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Portia learned to pick a pocket at the age of eight.
It was after her father had lost everything they had in a game of sabacc. The week they’d arrived on Pasir with new names and a new home that was smaller and smellier than their old one. Her father had put on his greatcoat, the blue one with the scorch mark on the back and a faint hexagonal shadow on one shoulder where a Confederate insignia had once been sewn. But instead of going out, he slipped a ration bar into each and every one of the pockets. Then he turned to his daughters. “Cheer up, girls. We’re goin’ to play a game.”
Her father got cross with her whenever she lost. Their lives were on the line. If Portia got caught slipping her hand into other people’s pockets, the bucketheads would have her in binders and she’d be shipped off to some desolate moon where she’d be worked to death and her family would starve without her.
Portia was thirteen now. After five years of training and hands-on experience, she should really not have made the mistake she’d made just now.
The Selkath turned around.
Portia bolted as fast as she could, but she could hear him chasing after her. “Get back here, you little punk!”
She turned corner after corner, desperately trying to lose her pursuer, until suddenly she was at a dead end.
The Selkath was advancing on her now, and he had his pistol out. “Nobody steals from me, kid,” he growled.
“I— I wasn’t—” Portia pleaded, backing against the alley wall. “Please—”
The Selkath cried out suddenly, dropping to the ground.
A vibro-knife stuck out of his back. Behind him, a Falleen boy grinned.
Portia gaped as the boy planted his feet on the Selkath’s back and wrenched his blade out, dripping with black blood. He wiped it on the man’s tunic as he lay there twitching. “Was he troubling you?”
No words escaped Portia’s hanging mouth. The boy smirked and rolled the man on his back. His eyes were still moving as his breath came in rattling gasps. She watched speechless as he began to search the Selkath’s still-quivering body. “Ah, here we are.” He glanced at her, holding up a wallet. “Was this what you were after?”
Still too amazed to speak, Portia nodded.
He opened it and retrieved a few credit chits from it. “Tell you what, darling, we’ll split it.” He tossed her the rest of the wallet with a wink.
The boy was young— somewhere between her older sister Mona’s age and her own— and immaculately dressed for this part of town. But Portia could not imagine what such a boy could be doing going around rescuing young girls by stabbing their attackers in the back. His deep purple eyes twinkled as he played with his knife. “You’re free to thank me any time, by the way.”
“Right!” Portia remembered herself. “Er… thank you.”
She flushed as he flashed her a pearly smile. She’d heard Falleen were something to look at. Actually meeting one was even more disarming than she’d anticipated. “I’m… er… Portia.”
“Well, Er-Portia, I’m Xizarel.” The boy slipped his knife back into the inner pocket of his dashing plum coat. “I’m quite possibly the most extraordinary person you’ll ever meet.”
She believed it.
“I’ve been a thief since I was eight years old,” Xizarel remarked. “I could my see my way towards giving you lessons.”
“Oh, I… I’d like that, I would,” Portia stammered, face growing warm again. She’d been about to protest that she was very good at picking pockets, she’d just made a mistake, but she changed her mind halfway through the sentence.
“Lesson one: it’s easier to steal from people when they’re dead. Well, nearly dead.” He glanced at the Selkath. “He’ll get there in a minute or two. Which brings me to my next lesson…”
At this, he extended a clawed green hand. “Probably best not to be here when the cops show up.”
Portia nodded vigorously as she followed him quickly. For a reptilian, his hand was warm. Were Falleens reptomammals?
“Are you hungry?” Xizarel inquired as they walked. Before she could answer, they were turning into an establishment. The sign read Bill’s Bantha Burgers.
The owner, a portly, hairy, mustachioed Besalisk, glanced toward the door from the kitchen. “Oh, hey, Xizarel. So… good to see you again.”
“Likewise, Bill.” Xizarel flashed his pointy teeth. “Two nerf steaks for myself and the lady here.”
“Right,” Bill deadpanned. “Still don’t sell nerf steaks. Or… nerf… anything.”
“Nice place you got here,” Xizarel remarked by way of non sequitur, glancing around.
“Alright, alright, I get the picture.” He pinched the bridge of his crest.
“And put it on my tab, as usual.”
Bill muttered under his breath. Portia grinned, wide-eyed. “What, ‘e don’t turn you away even though you ain’t got credits?”
“I’ve got something that carries more weight than credits, darling,” Xizarel smirked as he played with his knife. “A reputation.”
“Xizarel, funny seeing you here.” A female Besalisk around Portia’s age approached them from behind the counter, fiddling with her glasses. “I notice you’ve, um, brought a girl here. Cool cool, cool cool. Totally not jealous, haha.”
Portia flushed. Was this a date? Nobody had ever taken her on a date before.
“Xizarel! Xizarel!” A younger, tubby Besalisk appeared next to them, bouncing exuberantly. “Can I get your autograph again? Omigosh omigosh is that a new knife? Have you killed anyone with it? Can I have it?”
“Jeb, Jeb, don’t pester the man.” A pint-sized Besalisk in a tooka-eared hat pushed him aside. She plopped down on the stool next to Xizarel and crossed her lower arms conspiratorially. “So… did you kill anyone with it? Was there blood? How much? Gimme everything.”
“If I tell you,” said Xizarel, grinning, “you have to promise not to tell another single living soul or I will have to kill you. Painfully.”
“Ughhhhhhhhhhh, that is soooooooooooo cooooool.” She placed one of her upper hands on her chest. “Xizarel. I won’t tell anybody. I swear. Do I need to cut my hand open and shake on it? Please say yes.”
Portia had to smile. Apparently, Xizarel was good with kids. Well, Xizarel was a kid, but still. She began to idly imagine what she and Xizarel would be like as parents.
“Kids, please don’t talk to the teenage criminal extorting us for free food,” Bill admonished longsufferingly as he and his wife came out of the kitchen. “Here’s your, um… nerf steaks.”
“Okay, kids, c’mon, let’s go.” Bill’s wife herded her children out of the dining area. “Let the nice murderer and his girlfriend eat in peace. Hi. How ya doin’. Please don’t kill us. Thank you.”
“Mm-mm, that bukee is ree goola,” the oldest daughter drawled under her breath as she craned her neck to get a final glance at Xizarel. “Mee-yow.”
Portia took a bite of the square slab of meat on her plate, which tasted distinctly like ground bantha— greasy bantha. It was the most delicious thing she’d ever tasted. Suddenly she remembered— “I was supposed to meet my sister. She’ll be wonderin’ about me.”
“Lizzie, could you fetch us a box?” Xizarel called.
The tooka ears returned, their owner standing on tiptoe to deposit two to-go containers on the counter. “Madame,” she nodded to Portia solemnly. “See ya round, Xiz.”
As they left the Besalisk family’s establishment, Portia smiled bashfully. “Thanks for everythin’, Xizarel.”
“The pleasure was all mine,” he grinned, taking her hand. “Give my regards to this sister of yours.”
She flushed as he pressed her fingers to his lips. With a wink, he turned and began to walk away.
“Erm—” she fidgeted with her skirt as he turned around. “I, erm…”
“Don’t you worry about finding me, Portia,” he winked. “I’ll be around, never you fear.”
“Right.” She smiled as heat crept into her cheeks. “See you round, then.”
She found Mona waiting impatiently at their usual spot. Her annoyance turned to surprise when she saw the to-go box. “Boomin’ Am-Shak,” she huffed, impressed. “Where’d ya cop that?”