Feryn crouched beneath the ragged steps, listening to the screaming and crashing from the hovel she called home, and clenched her knees tightly. She felt the raw hatred towards her mother's current man stir within, and she ground her teeth in frustration. There was only so much a seven-year old could do to help. She had tried before, and had been beaten herself, once so badly she could barely walk. She could only wait until it was over, then tend to her mother as best as she could.

The screaming stopped abruptly. The cessation came as a blow, and a coldness and sudden fear swept over her, but she could not bring herself to move.

A flurry of curses filled the silence, and the heavy footsteps of her "stepfather" moved to the door. A pause, then it opened, and the man stood on the threshold, just above her head, while she held her breath. The door closed behind him, almost quietly, and he hurried down the steps and moved off down the street, in the direction of the tavern, his long shadow reaching like a finger towards her concealment.

She waited a minute or two, until she was sure he was gone. She crept out from her hiding place, and with a quick glance up the street, went inside.

The room was a shambles. There was broken crockery scattered everywhere, the shelf that had held their goods was swept clean. The meal that had started the argument was likewise on the floor. Her mother lay against the hearthstone, with her head at a funny angle.

Feryn stood looking at her, frozen. She stepped forward, hesitatingly, and a shard of pottery bit into her bare foot.

The pain broke through her confusion, and brought the true realization of her plight. She had seen death before. Here, in the alleys and twisting narrow roads of the poorest ghetto, death was a constant companion.

Her thoughts turned quickly to her own survival. She would grieve later, when she had the time. If she did not get out NOW, he might come back. Or the guardsmen would come, and she would be taken away.....

She made a bundle of her few articles of clothing, and the best of the ragged blankets the place boasted. She raided the pantry, and took the half loaf of stale bread, and the hard cheese that sat there, as well as the small bag of dried grain that was their staple. A wooden bowl. A cup missing only a handle. The precious hidden hoard of copper bits she had seen her mother conceal in the bowl of an empty lamp. There wasn't much to take. She looked at the small bundle, and took a last glance around the single roomed dwelling.

The remains of the meal on the floor drew her - she hadn't yet eaten that day. She picked up the bread and boiled vegetables from the floor, and crammed them into her mouth, eating as swiftly as she could.

Finally, with a last glance at her mother's body, she opened the door a crack, saw no-one, and slipped away.

She hurried through the dimness of the gathering evening, and took the routes that only children know, through the back gardens, the alleys, to her own safe place.

The building had burned years before, but a few walls still stood, filled with heaps of rubble. She was small, and could fit into the tiny window that remained in one of the walls, into a small space beneath some of the beams, and one of the standing walls. There had been a fireplace in that wall. The chimney had long since fallen, but the stone of the fireplace itself was solid. She had cleared it out, and had a dry stone room, some 6 feet wide, and 4 feet deep, with solid walls on three sides, reachable only by a narrow path from that tiny window. She huddled into this shelter, and the purpose that had driven her to escape drained away, leaving only the fear, and the loss, and the uncertainty of a future alone.

Feryn sobbed, until exhaustion finally drove her to sleep.

* * * * *

The first few days had been hard. She had watched from a safe distance as the guardsmen came, and the dead cart carried away her mother. When they had gone again, the scum of the neighbourhood descended on the place, and by the time it was safe enough for her to go back, there was nothing left. Even the broken crockery was gone, useful to someone for something. She didn't stay. Others would be moving into the empty building, and she didn't want to be found there.

She made her little bit of food last as long as she could. She added to it by pilfering from the back gardens of those who grew a few vegetables to add to their tables. Her conscience bothered her every time she did, but she had little choice. She considered begging in the marketplace, but watching the beggars there, she learned that they had staked out their territories, and wouldn't accept interlopers.

She scrabbled amongst the middens of the more wealthy for the scraps that even their servants wouldn't take. She fought there for that privilege, but she was so small, and these, too, fell into "territories" of those who had long before discovered them, that all too often she had nothing.

One by precious one, her carefully hoarded coins were spent to feed her, and then they were gone.

Hunger had always been there, but now it faded to a dull, constant ache.

She was beginning to starve.

And in desperation, she began to steal.

From the carts of merchants - carefully waiting until their sharp eyes had turned elsewhere before she darted around a corner - she would take a piece of fruit, or a loaf of bread, and flee again. She was often chased, but she learned quickly that her size and her agility could distance her from pursuit. She learned the alleys and roofways better than she had ever before. And she survived.

She became aware that there were others who lived like this, and she would watch them when she saw them, to see how they would distract, and confuse their marks. She imitated some of the more successful ploys, and found she was chased less, and could take a bit more, enough to have to steal less. She learned to hide her own food from those who would take it from her, and did not depend upon her single safe haven to protect her.

She became a thief.

In time, she learned which pawnmen would buy the small things she was capable of lifting, and began to look for those things they wanted. Her small size and thin face proved to be an asset, when she was caught, for they underestimated her, or believed her to be much younger than she was.

It allowed her to escape easily, or to inspire pity, and to be released.
And she learned, and she was not caught the same way twice....

* * * * *

She crouched on the edge of the roof, looking down into the alley, her heart fluttering like a captured bird in her breast. It was him. He sauntered down the alley, while she held her breath, and did not stare directly at him, watching as he skirted the refuse and unlocked a heavy wooden door, with a key he pulled from a pouch on his belt.

The hatred rose in a heavy wave within her, and it warmed her as she squatted on the roof, watching the door after it closed behind him.

He wouldn't know her now. She had changed so much, but she knew him. She wore a boy's cast-offs, and had her hair hacked short, in a boyish cut. At seven, she had been prematurely aged. Now, at ten, her eyes had seen the underside of the city, and she was ancient in it's measurement. She had lived a lifetime in those three years.

She waited to see if he would come out, but he did not, and finally, she moved away across the rooftops, to a place she could regain the street.

She took a circuitous route back to the room she had shared with Miro for nearly two years. She tried to keep her eye out for marks as she passed, although she wouldn't lift from here, it being too close to home. Normally she imagined how she would do so, had she needed to. Today, however, her mind was on other things, and she scarcely saw the people around her.

Miro was home, as usual. The old man looked up as she entered, and motioned to the table.

"You're late, boy. It'll be cold if you don't get to it."

She sat herself down, and ate the stew he had made her. Normally, she loved to eat his cooking. Today it seemed tasteless. She ate nevertheless. She had been hungry often enough to eat when food was presented.

When she was done, wiping her bowl with a piece of heavy black bread, she set her day's take out on the table for him.

He sifted through the coins, and the small items, and counted out a portion of it, which he gave back to her. The rest he carried into the small room that was his alone, and put it somewhere. He had his own secrets. She had searched the room as best as she could, on those occasions when he went out and left her there alone, but she had never found his cache. Not that she would have taken it, of course. But she wanted to know where it was.

He returned to the room, and studied her face.

"What happened, lad?" he said, finally. When she didn't answer, he reached over, and grabbed her chin, and tilted her face so she had to look at him. "Feryn, did you get caught?"

She shook her head, and his tension eased a little, but he didn't let go.

"Then out with it. What happened?"

"I saw him, Miro," she blurted out suddenly, "I saw him, and I followed him."

"Saw who? Speak plainly, boy. I'm not a mage who can pluck your mind clear."

"The man who killed my mother." She forced the words out and saw the astonishment on his face turn to disappointment.

"You'll not do something stupid. If you kill him, you're no better than he is. And that is our code, boy. Don't kill in the taking. The guard will chase the murderer more than a thief. Thieves anger people. Murderers frighten them." He looked over the youth in the carefully cleaned and mended clothing. "And you're no assassin. I wouldn't be training you if you was.

"The past is done. He'll pay for his crime, one way, or another. But not at our hands. You learn your trade, let him reap his karma elsewhere.

"Now." He said, and pointed to the other thing that sat on the table, beside her dinner. "Open the box."

She removed her tools from the little pouch she carried them in, inside her sleeve, and began to work on the lock. A jet of water squirted her in the face as she stuck her probe into its innards. She sputtered, and jumped.

Miro shook his head. "Ah, lad... I know you've got better than that in you..."

* * * * *

Feryn searched the room with a thoroughness that would have made the old man proud. He had taught her well. But was it well enough? Did she know him well enough to find the trove he had secreted away? She stopped, and stepped back. She wished...

There were many things she wished. But right now, foremost amongst them was the wish that she had been with him at the end. Not so that she could have pried the information as to where his hoard was hidden, but to spend the last moments with the man who had come to mean more than she could ever have imagined.

Three years she had spent under his tutelage. She still didn't know why he had taken her in, and taught her. She couldn't have looked like much. She had been a skinny little creature in ragged clothing, caught as she had tried to pick the pocket of a stranger in the street...

She sat down in the middle of the floor, as her memories took her.

He grasped her before she knew she was caught, and hauled her off the street into an alley. She fought with all of her power, but was unable to escape him. She was certain she was about to be killed. The children of the streets had no rights here. Most of the city guard wouldn't care what he did with her.

The old man – how old had he been, really? – examined his catch, grasping her chin and looking into her eyes. Whatever he was looking for, he found, although she cursed him and fought like a demon to get away.

She fought... but the hard life on the streets – ever on the verge of starvation, and exposed to the elements – had sapped her strength, and she eventually reached the end of her resources. Still, she fought him as he dragged her back through the streets to the decaying tenement in which he lived, but the feeble blows were nothing, and he ignored them, even as the passers-by ignored the man with the struggling child.

He locked her into a room, and left her there. No sooner had the key turned in the lock, than she searched the place for an exit.

The single window was shuttered, and sealed closed, and all of her tugging, and worrying at the slats of the shutters wasn't enough to open them. One of the slats was broken, though, and from it she pried a long splinter of wood. She clutched this make-shift weapon. She would have to make it count. It was sharp, but thin. One strike would shatter it, but if plunged into soft flesh it could do serious damage.

She would have one chance to use it, if he came close enough.

Restless, she hid the splinter beneath her clothing, and began to search the room again. It held a small cot, and a tall set of shelves, and nothing more. Not satisfied, she climbed the shelves to see if there was anything on the higher shelves she might put to use. It was empty.

But, above it, in the wall, where it had likely once held some ornament or other, was a nail. A metal nail.

Feryn pried the treasure loose from its hold in the wall, and climbed back down with it. It too, could be a weapon. But more... it could be a tool.

She crept to the door, and peeked through the keyhole.

And caught her breath. For she could not see through it.

The old fool had left the key in the keyhole...

She pressed her ear to the crack, holding her breath, listening for the sound of movement. Movement there was, but none nearby, and she bent to examine the bottom of the door. More than enough room... but the sound of the key...

She tore the blanket off the cot, and listened again for any sound from the other room. Footsteps crossed it, and she heard another door open and close, then, again, silence.

She bit her lip, then shrugged. If this drew him, he would meet her weapon. If it did not, she might be able to free herself. There was nothing to do but try.

She smoothed the thin blanket, and slid it under the door, then poked the key out with the nail. Slowly, she drew back the blanket, and felt a surge of triumph as she saw the key appear. She went to open the door, but paused, then turned back to the bed, as an idea took root. It only took a few moments to rearrange the bedclothes into a heap that could conceivably hold a frightened child.

With one more pause to listen, she turned the key in the lock, and opened the door. There was no shout, no movement in the room. She slipped out, and replaced the key in the lock, after once more locking the door. The exit was that way...

She hurried to the next door, and listened again before she dared to open it a crack. The hallway to the building was before her, and she stepped out, again closing the door behind her. She darted for the stairs that would carry her to freedom.

He was waiting halfway down them.

It had taken old Miro some time to make her understand he didn't want to hurt her, and that the room had been a test. He had avoided her fierce stab with the splinter, an expression of pleased surprise on his face, and had brought her back, to feed her, and clothe her in better than the rags she had worn.

It wasn't until he gave her the knife to cut her food, and turned his back to her as he worked at the fireplace, that she had finally permitted herself to believe him.

And that, too, of course, had been a test.

As was this, in a way, she realised. She lowered her head in sadness. She had grown to love the old man, although she had never told him so. He had taught her everything he could. She looked back through the door into the main room, where he sat, as if sleeping, in the chair beside the fire.

He would never begrudge her the hoard, if she could find it. He had no more use of it. And she had no doubts as to her standing in the world. She would need it, and whatever else she could use. At least, this time, she had a little time.

Once more she turned to the room, and ran her eyes over it. She had checked the obvious places. Then the not-so-obvious places. Now, there was only her mind, pitted against his.

He had suffered from the joint swell, and his hands could no longer do the delicate, clever work they used to. Some days, he could barely move them at all. Those days she would stay home, and help him with the simple things that were then beyond him. The joint-swell was also in his knees, and in his hips. He could move, and faster than she would have suspected, but it would leave him in pain afterwards, a pain that only the strongest of drugs could dispel. And he would refuse those, even when she had found a healer willing to sell some of them to her.

Wherever his hoard was, it was somewhere he could get to. She closed her eyes, imagining him moving around the room. It had little enough in it. His own cot, a shelf where he kept his clothing and personal things, and his work table and chair.

She had searched all of these things, of course. She had checked the lamp reservoir, remembering her mother's hiding place. She had searched the furniture for hidden compartments, checked the floorboards... She stood in the centre of the room, and turned, slowly, looking for something that was out of place.

And her eyes found the nail.

It was set in the wall, at a modest height, above the work bench, as if something should be hung on it.

Nothing had been.

That was odd, for Miro was a stickler for neatness. Everything had a place, and everything must be in its place if it was not in use. There were several other nails above the work bench, and they had tools of various sorts hung on them. But that one didn't.

Perhaps her memories of her first test had brought it to her attention, or perhaps the old man's spirit had given her a nudge. As she had searched, by habit, she had replaced everything as she had found it. Slowly, she climbed up onto the workbench. It would have been easy for Miro to reach it, for he had been a tall man. She examined it closely, then nodded once, and reached out to grasp it, and gave it a cautious tug.

A whole panel of wall came off in her hand, with the nail as its handle. The panel was irregularly shaped, made to slide in and out tightly, and the seams virtually invisible, with no straight lines to draw the eye. The curves and jagged angles of the panel blended with the terrible plaster job on the wall itself, and hid it perfectly. She climbed down, to refill the lamp, and light it.

When she held it up to the hole, she caught her breath.

It was no great hoard, no pile of jewels and gold. But the small bags of copper and silver would be enough to sustain her, for a while. If she used them carefully, it would mean she would not have to steal as often.

She took out the small pouches, and tucked them away into her shirt.

Beneath them was a dagger, plain of hilt, in a simple leather sheath. And a folded piece of parchment.

She drew them both out, and examined them.

The parchment had writing on it, and she set it aside. The blade was simple, clean of line, with a satisfying weight. No ornamentation marked it, but it had the feel of quality. This was as fine a blade as she could ever hope to own. She tucked it into her shirt as well. After a moment, she took the parchment too.

She replaced the panel when she was done, and climbed back down from the worktable, slowly, she returned to the main room, and the fireplace.

And the chair.

This time, there was no mad rush. She had time enough to say good bye.

She wrapped her arms around the old man's body, and held him close, kissing the weathered cheek.

"I love you," she whispered to him, and let the tears come at last.

* * * * *

She unfolded the worn parchment, and looked at it again. The words inscribed on it were still mere markings to her, but she now knew what they said. One of the precious copper pennies had bought the services of a scribe, who had read it to her in a perfunctory voice, took the money, and shooed her from his presence.

The words were simple: what she could carry away was hers. The name of a person to tell that he was dead. And his love for her. He had known she was a girl. And he didn't care. He let her keep her masquerade, and had, in his way, helped, with the clothing choices, and the hair cuts.

She owed him so much.

The stranger – a woman – whose name was written in the letter looked at her when she spoke the words, and had followed her back to the tenement. She had done what was required, and departed again, leaving Feryn standing in the silent rooms.

Feryn had long since carried away all that she could use, or sell, hiding it in secret places, not too much in any one cache, just in case it was found.

She didn't need the letter. She couldn't read it.

But she couldn't destroy it, or leave it behind, either. He had written it to her. She folded it once more, and put it away. Perhaps she was being foolish, but somehow, knowing that his hand had held the pen and his mind had shaped the words upon it made it precious.

One day, she vowed, she would find a teacher, and she would read it herself. With a last look at the tenement that had been home, she slipped out the door, and away.

There was a city waiting for her.

Not The End