Snippet #2816238

"We would have, really," Anaïs replied with an apologetic smile, flipping her bag off her shoulder. "But the Archive really prefers to keep such matters quiet if we can. Saving face, and all that, you know? And since you lot took the culprit into custody the same day we noticed it was missing, well."

She flipped open the lid of her bag, pulling out contents so the guard could see before stuffing them back in. A bundle of rope, a box of quills, three crystal vials of ink, thirty or more tightly rolled pieces of blank parchment and half a dozen of vellum. The small journal in which she'd been recording "Peasant's Tales". "Will that do for you?" she asked. "I'm afraid that's about all the storage space I have." She lifted up the front of her robe in demonstration, showing off the lack of pockets on her trousers.