Changes

His was the cut-and-run style, rushing at the victim from under cover, cutting the bands of the belt pouch, and dashing off with it. Effective only when conditions favored a swift escape, it was well suited to a night thief and to thefts where crowds thickened and thinned again, hampering pursuit.

The boy thought he had such conditions—night, the alley, and a half a dozen escape routes on the other side of the street.

He was wrong.

The man heard the running footsteps; his instincts all came alive, and an unholy glee came over him.

The rest was a blur to Mags, caught as he was between the thoughts of the cutpurse and the thoughts of Temper. Temper threw off such violence that it rocked Mags back on his heels, but it was precise and calculated violence, and an acute pleasure in what he was about to do that was very nearly pain in and of itself.

The man moved at the last minute; the boy’s outstretched hands missed the tempting purse. There was a moment of anger and bewilderment on the part of the thief as his hands closed on air.

Then a flash of terrible pain and incredulity.

Then nothing.

And in the street ahead, all that anyone would have seen was the thief make a rush, the man step aside, and the thief falling to the ground as if he had stumbled. Except the thief didn’t get up again.

Temper passed on, leaving the cooling body of the boy in the street. It happened that quickly. One moment the thief was alive, the next, dead.

Mags shook off the unwelcome memory, and this new thief faded back into the shadows and waited for the two laden boys to pass, figuring to take them from behind. Burdened as they were, they wouldn’t be able to run or fight effectively.

Mags swarmed up a drainpipe and got onto the roof; he waited for the older boy to come out of the shadows and paced him while he followed the children, making sure that they didn’t have an adult protector anywhere about. When the thief was positive they were alone, he made his move.

That was when Mags dropped down on him from above.

All that training at the hands of the Weaponsmaster culminated in a move so perfectly executed that he thought his mentor would probably be beside himself with pleasure if he could have seen it. Mags managed to knock the boy cold without damaging him too much, and do it so silently that the children up ahead of him were not even aware that anything had happened.

Mags dragged the young thief into the shelter of an alley, pulled him behind a pile of garbage, and left him there. Bad luck, tosser, he thought, as he resumed tailing the children. Mebbe that’ll teach ye not t’rob kiddies.

The children staggered into what looked like an enormous abandoned building; it was hard to tell in this light, but part of it looked fallen in. Burned out, perhaps?

::I believe so,:: Dallen told him. ::There was a building around about there, a big building that held several apartments. There was a fire there four or five years ago. No one could sort out who it belonged to afterward—probably the actual owner didn’t want to come forward, thinking he’d be up on charges for letting it get into that state. So it’s been abandoned, and no one can do anything about it until an owner is found or the city confiscates it. I suppose there are all manner of squatters in it now.::

They plunged into the warren; he followed only far enough to determine that their “home” was an intact part of a cellar—and that the little girl who had fled was already there. He left them then, as the oldest of the boys sorted out some of the things that were likeliest to sell and hurried off with them to get some money and buy them all the food they had been promised as the reward for—whatever it was they had done for the assassins.

::What are you thinking?:: Dallen asked curiously.

::Tryin’ t’think how t’get at ’em,:: he said briefly, as he headed back to the Weasel’s shop at a trot. ::Reckon I’ll sleep on’t. I dun’ think they’re gonna go anywhere soon.::

It had been a very long night, full of exertion, and once he got back to the shop and Nikolas’ congratulations, he was yawning. And starving. He didn’t say anything about the latter to Nikolas; after all, he would be getting food soon enough.

If he could stay awake for it.

He managed to have a coherent conversation about the Special Guards with Nikolas, anyway, once they got the Companions and headed back up the hill. It was quite enlightening; evidently there were more suspicious deaths in Haven over the course of a year than he had dreamed.

“. . . so the rule of thumb is, figure out the motive, and you generally find the killer, if there is one,” Nikolas was saying, as they rode in through the back gate near the Kirball field.

“Wisht we could figger out the motive of them twa new bastiches,” Mags fretted. “An’ if there’s more’n two. I cain’t b’lieve all they been sent fer was t’clean up t’others’ mess. I reckon they’re s’posed t’ finish what t’others started, an’ we still don’ know whut thet was. I dun’ like it, sir. I dun’ like it one bit.”

“That makes two of us, Mags,” Nikolas replied, and sighed. “All right. I need to report to—whoever is awake at the moment. It won’t be the King; probably the Lord Marshal. Then I need to write a report that the King will get as soon as he is awake. There’s nothing much that you can do, lad, so get yourself fed and get some sleep. We’ll be on this tomorrow.”

Dallen paused, in response to Mags’ unspoken command. “Sir? Reckon this’s th’ time fer me t’ take a bit uv leave from classes?”

Nikolas pondered that for a moment. “It might just be,” he said, slowly. “Your Gift isn’t going to find these men from up here on the hill, not without opening yourself far too much and endangering yourself. You did that once already, and we were lucky you didn’t go mad. The odds are not good that we will be lucky twice. We might have to