Cast In Secret. Michelle Sagara

read her—no, she told herself forcefully. It was bloody obvious he had. You’d have to be blind and stupid not to recognize the fact.

      “Yes.”

      “You are looking for?”

      She stopped. Looked at him, truly looked at him, as if seeing him for the first time. The Tha’alani worked in this office for a reason. But—

      The image of a bruised child’s face rose up before her eyes, captured in water’s depths. It was so strong, so clear, that she couldn’t shake it. It was more concrete in that moment than the rest of the office.

      The man waited.

      She noted this, her Hawk’s training in place. And she knew as well that all real images that went into records, any real information, would come, in the end, through him or his kin.

      “You know what’s in the records?”

      “Not all of it,” he began.

      “The recent reports. You might know if someone came in looking for a missing girl.”

      “Of what age?” His eyes seemed to glaze over, as if he were a living embodiment of what the records contained, and he was accessing the data.

      “Nine, maybe ten. Scraggly dark hair, dark eyes. Pale skin. Poor family, I think.”

      “How long would she be considered missing?”

      “I … don’t know. More than two days.” Maybe, given her condition, many more.

      He was still frowning.

      And Kaylin clenched her jaw tightly, stepped forward toward him, and, lifting her hands, drew her hair from her forehead. She was shaking. But the girl’s image was strong enough.

      “You know this child?” he asked, understanding exactly what she offered.

      “No. But I’ve seen her once.”

      “And you are willing—” But he stopped. He was, by law, required to give her a long speech full of unreassuring reassurances.

      None of which she had time for. He did her the courtesy of not failing to read this clearly, and held her gaze for just that little bit longer than required. She didn’t blink.

      His forehead stalks began to elongate, to thin, as they moved toward her exposed skin.

      “Don’t touch the mark,” she warned him.

      “Ah,” he replied. “No. I will not.”

      And they were feathery, those stalks, like the brush of fingertips against forehead. He did not touch her face with his hands, did nothing to hold her in place. In every way, this was unlike the first time she had submitted to the Tha’alani. But this was an act of choice.

      And if he saw more than she wanted him to see, what of it? It made her squirm, the fear of exposure, and she balanced that fear—as she so often did—with the greater fear: the child’s bruised face. The frustration, anger and, yes, pride and joy that she felt just being deemed worthy to bear the Hawk. The fear of failing what that meant, all that that entailed.

      The Tha’alani stalks were pale and trembling, as if in a breeze, but they lingered a long time against her skin, although she did not relive any memories but the memory of the water, its dark, dark depths, and the emergence of that strange child’s face.

      Then he withdrew, and he offered her a half-bow. He rose quickly, however, dispensing courtesy as required, and with sincerity, but no more. “I better understand Ybelline’s odd request,” he told her quietly. “And I do not know if what I tell you will give you comfort or grief, but no such child has been reported missing. There is no image of her in the records.

      “But go, and speak with Ybelline, Private Neya. I fear that your partner is about to lose his composure.” He bent to his desk, and wrote something carefully in bold, neat Barrani lettering. An address.

      CHAPTER

       3

      “And you’ve never hit him?” Severn asked, as they left the crowded courtyard behind in the growing shadows of afternoon.

      “No. He and Marcus have history. I couldn’t find where Mallory’d buried the skeletons in his closet, so it didn’t seem wise. Marcus, in case you hadn’t noticed, has a bit of a temper.”

      Severn’s dark brow rose slightly. “Wise? You have grown.” He paused and added, “He probably doesn’t have them in his closet—he probably has them neatly categorized by bone type in his filing cabinets.”

      Kaylin snickered. “You feel like a long walk?”

      “Was that rhetorical?”

      “No. Whatever that means. We can walk, or we can hail a cab.”

      “Given the pocket change you have for the next few days, we’ll walk.”

      “Ha-ha.”

      “But I wouldn’t mind knowing where we’re going.”

      She frowned. “I know where I’m going.”

      “You know where you want to be,” he replied.

      “I know the city, Severn.”

      He shrugged. “I’ve been led to understand that you know every inch of every beat you’ve ever covered.”

      “And your point is?”

      “Let’s just say I take Sergeant Kassan’s warnings seriously—and I have my doubts that you’ve covered this beat much.”

      “Why?”

      “You’re walking toward the moneyed part of town.”

      She shrugged. It was true. Marcus said that she could make dress uniform look grungy when it had just left the hands of the Quartermaster. You needed a certain bearing to police this section of town, and Kaylin had its opposite. Whatever that was.

      Kaylin’s unerring sense of non-direction added about an hour to their travel time. She cursed whomever had built the streets in gutteral Leontine, and the fifth time she did this, Severn let out a long sigh and held out his hand, palm up.

      She shoved the address into it. “Don’t even think of saying it.”

      He did her the grace of keeping laughter off his face, but his brows rose as he read the address. “You’re going there?”

      “Yes,” she said tersely. Followed by, “How the hell do you know where it is?”

      “I know Elantra, Kaylin. All of it that’s in records. I know the historical shape of the streets, the newer sections, the oldest parts of the town. I’m familiar with the wharves, and the quarters given to the Caste Lords of each of the racial enclaves.

      “I’m less familiar with the southern stretch,” he added. He would be. That was where the Aerians lived. “The Wolves seldom run there.”

      Of course. He was a Wolf. A Wolf in Hawk’s clothing. “Lead on,” she said quietly. “And yes, I’m going voluntarily.”

      “Who lives here?”

      “Ybelline.”

      “I know of only one Ybelline who works outside of the Tha’alani enclave in any official capacity.” He gave her an odd look.

      “Yes. It’s the same Ybelline. We met her—”

      “You met her,” he said gently.

      “—when the Dragons came to talk.”

      “You didn’t seem to love her then.”

      “She’s Tha’alani.” Kaylin shrugged.

      “Kaylin—why are you going? Your feelings about the Tha’alani have been widely quoted