Changes

specious reasons to go track those children down.

Mags just shrugged. “Dunno till I find out. Which I reckon t’start on t’night. Reckon I kin cast ’bout fer them new fellers while I’m bullyin’ the liddle ’uns.”

Nikolas winced—rather as Dallen had done. Mags reflected that it was rather odd that they both felt so squeamish about frightening and intimidating a group of street urchins who were probably already criminals and yet were utterly matter of fact about other, far nastier things.

Maybe it was because Nikolas was a father and saw his own child reflected in the eyes of every child. If so —

—’e needs t’ get over thet. Not every child was innocent. Not every child was good. Mags knew that one, firsthand. Always seeing a child as the innocent left you open to not seeing when the child was scheming to take you down.

It remained to be seen what these three were—innocent, half-innocent, or nasty little monsters. Although the fact that they had banded together and were loyal to each other was a mark in their favor.

“I won’t need you that I know of,” Nikolas said, “You might as well go see what you can do about these children once we have a look at the other shop.” He looked sheepish. “I haven’t been there, except to make sure all the exits were in order.”

Mags ran over what he knew of the shop next door in his mind. If this shop was small, the one next door was scarcely more than a hole in the wall. It looked to him as if it had literally been built between two existing buildings, and how the builders had gotten away with that, he could not imagine. Nikolas led the way into the tunnel, which was short and ended in a ladder. While Mags held the lantern, Nikolas climbed it, and opened the hatch at the top.

Mags passed up the lantern and followed.

The space he climbed up into was dusty, narrow, and absolutely empty—from inside it was clear that what he had taken for a shuttered window was actually a shuttered hatch. In fact, it looked exactly like a serving-hatch. There was no front door, only the rear and another ladder to a hatch directly in the roof above. There was nothing in this long, narrow room but a single barrel. The good thing was, it was not nearly as warm in here as he had feared, though it was stuffy. It would make a decent place to sleep. And there was a privy in the tiny patch of walled yard that this place and Nikolas’s shop shared.

“What was this place?” he asked.

“Alehouse,” Nikolas said briefly. “Or, really, more like an ale stall. You brought your own tankard or pail, bought the ale at the hatch, either took it home or drank it standing at the front. When the owner was prospering, he probably also sold bits of things to eat. Meat pies, sausage, that sort of thing. There are not a lot of these places anymore. It was one thing when this was a busy street during the day and people would snatch a bite and a drink on the way to a job or on the way home from one. But this part of the city stopped prospering, and when you are poor, you drink water, or what you can brew out of what you can scavenge, and you don’t pay someone else to cook your food. And in the rare good times, you want to go somewhere that you can sit down to drink your ale.”

There was just enough room for them to put their mattresses here without blocking the exit. And this was probably better than the cellar, where it was likely that they’d kick or step on each other a couple of times a night. They spent a little time hauling their bedding over and setting up; by then it was dark, so Nikolas opened the shop, and Mags went out over the roofs.

He didn’t immediately seek out the children, however. They were secondary to the reason why he and Nikolas were here, after all. He settled in the coolest spot he could find, one with a bit of breeze and nothing digging into his backside; he rested his back against a cold chimney and carefully opened his mind.

Not a lot. And slowly.

Nearby thoughts brushed against his. Ordinary folks, settling in for the night after a hard day of work, for the most part. Nikolas’ shop notwithstanding, most of the people in this neighborhood were pretty law-abiding. They’d steal a little if they got the chance, just as he and the mine-kiddies had stolen and for the same reason—not out of greed or avarice, but to eat, to live. But most of them wouldn’t steal from a neighbor, and most of them wouldn’t do anything to harm another person who wasn’t trying to harm them. He didn’t probe; probing was wrong, unless he had a compelling reason to do so. He simply let surface thoughts brush past him. There was a lot of anxiety about money, some hunger pangs that drinking water wouldn’t still. Restless children who had not worn out their energy at their jobs (for everyone worked here), exhausted parents who had come home exhausted and only wanted to stuff a crust into their children and themselves and sleep. Some bright spots of happiness—someone had done well, there had been a good meal, a promise of prosperity, a bit of luxury. Someone was in love, someone was heartbroken, both were not much older than he was. Many were a little drunk, several were very drunk, some were in pain, physical or emotional. A few were ill. Several someones were—he shied away from that particular activity, a little embarrassed. Nothing was so terrible that it required his intervention or that he call for help via Dallen. It was “noisier” here than up at the Collegium; Dallen had explained that as the existence of many old and new shields, and the buffering efforts of the Companions.

But nowhere was there that peculiar half-emptiness that marked the presence of the foreigners. Which didn’t mean that they weren’t in Haven, it only meant that they were not within a block or so of where he was. That was the problem, the farther he reached, the more mental voices started to press against him, and the harder it became to lock them out. Now, if he was “talking” to a single person, or a few, he could reach quite far indeed without danger. But if he had to do something like this, open his mind to every stray thought that passed by, well— That was a great deal more difficult. Partly, since they weren’t Mindspeakers, it was more difficult to make sense of what they thought, and their thoughts didn’t have the force behind them that caused them to reach farther.

Which was just as well, since this was rather like being in a room full of people all talking at once. He had to concentrate to sort out what anyone was saying. The farther away he reached, the noisier it became, because it wasn’t possible to block out the nearer folk while reaching for the farther.

Such things had driven people mad in the past. And they probably would again. He was just fortunate that he had Dallen. The more he came to understand Heralds and Companions, the more it became obvious that Dallen “helped” him far more than most Companions aided and taught their Heralds.

He put up his shields again, “resting” for a moment in the peace and silence that followed the incessant chatter.

::You aren’t exactly the normal sort of person we Choose,:: Dallen commented dryly, ::As you already knew.::

::Quit joggling m’elbow,:: he chided, with amusement. ::I think I jest figgered out you got in an’ dumped a whole lotta learnin’ in m’head back when I was lettin’ ye keep me from havin’