The Shifter by Janice Hardy Page B

pity, others in disgust. One woman started to move closer, concern on her wrinkled face, but three Baseeri soldiers came over the bridge and she scurried away, her head low. The soldiers didn’t even glance down.
    No one was going to help me stand up, let alone save Tali. Certainly not a Baseeri, and not even one of my own people. They were all too scared they’d get noticed, too scared to raise a fuss, no matter how small. People who got noticed got hurt. People who fussed, disappeared. That was just how things were.
    We’d heard the same stories from those who’d escaped Sorille before the Duke had burned it to the ground, and by the time the Duke was done with Verlatta, they’d understand it too.
    I took a few deep breaths and things steadied. I could do this on my own. I would find Tali and together we would save the fisherman. I struggled to my feet and started back toward the Sanctuary. I was nearly there when a hand landed on my shoulder.
    I screamed and turned around, braced for soldiers or worse.
    Aylin yelped and threw her hands in front of her face.
    “Saints, Nya! I thought I told you to stay hidden.”
    “Aylin, I’m such a horrible person.” I clung to her, sobbing on her already damp feathers.
    “No you’re not. What happened?” She leaned her head away and wrinkled her nose. “Were you puking?”
    I covered my mouth and nodded. “I did something terrible. I—” Couldn’t tell her without telling her I was a Taker. Not without getting her involved in this more than she already was. I still didn’t know who had Tali and couldn’t risk Aylin getting kidnapped as well. “I stole ten oppas from the charity box at the Sanctuary.”
    Her worried frown twitched at the corners. “You need it more than anyone I know. You’re not a bad person.”
    Yes I was. Monstrous. But money and information could help me find Tali, and I needed both. “Did you find out anything?”
    “A little, but I don’t think it’s much help.” She glanced around. “It’s too open here. Let’s go to Tannif’s, and you can buy us coffee with your stolen wealth while we talk.”

    Tannif’s was crowded, stools and benches along the walls crammed with people. Baseeri were seated at the larger tables with padded chairs. Aylin managed to grab us a small table in the back near the door to the kitchen. Every time a serving girl swished by, scents of coffee and fried perch wafted out.
    “Tell me everything,” I said, hands tight around a mug of coffee. My first hot meal in months was cooking in the back. The money felt tainted, but I couldn’t find Tali if I was half starved. Common sense saves more lives than swords, as Grannyma used to say. And liars and thieves are never happy . I shoved that thought away.
    “My friend said the Elders have been carrying a lot of people away from the main treatment rooms. Somewhere higher inside the League, but he couldn’t see exactly where the stairs led past the second floor.” She leaned in closer across the table. “Nya, he swears every person he saw carried upstairs was wearing green.”
    “Apprentice green?”
    She shrugged. “He wasn’t sure, but he thought so.”
    “Did you talk to any Elders about Tali?”
    She scoffed. “They wouldn’t talk to me, but I found a few fourth cords who said Tali quit because it was too hard. They said she went home.”
    Fear stole my hunger away. “That’s a lie.”
    “I know, but they believed it, so someone they trusted must have told them that.” Aylin looked around the coffeehouse. “Nya, I asked the son of one of the show house regulars about the people being carried upstairs. He’s a guard at the League, and he didn’t seem that worried, said the Luminary himself told him they were exhausted because the ferry heals were so draining. They were just being taken somewhere to rest.”
    The Luminary was lying? It shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did. He had a lot to hide. No pynvium, so many injured, apprentices being