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I cursed under my breath. He had disappeared completely from the alley; all the surrounding shadows lay flat and still and unremarkable. I spent a few minutes juggling my dresses, finally tucking two under one arm and one under the other, before stepping out onto the street. Hardly anybody was out, just a few shopkeepers getting everything ready for the start of the day. I nodded at them like it was totally normal for me to be traipsing through the streets in the dark hours before dawn, heading in the direction of the ocean, alone.
I got to the pleasure district as the sky was turning gray with the day's new light. I ducked into an alley and waited.
Naji materialized a few moments later.
"Now what?" I said. "By the way, I should tell you, my parents might be down here. Wouldn't be up at this hour, but you know."
"Your parents?" He pulled the mask away from his face.
"Yeah, my parents. Kaol, don't you know?"
"I obviously don't."
"I mean, don't you know why you were hired – why the Hariris–"
"I'm not told the particulars," he said, interrupting me. "Only what's needed for my tracking spells. We need to find a place to stay before the sun comes up. You really should rest."
"Is that part of your protection deal? Making sure I get enough sleep?"
He didn't answer, just stepped out onto the street. I hoped he'd pay for the room and I could save my coins for later. That's what Papa would've told me.
Naji stuck his head back into the alley, looking all angry and put-upon, like I was some little kid he got saddled with. I shuffled out to join him. The pleasure district was mostly full of drunks stumbling home for the night. Nobody paid us any mind.
We'd been walking for about ten minutes when Naji spoke.
"Why would your parents be here?"
I glanced over at him. He had his eyes fixed straight ahead. It was like he didn't want anyone to know we were having a proper conversation.
"They're pirates," I said. "I told you."
"You said you were."
We were close enough to the waterfront that I could smell the salt in the sea, and my stomach twisted up with homesickness, not just for Papa's boat but for the ocean itself.
"I grew up on a pirate ship," I said. "Looting and pillaging's all I know."
"How charming. Would your parents take you back if they found you?"
He didn't sound hopeful when he asked it.
"What if they did?" I asked. "What would happen to you? Are you seriously telling me you'd have to tag along, just cause of some stupid oath–"
The expression on his face stopped me cold.
"You talk too much about things you don't understand," he told me, his voice low and dark. "Come along, the Snake Shade I
I knew the Snake Shade I
So I probably wasn't going to run into my parents, but if Captain Hariri had dispatched any of his men – maybe. A little shiver of fear eked up my spine, and I snuck a glance at Naji, with his mask and his armor and his black clothes, and wondered if I was go
All around us, the food vendors were opening up their carts for breakfast. Cause it was the pleasure district, there were still drunks dragging themselves around, trying to find a place to sleep off the drinkingsickness. Most of 'em shied away from us, crossing the street and turning their faces away, but I could still hear 'em whispering as me and Naji walked by. It was an uneasy feeling, the way their fear followed us down the street.
Abruptly, Naji reached up and yanked his mask over his face. He didn't falter or stop walking, but the sudde
"What's wrong?" I asked.
He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. "We're almost there."
"That don't answer my question."
"You're not in danger."
"Why'd you put your mask on?"
His eyes darkened and he turned away from me and started walking more quickly, his strides long and brisk. I sighed with irritation and then lagged a little behind him, ambling along, taking my time. He glared at me over his shoulder.
"What?" I asked. "You said I wasn't in any danger."
A peal of laughter broke out from the shadows of one of those narrow Lisirran alleys that run like glasscracks between the buildings. A man spilled out of the alley, an old Empire sailor from the looks of the rags he wore. He leaned up against the building and guffawed and then said, "Now this is something I never thought I'd see. A little girl hassling an assassin." He laughed again, snorting like a camel, and then took a long drink from a rum bottle.
"I ain't a little girl," I said. Naji just glanced at him and kept walking, although I noticed he stuck his hand on the hilt of his sword. I followed after Naji, though I wasn't too worried – it was just some drunk. What else do you expect down here?
"Why you wearing the mask?" The man tottered forward. "You know you ain't in the desert."
Naji didn't answer, just stared straight ahead. I found myself hanging back a little, watching the whole thing with interest. You live your whole life with pirates, you start smelling when a fight's brewing.
"You don't got an answer for me?" the man called out, stumbling after Naji. "Or are them stories true, that they cut out your tongues?" And then the man grabbed Naji by the upper arm. In one clean movement, Naji had the man laid out on the ground, his foot on the man's chest, the point of his sword at the man's throat. I was pretty impressed in spite of myself.
"No," Naji said, "They don't."
By this point a crowd had gathered, drunks and sailors and sleepy-looking whores. A few of 'em tittered nervously at that, and Naji looked up at 'em, his dark eyes glittering. They looked away.