The governance of Floria is a curious thing - each of her five hundred thousand inhabitants knows well that, at any moment, Nurass, the Tyrant of Floria, could decide to institute a martial law however strict he wished, and there isn't a thing the populace could do to resist it. Not with several hundred Shadowguard trained, equipped, and oath-sworn to do his bidding. And yet, the Nurass leaves the governance of the city to the Master of each canton (and to the Collegium within the Shadow Canton), and the Masters are strongly urged to give their territories significant self-governance.

At first, Masters think themselves little tyrants over their domain. But overzealous Masters soon find themselves censured by the Shadow Hall and, if they do not relent, find their tenure in Nurass's inner circle brief, indeed. Therefore, each Canton is policed only occasionally by the Shadowguard. More often, it is the half-dozen mercenary companies given license to operate within the city that supply local guards, and the Master of each canton sells authority to these companies by way of special badges.

For instance, while the Foreign Canton hosts a tapestry of different guard companies, 'Mini Gionika' (the Gionian district that occupies almost a quarter of the canton) is patrolled almost exclusively by Filitze do Hiverrosa, the Sons of the Winter Rose (though, if I'm not mistaken, their numbers boast roughly one quarter 'daughters'). The Filitze is, obviously, a Gionian mercenary company - or, at least, one owned by local Gionian-Florians and populated by guards who speak fluent Gionian. Many of them are retired Gionian soldiers fresh off the boat and don't speak a word of Perditalog.

After parting ways with Opellia - she had more artificing to do, of course - Mailyn and I made our way back to Mini Gionika, only to find Aldo near the Promenada Lapitze, the Jeweled Promenade, getting interrogated and patted down by the Sons. Since they seemed to be observing proper respect for a Collegium Scamp (which is to say, they weren't actively roughing him up), Mailyn and I stayed back to observe.

"Looks like the Sons have got it in for Aldo," I said.

"Wonder what he did?"

"Knowing Aldo, he probably nicked something he shouldn't have. He's usually good about keeping his nose clean in Mini Gionika, though…"

Mailyn nodded. "Doesn't mean he didn't annoy somebody outside the neighborhood who's got inroads among the Sons."

"That's true," I allowed - just because you committed your crimes outside the neighborhood, that didn't mean they couldn't follow after you.

Of course, we - Mailyn and I - hadn't been bothered by the Sons in months. We were known around Little Gionika and the merchants thought well of us. Even Aldo was called 'Little Aldonio' by the merchants and treated like something of a lovable local curmudgeon. He got more free sweets in a day than I ate in a week.

We eventually approached after the guards disengaged Aldo. It was early evening, the sun just setting over the Jeweled Promenade, a stretch of high-end shops that I'd never actually been in since it was closed off to everybody but guild members and Floria's elite. Verdant vines draped from the promenade, dotted with a rainbow of tropical flowers bathed in the mists of spraying fountains. Between the vines were the blue lapis carvings of notable Florians, chief among them Enzio Perccolo, the chief architect of Mini Gionika close to a century before. The Promenade's private guards scowled down at us as we milled about in the dusty courtyard below, but if the Sons weren't going to stop us, then the promenade guards weren't about to second-guess them.

"What'd they want you for?" Mailyn asked.

Aldo scratched his head. "Bugger if I know. They gave me a proper pat-down and asked me if I'd been nicking things from nearby shops. Prince's Pillar, Spices of the South, Aldinello's Boutique… one or two more." He shrugged.

"And did you?" Mailyn asked, one auburn eyebrow venturing upward.

"Hell no!" Aldo spat. "How long have we known each other, Mai? I'm tricky, not stupid!" He cast a suspicious glance around us. "Plus… I think I'm being followed, but whoever it is, they're being real subtle."

"More than one person?" I asked.

Aldo nodded. "I reckon so. And at least one knows shadow magic… or at least some shadow tricks."

"How could you possibly know that?" I asked.

He rolled his eyes. "Avatar's arse, Vix, you're not the only one with a shadow gift. I know when it's being used as well as you do, maybe better, and somebody was definitely dipping out into the shade whenever I got an itchy chin."

I raised my hands to placate him - Aldo could be touchy about the nuances of his sneakiness. He wasn't in top classes like Mailyn or myself, but that was largely because he was lazy when it came to schoolwork and not because he wasn't prodigiously talented. The fact that he was in mostly tier four classes despite his allergy to out-of-class reading and drills was actually pretty impressive, given that his chief competition was smart Scamps who did study. "Okay, true, fair point," I said. "You know more about the Shadelands than any other Scamp. It's getting late to go on a carrafin chase for these mysterious trackers, so why don't we get on it first thing tomorrow?"

Aldo scuffed his shoed against the dry cobblestones. "Yeah, alright," he eventually conceded.

We made our way north, the Largotto to our east, dark but dappled with the lanterns of ferries and sandolos as the shadows grew long. Once we were back on Collegium grounds, we kicked about with some of our friends who went to other quarters of the city during the day - quite a few of them, including Aldo, liked to bet whatever extra they had at the end of the day in little games of skill (games of chance were seen as a sort of game of skill, too - to see who was the most skilled at cheating). I kept my clutch of hard-earned tollos close, only betting what I was willing to lose when I thought I could win. I imagine I came out about even.

Aldo placed second out of four in a game to see who could balance on a precarious rope the longest, which meant he got to keep his money but didn't earn any extra.

"I'll get 'em some day," Aldo stated, wiping the blot of blood from his dirty lip. Things could get quite heated on the rope, and nobody was there to catch you when you fell into the dust.

Once it got too dark to see much outside of the campus glow-globes, we headed into the bunkhouse for the night. For me, that usually meant an hour of study for school, an hour of calisthenics (whenever that small group of friends got around to it), and two hours of reading and practicing whatever I liked. Recently, that had been a book on metalworking tricks, but that seemed like less of a priority now that I wouldn't have access to an artifice workshop until I made Sneak, which would be…

"I can't believe we're gonna be Sneaks in a few months," I whispered to Mailyn as I reached for a new book among our pile.

She looked up from her own book and yawned. "I can. We've been Scamps forever."

"Two and a half years isn't forever," I observed.

"Yeah? Well it sometimes feels like it. Just make me a Shadow already!"

"We don't know enough to be Shadows yet," I said.

She nudged the book I was reading with her foot - we were both sprawled out on the floor in opposite directions, our sleeping pads providing the little cushioning we needed over the worn wood. "You're never going to get there if you read schlock like Princess Jacinta's Amazing Adventures, or whatever that is."

I stuck out my tongue at her. "I just switched to this book. And it's pronounced Ya-thinta, and I'm using it to learn Altissan."

"Wonderful. Another language," she sighed.

"And why are you reading…" my eyes bugged out as I caught the title - Mailyn had been trying to cover it, but her finger slipped with my nudge. "Sordid Tales of a Hedge Witch? By Perdita X. Nix? That's got to be a pseudonym…"

Her face went red - and, given her Wext complexion, it could really go red. Her cheeks went waxy and pink like a Feist pomme. "She's a real pyromancer," Mailyn mumbled into her own shoulder. "Thought it might have some tips about, you know… magic… and it's got a bit of that and lots and lots of…"

"So the sordid bit…"

"I didn't even know what sordid meant," she whispered, blushing even more. "I had to look it up…"

"And?"

She poked my side with her cold toes. "I know what it means now. Read it when I'm done and let me know. I want a second opinion…" her voice dropped to an almost-whisper. "But I think I like it?"

Yes, Mailyn was starting to get Adult Thoughts, which I was not yet privy to. And, having since perused several of Ms. Nix's memoirs, I can confirm that it's pretty clear that, if the woman isn't actually a pyromancer, she's interviewed plenty of mages and taken scrupulous notes. And if she hasn't lead a positively sordid life, she's interviewed plenty of trollops and taken unscrupulous notes.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

I can confirm that the material Mx. Nix wrote about proved very… let's say formative to Mailyn. The results speak for themselves. As for my own Adult Proclivities, I'll remain mum for now - they weren't even a bone in my divinations yet.

I went to sleep with the adventures of a brave Altissan princess jaunting through my dreams and Mailyn drifted off in the bunk next to mine with… well, we'll forgo the likely topic of her Perdita-Nix-inspired dreams for the moment.

The next day, as with every week day, we were turned out from the Scamp Hall after our morning classes. As Aldo, Mailyn, and I made our way to Little Gonika, we kept an eye out but didn't spot anybody following us. However, it was hard to be certain. As with every day Scamp groups of varying sizes drifted out from the halls, noisily socializing before dispersing throughout the city . There were fifteen hundred of us, after all, so it was just about impossible to tell if somebody was following you anywhere near the Collegium. Most Scamps had their groups, and those groups sometimes changed their plans or daytime destinations.

I didn't notice anybody following us. What I did notice was Tizzie Drake, formerly of the Tetrad of Terror, discreetly consorting with a trio of Scamps about a year younger than us.

Now… I probably wouldn't ever like Tizzie, but neither did I wish her any particular harm. Neither Tizzie nor any of the other Tetrad members had bullied me for quite some time. All I'd gotten from Tizzie in the past year were the same dirty looks she gave everybody she didn't like, which was a pretty long list. So I had no particular reason to think this had anything to do with us… but I wasn't going to rule it out.

"You saw that, right?" Mailyn asked.

"Saw what?" Aldo asked.

"Tizzie. She pointed right at us."

I wondered what Mailyn was going on about. "No she didn't," I said. "She was talking with those kids from Hall One, but she didn't point at us…"

Mailyn shifted her chin just so. I'd seen her do that before. "Pointed with her chin. That's how folks do it in Wexland?"

"How am I just now finding out about this?" I huffed.

Mailyn pulled me close and ruffled my hair. "Because, Vixie dear, you aren't always as amazingly astute as you think you are."

"At least I know what sordid means," I mumbled. Predictably, this dampened Mailyn's enthusiasm a bit. Aldo didn't seem to notice.

"Yeah, wonderful, lessons on culture." He twirled his fingers around. "Didn't notice any of 'em actually following us, though. So… I reckon it's time we split up?"

As somebody with more than a little experience at counter-espionage, I'll give you a pointer for free: the ruleset of things to do when you're being followed (or think you're being followed) is surprisingly short. Unfortunately, the contingencies are often contradictory. For instance, if you're in a group and trying to find out whether you're being followed (and by whom), the rule is to split up and then circle back to the nearest rendezvous point. Unless you think your pursuers want to ambush and/or gang up on one of your number… in which case, the rule is to stay together and head to somewhere that your opponents will find it difficult to ambush you from.

"We should go to The Learned Gentleman," I said. I had a good rapport with my employer, Mr. Hianchi, for whom I did translations and the odd bit of cryptography. He would let Mailyn and Aldo hang in the front of the store for at least a little while, provided they behaved themselves and I was working at the time.

"Vix," Aldo said with just a smidge of exasperated condescension. "I'm not gonna be intimidated by Tizzie Drake and a bunch of eight-year-olds." Never mind that we were only nine - it felt like a significant difference at the time. "Back me up on this, Mai."

I looked to Mailyn. She sighed. "He's not wrong, Vix."

"Damn," I grumbled. "Fine. Fine! Let's just… split up, okay?"

"Um… that was the plan," Aldo said. "We'll meet back at… you'll love this… The Learned Gentleman. Happy?"

I pouted but nodded. "If we all die, I'm blaming you."

"Fair enough."

As the one who'd suggested splitting up, Aldo forged straight ahead while Mailyn and I peeled away at the earliest opportunity. As soon as a rush of coach traffic and pedestrians managed to obscure us from up the street, we spread along the byway behind a lacuna of bustling business.

To anybody not used to trailing a canny mark, it would appear as though we'd simply vanished from Aldo's side. To a veteran stalker, our tactic would be immediately obvious, though they'd have their work cut out for them figuring out where we'd scampered off to.

As soon as I'd made some distance between myself and Aldo, I proceeded south toward the 'Triabca' where the neighborhoods of Mini Gionika, Little Kulsiniy, and Wee Wexland intersected. I was less interested in this intersection than the fact that it had numerous shaded alleyways that dead-ended against the levee built up around the Nation's Pool. I made myself as obvious as could be for about three blocks before ducking into an alleyway between Arkavy Deluxe and Coulcot's Tea Emporium and subsequently dropping into the Shadelands. To any observer in the outside world, I would appear as nothing more than a slightly darker smudge in an already shadowy alleyway.

The world muted around me and blurred, structures taking on the strange sepia likeness of themselves, as if the whole world was encrusted in a patina of delicate, undulating fungus, any sense of shape or distance warped in a way that only those familiar with the shadow could decipher. I was still a neophyte in shadow magic, but I was no longer a rank beginner and I could maintain my spot in the shadelands for up to a minute before I felt the ponderous, creeping attention of the Abyss shifting toward me, drawing me in, and making it ever-easier to drift further into the realm of darkness without realizing it. Not thirty seconds had passed when a flitting shadow out in the bright wedge representing the street beyond the alley came back around and traipsed into my alleyway.

And then, to my surprise and delight, they, too, slipped into the Shadelands.

Even though I was a bit deeper in the shade than she, the girl who slipped into my vicinity noticed me almost immediately. She gasped in surprise, the emotion on her washed-out face clear enough, even if the gasp itself was transformed into a distorted hiss, like the tearing of gossamer fabric. I vaguely recognized her as one of the younger kids I'd sometimes see playing at Wizards and Scoundrels or racing about the dusty green in front of the Scamp halls. She was short but compact with intense, blue eyes.

From the amount of time it had taken her to enter the Shadelands, she was about where I had been a year ago - able to perform the trick more or less at will, but only after accessing some emotional memory to reign the power in. Fortunately for us Scamps ('fortunately'), traumatic memories are never hard to find. Remembering the time I was nearly drowned in the Largotto still ticks my heart rate upward all these years later. In any case, I was the superior shadow stalker, even as she approached me. I took a step forward and braced myself, raising my hand.

"Pneumatis Pyrexia!" I shouted. The little Ring of Fire Sphere that Opellia had gifted me activated in a literal flash. I'd braced for it, but my tail hadn't. When we were forcibly ejected from the shadelands, I merely skidded back half a pace, whereas the girl stumbled wildly backward and could have been seriously injured, had it not been for the middling mound of damp sand she collapsed back onto with a wet hiss.

"Don't!" she yelped.

I was on top of her in a flash, mounting the poor girl and pinning her arm before she could reach for her blade. "Don't what? You were following me!"

"I wasn't!" she insisted.

"You were," I stated.

She stopped her wild thrashing when it became clear that I didn't intend to stick her on the spot. "Okay, fine. I was following you. That's not a crime, is it?"

"No, but it's not a good way to be friendly to a fellow Scamp, is it?" I dismounted the girl and hopped to my feet, snatching the little bound notebook poking out the back of her satchel. "Better tell me what you were up to or I'm keeping the notebook, uh… what's your name?"

"Mossy Lakes," the girl said. I cringed at the unfortunate name… though her first name was likely a nickname. Her pale blonde hair had a greenish tinge to it that it almost certainly hadn't possessed prior to the start of her thaumic awakening. Mossy struggled to her feet, patting the damp sand off of her tunic. "That's my notebook."

"Okay, Mossy," I said, and I took a modest but calculated gamble: "Then you'd better tell me why Tizzie Drake wants you and your friends to follow us."

The girl visibly considered keeping the secret before deflating under my intense scrutiny. "She told us to catch you doing crimes so we could kick you lot out and take over the Foreign Canton…"

"Take over the Foreign Canton?" I had to laugh. At any given time, there were at least a hundred Scamps operating within the canton, perhaps twenty in Mini Gionika. There's no way that any of our trio controlled the Canton. We simply had a stable base of willing employers who were understandably reluctant to throw in their lot with a Scamp they didn't know - what point was there in depriving yourself of a known commodity? "So, Mossy, what crimes have you got me dead to rights doing?"

She glanced at the notebook. "Um…"

My eyebrows arching upward, I flipped through the pages, perusing Mossy's carefully-printed obervations. "Moonsday the 15th… entered La Sieurhom Entellektua… it only has one 'l', Mossy… entered La Sieurhom Entelektua to commit crimes early afternoon. Went to artificer's school late afternoon to commit crimes. Crownsday the 16th, early afternoon procured street food for fuel to commit crimes. Stopped by creepy herbalist's shop south of temple to commit crimes. Afterward went out to the Old City, probably to commit crimes (didn't follow that far). Mendsday the 17th, stopped by the Bannered Temple early afternoon to commit crimes. Met with other criminal friends outside of Little Gionika for pastries, no doubt to fuel crimes. Afterward entered La Sieurhom Entelektua to commit crimes…" I looked up from my reading and arched an eyebrow. "You know, just because you write 'commit crimes', wherever you've watched me go that doesn't mean I've actually committed any. It seems like whenever you can't keep an eye on me, you assume I'm up to no good. Why's that?"

"Um…" Mossy nibbled at her lip. "Tizzie said you lot were up to no good?"

"Did you actually see me committing anything that could be interpreted as criminal?"

"You stole a book. Or maybe it was a spy book. You took it from that herbalist's…"

"A worn old book, yea big?" I gestured with my hands. "Faded purple binding and about a hundred different dogears? I'll admit that dogearing a book ought to be a crime, but I haven't dog eared it even once…"

"Well… taking somebody's book and selling it…" Mossy said hopefully.

"Yeah, but I didn't sell it. That's Mrs. Delina's copy of Spurspar's Compleat Herbarium. When Mr. Hianchi hasn't got a full day of translating for me, I'll wait a day or two for him to build up a backlog and do some herb collection for Mrs. Delina in the Old City in the meanwhile…"

"Illegal herbs? And illegal translating?"

I put my hands on my hips. "No, Mossy. Regular herbs and translating mostly fiction. I'll bet I'm one of the least criminal Scamps in the Collegium. Aldo, on the other hand… there might be some real dirt to be had on him…"

Mossy's shoulders sagged in defeat. "But I'm not assigned to follow him. Gabriella is."

That triggered a flash of memory. "That's the half-Arkavian girl," I said.

Mossy's periwinkle-blue eyes went wide. "Oh! No! I mean… you can't tell anybody… I…"

"I won't," I assured her with a chuckle. "No… I want you to keep reporting on me… exactly like this." I tapped the pages of her notebook. "I'll find you on Saintsday and we'll talk some more. For now, I'm probably late to my rendezvous with my remorseless criminal friends."