Cast In Flight. Michelle Sagara

staying here.”

      “Good.”

      Kaylin exhaled heavily. She liked Mandoran, most of the time. It didn’t stop her from wanting to smack the back of his head. “You know, I think you’d actually like her if you could treat her with a smidgen of respect.”

      “Not worth the effort,” he said, straightening his clothing. His hair, being Barrani hair, was straight and perfectly untangled.

      “I like Bellusdeo.”

      “Yes. And she likes you. Bellusdeo and I were born, raised, and trained in a world that doesn’t exist anymore. I am never going to be happy about Dragons. And she is never going to be happy about Barrani.”

      “She seems to like Teela.”

      “Teela is hardly Barrani.”

      “I heard that,” Teela said, a distinct edge in her voice. “And if it came from anyone else, they’d be picking up teeth. Or body parts.” To Kaylin, she said, “Try to keep him out of trouble, hmm?”

      * * *

      Kaylin’s beat was Elani Street, and she headed there with Severn and Mandoran in tow. Only years of long practice stopped her from patrolling in ground-eating, angry strides. She made clear what she thought of politics in several different languages, settling at last on Leontine as the most appropriate, because it implied the most violence.

      Mandoran understood every word; he’d picked up most of the phrasing from Teela without the need to actually learn it himself. Kaylin’s extremely foul temper seemed to be a balm to what had started out as a gloomy, bored mood.

      “Did you see the assassin?” Kaylin demanded.

      “Of course I did.”

      “Did Teela?”

      Sensing her mood, he answered. “No. And before you ask, I don’t know why I could see her and Teela couldn’t. She could, however, take a look through my eyes.”

      “Male or female?”

      “Is there a bet riding on the outcome?”

      Kaylin rolled her eyes.

      “What? If you could be careful enough to count every breath you take during an average day, you’d bet on that.” It was more or less true, which was annoying. So far, the morning had been nothing but annoying.

      “Let me guess. You didn’t think to make a bet.”

      She hadn’t. “It doesn’t matter. Was the would-be assassin an Aerian?” It was the only question that actually mattered. She desperately wanted the answer to be no, because she desperately wanted to be able to thumb her nose at the Caste Court. And if she were being honest, that wasn’t the whole of the reason.

      She was upset because Teela was probably right. For some reason, Kaylin expected better from the Aerians.

      “It depends.”

      Kaylin glared. “On what? Did they have wings?”

      “Yes.”

      What was left of her hope curled up in a ball on the inside of her chest. Mandoran, however, stopped walking, forcing her and Severn to stop. When she turned back, he said, “Am I Barrani?”

      * * *

      She didn’t answer the question immediately, although anyone else looking at Mandoran would have. He looked like the Barrani. He didn’t look young or old; his age was only obvious, according to Teela, because of his behavior. But he had the same skin tone, the same eyes, the same perfect hair and flawless skin, and even the same height.

      But she knew that the answer was both yes and no. Mandoran was in Elantra for Annarion’s sake, but he was trying to relearn the art of being Barrani, the race to which he’d been born, for his own.

      “Does Teela know?”

      “Of course she does. Teela couldn’t see her,” he added. “I imagine only your familiar and I could. She could see what I saw, when she chose to look.”

      “Her.”

      Mandoran grinned. Kaylin couldn’t. “Teela’s talking to your sergeant now. Oh, no, wait—she’s heading up the Tower stairs to talk to the Hawklord.” He frowned. “She’s just shut me down, so I can’t give you a report on what he has to say. This is bad information?”

      “It means the Caste Court is likely to get its damn exemption, yes.” She walked for two full blocks, Mandoran keeping easy pace with her stride. “She wasn’t like you.”

      “No. But she wasn’t entirely Aerian, to my eye. She had the form, the shape, the wings—and she also had an odd weapon, as well as a healthy command of magic. But Teela said her invisibility wasn’t entirely due to a spell.”

      “What was it due to, in Teela’s opinion? Don’t give me that look—if I ask Teela she’ll just pat me on the head and tell me to mind my own business.”

      “Not entirely clear.”

      Kaylin hesitated. “Can we take a small detour?” she asked Severn.

      He nodded. “Darrow Lane?”

      “How did you guess?”

      * * *

      As it happened, they didn’t make it to Darrow Lane—an area that would have taken “investigational difficulty” to new heights, given the midday traffic. Kaylin had been considering the logistics glumly while they walked very briskly to the site of the attack, but she stopped as a passing shadow grew larger and darker overhead. It was an Aerian shadow, and it wasn’t doing a patrol flyby. She wasn’t surprised to see Clint join his shadow as he landed.

      She wasn’t even surprised to see that his eyes were very blue. Disheartened, but not surprised.

      “I’ve been sent to find you,” he told her.

      “You’ve been sent to chase me away from Darrow Lane.”

      “I’ve been sent to make certain that you observe the...etiquette of the laws of exemption, yes.” His expression made clear that he didn’t care for exemptions—but no one in the Halls did, unless the exemptions were for the Barrani. That was just practical. The Barrani were pretty much death for any Hawk who wasn’t.

      And, Kaylin thought silently, even the Barrani didn’t care much if the Barrani were murdering each other.

      “Clint—what’s going on?”

      “I’m not on the Caste Court,” he replied. “And no matter how much I rise in rank, I’m never going to be on the Caste Court. I can’t answer your question.”

      “Would you, if you knew?”

      “Laws of exemption,” he replied.

      Her hands found her hips as she looked up at her favorite Aerian. “Laws of exemption apply to legal consequences. They don’t govern answering bloody questions!”

      “Kitling, the human Caste Court isn’t the Aerian Caste Court. They exert different powers. The human Caste Court might as well call itself the ‘Order of Merchants with Jumped-Up Titles and Pretensions’ for all the difference it makes to anyone who isn’t the Emperor. Do you know what happens to outcaste humans?”

      Kaylin frowned. “What do you mean, what happens?”

      “Are you, that you know of, outcaste?”

      “No.” She paused. “I don’t think so.”

      “Exactly. The human Caste Court doesn’t give a damn about you. As far as I can tell, they don’t give a damn about humans in general, except the rich or powerful ones. You don’t give a damn about them—you probably can’t name the members that constitute the Caste Court.”

      “It’s not relevant to my life or my work,”