Dagny: An Inheritance Cycle Fanfiction.

8. The Thief Lord

The firm paving stones beneath Dagny's feet gave way to the scuffed dirt of familiar old alleyways. The streets changed in other ways, too, as she neared the Fourth Quarter. Nobles in litters and their imperious servants, a common sight close to the keep, became scarcer. The clothes of the haggling merchants became plainer and plainer and their wares became less exotic, less expensive. The furious, overwhelming noise of the market, the irrepressible energy of the place, faded and was replaced by sullen, unwelcoming silence. The transition was creeping and gradual. She couldn't say if there was a boundary line, some unspoken marker of territory. But you definitely knew when you had crossed from Lord Risthart's - or these days, Lord Emedin's - Teirm into the fractious republic of the slums.

It was familiar and it wasn't. The sights, colours, shapes, the physical form of everything was the same. Yet it was profoundly different. Dagny stood out. Despite the deliberately cheap, common clothing she'd chosen, she was markedly an outsider. The thick, twisting crowds of people flowed around her like the waters of a stream flow around a rock. Urchin children tugged at her belt and her pockets as they appeared and vanished through impossible gaps in the crush, searching for her coin purse. Hard, thin-faced adults stared at her with closed expressions. Of course. She knew how the slum-dwellers looked at outsiders, the wealthy struts who showed their 'bravery' by strolling through the rough parts of town, gawking at the less fortunate. Ordinary dwellers wouldn't dare knife anyone whose death might be investigated - but they'd certainly hope one of the Thieves would get him.

What had she expected? That they'd treat her exactly they had before, as if she'd never gone away? That she'd blend in with the rest of the grimy pickpockets swarming around at waist level? She didn't fit that part anymore and that was one thing she was glad to to done with. Stealing - however much of a sneaky thrill it gave her - was wrong. You couldn't spend decades working your way through Elvish philosophical texts without developing a keen sense of morality.

Dagny's sense of morality was, admittedly, a little more flexible than a typical elf's. Or rather a lot more flexible. Arne used to get so frustrated with her -

Focus, Dagny told herself, since Sverrir wasn't there to remind her. She was drawing too much attention. Too many of the glances directed her way were suspicious. Too many of them lingered curiously. A curiosity was memorable and neither of those were something she wanted to be today.

She moved deeper into the crowd, trying to blend in. It wasn't working. She could feel that it wasn't working. Her bearing was wrong - too upright, too assertive. Her clothes - how could she have thought these would help her fit in? They were so clearly a costume, too neat, too clean, too new. No slum-dweller would wear these. Even the way she walked looked off. She moved with a swordswoman's grace and in a crowd of shuffling beggars, that drew one too many second looks. For a moment, Dagny started to panic, wondering if her whole idea hadn't been an idiotic and ill-planned from the start.

Then, between one step and the next, her body remembered how to move furtively, quickly and gracelessly. Dagny hunched her shoulders as if expecting a blow, kept her head ducked so no-one would notice her face. And if her clothes weren't quite shabby enough, they were dull and unremarkable. Dagny slipped smoothly into the skin of her younger self and moved unheeded through the slums.

The children-thieves were so skilled, so efficient. So professional. She marvelled at them. Had her fingers been that nimble once? They must have been. Dagny remembered doing as these children did. Courting the hangman's rope, all for the sake of a few copper pennies. It was incredible how blasé they were, hardly even flinching when their victims yelled abuse, or made to strike them. The miniature pickpockets took it in stride, dodging neatly and moving on to the next easy mark with minimal fuss. Dagny couldn't help admiring them, even as the part of her that was elf-taught cringed in horror. Sights like this would be unimaginable in Du Weldenvarden. But then, she thought bitterly, a lot of things that happened in the Broddring Kingdom were unimaginable in Du Weldenvarden.

One dark-haired boy - though, he could have been wheat-blond under a few layers of dirt - disengaged from the crowd, sidling away down a smoky alley. Dagny followed without missing a beat. He didn't notice his pursuer; she moved with careful, practiced nonchalance, a skill she'd learned from Rowan rather than the Riders.

This boy had the same training, however, and after a few minutes, he spotted her. Or so she assumed. He vanished from view, anyway. Dagny halted in annoyance and swept her gaze carefully over the dirty alley, searching for some sign of the little thief. He was close, no more than a few steps away. She could feel his mind but she couldn't pinpoint his location.

"Hey!" The young Rider yelled, raising her voice obnoxiously. "Stop! Thief! Thief!"

Not a head turned to look down the narrow alley, but her screeching had the desired effect. The boy wasn't veteran enough to keep his cool. He darted out of his hiding place - a clever choice, beneath the broken-down remnants of a wagon - and bolted like a hare. Dagny lunged and caught him by the scruff of the neck, hoisting him aloft. He immediately began cursing and kicking at her, writhing like a snake in her grip.

"Hey, calm down, kid. Calm down! Heavenssake, I'm not gonna toss you over to the guards! Hold still, you little mutt!"

She layered her old slum accent on thick, hoping to reassure him. Unfortunately, it had been ruthlessly trained out of her in Vera-trür. Dagny suspected she sounded more like a bad actor, now, than anything else.

"Look, I'll put you down in a minute! I need you to do one thing for me!"

He ignored her, hissing like a cat and spitting a mouthful of vitriol that would make a dwarf blush. Clearly, this method wasn't going to get her results. She shifted her grip on the kid, so she was holding him with one hand. The other, she slipped inside her tunic, freeing a coin purse from where she'd concealed it. Predictably, the jangle of metal made the boy go still and his eyes go wide.

"Now," she said, hefting the purse in her hand. "If I put you down, are we going to talk like civilised people? I've got a job for you and there's a solid gold in it for you if you help me out."

The boy wet his lips carefully. Then, eyes still locked on the bag on coins, he said hoarsely: "Put me down."

She lowered him to his feet, gently. He scrambled out of arm's reach the minute his toes touched the ground. His eyes on her were wary, filled with instinctive distrust. Dagny shook a single gold coin from her bag into her palm and held it out to him. Calmly, she met his suspicious glare.

"I want you to get me an audience with the Thief Lord."

Hello lovely readers!
Sorry this chapter is so short. It was originally supposed to have more included, but then I realised it would probably get too long. I didn't want to cram a lot of new information into one chapter, so I broke it off here.

The next chapter should have more action than the last few - it's set in Illirea. There's a lot going on in Nasuada's court, not all of it good, which some of you probably realised from the chapter before this one.

(Warning: The following A/N is quite dull)

I also want to thank all of you who have voted and left comments. I logged on to Wattpad for the first time in ages last week, and it was marvellous and completely unexpected to see those votes and comments waiting for me! So thank you. This story probably would have languished for another few months - possibly longer - without you all.

Special thanks to:

Nikkisha16
Kittencatten
CorinneMeyers

This chapter is dedicated to these sweet, basically wonderful people. Thank you for every single inspiring, encouraging comment. If I could figure out how to work the dedications on the Wattpad app, it would actually be dedicated to you.
:)