Nameless Trader

I'm a thief in your world and so far I've never been caught. Who's my next target?
    _Well, really? Serendipitous...

   Thief Caste is a empty chair in low caste councils, most civilized places don't have anything like that. If you ask anyone you just met, the person will deny the possibility of such a thing. If you ask a Scholar Caste he is likely to prove to you that those institutions could not survive under normal circumstances. 
     People take things from travelers on the road, in the wilds, by force. That is not crime at all, since laws don't exist in the wilds neither does crime. Any man can furtively enter a nation different from his own and take anything. Usually, the actual practice is to take a free woman and preferably a high caste one and carry the lady tied and gagged to be branded slave and locked in a slave collar whit the name of her captor written on it. No crime there (if you are not caught before evade the Nation you are stealing from) it is the most sacred and overspread tradition on Sharitarn, shared by wild folk and civilized nations. So what place could such a world have for thieves? 
   Well, if you turn out being adopted by a Merchant Family you will read a different version of that. Or perhaps you earned the privilege of being called "friend" by a native, not the entire word in Merchant Language but the contraction Sharitarnes use when they actually mean it. 
   According to this second version, less logical and more empirical, most civilized cities do have a Thief Caste in an way or another. It dedicates itself to pickpocket and home theft inside the city, but in a very limited scale. Black-market circulates valuable goods coming from the wilds through illegal fairs at Peasant Caste settlements, but would be far too dangerous to steal something important from a local family and try to sell it locally. 
   Merchants divide themselves in two groups, Honest and Dishonest Merchants. First group do not deal with Black-market, second does. They know who is in each group, but that information is a caste secret. Both groups are Merchants, and they certainly do business with each other regularly. If you ask, all merchants present themselves as being Honest.    
   Then you may ask me: HOW ROYAL JEWELRY IS STOLEN ? How, for instance, someone took the Seed of Fire from the feudal fortress where it was heavily guarded? 
    For a generic answer you can deduce by elimination. Since is not local Thief Caste, must be outsiders. The thieves from one nation going steal national treasures from another, under the command of a King, or High Caste Council more often than not. 
    To know the facts, you have to be adopted by a Thief Caste yourself. If my personal experience count for anything, be already a thief before the Vortex catches you_ a competent one_ may help. Locks on Sharitarn are nothing to take seriously, except for the magical ones they are heavy, large and clumsy. 
    On the other hand, there is no human rights here, therefore chances are that you will not be caught alive if your escape route collapses ahead of you. If they do catch you alive, that can be worse. Even worse, and still very possible, is the case where you die trying to escape and someone brings you back for questioning, and punishment. 
     So, I was talking to you about the Caste, and the Caste secrets. There is some degree of cooperation between different Thief Castes, some "good will" you may expect if you know the right names and they recognize the knots in your bag or trousers. In general that don't help you after the job, is your business to escape city in one piece with whatever prize you achieved: no local will get involved. The "good will, or unspoken code" only helps cover your entrance, and gives you a chance to avoid the City Guard for long enough to find your target and position yourself to make the decisive move. 
   And that is all about cities, towns and villages. If what you want is inside a less civilized nation you can hardly count with local help. Wild folk do not steal from their parents. Actually they do, all the time, but they do not allow others to share that privilege. 
   Now let's say, for instance (and I am not suggesting you anything!!) that you happen to know something about The Seed of Fire, or The Seed of Black Fire. It is a unique item that was made somewhere on North Pole by a large number of Enchanter Mages, one of them stole it, or gained it in a bet from the others, and fled to a feudal fortress where he accepted the job of "Court Mage" or however this position is called in the Polar Islands of the north. 
    This pretty bauble is neither taller nor heavier than a domestic cat, a thin statue of dark vitrified stone. It is absolutely useless. 
    Unless you happen to be a magic user interested in make enchanted weapons. In which case study the Seed is the only way to gain the power to create magic weapons of special destructive power. Those black-fire weapons that destroy most magic protections as if it was nothing, and hurts the magic body as much as the physical one. And they say the magical body is far harder to heal than the one we can see and touch. 
   There is one thing you can do with the statue, being neither mage nor sigrax. That is sell the decorative piece of stone. I happen to have somewhere a list of people who happen to be aficionados for the art stile of that particular statue, you can't expect me to remember any name or number all the sudden. However, the King of Lutianen has a daughter who would like to be asked in free companionship by any man who gifts her father this particular statue. 
   Perhaps the hand of a princess, with the citizenship and the position in Noble Caste implied in it, don't attract you. Personally, I do not like islands. All that salt water makes me nervous! Did I mentioned that was just one item on a list? 
   Well, if someone decides to obtain the Seed for any reason that person will not have to travel all the way to Polar Islands (which is a very hard travel, they say) because the trinket if actually in Main Continent now. In a warm place, far easier to reach. You see, is funny that you are curious about that particular item that I would never suggest anyone to steal. 
   Because this new king of Piwag Desert brought it recently to his home land. Riagare is building a sort of capital in his domain. Certainly following fantasies about build an Empire as shiny and powerful as those of Imperial Age. His fate is uncertain but the present must be as chaotic as anyone could imagine. Possibly chaotic enough to allow a smart and seasoned thief such as yourself to enter the Royal Castle in construction, locate the Seed of Black-Fire, and leave Piwag Desert with the statue in a backpack before anyone realize it isn't inside Riagare's vault. 
    All that hypothetically speaking. Goes without saying, you didn't heard any of that from me.