Sammy lazed on the retaining wall running along the upper-city side of the Damsy River. It gave a wonderful view of the river, the far city and the wilderness beyond. Probably why they built that super fancy restaurant right above her spot, what with it large pane windows and all.
The girl wore a light blue tank top and a faded green skirt, the top pulled up to bare her stomach and hint at her nigh non-existent breasts, her skirt pulled up to bare as much leg as she dared. She would have taken her shirt off entirely since she really did not have anything to hide yet to her great disgruntlement. She was fourteen, dad-blast-it-all. Still, she knew that would be pushing more buttons than she wanted at the moment. She expected the constables to come climbing up to her rather inaccessible spot soon enough, considering her current viewable audience. She smirked to herself as she subtly glanced at the restaurant. So much fun.
As if on cue, the sounds of stealthy climbing reached her ears. Her smirk widened. She could tell those ever so diligent constables had been practicing. Good for them, following her regimen so faithfully. She waited until they had come within twenty feet before springing up and running along the wall toward the high spot where it ended. A rocky cliff dropped into a rock-strewn eddy of the Damsy.
“Stop right there, you little twit,” one of the officers yelled. “That’s a . . . .”
Sammy laughed at him over her shoulder. She thought his name might be Lafardy or Larry or Betty, but was not entirely sure. Reaching the edge of the retaining wall, fully visible from the fancy restaurant, she whispered intone her special stapha activation word, “ｩڅ.”
She had discovered the mini spell through much research and dutiful trial and error . . . well, more like blind luck, if she was forced to be honest. Still, she had done lots of research since and definitely had lots and lots of practice using it. Basically, the word overcharged her stapha magic she almost always kept in residual background quite nicely.
Thirty feet below, the eddy waters rippled and sloshed against jagged rocks. Power flooded her body, amplifying muscles and blood flow, perception and thought. Jumping, she did a slow pirouette in the air, her skirt flapping at her knees as she pulled her lower eyelid down, stuck her tongue out and said “bleh” both to the two officers and the watchers visible behind the restaurant’s large windows.
Finishing her pirouette, the street urchin dropped to land on one of the rocks marking the far side of the gap, a bit shy of the actual continuation of that bulwark. Jumping again, she daintily landed on the wall. Spinning around with a laugh on her lips to face her audience just long enough to curtsey, she raced away into the city with glee in her heart.
Later, Sammy walked casually down the bustling Lambra Street, window shopping . Many shops made their homes on this street, a hodgepodge of old and new, and that in-between. Rickety stores crammed with junk did business next to high end fashion stores. Sammy liked the juxtaposition of contrasts, as did the shop keepers and patrons all.
Sammy paused in front of a window displaying the newest fashion for ladies. She tried to imagine herself in one of the contraptions, posing in the window’s reflection. A radar built into all successful street urchins tweaked her personal red flags. Not even checking what had triggered her unease, she bolted across the street and down an alley. “ｩڅ”, she intoned and jumped straight up to catch the building’s lip and flipped to safety on the roof.
A quick glance confirmed the roof deserted. Sammy then peeked over the edge to look down into the alley. Nobody came rushing into the short path between buildings. The street savvy girl grimaced. She did not like not knowing things, especially things that scared her. She crept to the front of the building and peeked down onto the busy merchant street.
Nothing abnormal.
But from this new perspective Sammy spotted a group of people moving up the road, unique in that they were using a powered cart. Powered vehicles were prohibited within the Seven Down district, which was one of the reasons she used it for her pranks on the powers that be. The thought of stupid nobles having it easy irked her ever since she researched the details concerning her parents’ deaths. Stupid freaking nobles.
Of course, that stupidity had become one of Sammy’s focuses in life. Seriously, why the heck were nobles afflicted with noble stupidity? She wanted to know, because then she might come up with a remedy for it, right? Well, she did have some theories, currently torn between it being some kind of insidious disease they contracted or a curse that somehow subverted them, like, every single one of them.
Setting aside the random tangent her mind had taken, Sammy slipped along the edge of the roof, her hand touching the low retaining wall. She wondered what or who could have gotten permission to use such a vehicle there. Had to be some stupid noble, since it disrupted everyone else’s lives.
“Ah,” she said, relaxing a bit. “They have to push it, huh. So the cart just has some kind of hovering glyph separate from propulsion. Makes sense I guess.” Now her curiosity took a new, stronger tack. What kind of glyphs were they using? She really, really wanted to know. She wondered if she could get close enough to get a good look.
Sighing, she turned her back on the street and sat on the roof’s low protective wall, her feet just barely not reaching the roof’s surface. “Not possible. They would make some kind of big stink or something, for sure.” She glanced behind her to the street and the cart being pushed there. The vehicle rocked several times as if someone was moving inside it, and then something fell off the cart. No one seemed to notice and the crowd closed in around the cart, trampling the lost item. It flew to a curb as someone kicked it.
This kind of opportunity was Sammy’s bread and butter. If it hit the street, whoever picked it up first owned it. Springing from the roof, she dropped to the street while holding her skirt in place so as to not show too much. Landing on the sidewalk between two fat old women who both made the funniest squeals of protest, the small teenager darted around them, her dark, blue tinged hair trailing behind her.
Sammy zig-zagged across the bustling street and caught the object up in passing. Clearing the street, she darted down the far sidewalk, down another alley to emerge onto the parallel street, Rhapsody. She slowed to a walk and melted into the crowd. Rhapsody and Lamba were twins of each other, the crowds always about the same.
Sammy went down three storefronts and then entered Ja’see’s Imperium, incidentally her favorite junk shop. A glance down the street just before entering gave no hints of anyone pursuing her.
“Well, if it isn’t the wonder urchin Sammy,” a young man named Geo said from a ladder along the wall to the left. He shoved an old tin pot onto a shelf brimming with other junk and then slid down the ladder without touching the steps. “What brings you to the Imperium? Anything to sell, or are you here actually buying?”
“Yo, Geo, nice to see you too,” Sammy laughed. She liked Geo much better than Geo’s grumpy grandfather. “Just checking out what’s of interest these days.”
“Ha, who you running from this time? Constables? Camp? The Myst?”
“Nope,” the girl chirped with a distracted glance out the front windows. “I don’t think I’m running from anyone.” She still could not see any fuss being raised. “I just picked up something dropped on the street, is all.”
“Did you help it drop?” Geo quirked an eyebrow.
Sammy straightened her shoulders and threw him a look after flicking her braid to her back. It fell just below her shoulder blades. “I never help things drop. If I steal something, I at least have the honor to admit it. I don’t think they even noticed it fall, nor me picking it up. Either that or it really isn’t that significant.”
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“So, what is it?” Geo moved closer.
Sammy edged away. Geo was a lot older than she, though not old enough to be her father. He was fast and strong, and she never knew exactly what to make of him. Sometimes he treated her nice, others showed her no mercy. Still, all that aside, he was fun to tease.
“I haven’t looked at it yet, so no way am I going to show it to you.”
Geo sighed and nodded, stopping. Sammy’s trust was hard to earn, easy to lose and near impossible to regain. He had learned the hard way not to push things, though he had been lucky enough not to actually break trust with her. But he was still recovering from his little ‘almost.’
He in fact felt a little intimidated by the girl. Geo had the street smarts of a veteran dodge-about, and would put money on his instincts against nearly anyone on the streets. But against Sammy? So hard to deal with. He stressed just observing her. He had only known her for a little over a year and to date she had gone head-to-head with the Camp, that group of cutthroats, thieves and general low-life elite. She had escaped well laid nets of city guard and the constables for this or that reason. She even slipped away from the baron’s own Myst Guardians. And then she went about business as usual, as if half the city’s elite hadn’t been dissed the previous day.
And then there were the other things that made her really scary.
“So is Grumpy Bear around?” Sammy asked.
“My grandfather’s gone for a few days. He went to an antique show in Hammond.”
“Is he still calling this store an antique store?” Sammy looked around. “I still see junk.”
“Says one of the main suppliers of said junk,” Geo laughed.
“Hey, I pull most of my loot from the trash and fix it up a little bit. Junk is junk.”
“But what is junk to one is treasure to another.”
“Which is good, since I get money from the schmoze.”
“Speaking of that, we got a knife in the other day. I’ve been holding it for your inspection.”
Sammy cocked her head and smirked ever so slightly. “Are you calling me a schmoze?”
“Never.”
Geo and Sammy both laughed and moved toward the back of the store, dancing around this barrel of scrap metal and that basket of tangled yarn. Sammy sneezed as dust billowed at their passage.
“You need to dust,” she complained.
“You want the job?”
“250 sil,” she quipped, “one time service.”
Geo snorted. “That’s pretty steep. I could hire a five man team for a day to do it for that kind of money.”
“Then do it,” Sammy said as she hopped up to sit on the counter, twisting around to follow Geo with her eyes as he moved behind the counter and then through the back curtain. Several minutes later, the boy-man returned with a long, black handled dirk in a black leather sheath.
Sammy held out her hand and accepted the dirk. The next moment she released the weapon and it fell to the countertop. She sprang off the counter to land ready to run. She froze and glared at Geo.
Geo, for his part, was bent over laughing.
Sammy crept back to the counter and peered at the dirk and then glared at Geo. “You could have warned me, Dufus.”
“What? And miss that classic display?” Geo managed between gasps for breath.
Sammy waved her hand up and down. “Enough already. Glad I can be your entertainment for the day.” She bent over the dirk and poked it with her pinky. The familiar tingle made her shiver. Glyph magic, though she did not feel any dread from it. “So, how much ya’s asking for it?”
Geo laughed. “More than you can afford, urchin.”
“Hey!” Sammy reared back, her eyes flashing. “I ain’t be no urchin, ya’s twit.”
Geo laughed. “Ya’s be the urchin o’ urchins, ya urchin.”
Sammy giggled. “Enough already. Seriously, how much are you asking for it.”
Geo shook his head. “How ya’s, er, how you can switch from the gutter talk to high-proper with the drop of a hat is beyond me.”
Sammy turned serious for just a moment, “I remember how Mom and Dad used to talk. So how much?” She pointed at the dirk still laying on the counter.
“Five thousand five hundred dim,” Geo said, anticipating the coming reaction.
Sammy glared at him for a moment, but refused to give him the satisfaction. She knew what he was looking for and she was so not giving it to him. No way, no how.
“That’s a lot of dim. At five hundred sil to the dim, I would have to clean this place for a very long time.”
“Indeed,” Geo agreed, fighting hard not to grin.
“Can I borrow it for a few days? Just to, you know, play with some?”
Geo shook his head, the desire to grin banished. “Sorry. If I had the say, I would, but this one’s already spoken for and Grandfather would skin me.”
“He wouldn’t have to know,” Sammy weaseled and then declared proudly. “I would for sure have it back before he gets back.”
Geo shook his head. “So not believable. You can ‘play’ with it here and in the back, but I can’t let you take it from the shop. You know Gramps would know you took it.”
Sammy sighed. “No fair showing me something like this, but not letting me borrow it.” She pouted, her eyes cast to the floor.
“Hey, stop that. I’m not going to let you, no matter what. I thought you would appreciate seeing it. If you’re going to start that kind of stuff, I just won’t show you anything again.”
Sammy glanced up at Geo for a moment to see if he was serious. No smile even being hinted at. She dropped the pout and grinned at him. “Dang it, you used to fall for that all the time.”
“You were a cute little kid before.”
“I’m still a cute kid,” she shot back. “I’m only fourteen, and, what, you’ve only known me for a few months.”
“Over a year now. Anyway, do you want to,” he paused, “play with it in the back?”
Sammy nodded, unable to keep the silly grin from her face.
The doorbell to the shop rang and an older couple entered. Sammy grabbed the dirk and shot through the curtain behind the counter as Geo moved forward to offer help to the regulars. The back room had a door leading to the upper level living apartment, one leading to the storage room and one leading to the workrooms where the junk was fixed up.
Sammy went into the first workroom and stood at one of the counters. Drawing the dirk with slow care, she set both sheath and dirk on the counter. Both tingled her palms. Rubbing her hands together in excitement, she began her examinations.
“You’re lucky,” Geo said.
Sammy let out a startled screech and nearly cut his throat open with the dirk. “GEO!” She yelled. Taking a deep breath to calm herself, she shot him a dirty look. “You live dangerously, Freak. Don’t scare me like that when I’m holding a knife.”
Geo, having retreated several steps, nodded with pale face. “Duly noted. But you are lucky ‘those who hunt you’ did not stop by. You’ve been studying that for several hours now.”
Shaking, Sammy set the dirk on the workbench. She did not like at all that she had almost killed her friend. “I’m not used to studying these things out in the open like this.” She glanced at the dirk and sheath. “You sure I can’t convince you to let me take this with me for a few days?”
And the really scary part of Sammy had reared its head. Not the knife work, though that needed a good bit of respect, but her infatuation with experimenting with glyphs. Geo shook his head. “I’m really sorry, Sammy, but I can’t.”
Sammy stretched and leaned against the bench. “Well, I have to be going. Thanks for showing it to me.”
Geo nodded. “You want to stay for dinner?”
Sammy leaned forward with a little smile. “Are you hitting on me? I’m only fourteen.”
“I am not. I am offering you dinner. Are you interested, oh great devourer of foods most inedible.”
Sammy laughed. She seriously liked to tease Geo. He turned really red sometimes and that was so funny. Still, she knew better than to push it too far. The boundaries between men and women were tricky things, and missteps on her part, in her unstable social position, were freaking dangerous. “Well, I am hungry, so thanks!”
Full and content with her day, Sammy used one of the sewer entrances to her refuge instead of the bridge. The full moon made it too bright, and she did not want people seeing her around that particular entrance too often, no matter how good the glyph magic concealing it might be.
Once safely inside her hideout, she pulled out the object pillaged from the street and looked it over. It did not look all that impressive, a small box about the size used to protect a bracelet or a pair of spectacles. She wondered if it was really worth the worry of being chased.
Holding it in her palm, she looked it over from all directions. Her eyes grew wide and she set it on the desk with trembling hands. Not strong, but there was definitely a tingle there. The case may not have been magical, but glyphs there were indeed.
***
Mik and Leah sat quiet and small. No one could say for sure they were to blame, but both thought about the same event as the current lecture raged before them. Currently their older sister was taking the brunt of it, but their mother could easily shift focus.
“This is ridiculous,” Mer’cd said, her voice low despite her anger. Her husband Sala sat in a chair behind her, his eyes boring into his three children though he had yet to say anything. “No matter how much I think about it, no matter what angle I look from, that you three could lose an artifact of the Paras era is beyond, beyond . . . well beyond beyond.”
“You are not being fair, Mother,” Daringe said. “The Myst guards oversaw its security. We had no control or say in the matter. Captain Jerra would not even let us near it while traveling through the city.”
“And you are sure it was in the cart,” their father Sala asked, speaking for the first time.
All three children gave internal thanks, though it did not show on their faces. If their father was done contemplating, then their mother would be easier to handle.
“I saw it in the cart when we set out in the morning, but we were not allowed near the cart since then. However, the captain confirmed its security just before we passed into the city,” Daringe said.
“Mer’cd, if the Myst guards would not allow approach, even you would not have been able to do anything. I will speak to my brother about the matter. Since the Myst lost it, they will be responsible for retrieving it.”
Mer’cd snorted, but only said, “Let’s hope the Baron is as low key about this as you are.”
Sala nodded, affording his love a smile, “My brother is usually reasonable. He will not place blame where it is not due.”