She dropped the flat of her palm across the top of the mortal girl’s head. An’Teela’s companion moved in to deal with the fool who wished to aggravate the Hawks, as if their tabard gave the drunkard immunity to Barrani.
Elluvian turned his attention to the young man he had been observing. A knife flashed in the youth’s hand; the whole of his body tensed as he bent into his knees. His eyes scanned the crowd, flicking from side to side; they returned, always, to the girl.
Elluvian managed to reach the youth’s side before the boy could—as it appeared he intended—move toward the mortal girl currently restrained by the Barrani Hawk. It was not as simple as it should have been; the boy was quick—he made use of any possible opening in a crowd through which a certain stillness had expanded, like rings in liquid will when a stone is dropped through its surface. He did not pause or stop but looked now for the advantage that the crowd might give.
Elluvian caught the boy’s knife wrist, but in order to do so, he had to step into, step through, the shadows cast by the unfortunately high sun. The tiny, tiny ripple of magic its use caused would have been beneath the notice of most of his kin. Most of his kin, however, were not An’Teela, and she froze instantly.
“Kaylin.”
Something in her tone—the word was softer and shorn entirely of expression—finally caused the girl to freeze. An’Teela lifted the hand that held the girl more or less in place and turned to scan the crowd while her partner dealt with the much noisier, much uglier mortal foolish enough—or drunk enough—to tangle with Barrani.
Elluvian held his position, but his grip around the young man’s knife wrist tightened. He was not terribly surprised to see a second knife join the first—the second knife, now wielded in the free hand. “Unwise, boy. I am unarmed, and you now carry two knives. Should you attempt to use one to injure me, you will—of course—fail to do so. In order to preserve your life, I will be forced to break one, or both, of your arms. It will, given the presence of two weapons, both yours, be entirely legal.
“I wish to speak with you. If you attempt to stab me and flee, I will break one of your legs. Anger me further, and I will break it in such a way that your future mobility is not guaranteed. Do you understand?”
The young man sheathed the left-hand dagger without apparent effort. But his eyes flicked, once again, to the mortal and her two Barrani companions.
“You are concerned about the mortal girl that An’Teela calls Kaylin?”
The boy’s arm tensed once again.
He did not answer. Would not, Elluvian thought. This was a different type of rebellion. Against his better judgment, he found himself saying, “You do not understand what you have seen. That Hawk is An’Teela. Your mortal quarry ignored the first command An’Teela uttered—and among our kin, there would be no second command. If An’Teela not only accepted insubordination, but also condescended to touch—without intent to harm—the mortal girl, that girl is safe. She is safe from anything that would be incapable of quickly killing An’Teela and her companion.
“And boy, An’Teela is among our best. There is very, very little that could threaten that child at the moment. And you, with your mortal dagger, are not among those things. Who is that girl to you?”
He again failed to answer; merely looked down the bridge of his nose to the place where their two arms were joined. “I wish to speak with you,” Elluvian said again.
“About?”
“I have no interest in the child. It was not the girl I was following.”
“It wasn’t the Hawks, either.”
“You are observant. Good. The Hawks, at the moment, are irrelevant to me. The girl would have been beneath notice.”
“What do you want?” The young man waited.
Elluvian smiled. He released the young man’s wrist. The young man remained stationary; he met, and held, Elluvian’s gaze. The altercation that had caused the Hawks to pause had apparently ended; foot traffic once again resumed. So, too, the more cumbersome traffic of wagons, carts, carriages.
“I am considering offering you employ. I am, however, undecided.”
“Not interested.”
“No? A pity.” He smiled. Nothing about the smile was friendly; it was not meant to comfort.
The young man shrugged. He was not so sanguine that his gaze did not flicker, briefly, to the backs of the Hawks. He made no attempt to follow them or otherwise draw their attention to his possible predicament. Interesting.
“Who is the girl to you?”
The young man shrugged again, as if the shrug was more eloquent than he could otherwise be. And then, before Elluvian could continue, the boy vaulted backward—and onto the edge of a wagon. Given the condition of the road, it was unlikely the driver would notice the momentary weight.
Elluvian smiled; his smile had edges. He did not immediately pursue—there was no challenge, no test, in that. He merely folded his arms and waited as the boy disappeared from the wagon, melting into an alley. Run, boy. Run. If you can evade me for an hour, we will talk.
CHAPTER THREE
In the end, to Elluvian’s surprise, the boy evaded capture for almost two. He had given the boy a sporting chance, a decent head start; the boy had, of course, taken it and made the most of it. But his most and the “most” of the majority of citizens in this sprawling, messy city were not the same.
When the youth finally came to a resigned stop, he was not wielding weapons. His hands were empty, his arms by his sides. He didn’t appear to be exhausted. He had more flight in him; he had chosen to preserve the energy necessary to face what had become clear to him was inevitable.
“Were you trained,” Elluvian told his quarry, “you might have lost me.”
“You gave me a head start.”
Ah. “Yes. Yes, I did.”
“So this is a game to you.”
“I am Barrani. Most of what we do is a game of one sort or another.”
The boy’s nod was curt but decisive. “You’re not a Hawk.”
“No.”
The young man’s expression shifted. “You weren’t following them.”
Ah. “I was curious about An’Teela. Among the Lords of the High Court she is...unusual. I assumed you had been paid to follow her and to report on her activities. But you weren’t. You weren’t following An’Teela at all. You were following the child that she keeps by her side.”
Silence.
“You understand that those Barrani are Hawks, and even if they were to detain the girl, they would be extremely unlikely to harm her?”