Littleshy was worried about her lizard. She had been active and bright at first, in those terrifying days after their escape, but over the past few weeks, she had gotten slower and lazier. Flying lessons in the mornings had gone from an easy fun time for the both of them to a chore where she had to coax and cajole for even the shortest flight or hop.
It was, on a visceral level, terrifying. She hadn't thought, when she took charge of the dragon, that she might end up killing it out of ignorant neglect, but here she was.
She had tried out different foods over the past week, everything from vegetables, to fish, to lamb, which was difficult to get, but worth a try, yet none of it made a difference.
Her friend at the butchers had shaken his head and suggested that sometimes lizards needed insects to live, much like cats, but neither of them knew how they would manage that.
In the end, they had gone back to a mix of beef, pork fat, rice and vegetable trimmings, which the lizard didn't seem to like as much as raw meat, but which he assured her was a balanced diet, and was what he would feed to a sick dog.
His other suggestion was that she find a Changer and get them to make sure they were all there inside, and Littleshy hadn't been able to tell him why the idea terrified her so much.
Sometimes, he shook his head, running his knife across a stone, the scraping of metal punctuation to his speech, calves, kits and babes would seem fine at first, but given time they would stop eating, something inside them failing to grow, or something coded wrong on a deep level.
"Sometimes," he continued, the rasp of the knife ringing out with each word, people would bring him dead animals, in the hope that he could tell them what went wrong, but it was a rare case where he could help, and he had started turning them down years ago.
It terrified her, the idea of going to a Changer, somebody who she couldn't lie to, who could tear her life apart when they discovered what she had wrapped around her shoulders, but not as much as the thought of losing her friend, and it was with this thought that she called a day off from her many odd jobs, and sought out a new part of the city.
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She hadn't been inland much, preferring the easy work and transient society of the docks, but she had directions on where to go, and finding the street didn't take her long.
She knew it was correct the moment she found it. There was something about the air that seemed cleaner, the scents on the breeze more chemical, like the night after a storm, less of a stink of shit.
Not that the city stank too much, but it wasn't the cleanest place she had ever been, and with the summer being a warm one, there hadn't been rain in weeks, allowing refuse to build up in the streets.
This street was cleaner than any she had seen on her way here, and even the dragon seemed to perk up, not opening her eyes, but sniffing the air with a sleepy curiosity.
Down this end of the street, it seemed to be mostly artists, and she passed a dazzling display of tattoo and art shops, catering for everyone, from bored housewives, to love-struck young hopefuls, to hardened sailors.
She stopped in front of one shop and ran her hands up and down her arms, admiring the walls of the shop, which were covered in paintings of swirling patterns, all in bright colours, too many to count, overlapping and leaving no white space at all.
She stood there for a while, staring at the colours until the owner of the shop caught her eye, and with a shake of her head she set off again.
There were several more similar shops, all with their own particular styles, but as she progressed down the street, the air started to change to something more serious, from ink to disinfectant. Along one side of the road were small stalls offering healings or scar removal. Others offered tattoo removal, to regrow a missing tooth, and fixes for broken fingernails or even fingers. There was even one building doing a roaring trade in simple splints and stitches, without magic at all, and she stopped to look for a moment, but it wasn't what she needed today.
Eyes wide as she moved past the healing stalls and towards a row of shops all specialising in potions, everything from love to laxatives to prophylactics, although she wasn't sure what that last one was, and suspected it was a word made up for the occasion.
The true magical draughts, those that worked, weren't sold in places such as this, and they were much more limited in their scope, warping and poisoning as often as they cured. Still, she enjoyed looking, running one hand over the scales of her friend and dreaming of what she could do if she had that kind of money to throw away.
Finally, she came to the end of the line, and standing in the middle of the road and staring around, her meagre savings weighing heavy in her pocket, she had to make a decision.
Chewing on her lip, one hand petting the dragon's tiny head, she headed towards the final shop, one which didn't advertise. There was simply a small sign by the door, stating the name and credentials of the person who owned it, Glassyseas, Researcher.
It inspired a knot of fear in her stomach, the thought that they might want to research her friend, but she was out of options, and that might be what she needed.