books stacked here and there like so much garbage so many times she couldn’t feel uncomfortable here. If it was an odd place, it felt like someone’s home, and she was welcome in it.
“I don’t believe we’ve met,” Evanton added pointedly, looking up at Severn. As Evanton, bent, was about Kaylin’s height, he had to look up.
“No, sir,” Severn said, in a much politer—and cooler—voice. “But I am aware of your establishment.”
“Fame gets me every time,” the old man replied. “Who are you?”
“He’s Severn,” Kaylin answered quickly. “Corporal Handred is also—as you can see—a Hawk.”
“Aye, I can see that,” Evanton said. “I would have called him a Wolf, if you’d asked me.”
Severn raised a brow. It went half as high as Kaylin’s. “He was a Wolf—” she began, but stopped as Severn stepped neatly, and heavily, on her foot. “What do you know about the Wolves?”
“Meaning what dealings have I had with them?”
“Meaning that.”
Evanton snorted. “You haven’t spent enough time with those Barrani, girl.”
“What?”
“That’s no way to get an answer.”
“I could threaten to break your arms if you want.”
He laughed his dry, low chuckle. “Aye, but they’re more subtle than that. I’m of use to them. It’s important in this business to be of use to people.”
Severn said, quietly, “We’re here on official business.”
“Dressed like that, you’d have to be. Although the uniform suits you.”
“You sent a message to the Hawks.”
Evanton shrugged. “I? I sent no message to the Hawks. I believe a message was sent, on the other hand. I know my own business,” he said at last, “and I know Hawk business when I see it. I prefer to keep them entirely separate, you understand, but we can’t always get what we want. You’ll want to follow me,” he added.
Kaylin was already behind him, because she always was in his store; he could bite your head off for going anywhere without him, and usually at length.
He led them behind his tall, sturdy counter. Its sides were made of solid wood that had the patina of time and disregard, not craft. It was impossible to see most of the wood, it was covered by so many things. Papers, bits of cloth, needles, thread—she had never asked why he wanted those because his answers could be mocking and gruesome. It looked more as if it belonged in a bar than a store, but then again, most of the things in the store looked as if they belonged somewhere else; the only things they had in common were dust and cobwebs, and the occasional glint of something that might be gold, or steel, or captive light—a hint of magic.
Wedged between two hulking shelves that looked suspiciously unstable was a very narrow door. Evanton took out a key ring that Kaylin could have put her whole arm through without trying very hard, chose one of three keys that dangled forlornly from its thin, tarnished metal, and unlocked the door. Like everything else in the store, it creaked.
He opened it slowly—he opened everything that way—and after a moment, nodded to himself and motioned for them to follow. Kaylin started forward, and Severn, with long years of practice, managed to slide between her and Evanton so smoothly she didn’t even step on the back of his feet. And not for lack of trying.
They entered a hall that was, like everything else in the building, narrow; they could walk single file, and if anyone had tried to pull a sword here, it would have lodged in the wall or the roof if they actually had to use it. Given Evanton, this was possibly deliberate. It was hard to say where the old man was concerned.
But at the end of the hall was another door, and judging by the jangle of keys, it, too, was locked. “Here,” he said quietly, “is the heart of my store. Let me tell you again. Touch nothing. Look at nothing for too long unless I instruct you otherwise. Take nothing.”
Kaylin bridled slightly, but Severn merely nodded. “How difficult will that be, old man?”
“Maybe you are a Hawk after all,” Evanton replied, eyeing Severn with barely veiled curiosity. “And the answer to that question is, I don’t know. I have no trouble.” He paused and added, “But that was not always the case. And I did not have myself as a guide, when I first came here.”
“Who did you have?” Kaylin asked, tilting her head to one side.
He raised a white brow.
“Sorry, Evanton.”
“Good girl. Oh, and Kaylin? I continue to allow you to visit here because of the great respect I have always felt for the Officers of the Halls of Law.”
“But I haven’t—” She stopped moving for a moment, and then brought her free hand up to her cheek to touch the skin across which lay a tattoo of a simple herb: Nightshade, by name. Deadly Nightshade, she thought to herself.
If it had only been a tattoo, it would never cause her trouble. It felt like skin to her, and the Hawks had become so used to it, she could almost forget it existed.
But this mark was—of course—magical, and it had been placed on her cheek by Lord Nightshade, a Barrani Lord who was outcaste to his people, and oh, wanted by every division in the Halls of Law for criminal activities beyond the river that divided the city itself.
Lord Nightshade had marked her, and the mark meant something to the Barrani. It meant something to the Dragons. To the other mortal races, it was generally less offensive than most tattoos. But clearly, it meant something to Evanton, purveyor of junk and the odd useful magic. He understood that it linked her, in ways that not even Kaylin fully understood, to Lord Nightshade himself.
But if Evanton’s eyes were narrowed, they were not suspicious. “Here,” he told her quietly, “there is some safety from the mark you bear. He will not find you, if he is looking.” He pushed the door open so slowly, Kaylin could have sworn she could feel the hours pass. “Is he?”
“Is he what?”
“Looking.”
She shrugged, uneasy. “He knows where to find me,” she said at last.
“Not, perhaps, a good thing, in your case. But enough. You are clearly yourself.”
“You can tell that how?”
“You could not have crossed my threshold if you were under his thrall.”
She nodded. Believing him. Wanting to know why she couldn’t have.
Severn spoke instead. “You sent a message to the Halls?”
“Ah. No, actually, I didn’t. If you check your Records carefully, you will not find a single—”
Severn lifted his hand. “Where did you send the message?”
“Ah.
