“What are you doing today?” Cheeyt asked Nuliyaa as the family ate their morning meal. Miyt frowned at her over her bowl, the expression warning Cheeyt about her tone. Cheeyt pretended she didn’t see.

“I have a delivery today.” Nuliyaa sounded particularly unhappy about the job.

Good. Maybe she was finally starting to realize just how difficult this work was and go find something else to do. Cheeyt could keep her name on the business and stop worrying about how she was going to protect her sister when the company eventually got a job that would take them out of the city.

“You will go see if anything has come available?” she asked.

“What else would I be doing?” Cheeyt snapped back. Did Nuliyaa think that just because she had a job and Cheeyt didn’t, that Cheeyt hadn’t been looking?

“Right.” She looked down, crumbling her bit of cheese. What was wrong with her? Nuliyaa never backed down from an argument with one of her sisters.

Cheeyt pushed to her feet. She didn’t have time to waste on whatever this mood of Nuliyaa’s was. “I’m out for the day.”

Kachaark was setting down a pail of water when Cheeyt stepped into the courtyard. “You’re spoiling them,” she said.

He shrugged massive, furry shoulders. “Just keeping busy.”

“I’m heading to the Guild office.”

“Fortune be with you, then. I’m going with Nuliyaa today. Package is valuable, I gathered.”

Cheeyt snorted. People didn’t hire Guarding Guild members for courier work unless the package was valuable. “I’ll see you this afternoon, then.”

Morning traffic had slowed a bit from the hustle of pre-dawn deliveries, but it was picking back up as people started their days. Cheeyt eased into the flow. First, the office, then she needed to go to the Sea End. It had been a few days since she had checked those boards.

Across to the next row of houses, up toward the river. She had walked this route so many times in the past few weeks, Cheeyt barely needed to do more than keep awareness of the people around her. Which gave her plenty of time to worry.

It just didn’t seem that the Guild had enough jobs. She wouldn’t have made this plan if she’d known how difficult it would be to get work. Clients tended to go to the same companies over and over, but where the people who had never worked with Guild guards before? The people who only needed one job? That was how new companies survived their first few years—how she had expected to survive. And she remembered there always being a few of those types of jobs available. Where were they now?

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“Cheeyt,” a feminine voice purred from the building she had just passed.

She did not want to deal with that woman today. Could she pretend she hadn’t heard Layk’s voice? No, she’d slowed down before she recognized the sound. What was Layk even doing in this area? Bad enough she’d gotten herself a little army of mages—of course. That’s where all the jobs were going. Hopefully Nuliyaa was right and that company would be bankrupted by all the mages they were paying.

“Layk.”

The other woman was leaning her shoulder against the building’s doorway, smirking. She seemed to always be smirking these days. “Where are you headed so early?”

“Guild office.” Cheeyt inched back, trying to escape.

“Oh. Still looking for work?” She tsked. “You should do what Yallee has done and find an office of your own.”

An office—? Cheeyt looked up and realized the sign over the door was for a guarding company, Guild emblem included.

“The Guild let you do this?” Layk had been in the Guild for as long as Cheeyt. She should know the Guild would never allow this kind of competition!

Layk gave a lazy shrug with the shoulder not propped against the door. “As long as they get their cut. You know, we would be willing to pass you some jobs.”

“You would give another company your leads?” That didn’t sound like the Layk she remembered.

“Ha. No. You’d do the job and we’d pay you for it. Yallee’s business manager calls it subcontracting.”

Cheeyt stiffened. She’d rather beg Supyuunch for her job back. “We’re doing fine.”

“Are you?” That smirk widened. “Run along, then. Since you’re so busy.”

They’d stolen all the mages, now they wanted to take all of the clients? And the Guild was letting them? People scuttled out of Cheeyt’s way as she fumed her way to the Guild office. She’d let Layk dismiss her like a child, on top of all the other insults.

As she stepped through the office’s door, she paused to let her eyes adjust to the darker interior. She should speak to Yuunuusi Larpuu—the Guild couldn’t possibly know what Layk was up to.

“Etskaau!” Miirni was back at the front desk. Why did she always have to have the early shifts? Cheeyt was not up to dealing with her today. Miirni waved Cheeyt over with an exaggerated motion.

“What? I need to talk to a Yuunnuusi and I don’t want to hear about who went home with who—.”

Miirni’s gestures changed, now telling Cheeyt to keep her voice down. “There’s a client,” she hissed. “One of the afternoon people messed up and never posted her job and she needs somebody now. Now now. There’s someone from her household sitting in Room A waiting to escort the guard back to her house. You don’t have a job going on, right? You’re free for an overnight?”

There was a job available? A job for something other than running from one corner of the city to another? “Yes, but I don’t have any gear with me.”

“I can get you some gear out of Stock.” She lowered her voice even more. “This is a good client, Cheeyt. You want this one.”

It didn’t matter if the client was a good one or not. Cheeyt was ready to walk barefoot through brambles to get a job done. “Who is it?”

“She’s a trader. Normally hires for big caravans. But today she’s taking her spouse and son to Tuunu to visit and she wants an extra guard to supplement her household guard during the trip.”

“Today?”

“Leaving now, back tomorrow.”

“I’ll do it.”

“Perfect! Here, let’s get you some gear.” Miirni grabbed keys and hustled to the back of the building. “I’ll let them know while you put a bag together.”

A trader. Not quite the client Cheeyt had been looking for, but if she and her family traveled regularly, that had potential.