Vanit’s crewmate took us to where Sillara’s files were stored – which turned out to be in the basement, on the same floor as the jail cells I’d been forced to spend the night in after the whole city found out I was half-mage. There were several boxes of files, so Lakin and I had to call a cab to help transport them to his house in Shiftertown, driving alongside the cab with our bikes. No way was I leaving my steambike at the Enforcer’s Guild parking lot – Vanit’s crewmates were liable to slash my tires for what I did to their foreman, or worse.
“You really did a number on that guy, Sunaya,” Lakin commented as we lugged the banker’s boxes into his living room, admiration in his voice. The one-bedroom house was sparsely furnished, with only a single armchair and a low wooden coffee table in the living room. Still, the space was open and airy, with a large window that let in plenty of sunlight, and a fireplace that would make the space very cozy in the winter. “He looked like he was twice your weight, but you didn’t even break a sweat when you took him down.”
“Eh.” I set down my stack of boxes on the ground, then shrugged. “I’m used to fighting opponents bigger and stronger than me. That’s why I have these.” I lovingly patted my crescent knives, which were strapped to my thigh once more.
Lakin glanced at them curiously. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone use weapons like those before,” he admitted.
“They’re Garian-style weapons,” I explained, sitting down cross-legged on the hard wooden floor so that we could start going through the boxes. “Great for close quarter fighting, and also for deflecting larger weapons. They’ve saved my hide more times than I can count.”
“I’ll bet.” Lakin joined me on the floor, then turned his gaze toward the sea of boxes between us and sighed. “Let’s start with the most recent one,” he said, grabbing a box that was a few feet away from him. “That’s probably where we’re going to strike gold.”
The first couple of files were pretty dull – they were all bounties for small time thieves or racketeers, stuff I’d seen a thousand times before – but the fifth file I opened proved to be much more interesting.
“Get this,” I told Lakin, scanning the first page. “Looks like Sillara was looking into some shifter disappearances.”
Lakin raised his gaze from the file he was looking through. “Shifter disappearances? You mean kidnappings?”
“Not sure.” I shrugged as I flipped through the notes in the file. “As far as I can see there were no ransom notes left, or any demands made on the family members of the victims. They just disappeared, and were never heard from again.”
“Huh.” Frowning, Lakin moved some of the boxes aside so he could sit next to me. “Is there anything tying the victims together other than the fact that they’re shifters?”
I pursed my lips. “According to Sillara’s notes, they’re all in their early twenties, and nearly all of them are clanless, with the exception of one.” I pulled out a letter and passed it to Lakin.
Lakin’s eyes widened as he read the letter, which was the original request sent in to the Enforcer’s Guild that sparked the case. The letter had been sent from a wolf shifter family that belonged to the Solantha wolf pack, several days after their son Tylin had gone missing.
“I remember that name, Tylin.” Lakin looked up at the ceiling, tapping his chin in thought. “Roanas had a file on him too. From what I understand, he wasn’t able to find out what happened to the boy, and the family just assumed he’d defected to the Resistance.”
“I bet that’s what a lot of the families ended up thinking.” I pulled out the list of names, my heart sinking as I read through them again. Many young shifters, especially the ones born into poorer families, ran off to join the Resistance in hopes of a better future. The clans tried to take care of their own as best they could, but the government levied heavier taxes on the shifter community, and in return for leaving shifters alone they expected them to take care of the majority of their own welfare programs and civic upkeep. The Chief Mage, who wasn’t from Solantha, had seemed surprised when I’d mentioned this to him, and with any luck he might dig into this issue eventually and help out Shiftertown and the other shifter communities scattered across the state. But from what I understood, the Chief Mages who ran the other forty-nine states in the Northia Federation were more than happy with the arrangement. As far as they were concerned, mages had created shifters, and if they weren’t allowed to use us as slaves anymore, they weren’t going to help us either.