“Yeah.” Rook continued staring as if he’d never seen a pair of titties before, which was unlikely, considering.
Butterbelly chuckled as he produced a jeweler’s loupe from his stained robes. This was better than Rook’s usual loot, much better. The intaglio-carved ruby ring alone was worth several thousand thrones if he could find the right buyer.
Butterbelly said, “Not bad. I’ll give you four hundred chalices for the lot.”
“Four hundred? Only four hundred?” Rook looked skeptical.
“It’s a good price.” It was a lousy price and Butterbelly knew it, but better and safer than Rook would find anywhere else. “Ain’t I always straight with you?”
Rook raised an eyebrow. “That’s a ruby, Butterbelly.”
Damn, he needed to stop thinking the boy was one of those roughs who couldn’t tell the difference between a ruby and a chunk of pink quartz. Rook was a Key. And as Rook’s late teacher, Mouse, had once explained to Butterbelly, every substance in the world had an aura distinct from every other. A Key could use their sight to tell if a coin was painted lead or real gold, and if gold, what purity. If a certain teenage ragamuffin had been smart enough to keep master samples, he could also use it to identify just what sort of precious gem he’d stolen.* Damn the boy for his smarts, they had been no help to Butterbelly’s business. “Not ruby, but spinel,” he corrected. “And warm to the touch, like.”
Rook cursed and half-turned away. “Taja! That matches pure, Butterbelly. Raven has a ruby earring, a real one, so don’t rain me.”
Butterbelly rubbed the corners of his mouth and looked at the boy. Rook was tall, taller than anyone Butterbelly knew and not full-grown. Prettier than anything a local would encounter outside a velvet house too. His whole body was a walking advertisement of foreign ancestry. Sure, Rook dyed his hair black—either because he thought black hair would fit the name “Rook” or because of some fool notion he’d fit in better—but Butterbelly thought it looked stupid. The funny thing was, despite his looks, Rook did have a talent for vanishing on a man if he wasn’t paying attention. Butterbelly never figured out how a boy so out of place could be so damn good at the sneak.
Maybe some people were born to be thieves.
“If you don’t mind me being nosy,” Butterbelly changed the subject, “you been working with me since Mouse went south, what, three years?”
Rook shrugged. “So?”
“So, what gives most kids away is you spend the money too fast. Even the Watchmen are smart enough to know something’s up, when some urchin too young for service burns a path through Velvet Town. But not you. You never spend a coin, so the guards and the witchhunters ain’t ever come looking. By my count, you have a bundle tucked away somewhere. What does a boy your age need so much money for, anyway? You thinking of getting out?”
Rook crossed his arms over his chest and didn’t answer.
Butterbelly waved his hand in front of his face. “Never mind. None of my business anyhow.”
“It’s not for me.”
Butterbelly stopped and looked at Rook for a long minute. He’d had a good idea it wasn’t for Rook. Folks in the Shadowdancers weren’t supposed to know each other’s real names, but even in a city with one million people during the dry season, the residents of a quarter were bound to run into each other. Since Butterbelly scouted out the models for his paintings from the velvet houses of the quarter, there were few houses he had never visited. He knew Rook’s given name was Kihrin. He knew Rook’s adopted father was a blind musician named Surdyeh who eked out a meager living performing at the Shattered Veil Club. And he knew Rook wanted the money not for himself, but so Surdyeh could retire to a life spared from the toil of nonstop performances on arthritic fingers. It made Butterbelly all maudlin if he thought about it too hard.
Sometimes he was tempted to give the kid a break, but Butterbelly always got over the impulse.
He ducked his head once and nodded. “All right. Yeah, okay. I see it. You’re a good kid, Rook. Don’t let no one tell you different just because your ma weren’t no local girl. You want me to send you the money the normal way?”
“Wait. We haven’t settled on a price yet. There’s something else I want to show you—”
The street bell rang as someone stepped into the pawnshop. Butterbelly saw who it was and groaned.
A voice called from the front of the shop as a teenage boy swaggered forward. “Well hell. If it ain’t my favorite velvet boy. You trading favors for metal, Rook? I got a spear that could use polishing.” He grabbed his crotch just in case Rook missed the innuendo.
Rook didn’t turn his head to acknowledge the newcomer, but Butterbelly saw the boy’s knuckles turn white as he squeezed the edge of the table.
Rook said, “Butterbelly, next time Princess has kittens do you want me to bring you a couple? Your shop seems to have a problem with rats.”
The bell rang again as several more teenagers entered the pawnshop behind the first.
“You boys remember where you are. No fighting,” Butterbelly admonished all of them.
“Oh, I was just having fun. Right, Rook?” The leader of the newcomers was a hardened, creased street tough a few years older than Rook. Butterbelly had seen a hundred like him in the course of his career: bullies and sadists who thought membership in the Shadowdancers was a sure amnesty against all crimes. Sooner or later, most learned their lesson, often in chains. Some never did. The street tough moved his left hand toward Rook’s back.
He had no right hand.
“Touch me, Ferret, and you’ll lose the other hand too,” Rook said. He’d pulled the knives back out of his sleeves.
“How many times do I have to tell you? It’s Faris!” However, Faris drew back his hand.
Rook didn’t smile. “That’s okay. You’ll always be a weasel to me.”
“No fighting!” Butterbelly shouted as both teens readied weapons. “Remember where you are.”
Faris and Rook had history. Worse, they’d once been friends. Although something had soured that friendship, turned it into a seething hate, Butterbelly never knew the specifics. Maybe it was as simple as jealousy: Rook had grown up handsome and singled out for special training as a Key, and Faris had not. There were darker rumors of what had happened, involving Mouse and her death. Rumors that Butterbelly wasn’t sure he wanted to believe.
Faris laughed and held up his good hand and the stump of his other arm. “Yeah, sure. No fighting at all. We just want to do business. Took some great metal off a few merchants one of my boys drugged up over at the Standing Keg.”
Rook glared. “Great for you. Why don’t you finish your business and go?”
Faris smirked. “Ladies first.”
“I’m done.” He looked at Butterbelly. “The usual will be fine.” The boy turned on his heel to leave, but two steps toward the door he stopped with one hand to his belt, his expression angry.
Butterbelly looked over to see Faris dangling Rook’s belt pouch from his fingers, a wicked smile cracking the hard leather of his face.