Pait considered herself to be a bit of an expert escape artist. Necessity had made a fast learner of her. But this dude chasing her was fucking determined. She ducked into dark alleys, slid through every hole and crevice she knew in this part of town, scrambled over walls and used all of her tricks, but the guy was like a damn flying monkey the way he climbed and jumped over every obstacle the city threw at him.

She should just give him the fucking stone, she knew. When Pait had given Agatha the purse and the painted ol’ bitch had rifled through it, she had flicked the pebble back at Pait with one long, bright red nail. Pait had caught it on instinct and stuck it in her pocket for further examination later, but she’d never gotten the chance. Agatha had declared “late is late–by an hour or a week,” and she’d had Pait tossed out. Like the contents of a chamber pot.

But if this guy was going through this much trouble to get one little pebble back, maybe it held some secret value. Maybe she could sell it for a bag of gold and Agatha would take her back.

Pait wracked her brain as she vaulted a barrel, then skidded around a corner. There had to be something she could do, somewhere she could run that he couldn’t follow—the problem was the guy was obviously Inhuman, meaning he’d be able to track her scent. And she had nowhere she could hide, now that she was locked out of Agatha’s. But maybe she could buy herself enough time to get rid of the stone, hide it or sell it, and then he’d have no reason to chase her anymore.

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A distraction. She needed a distraction.

There was some commotion going on a few blocks down, on the main road, so Pait sprinted toward it. One thing Pait knew she could do was run. And run and run and run—she’d expected the guy on her tail to wear himself out long ago, big as he was, but it seemed she’d underestimated his stamina.

As they neared the main road, Pait saw more clearly what was going on ahead. The city guard was out in force, civilians were shouting, singing, fighting, dancing, some stalls along the roadside were on fire or had been looted. Someone had started a riot. It was perfect. The guards would be far too busy to worry about catching their favorite little pickpocket, and Pait could shake this guy in the confusion. Maybe, if she played her cards right, she could even set the guards on him—then she could circle back, find Archie, East Luvatha’s resident peddler of rare, stolen items, and offload this stone.

She just needed to get this asshole off her back.