’t do to walk in on snoopy guardsponies without checking to see that there was nopony outside the secret door. Lock peeped.

A plain room was on the other side, the walls decorated with plain hangings, but that wasn’t why she almost felt her heart stop. In the cold blue of several light gems, a thin unicorn was lying spreadeagled on a marble table, a nullifier ring over her horn and a collar around her neck. She wasn’t secured by any means Lock could see, but although she writhed, her legs barely moved.

Lock fell away from the door, her mind racing a mile a minute. Some ritual. The specifics didn’t matter; anything with equine sacrifice was bad news. Already, she was coming up with something resembling a plan. She’d leave, hide her loot, and alert the Royal Guard. They’d storm the place and rescue the pony. She’d have to answer a few awkward questions about what, exactly, she was doing in the house, but compared to kidnapping and attempted equine sacrifice, mere breaking and entering would get overlooked.

She’s on the makeshift altar already. By the time the Guard gets here, it might be too late.

It wouldn’t be.

What if it is?

Definitely. Probably.

What if it is?

Lock held back a groan. There was a reason she was a burglar and not a mugger (besides the money being better). After another look through the peephole to be sure there weren’t any other ponies in the room, Lock flicked open the lock on the door and entered. Hearing the noise, the unicorn snapped to look at the door, her eyes wide with fear. But once she failed to recognize Lock, her expression turned to confusion. She made a puzzled sort of grunt as Lock walked up.

“Listen,” Lock whispered, “I’m- I’m gonna try to get you out of here. Got it?” She didn’t sound very convincing, but what else was there to say?

The unicorn blinked, then nodded vigorously for several seconds.

First things first: get the unicorn moving again. Up close, Lock could see weird, scabbed shapes traced into the unicorn’s skin, on her coat, on her legs. Runes. That could keep her paralyzed. …Probably. Literally the only thing Lock knew about runes was that the shape mattered. Destroy the shape, destroy the rune’s effect. Lock drew her knife out and laid the point on the unicorn’s cheek. She whispered in the pony’s ear, “Sorry.”

Then, as shallowly as she could, she sliced through rune and skin alike.

She was halfway across when the unicorn’s mouth snapped open, and she yanked her knife away. The unicorn almost yelped — Lock could hear the beginnings of a scream — but clamped her mouth shut again. Biting into her lip hard enough to draw blood, the unicorn whimpered quietly.

Trembling, Lock found another rune on one of the unicorn’s legs. She delicately sliced through it the same way and the unicorn could move her leg freely. A few more seconds, and the unicorn was shaking on the table, but at least she was free enough to shake. “Hey,” whispered Lock, laying a hoof on her. “Are you okay?”

The unicorn blinked back tears and curled into a fetal position. “N-no,” she mumbled, hiding her head behind her front legs. “I’m not ok-kay. I- I-” She sucked in a shuddering breath. “I’ve been here for- I d-don’t know. D-days. They j-just put me on there a-an hour ago. It’s-” Whimpering, she pressed a hoof to the bleeding patch of skin on her cheek that had once been a rune. “I… I don’t…”

Lock seized on what little bedside manner she had. “Listen. I’m getting you out of here. Can, can you stand?”

“I don’t know,” mumbled the unicorn. “Lemme…” She flexed her legs, one at a time; both ponies cringed at the pops in the joints. She rolled off the table and landed, trembling, on all four hooves. Her knees were almost knocking together as she stood upright. But she was still standing upright. She took a few steps; contrary to Lock’s expectations, she didn’t collapse. “I think so, yeah,” she said, “but don’t ask me to run.”

And just like that, Lock’s initial plan — they both climb a tree and jump over the fence — was shot. She had a plan B, but it was so hopeless she’d barely considered it: steal the key to the front gate and stroll out. Where was she supposed to find the key in a house this big? She didn’t have much faith in her ability to pick the gate; a lot of locks of that type nowadays had enchantments that would literally eat fake keys and lockpicks if triggered. She didn’t have a plan C. There were no other options for plan C.

Although, technically… Maybe there was. Hide the unicorn, then go back to her “leave, hide plunder, alert guards” plan. But that was still iffy; it relied on the inhabitants of the house not coming back, finding the unicorn gone, and searching the house in the time being. Lock didn’t know the layout of the house, and she doubted the unicorn did, either, but owners probably knew every nook and cranny. Still, it was an option. Plan D, then, if plan B fell through and she thought of something better for plan C.

The unicorn flexed her legs, trying to get the blood flowing. They were still shaky, but slightly less so. “So what are you doing in here?”

What the heck. Lock had never been good at lying. “Burgling.”

The unicorn stared. “Burgling?” she said slowly. “You mean… stealing?”

“Yes,” snapped Lock. “Burgling, stealing, robbery, theft, purloining, wealth redistribution, heisting, pinching, appropriating, moonlight requisition, heaving, pillaging, whatever you want to call it, and if you’re gonna judge me on it, you can-”

You wouldn’t leave her here and you know it.

“-just shut up, okay? I’m rescuing you.”

Pinching her mouth shut, the unicorn nodded.

“Now put your head down.” Lock quickly worked the nullifier ring off the unicorn’s horn; it was one of the more common models that required a physical key rather than the right enchantment to open. Granted, the lock was a complex one, but it was still a physical lock. It put up about as much resistance before Lock’s picks as a thick sheet of parchment.

Tossing the ring aside, Lock thought: where to put the unicorn during her incursion? If she left her here, the inhabitants of the house would find her free immediately the second they got back and do something unspeakable to her. Lock poked her head back inside the ritual storage room for a second. “Now, listen: you take the passage in here to the end and stay there-” (The unicorn’s eyes widened and she started to protest.) “-stay there. I’m going to look for the key to the outer gate. That might be the only way out. If- When I find it, I’ll come back and get you.” Lock knew someplace that close to the ritual chamber was a bad hiding spot, but she had no idea of the other rooms nearby.

“W-why can’t I go with y-you?” The unicorn shivered. “Why d-do I have to wait here?”

“How sneaky are you?”

No response.

“That’s what I thought. Stay here. I promise I’ll be back.”

The door to the rest of the house was locked. After a few seconds’ examination, Lock guessed it was a lever tumbler lock. Time for a curtain pick. She strapped the pick around her hoof and held a torsion wrench between her teeth. Inserting both into the keyhole, she wiggled the wrench around until she could feel it resting in the groove of the latch. She twisted the wrench at the same time as she swept the pick over the levers, and the door opened like a dream.

After making one last “stay here” motion to the unicorn, Lock cautiously looked outside. Nopony to the right or to the left. They were supposed to be at dinner — it was why she always broke into houses at around this time — but there was always a chance that somepony could be wandering around.

Why do you think you’re supposed to limit yourself to one room?

The white-walled hallway stretched off to her left; to her right, it quickly took a sharp turn as it hit the boundary of the library. Lock had no idea where she was going, so she chose right. “Remember,” she whispered to the unicorn, “I’ll be back.” Without waiting for a response, she stepped into the hall and shut the door as quietly as she could.