Thief's Cunning

by Sarah Ahiers

  “Pah,” Marcello said. “The head of the Family always has secrets.” He got up from the table and walked over to his favorite chair. He sank into its cushions and groaned. His knees pained him almost constantly.

  And he was right, of course. Lea was the head of the Saldanas. There were things only she was privy to, though I doubted she kept any secrets from Les.

  “This isn’t a Family secret,” I countered. “This is about me. My life. My parents.”

  “Your parents are dead,” Lea said. “We raised you. That’s all there is to know.”

  “That isn’t all there is.”

  Les raised his hand. “Kuch nov, please.”

  Les had given me a beautiful gift for my birthday. I didn’t want to ruin that by making him feel like I didn’t appreciate that he had raised me.

  I pressed my lips together. “Fine.”

  It wasn’t that I didn’t love them, that I wasn’t glad to have been raised by Lea and Les. But when I thought of my parents, who they were, what they were like, my chest felt hollowed out. Maybe if I just knew more about them, I would finally understand how to belong. How to be a Saldana that they could be proud of, instead of the Saldana I was, the Saldana who got into trouble because I acted before thinking.

  But every time Lea refused to talk about my parents, I pictured myself in a wire birdcage with a locked door, and the cage getting smaller and smaller the older I got.

  More than anything I wanted to be free of that cage, and maybe knowing about my parents was the key to unlocking the door.

  “Are we done with it, then?” Lea asked.

  I shook my head. “No, but I’m tired. I’m going to sleep in tomorrow. Birthday privilege.”

  “That’s fine,” Lea said. “But we have something else we need to talk about first.”

  She gestured at Emile, who hesitated before sitting down at the table.

  I glanced at him, but he only shrugged slightly. Whatever was going on, he was as in the dark as me.

  She clasped her hands and leaned forward. Lea opened her mouth, then closed it, struggling to find a way to start. Whatever she was about to tell us, it was serious. Bad news. Someone was ill. Or in trouble.

  Les squeezed her shoulder and she visibly relaxed. “We’ve gotten an invitation.”

  I blinked. An invitation wasn’t such a serious occasion.

  “The king has entreated us to visit and swear fealty to the princess on her crowning with the rest of the Families.”

  “The king of Lovero?” I asked. We’d been invited to go to Lovero. Where everyone was fashionable and stayed out all night for revelry and refreshments and romance. This . . . this could be the best birthday present of my entire life.

  I craved other places, other cities, other countries. I didn’t hate Yvain. I loved it, its flowers and foods and canals. But it was small. Too small for me. I didn’t fit here, either. And the world was a big place, just waiting for me to see it. All that wide space—surely I could belong somewhere.

  “Yes,” Lea said. “The king of Lovero. Camelia Sapienza has come of age. The Families must once again swear fealty to the Sapienzas, so they retain Safraella’s favor and the ghosts remain barred from Lovero.”

  Marcello snorted. “And this affects us how? We don’t live in Lovero. The ghosts walk freely among our streets. We are only invited because you are the chosen of Safraella.”

  How luxurious it must have been to live in Lovero. They didn’t have to watch their backs, or listen to wails and groans and wonder whether it was a ghost bemoaning its fate or just the wind over the canals.

  Not that Lovero had canals.

  “It affects us,” Lea said, “because we are still considered one of the nine Families. We may not make Lovero our home, but that was our decision and not one I regret. And this is an opportunity for us. To show the other Families that there can be peace between us. That we can let the animosity go.”

  It was Lea’s biggest platform. To try to finish the endless feuding between the Families. She had seen firsthand what it could do. Entire Families wiped out. Good clippers killed. Skills and knowledge and bloodlines lost forever.

  She so desperately wanted there to be peace between the Families. Or, if not peace and goodwill, at least not war.

  She had started with the Caffarellis and that had gone well. Of course the head of the Caffarellis, Brand, was her first cousin and they were on good terms. It was easier making peace between shared blood. That, and Emile was betrothed to Brand’s daughter, Elena. She would join us and become a Saldana soon.

  But the Da Vias and the Addamos still hated us. And the Accursos and the Maiettas had been quarreling for generations, breaking into actual skirmishes every decade or so.

  “If we go to Lovero,” Lea continued, “and stay in Lilyan with the Caffarellis’ welcome, we can show the other Families it can be done. That there can be peace.”

  “What about the Da Vias?” Emile asked. “Won’t they try to kill us anyway?”

  Lea shook her head. “I don’t think so. Brand says their Family head, Bellio, is pious. He wants to regain Safraella’s favor, the things they lost. He won’t challenge us.”

  While Lea and Les had plotted vengeance against the Da Vias, the Da Vias had caught up to them and killed them both. But Safraella had resurrected Lea and given her Les back as well, and Lea had punished the Da Vias for turning to a different god by driving an army of angry ghosts into the Da Vias’ home. The Da Vias had returned their worship to Safraella after that, and Lea remained Safraella’s chosen one, able to drive away the ghosts and pass through the dead plains at night.

  “You mean he won’t challenge you,” I said.

  Lea waved her hand, dismissing my distinction. “Anyway, Costanzo Sapienza—”

  “The king of Lovero,” I interrupted.

  “Yes, the king of Lovero has promised us safety if we attend his daughter’s fealty.”

  “Pah.” Marcello waved a hand at her. “Let them all rot, I say.”

  “Duly noted, Uncle.” She turned her attention back to the rest of us. “So the Saldanas will attend. Even if more peace cannot be brokered, swearing fealty to the Sapienzas, and through them, Safraella, is necessary and expected of us, even if we no longer call Lovero home.”

  Lovero held wonders and masquerades and foods and people I’d never seen before. It had other clippers I could befriend, or maybe more than befriend. Lovero was different from Yvain, and I wanted to see every inch of it.

  But outside of all of that, Lovero held answers. My parents had died in Lovero. Someone there had known them, could tell me about them. And that was worth more than all the adventures Lovero promised.

  “It’s not as simple as all that,” Lea said.

  My stomach sank and I leaned back. “Not as simple” was Lea’s way of skirting around telling us that we wouldn’t actually get something we wanted, whether that was a new sword, a pretty dress, or a trip to Lovero.

  “We can’t all go.”

  And there it was, the final stab as my hopes and excitement slowly bled out. This didn’t need to be such an ordeal. Lea could have just told us she and Les were going to Lovero alone and everyone else had to stay to run the shop and tackle any jobs that couldn’t wait for them to return. It was the same thing. As always. Because nothing ever changed for me. Not even on my birthday.

  “I’m expected to attend.” Even if Lea hadn’t been the chosen of Safraella, she was the head of the Family and therefore spoke for all Saldanas. If she swore fealty, it meant we all did. “Les will come, too. He’s my husband, and it will be a show of good faith if we both swear. Especially since he was not raised as a clipper.”

  Lea shifted and glanced at me quickly before turning her gaze away.

  “And Emile,” she said, avoiding my eyes. “You will be coming as well.”

  three

  EMILE. EMILE WAS GOING TO LOVERO WITH LES AND LEA.

  “What?”

  I hadn’t even realized I’d spok
en until Lea focused on me. I swallowed. My cheeks felt flushed but I didn’t know if it was from embarrassment or anger. “Only Emile?”

  “Emile is coming because of our arrangement with the Caffarellis,” Lea explained. “We’ve agreed to their terms for the marriage, but I know Brand would feel much better about sending his daughter away, especially outside of Lovero, if he met her betrothed. It’s a courtesy we show them. That we don’t take this agreement lightly, even though we are gaining a member and a dowry.”

  I shook my head. “That’s not what I meant. I understand why Emile needs to go. But why can’t I go, too? Why do I have to stay here?”

  “We need someone to help Beatricia and Faraday in the store.”

  Beatricia looked between Lea and me. “I’m not so pregnant that I can’t handle the shop alone, if Allegra went with you.”

  I smiled brightly at Beatricia, but Lea’s shoulders stiffened. Beatricia’s offer wouldn’t change anything.

  “And,” Lea continued, “you’re in the middle of a job. It can’t just be abandoned.”

  “My mark hasn’t shown himself in over a week. A few days won’t change anything.”

  “You don’t know that, and that’s not the point.”

  “Then what is the point?” My voice had grown louder, and I felt a mixture of shame and strength from my anger. “I’m eighteen. Nothing ever happens here and nothing ever changes.” And they kept me in the dark about my parents. “By the time you were my age, you’d already saved the Saldanas from oblivion and moved here to keep us all safe.”

  “I did all of that out of necessity.” Lea clenched her hands together. “I would have gladly given anything to live a safe and happy life. The things I did when I was your age were not adventures. They were brutal and bloody and if I have to spend my entire life protecting this Family so none of us have to experience anything like it again, I will.”

  I closed my eyes, feeling the anger sliding through my veins. Feeling the mantle of my Family like an ill-fitting bone mask, or leathers. “You protect me too much. I’m cloistered away, except even Brother Faraday had more freedom when he lived at the monastery.”

  “Allegra,” Faraday started, but Lea cut him off with a raised hand.

  “The decision has been made.”

  “I just don’t understand why!”

  Lea and Les exchanged a glance, then she leaned back in her chair. “It doesn’t matter why. Allegra, you will not be coming to Lovero.”

  Secrets. I could practically smell them.

  “Of course not,” I scoffed. “Happy birthday to me. I hope you all have a lovely time together.”

  I got to my feet and pushed my way past Emile, not caring that I shoved his shoulder.

  “What have I done?” he asked.

  I gathered my presents and left, ignoring Les’s entreaties to return.

  Upstairs in my room I locked the door behind me. Someone would try to talk to me—Les or Beatricia most likely. Maybe Faraday—and I didn’t want to deal with any of them right now.

  I flopped onto my bed and stared at my ceiling.

  I was a prisoner.

  I lived a life of relative luxury and ease with a family that loved and cared about me and wanted to keep me safe. But all I’d ever wanted was something different than the same old thing every day. My skin itched as I thought about my birdcage.

  Emile was the exact opposite. He found comfort in things remaining the same, and the biggest reason he’d been fine with Lea arranging his marriage to Elena Caffarelli was that it meant he wouldn’t have to step out of the little world of safety he’d built around himself. He liked his cage.

  And yet, he was the one they were taking to Lovero.

  I jumped off my bed and paced back and forth, any thoughts of sleep gone. There had to be a way to get to Lovero, even if I had to do it on my own. I needed answers. I needed my cage opened.

  I paused and stared out my window at the stars in the sky, letting the night air pass over me. Lea had told me once that in parts of Ravenna in Lovero, the lanterns were so bright you couldn’t even see the stars. I would give almost anything to witness it myself, to explore the night freely, to taste different foods and to drink different wines, breathe different air.

  I clasped at my chest and felt a hard object beneath my leathers.

  I looked down and found Les’s necklace, still hanging from the chain. I shuffled to the mirror and held my hair out of the way, examining my reflection. The blues in the stone somehow made my brown eyes look richer, or at least it seemed that way in my dark room.

  I dropped my hair. Maybe he’d just given me the necklace because he knew how upset I’d be that I’d have to stay home while the three of them went off to meet royalty.

  I grasped the stone and it felt warm in my fingers. No. Les wouldn’t do that. He meant what he’d said when he’d given me his mother’s necklace.

  I tugged my leathers off and threw them in the corner before climbing into bed with my gifts.

  I paged through the journal Faraday had given me, looking through the Families. He’d written them in the current ranks: Accurso, Bartolomeo, Caffarelli, Maietta, Da Via, Addamo, Zarella, and Gallo. The first page, of course, was for us, the Saldanas, even though we were unranked.

  I traced my fingers down the lines of my family tree to the very bottom. There was Emile, his line breaking apart at his father, Rafeo Saldana, Lea’s oldest brother, and his mother, who had not been a clipper but a cleaner. And there was my line beside his, breaking apart at my own father, Matteo Saldana, and leading to nowhere for my mother. If Faraday knew the identity of my commoner mother, he hadn’t included it in the journal.

  I snapped the cover shut and shoved all my presents off the bed before curling up on my side under the blanket.

  I would’ve loved to think morning would make things look better, but it wasn’t true.

  Nothing would be different in the morning.

  I paced across the roof of the empty warehouse along a stripe of moonlight, listening to the sound of my breath beneath my bone mask.

  When I’d finally fallen asleep after my birthday, I’d dreamed of a monster.

  Or monsters.

  Sometimes there were three of them, and sometimes they would merge into one creature.

  I couldn’t quite see them. They were mostly hidden behind a veil of fog, and when I’d try to peer past, the fog would swirl and block my vision. But I knew the beasts were there, hidden, watching me.

  Their whispers echoed in the dream, until they drowned out everything, even my own being.

  Then I’d woken with a plan.

  Seven nights.

  Seven nights and seven days I’d been out in the southwest corner of Yvain, trying to catch Jonus Aix in person. He lived in the house across the street, the one that had remained locked and quiet. He hadn’t even gone out for groceries or to meet a friend for a drink or a meal. He’d stayed locked inside his house and I’d stayed waiting and watching and itching to do something, anything, to end this horrible trap I’d found myself in.

  This afternoon I’d skulked around outside his house, pretending to shop at the nearby market, innocently eating street food while I kept an eye on his door.

  Which was the same thing I’d done the last week. But that was fine, because this time things were going to be different.

  I bought a sweet pasty, the inside dripping with hot melted sugar. It burned my tongue and I waved cooling air at my mouth while keeping an eye on Jonus Aix’s door.

  “They’re hot today,” a voice said behind me.

  I looked over my shoulder, then continued my surveillance of Jonus’s house, the pasty cooling in my hands. “They always are.”

  Denny stepped beside me. I could feel his gaze, but I kept my eyes away. If I looked at him, looked at the way the setting sun softened his russet skin, remembered the strength of his arms, the taste of his mouth, my chest would tighten unfairly. And I was tired of feeling things I didn’t want to feel.r />
  It had been fun, being with Denny. And more than fun. At least at first. And he’d been my secret, something I could keep from Les and Lea, just like they kept things from me.

  But they’d found out. Of course. They always found out everything.

  It wasn’t that Lea and Les were against casual romances; they just had to clear him first.

  Denny had black hair in tight curls and bronze eyes that seemed to peer right into me. I liked the way his strong hands gripped my thighs, how his mouth was as smooth as his skin. He could make me shiver by breathing on my neck and I thought I might have loved him, at least a little. And maybe it could have been more than a little.

  But Lea and Les had to ask all these questions. Who he was, who his family was, what they did as a profession, how long they’d made Yvain their home. They’d even stalked him. Until being with Denny started to feel like another cage.

  Denny and I had fought.

  I’d said unfair things, and he had countered with his own. And there was no reconciliation. We didn’t fit anymore.

  After that, it seemed easier to be alone. At least as long as Lea and Les were so adamant about their questions and concerns. Whatever they were protecting me from, they wouldn’t tell me. And I didn’t believe it was just from having my heart broken, like they said.

  I had a strong heart. I wasn’t afraid of a few cracks.

  “How are you?” Denny’s voice reached depths in me that made me tremble.

  “I’m fine.”

  I bet there were plenty of attractive, available clipper boys in Lovero. Caffarelli boys dressed in black leathers with stark bone masks decorated in purple. Boys who weren’t afraid of the night the way the Yvain boys were. Boys who could chase me and actually catch me. Boys who could keep up.

  A shadow passed behind Jonus Aix’s window. I narrowed my eyes.

  “I just wanted to say hello. And happy birthday, Allegra. I hope you had a good year.”

  I looked at Denny then. He’d cropped his hair close to his scalp, and he smiled at me, teeth white and crooked. Then he inclined his head and went on his way.

  I shoved the rest of the pasty into my mouth, not caring how much it burned me.