LITMIR.BIZ

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You’re not human. Not completely. But you’re still Kaylin.

       Could you? Could you use it?

      He’d been quiet for a long time; she could still remember the texture of that silence, the way he’d stared at her face for a moment, and then turned away almost wearily. What do you want me to say, Kaylin?

      She hadn’t answered. She wasn’t certain.

      “We have to find her,” she told him, her voice quieter now.

      “I know. Any idea where to start?”

      Missing Persons was a zoo. Almost literally. Although the offices that fronted the public square in the Halls were slightly better equipped and more severe than the interior offices in which Kaylin spent much—too damn much—of her day, they were in no way quieter.

      For one, they were full of people who would never—with any luck—wear a uniform that granted them any kind of Imperial authority. For two, the people who milled about, either shouting at each other, pacing, crying or shouting at the officers who looked appropriately harried, were by no means all human; although here, as throughout most sectors of Elantra, humans outnumbered the others by quite a large margin. For three, many of the visitors were either four times Kaylin’s age, or less than half of it. Kaylin recognized a smattering of at least four languages, and some of what was said was, in the words of Caitlin, “colorful.”

      Impatience was the order of the day.

      Missing Persons was, in theory, the responsibility of the Hawks. Depending, of course, upon who exactly was missing. Some missing persons had left a small trail of death and destruction in their wake, and these investigations were often—begrudgingly—handed over to the Wolves, the smallest of the three forces who called the Halls of Law home.

      The staffing of the office, however, was the purview of the Hawklord. Or his senior officers. None of whom, Kaylin thought with a grimace, were ever on the floors here.

      She herself was seldom here, and of all duties the Hawks considered their own, this was her least favorite. She was not always the most patient of people—and people who were desperate enough to come to the Halls seeking word of their missing, and possibly dead, kin required patience at the very least.

      She was also not quite graceful enough to forgive other people their impatience. But at least she was aware of hers.

      “Well, well, well, if it isn’t the vagabond.”

      And, if she were entirely truthful, there were other reasons for hating this place. Grinding her teeth into what she hoped would pass for a smile, she faced the worst of them squarely.

      If it was true that the Barrani had a lock on arrogance, and the Dragons on inscrutability, it was also true that for petty malice, you really couldn’t do better than finding a truly loathsome human. And to Kaylin’s youthful disappointment, she hadn’t actually had to look that far to find this one.

      His name was Constant Mallory—and, give him this, if she’d had that as a name, and she’d been too stupid to change it, she might have developed a few personality ticks. He was, for all intents and purposes, the ruler of this small enclave. He answered to Marcus, and to the Hawklord, but his answers could be both disingenuous and fawning, and she thought he’d learned enough from the Barrani to dispense with truth entirely.

      She was aware that he and Marcus had, as the office liked to call it, “history.” She’d once asked why, and Teela had said, with some disdain, “You really don’t pay attention, do you? How much of history is spent discussing happy children and fluffy bunnies?”

      “It’s true,” Tain had half drawled. “If humans actually had a lifespan, things would have been a lot more interesting around here a few centuries ago. But that’s the problem with mortals—they get a little power and it all comes tumbling down. It’s a good thing you breed so quickly.”

      Teela and Tain had no problems at all with Mallory. They didn’t like him, but then again, given the way they treated people they did like—and Kaylin had some experience with this—their lack of affection was a dubious negative. Like many humans, he treated the Barrani with respect and care. He had not always given Marcus the same respect.

      Or rather, he’d given him exactly the same respect, but then again, Marcus took subtle office politics about as well as he took vegetarian menus.

      Mallory had wanted the Leontine’s job. Then again, so had Marcus. Marcus had come out on top. The miracle of the tussle, to Kaylin’s mind, was that Mallory had come out alive. She gathered that not everyone had.

      But getting people who’d been there to talk about it was more difficult than getting criminals to cough up useful information. And, as a harried Sergeant Kassan had finally said, “You’re usually so proud of your ignorance. Learn to live with it, Kaylin.” The implication being that living and living with it, on that particular day, were the same thing.

      Mallory was tall. He was, by human standards, fit, and not even painful to look at: he was competent, quick-witted, and good with a sword. He handled his paperwork with care—a distinction that he did not fail to note on the rare occasions he was allowed to visit Caitlin’s office.

      But he was a self-important prick, and he was the only Hawk of note who had spoken against her induction. The latter, she was unlikely to forget. The former, she had come to expect from the world at large.

      His greeting was not in any way friendly. Her smile was not in any way friendly. It was, as Marcus called it with some distaste, a human social custom. Probably because it didn’t involve enough blood and fur.

      But she had never come with Severn before.

      And Severn became completely still beside her.

      “Corporal Handred,” Mallory said, greeting him as if that stillness were not a warning signal. “Our newest recruit.”

      Severn extended a hand, and Mallory took it firmly. “I see that they have you babysitting. It’s unusual to see the private in any company that isn’t Barrani. How are you finding the Hawks so far?”

      “Interesting,” Severn replied. At least he hadn’t gone monosyllabic.

      “Compared to the Wolves?”

      Severn didn’t even pause. “Yes. Longer hours. I confess that I’ve seen many reports from your office, but I’ve seldom had a chance to visit in person.”

      Mallory looked slightly at a loss, but he recovered quickly enough. “We do important work here,” he began, straightening his shoulders somewhat. “It’s here that most of the cases that require official attention are brought to the notice of the Law.”

      “I imagine you deal with a lot of reports. How do you separate the frauds from the actual crimes?”

      Mallory looked genuinely surprised, and Kaylin fought an urge to kick someone—mostly because she couldn’t decide whether or not she’d kick Severn or Mallory. Mallory took the lead, and Severn, walking by his side, continued to ask pleasant questions, his voice engulfed slowly by the office noise.

      Leaving Kaylin on her own, with no Mallory vindictively standing over her shoulder. It was a trick not even Teela had ever tried.

      There were two ways to get useful information about the missing persons being reported by the people who came to the Halls. The hard way—which was to take notes, to have the official artists employed by the Halls on hand, and to attempt to draw a picture of some sort that could be used as an identifier. This was both the least efficient and the most commonly used method of gaining some sort of visual information the Hawks could then use.

      The second, and far more efficient, method involved the Tha’alani. And the reason it was little used was, in Kaylin’s opinion, pretty damn obvious. She looked across the crowded office as if the people in it were shadows and smoke, and against the far wall, bordered on either side by finely crafted wooden dividers, and no door, sat a gray-haired man.

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