"Did you hear?" Annabelle breathed out as if she had run across the entire campus. In fact, she may have, so Lirssa feigned interest looking up from her tablet with the next day's flight plan.

Having gained the desired attention, Annabelle dropped to sit next to, and nearly on top of, Lirssa. The black hair caught in a breeze and tickled at Lirssa's face before the sallow faced girl with big moon-grey eyes wrestled the hair back under control. "Colonel Archibald Thremcore is visiting tomorrow. It's so early in the season. I can't imagine why he would be here, but I heard it from Drake who heard it from Shimmer, and you know she's a student volunteer in the teacher's lounge."

"There's a position she won't have much longer if she keeps slicing out their chat-ups." Lirssa muttered but only to cover the nervous flutter racing about her stomach.

"Oh, Lirssa, stop being such a grouch." Annabelle teased and pecked a kiss to her cheek. "I knew you would want to know, and so came right over to tell you." She preened as if she should get a reward. "Now, I've done you a favor, and you have to do me one."

It was, afterall, the way things worked. Even though Lirssa could have pointed out that she did not ask for the favor done for her, she gave a nod. Something for something. "What's the shake?"

"You know all the right people in the fashion of Rhydin, and I absolutely have to have something spectacular for the dance." Her hands clasped in begging fashion under her chin. Annabelle may not have been the prettiest girl around, but she was vivacious and charming — and her family had money to lavish her with gifts. Something couture would not be out of their means to get, so Lirssa nodded. It was a win-win. A friend would get an outfit sold and displayed prominently at the academy dance, and Annabelle would get her favor.

Annabelle squealed in delight at Lirssa's silent nod, and then grabbed her hand dragging her from her seat of study. "Come on - you know the scheduled flight better than any of us. Let's go chase the boys around the anti-grav room."

Lirssa rolled her eyes. "I don't want to chase the boys."

"Oh, pooh. Fine, I'll chase the boys, and you can be chaperone and talk Coach out of grounding us when we're caught."

Lirssa felt a strong desire to go climb a tree, but instead followed along, tugged by the hand of her friend.

And the things that we fear are a weapon to be held against us...

He's not afraid of your judgment He knows of horrors worse than your Hell He's a little bit afraid of dying But he's a lot more afraid of your lying —The Weapon, Rush

Training planning had gone well, Lirssa thought. She was keen to get progress. Patience was not particularly one of her strong suits. That was something to work on, too.

Her sigh puffed as wispy cloud out into the cold air. It was past midnight. Tall buildings with shuttered eyes, lamp glow barely breaking past cracks and seams, gave way to the quieter but no less grand designs of the shipyards. It was a popular place for the shadow children, children abandoned or left adrift, to find shelter. Half hulls, haphazard beams, and makeshift lean-tos were easily found. Too easily found. Only the new shadow children drifted there.

There was a figure pulling away from the corner of a building. Lirssa knew him. He was far from his patch. A quick whistle signal caught Briar's attention. He darted back to the shelter of a building shadow, and Lirssa whistled again.

It had been a long time since he heard her signal. Sure, he was right to be cautious. Lirssa took a moment to check their surroundings again. It was safe for the moment, and she whistled one last time, but did not move forward. No, it was not safe to startle him out. He would have to come to her.

The tiny ache spun in tight circles at the center of her chest. She had been gone too long. She was different now. She was other, of them, and she had left them behind.

But she hadn't. It was a comfortable half truth. The ache spun out a bitterness that caught her breath.

"Aye, what?cher doin' 'round here" What's the shake?" Briar had come around behind her.

That was a good moment to practice patience. Lirssa turned her head just enough to speak back. "Could ask the same o' you, Briar. Off your patch, eh' What's the shake?"

"Escort."

That narrowed it down some. He was talking. With that, she took each step of her turn to face him with deliberate care. "Rigga?"

He had aged. He had aged past her though they once looked to tally the same years. Scars of fights won or lost drew his history on his skin. Dirt was a constant patina, and it gathered fine lines between his brows and across his forehead. Not around his eyes, though. No laugh lines. Yes, Briar had aged. And changed. "Still rememberin', eh' Got the street still hidden there under those fine clothes and fancy friends" Nah, nah Rigga. Mice. Not enough riff."

"You didn't." Practicing patience would wait. "Where?"

"B'aint tell you nothin'. You know the rules. Fair trade. They earn their keep or they go. We b'aint no charity, like you feathers."

Lirssa had never been called a feather. Sure, Penny had referred to it, but she had not right out called her one to her face. Delicate pretty things with hollow cores. She dropped the street lingo. "Tell me where they are, Briar. You go about your business. I'll go about mine."

He spat on her boots. "That's right. I go about my business. Got nothin' doin' with you sort." And he left with a smug grin as if he had won.

He chose it, Lirssa reminded herself. He wanted to keep that life. There was nothing she could say to bring him back. Years apart, different lives, different luck; it was a gulf they could no longer bridge across.

The Mice. She marked the direction he had come, and started to follow the path back, moving as fast as she could and keep silent. Loping, with her back curved over, her feet touched the ground along the edge in a quiet shuffle step.

Every sound brought her to a stop: a desperate leaf dancing across cold cobbles; drip-drop from the slate roof into a rain barrel; wind teasing a tarp into a dance.

Then a whimper. The stifled sound so familiar of the scared desperate not to cry. "Shh, wan' no fingerman find us." And the whimpering was lost beneath a quick snap of another tarp over wood.

Lirssa knew sound bounced around these buildings and streets, and she crouched low to the ground, thinking on where the sound had been. There was a soft rustle unplaced around her. A glance to the grate against the curve of the street.

The Tunnels. She could not just jump in without scattering the children hiding there about, and one of them might get hurt in their frightened flight. There was another entrance to the Tunnels some yards down. She could get there and come across them. Show them they weren't ready for the Tunnels yet. Not Mice. Not those Mice.

With as much speed as she dared, she made it to the second grate, sliding it open and dropping onto the ledge below. The sewers had been flushed out in this area lately. No doubt after the latest ruckus. Lots of water flow.

That meant is was colder down there. There was not enough filth and garbage decaying to create a low heat. Sure, it stank, but it was warmer than above in the wind. Or would have been.

Lirssa walked back towards the Mice. A faint glow from the grate above gave them pale halos like stone figurines of great cathedrals, the bowed heads saluting the dead. There were six little, trembling bodies. Their clothes the same cast off, threadbare remnants that their street gang had valued them as.

As she drew near, two stood holding up knives as children do with more threat than skill. Faces pale and lips greying to blue. Their hands could barely grip the handles in their aching chill. But still they stood against her. If she had been anything other than what she was....It was a thought she could not entertain. Because there were other children. Others she would not get to, and that only brought the sting of tears to her eyes.

She would cry later.

Lifting up her hands, she slowly drew back the sleeves to reveal the vambraces of throwing knives. It was there in the dread and sorrow of widening eyes. They knew. She could have killed them if she wanted to, but also, there was nothing to keep her from doing what she wanted to them. "I don't want to hurt you. I want to help."

"He's so cold." One little girl whimpered from the huddled four.

"Shush now," The boy with a knife hissed. The two standing between her and the others were maybe eight. That meant the others were younger.

"Come here," Lirssa motioned to the boy as she sat on the ground. She gave him advantage, gave him power over her, and she knew that would be a start. She did not have time to woo him from his defensive posture.

He moved only a few feet forward, his mouth a quivering blue line. Lirssa smiled. "Tunnels no place to cobble bed tonight. You let me, I'll find you better places. Better for tonight. But you gotta do somethin for me." Trade. That's how it worked on the streets. Something for something else.

"Whatcha?" He gave a jerk of his chin.

"Know the bistro in the Marketplace?" His swift inhale, like he could smell it, was enough of an answer. "You're gonna help me run some supplies to them. Need an extra pair of hands. Work for shelter, yeah?"

"He's so cold." The girl cried again.

Lirssa did not wait for the boy's answer, but shuffled on her knees in the muck to the other children. There was a seventh. Tiny thing of less than three with a hat too large over a face grey and blue.

No. "Give 'im to me." Lirssa took off her peacoat and wrapped it around two of the other children. Her cap she took off her hair, letting the strawberry blond curls free. She used the length of that wrap around the shoulders of two others. Faces gaped and one little boy turned to whisper to his coat partner. Lirssa did not have time to ask them what the problem was. The little, chilled child was drawn close. With care for the agonies his body was feeling, she slid him down her shirt. Direct contact with her warmth.

It was as though she cradled a block of ice. His breath was shallow and rattled like a bird in a cage. Sitting among the children, all six others now close around her, she sat back against the walls and thought.

She could not leave them. Not for a moment. And that meant she needed help. Oh, would that she had Canaan's talent and could just warm them up with a thought. But she was nothing but a useless battery, charging others and of no talent herself.

Pulling out the com device from her pant leg, she texted the only two she thought of who might still be awake. Who might come. She noticed her own fingers began to tremble with chill, but the message was sent. It was wait for help or wait for dawn. Just that long. So long.