1st Draft Fridays - A Fistful of ... (#6)

Gangside, Salles

The dayglass on the desk casts prisms against the wall, distracting William from the reports he's trying to dig through, to find out which gangs might've taken over the southernmost gate out of the city. Yale's uncle said he thought it was the Daystars or the Houseguests, but those two avoid gatekeeping, and it would be very much like him to make something like that up.

Guto never has forgiven Yale for marrying William, much less for being born to begin with.

William can forgive the man for wishing his sister hadn't borne Yale, not when it had been the death of her. But blaming his wife for her mother's actions didn't even make sense. She didn't choose to be born.

The outer door slams hard enough to shake dust from the shelves. William and Yale both jump as one pair of heavy boots tromp through the front shop, settling as the office door's flung open.

"The prosti's here." Guto's scowl is normal, as is he unkempt blond hair—starting to whiten but not there yet—and rough clothing. The soot smudging him, though, is odd.

William has a bad feeling about why Guto left them in his office. Water magic does run in the family, after all, and what better to protect files? "Are the fires that bad?"

"See for yourself," the man retorts.

The girl-child who'd brought them Aldrik's letter leans to nod at him from behind Guto.

William sighs.

"Excuse me, but did you just call that child a prostitute?" Yale asks icily.

Guto prods the child's bony wrist. "Ain't she?"

William hopes that isn't confirmation of something he's long wondered.

The child shrugs him off. "No, she ain't," she says for herself. "I'm a runner. You know, one of those people you pay to run messages?" She turns to William. "Your sister's just got into town, and your nephew is camped a league outside the northwest gate."

And her casual references to his blood family are why he fled where they were staying: she knows. How?

He doesn't know, but somehow this child knows her mistress shared his father. Somehow this child used his true surname, Jarvim, when giving the letter—and in stables that were too private for the situation, suggesting the managers had known they needed to keep somewhere available for being discreet.

Guto rolls his eyes. "He don't have family."

The child rolls her eyes right back. Her "Yeah, he does," is pitched with an unspoken of course. "He would've attended the same school as the rest of us runners, otherwise."

Oh holy Creator. They'd messed up. They'd messed up badly, and it had probably never bitten them before now because of how social class conventions meant those who knew and those who would've cared to know didn't intermingle.

"That doesn't explain how you know who," Yale cuts in, voice soft in a way that reminds William of the last time Aldrik's late wife, Mataine, spoke to William's mother.

Mataine had tried to get William out of the room, first. The memory of salty iron-scented air fills his nose, anyway.

The child shrugs. "I dunno who figured it out. We just know. I think it was something to do with when the queen was sniffing about our lord's girl—someone figured out the queen noticed Wight was a sister-in-law, and from there it was just connecting pieces. You have a lot of siblings."

"Half-siblings," William corrects absently, distracted by the memory of his late sister-in-law. He hadn't thought to notice how similar she was to Aldrik's current interest.

"Most of them," the child allows, so she does know he's Aldrik's true brother, not just one of the many illegitimate siblings. "Pappy—he runs the runners—got all the younger ones out of town and ran into your nephew on the road, warned him not to come in."

Guto growls. "Why didn't you leave? You be young and not a prosti."

The child calmly shifts her attention to the man, something about the movement reminding William of Lallie, back when that montai was hiding what she was.

"Reasons," the child says.

Voice still soft, Yale asks, "It's just fire?"

And the child grins, eyes suddenly bright. "Did you see how the flames on the library went purple and made a fire break around the building? My cousin did that."

Guto stumbles, backing away with a snarl.

"We're not draken," the child says, "just fire elementals."

Considering the only fire user William knows is the clumsy half-elf who married his nephew and accidentally starts fires all the time, that's not as reassuring as she probably intends it.

Guto taps his breastbone twice, an old sign or prayer to ward off evil.

Yale gives him a flat look.

He flushes. "Just in case."

Just in case the evil some attribute to elementals is real, or just in case the Creator exists and can do something about evil?

His wife is watching him, deciding...something. She turns back to her uncle before he can ask what. "My ondine brother-in-law is looking to marry a montai woman, so you might want to get a grip on that idiocy."

Elemental cultures do tend to kill people for minor offenses that don't warrant it, like some etiquette matters. But neither Aldrik nor Tully were raised in the cultures associated with their magic—and since this child isn't a draken, she hasn't been, either.

The child is staring at Yale with wide eyes, though. "Lallie?"

"No," William answers first, as Yale shakes her head in confusion. Perhaps they haven't met.

"Oh. Lallie's nice. She's not together, but she's nice."

"She married that elf king, Leathin."

"Yeah, but he's dead, so maybe she's marrying someone else. She'd make a good queen, I think." The child frowned, thinking. "That elf one, then? Those are the only girl montai I've heard of near the king."

"We're talking about his family, not the king," Guto snapped. "Mice should stay in the walls, not in the open, anyway."

The child rolled her eyes again. "I'm Mouse, not a mouse."

"That's the same thing!"

Yale bites her lip against joining in as Mouse insists on respecting mountaineer grammar for names versus indefinite objects. Maybe her doctored forgeries have contributed to his misunderstanding. William himself doesn't care to alert Guto how to better mask the ignorance that leads him to blame his niece for her mother's death. Mouse, though, is young enough to not notice that sort of thing yet.

William turns his attention back to the reports. With his sister and nephew at hand, they need to know who they'll be dealing with...unless he and Wight leave through the northwest gate and circle down? That has possibilities...

He can decide after Mouse is done figuratively banging her head against the wall that's Guto's comprehension.