Calina made her way easily into the town surrounding the castle. It was a quiet town that had been built around the castle. The palace itself was at the top of a hill overlooking the kingdom, it's banners flying. She chewed her lip, trying to decide the best way to proceed. As she walked towards the castle she nicked an apple from a fruit stand. The owner didn't notice and as soon as he was out of earshot she bit into the juicy fruit. She frowned, wiping juice from her chin. The way she saw it, there were two way to proceed: either she tried to somehow insert herself into the castle, posing as a tutor or something, or she waited until dark and employed her cat burglar skills. The first option seemed like a lot of work and she wasn't sure she had any skills a princess could use. So it looked like she had a couple hours before she could do anything useful.

She spent the remainder of the afternoon in a bar, collecting information on the royal family. They had lost their son, the prince, just last year, leaving the princess as the only heir to the throne. The people seemed to like the princess, but there was also concern with her unwillingness to take a husband and produce her own heir. Calina was easily bored by politics, but much more interested in the princess's life before her brother's death. Riding, shooting, swimming; she almost seemed human! The more she learned about the princess, the more she wanted to learn, and she almost lost her chance to scope out the castle before the sun went down.

She left the tavern and stealthily made her way to the castle itself. It was surrounded by thick, stone battlements, but she was no stranger to scaling those. Which she did. She dropped into the courtyard and tucked herself behind a shrubbery so as to scan the grounds for guards. The kingdom must have felt secure, because she only counted three patrols; this would be an advantage. Along with the map and portrait, she had been given a rough floor plan of the castle itself. It indicated that the princess's room was in the top of the eastern tower. Calina easily made her way to the base of the tower and examined it. Scaling it would require her specialized equipment. It was dark now, the full moon rising over the land. She paused for a moment to watch it bathe the kingdom in a soft silver light. It was little wonder why they had built the castle here, it was a perfect location. Abandoning her rapture, Calina dug into her bag and began to focus on the task at hand.

Inside her bag was one of her most prized possessions: a set of immovable rods. She had saved for years to afford these beauties! She gently removed them from their velvet-lined box and cradled them in her hands. There were four of them; two for her hands and two for her feet. She took the first one and positioned it in the air next to the tower. She pressed the button and gave it a couple test tugs. It held firm, floating in mid-air. She smiled and set the second on in the same fashion. Then she began to climb, releasing and attaching the rods much like a ladder, until she reached what she assumed to be the princess's bedroom. She crouched on the sill and replaced the rods in their box before silently pushing the window open and slipping inside, silent as a shadow.