The Ratway was pitch-black, dripping, and reeked of sewage. Issana closed the door quietly behind her, eyes straining to see ahead into the darkness. She took a few cautious steps forward, tracing her fingers along the grime-coated wall to keep herself oriented, then stopped to listen. Her breath was shaky and she could almost hear her pulse in the darkness.

Voices.

She could hear them from far ahead, somewhere around a bend, but they were quiet enough that she couldn't make out what was said. She crept down the tunnel and felt the wall beginning to curve. A flickering glow slowly came into view ahead. She crouched down and listened.

"I don't know, Drahff," said a gruff voice. "They'd skin us alive if they knew we were doing this."

"Why are you always acting like such a big baby?" snapped a second voice. "I've gotten us this far, haven't I?"

"This far?" retorted the first voice. "We're living in a sewer. You said we'd have a house as big as the Black-Briars' by now."

"You worry about bashing people's heads in; I'll worry about the Guild." There was a moment of silence before the second voice spoke again. "I'm going to check the entrance. Thought I heard the door."

Issana felt panic rising in her throat as the flickering light moved and started spreading across the wall towards her. The glow fell on an alcove in the tunnel wall, maybe ten feet ahead of her. She dove for it, pressing herself flat against the wall and praying to whatever gods could hear that whoever was coming down the hall wouldn't look too closely.

Wet footsteps began to echo down the passage and the light grew brighter. Issana squeezed even closer to the slimy wall.

A scrawny man with a hunting bow slung across his back walked past with a torch in one hand and rusty dagger in the other.

"Anything?" called the gruff voice.

"Not yet. Probably just one of those damn beggars leaning on the door again."

The man continued on down the tunnel. Issana made sure his back was still turned, then crept from her hiding place and made her way quickly towards the sound of the first voice.

"It's nothing," came the scrawny man's voice from the entrance.

Issana peered around a corner and saw a small chamber, circular, with a tunnel leading off the other side. Blocking her way was a pitiful, makeshift campfire with a larger but still underfed man crouching beside it. His back was to her.

"It's always nothing," he grumbled. He shifted his weight and started turning around. Issana leaped as quietly as she could and landed behind him again. The sound of her feet slapping the stony ground was masked by the crackle of the fire.

The man turned around fully and grabbed a dead rat from a pile. Issana didn't wait for him to make another move before she ran off down the other tunnel.

She slowed once the glow was too far gone to illuminate her path. Her fingers began to trace the wall again, guiding her and making her grimace at the layer of slime. She started to lose track of time. How long had she spent in the darkness? Minutes? Hours? The putrid smell of the tunnels seemed to wax and wane, sometimes almost unnoticeable and other times enough to make her gag.

The wall suddenly disappeared and Issana's hand slipped off it. She stopped dead. It had to be a room, but there was no light at all and she could see nothing.

"Who's there?" whispered a man's voice.

Issana shrank back into the tunnel. She heard the sound of flint striking and saw the orange glow of a small fire come to life. "I hear you," the voice said again. "Come out where I can see you."

Issana crept slowly into the room and edged to the left, away from the entrance. Someone moved on the other side of the fire but it wasn't bright enough to see. "Come closer."

Issana hit a corner and stopped. "I know you're there," the man said. Issana could see his outline more clearly as the fire grew brighter. He was a beast of a man, large and muscled. Issana dared not move, but any moment now the fire would be bright enough to reveal her.

Something large and hairy brushed past her leg and she bit her lip hard to keep her shock contained. A long, thin tail followed, winding against her leg as it passed.

A crash of metal and a squeal shattered the silence from just in front of her. Issana still didn't move and the big man across the room stopped, a disappointed look on his shadowed face. "Just a skeever," he muttered, and strode across the room towards the source of the noise. Issana pressed herself into the corner.

Issana could see the dead animal in the growing firelight now, a large, mangy-looking rat about a foot high, cut nearly in half by a rusty bear trap. The large man hunched over it. "Supper is served." He pulled the bear trap apart with a wet, tearing noise and the shriek of rusty metal. Picking up the two halves of the creature, still dripping, he wandered back towards the fire.

Issana tip-toed across the room, hugging the wall. She reached the adjacent corner and saw the exit tunnel beside the campfire. The man took an iron spit and rammed it through both halves of the skeever, then sat down against the wall. Issana stopped. There was no way she could make it through the tunnel without being spotted.

Her foot bumped something round. If she threw it, it might distract the man long enough for her to slip past. Silently, carefully, she crouched down to pick it up.

It dropped from nerveless hands when her gaze fell on it. Black holes for eyes, toothless, pale grey in the firelight-a skull, cracked and old, staring back at her. It hit the ground with a clatter.

The man looked up and his eyes fell on her. A hungry smile peeled its way across his face. "What a pretty little thing you are," he purred. "Come over here." He rose to his feet.

Issana backed away, her back pressed against the wall. "Stay back," she snarled. But the fierceness in her tone shook with fear. The man took a few long strides and stopped in the centre of the room, blocking her escape down either tunnel. "You can't escape," said the man. "Just come here." He beckoned with a meaty hand.

Issana shook her head, heart pounding. She started inching to the right and the man moved with her, edging closer with each motion.

He lunged. Issana sprang aside and the man's fist grabbed air instead. He came at her again, long legs closing the distance in the blink of an eye. Issana jumped out of the way and had to twist to avoid landing in a bear trap. The man lurched after her, hands scrabbling for her shoulders, gaze fixated hungrily on her, and he looked down just in time to see his right leg plant itself straight in the centre of the trap.

The scream ripped apart the Ratway's dank air. The man collapsed, clutching his shattered leg, writhing against the metal as he tried to free himself. Issana ran. She leaped clean over the fire and down the tunnel at the far end, trying to block out the agonized shrieking, but it was unending, rebounding off the stone walls in a rising and falling howl of pain. Her foot caught a raised stone and she went sprawling, but she shoved herself upright and kept going.

She rounded a torchlit corner at full sprint and slammed headlong into someone she didn't stop to see. The person hit the ground hard and a knife skittered away across the stone. Issana didn't look back. Her run took her into a torchlit, square room with a heavy wooden door set in the wall opposite her. Issana ran for it, shoved it open and slammed it shut behind her. The screaming vanished. She pressed all her weight against the door, chest heaving for air.

When she at last was calm enough to look around, she found herself in an immense chamber. The centre of the room was dominated by a round lake, around which ran a stone walkway and some wooden platforms. Across the water were maybe half a dozen people, some seated at tables, some pacing back and forth. A man leaned on a bar in front of a roaring hearth, filling mugs.

The Ragged Flagon. Issana breathed a sigh of relief and sank down to the ground.

"What do you want?" growled a voice. Issana jumped up, startled, and saw a burly man staring down at her. She hadn't noticed him.

"I-" she stammered. "Brynjolf told me to come here." She tried to stop her voice from shaking. "I met him in the marketplace."

The man snorted. "So you're the one? Don't look like much to me."

Issana laughed breathlessly. "Well, I made it here, didn't I?"

The man shrugged. "He's over there. Stay out of trouble, or there's gonna be trouble." He thumped his fist into his other palm menacingly.

Issana nodded and made her way quickly around the lake. There were five people in all at this end, spread around several tables and the bar. Brynjolf's red-haired face glanced up from the bar and he waved her over. She glanced around warily and then darted over to join him.

"Well, well," he said. "Colour me impressed, lass. I wasn't certain I'd ever see you again!"

Issana looked over her shoulder at the door to the Ratway. "I-there's a man back there. He stepped in his own bear trap; I don't-"

Brynjolf and the barkeeper both burst out laughing. "Stepped in his own trap?" said the barkeeper. "That's almost poetic!"

"But," Issana added, "he's screaming, and-"

The barkeeper snorted. "He'll be skeever-food by now. Those things can smell blood."

Brynjolf must have noticed the horrified look on her face. "Don't fret, lass. The world's a better place without him. You don't want to know what he'd have done if he'd caught you."

Issana swallowed hard. "I… I see."

Brynjolf clapped a hand on her shoulder. "But you made it! And that's what matters. Welcome to the Guild, lass." He hopped off his stool. "Come, I'll introduce you to our friends here."

Issana clambered off her stool as Brynjolf gestured to the barkeeper. "That's Vekel. Keeps the bar."

Vekel looked her up and down. "You're Brynjolf's new protege? You don't look like much to me."

Brynjolf shrugged. "Neither did any of us when we started."

"Right, and look where we are now," Vekel snorted. "Running a bar in the sewer with hardly a single contract between the lot of us."

Brynjolf steered Issana away with his arm. "He's always like that, lass; don't worry. Here, Vex, meet our newest recruit."

A blonde-haired woman glanced up at Issana from her table. She said nothing and returned to her meal. Brynjolf chuckled. "She's not exactly the friendliest around here."

A bald, middle-aged man looked over at them from where he stood leaning against a crate. Brynjolf met his gaze and drew Issana towards him. The man proffered his hand. "Delvin Mallory. Let me guess, Brynjolf plucked you off the street and dropped you into the thick of things without telling you which way is up. Am I right?"

Issana nodded. "Something like that."

"Well, after you're done with him, come talk to me and I may have some work for you."

"Work?" Issana said. "What sort of work?"

Delvin laughed. "Eager little one, aren't you? I'll tell you later, once you're settled in."

Brynjolf gestured to a short, dark-skinned woman seated near the water's edge. "That's Tonilia, and Dirge is across the lake."

"I met him already," Issana said. "Dirge? Is that really his name?"

Brynjolf gave her a roguish smile. "Why don't you go ask him?"

"So is that it? Just six of you?" She glanced around. "Sorry, but I was expecting… more."

"Well, no," said Brynjolf, "that's not everything, but I can't be giving you all our secrets yet, can I, lass?"

Issana sat down at a free table. "What do I have to do?"

Brynjolf dropped into the chair opposite her. "Vekel wasn't far wrong when he said we hardly have any contracts. We need to start making people take us seriously again."

"How?"

"This is where you get to prove your worth. See, there's a few people that owe us some serious coin and they've decided not to pay. I want you to… explain to them the error of their ways."

Issana raised an eyebrow. "So I'm a thug."

"No, nothing like that. I might have faith in you, lass, but the others, well, you saw Vex's reaction, and Vekel's. They need to know you're tough. That you can handle yourself. You can get back to picking pockets and getting rich after they know you're a strong lass."

Issana leaned back in her chair. "I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm not exactly big enough to beat money out of people."

Brynjolf leaned forward, a knowing look on his face. "Ah, and that's exactly it, lass. You can get this job done without being a brute about it. Everyone's got a weak spot. All you have to do is find it. Think you can manage that?"

Issana nodded. "Doesn't sound too hard. Who are these people?"

"There are three," Brynjolf said, holding up three fingers. "Keerava, she's the argonian innkeeper over at the Bee and Barb. Bersi Honey-hand, he owns the Pawned Prawn on the edge of town. And lastly Haelga, owner of the ever classy establishment Haelga's Bunkhouse. Oh, the rumours coming out of that place, lass."

Issana counted them out on her fingers. "Keerava, Bersi, Haelga. Got it."

Brynjolf smiled. "Do this right, lass, and I can promise you a permanent place in our organization."

"Any tips?"

"Honestly, the debt is secondary here," Brynjolf replied. "What's more important is that you get the message across that we aren't to be ignored."

"Sounds easy enough. What do we know about the targets?"

Brynjolf laughed. "If I didn't know better, lass, I'd think you were excited."

Issana folded her arms and glared at him. "If this is what I have to do to survive in this city, I might as well enjoy it."

"Spoken like one of us," Brynjolf said. "But regarding the targets, I'd suggest you have a look around. Listen in on them for a bit. Who knows what you'll learn?"

"I'll see what I can find out." Issana pulled out a few coins. "But first, I want some food. And something strong to drink. Vekel!" she called out, rising from the table. "What've you got?"

Behind her, she heard Brynjolf laughing. "Aye, lass. I think you'll fit in here just fine."