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Everything's connected when you think about it, Neve mused as she cut through the alleyway. You pull one thread and the whole cloak unravels.
Today's sign of unraveling was her morning coffee. Her favorite shop had been closed when she stopped in, the sign in the window reading simply "nothing to brew." She had understood immediately; a slate of new import regulations had gone into effect yesterday. Some magister somewhere pulled a thread and now everyone would be rationing until the local network of suppliers sorted things out.
Everyone down here, that is. She doubted the denizens of Hightown were going without.
Shopping basket tucked over one arm, she hurried past an alcove thick with malodorous green smoke — a sight that was becoming more familiar by the day in Dock Town. The little huddle of smokers watched her with heavy-lidded eyes as she passed. It was frustrating that coffee — legal, mostly harmless, and a source of revenue for dozens of merchants in the city — was being kept out while Seheron Smudge still found a way in despite its illegality. Why the difference? Just a question of whose pockets were being lined, she suspected.
She stepped out of the alley into the the sunlit street. As she took the turn that led to the Cobbled Swan, she saw a man barreling toward her, hair the color of copper and a bulbous red nose to match. Her passing curiosity at what someone like him — clearly an Altus by both dress and demeanor — was doing in Dock Town was interrupted when she noticed a sleek tabby cat wander into his path. Grimacing, he gave it a sharp kick with the toe of his boot.
"Animal," he snarled. "Filthy animal. Disgusting."
He swept past her smelling of aftershave and sanctimony. She let her gaze follow him for half a block or so, just to entertain the fantasy of encasing him in a block of ice. He was on his way out of Dock Town and not in, though; that could only be to the good.
At least the local feline population is a little safer, she thought as she continued on toward the Swan.
"Neve!" Hal called as soon as she came within sight of his shop. "What are you doing here?"
"What am I ever doing here?" she laughed. "I live here, I work here, I drink here when I've got the time."
"Not so early, though. It's only half past ten. I've barely got my fires going."
"True. Miko's was closed, so I gained an hour." She sighed. "I like to read the morning papers at the table in the corner. They have the best bougatsa there."
"Gained time but lost your morning pick-me-up," he said with a grin. "You could try the Swan. I heard someone tipped them off before the new law passed and they stocked up."
"Tempting," she said, glancing up toward the doors. "But they don't open for another hour. Think I'll just get an early start on my job."
"Yes?" he said, waggling his brows. "Something exciting?"
She shrugged. "Depends who you ask."
"It always does," he said, nodding sagely. "Something for breakfast? Since you also missed out on your pastry."
Laughing, she reached for her coin purse. "Can I get just one fish skewer? Grilled, not fried."
"Watching your waistline?" he joked, wrapping the fish and handing it over.
She tucked the little parcel in her basket with a smile, arching one of her carefully-groomed eyebrows.
"Someone's got to."
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Crouched behind a low stone barrier, Neve felt the moisture from the limestone wall of the tunnel leaching slowly through the seat of her trousers. She shifted, trying to find a more comfortable position without being seen or heard.
"More comfortable" was very much a relative term, she thought. Not much about this particular stakeout was actually comfortable.
For starters, there was the location. Eyewitness reports had clustered around an abandoned warehouse on one of the lower levels of Dock Town. Barely above the waterline, even the well-maintained facilities of this part of the city tended to be damp — and she'd left "well-maintained" behind as soon as she'd stepped into the dusty interior of the building.
She'd abandoned it entirely when a rusty iron door at the back of the warehouse proper had led her into these tunnels. For all she knew, they connected up with the catacombs somewhere. The city was a warren, full of tunnels both natural and man-made, though she had no intention of exploring quite that far today.
Then there were the smells.
As she'd worked her way deeper into the tunnel the familiar bouquet of garbage, fish, and brine told her there was an opening onto the water nearby. Wanting to make sure her target hadn't escaped in that direction, she investigated and found a crude stone ledge with waves lapping desultorily along its edge. From there she could look out across the water to the source of one of the pungent smells. A fish processing operation was hard at work on the other side of the inlet. The sign on the roofline proclaimed Family Leandros — Fresh Fish Daily in hand-painted letters half as tall as a man.
The fish might be fresh, she thought, but judging by the breeze off the water they cheerfully dumped whatever wasn't saleable right back into the sea it had come from.
With no sign of her target in that branch of the tunnel, she continued down the other passage. It stank here as well, though differently — less rotting fish and more musty funk. Despite the aroma, she'd had more luck with her search here. A clear set of footprints told a story she could read as easily as one of the daily papers; her target was nearby. She'd made her preparations, located a suitable hiding spot — the corner where she was currently huddled — and settled in to wait.
That had been nearly an hour ago, and her thighs were beginning to cramp. Worse, the peculiar musty smell had intensified the further she'd gotten from the passage to open air. It seemed familiar though she couldn't place it, and she wondered what use had been made of the warehouse in its heyday. Odors from stored goods could easily have imprinted themselves into the very rock; limestone was notoriously porous, after all, as her trousers were discovering this very minute.
A sound on the other side of the barrier caught her attention and she went stock still.
Barely daring to breathe, she shut her eyes to listen. The sound came again, a little closer this time. Leaning forward a fraction of an inch at a time, she managed to peer around the edge of the barrier into the dim tunnel beyond. The sight that greeted her sent a surge of elation through her long-suffering limbs.
Got you, she thought.
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Hurrying back to report the day's success to her client, Neve stepped off the rickety elevator leading up from the warehouse district and onto the cobbles of the upper level. Thankfully, the late afternoon streets were not crowded. With luck, she thought, she'd be home in time to change her damp and dirt-streaked clothes and have a good wash before heading out for a quiet meal.
"Neve Gallus."
A familiar voice halted her progress; she sighed internally at the delay but turned to greet the ambush with a smile. "Rana Savas," she said, shifting her shopping basket to her other arm. "Fancy meeting you here."
"I was about to say the same," Rana said, looking her up and down until the scrutiny made Neve feel twice as disheveled as she actually was. "Working a case?"
Neve cocked her head. "How'd you guess?"
"Oh, I don't know. Call it intuition?" The templar's eyes sparkled and Neve could tell she thought she was being funny. She might even have laughed were she less tired and in need of a hot bath.
"Well, aren't you sharp," she said. "Listen, I've got a client waiting for me in—"
A loud mew emanated from her shopping basket. Neve cleared her throat. It was too much to hope Rana hadn't heard — she'd seen her eyebrows rise — but if she ignored it then she might be able to pass it off as noise from the street.
"A client," she continued, "waiting very patiently for me in—"
"Is that a cat?" Rana asked, in much the same tone as she might have asked whether it was a druffalo.
"A kitten, actually."
Rana narrowed her eyes. "You said you were on a case."
"I was." Neve drew herself up. "And as soon as I meet with my client I'm off to celebrate my success with a glass of wine and a soak in a tub."
A bark of incredulous laughter escaped the templar's lips. "This is what you're working on? Finding lost kittens? Shouldn't you be working on something serious?"
Neve's expression hardened. "This is serious to my client."
"Smugglers are filling the streets with Seheron Smudge and you're spending your time on lost pets," Rana scoffed. "There must be a hundred stray kittens in this block alone!"
"Well now there's one more," Neve said sharply. "As for the smugglers… find me a target! You know trying to track them down has been like trying to bail water with a sieve."
At this, the anger seemed to drain out of Rana. "Tell me about it," she sighed. "We've been watching all the usual entry points with no luck. It keeps coming in."
"And ninety-nine gold of every hundred made selling it goes straight into Venatori war chests," Neve said bitterly. "Dorian rants about it every time I see him."
They stood in silence for a moment in the lengthening shadows. "Can I at least see the kitten?" Rana asked.
It was Neve's turn to laugh. "Sure," she said, cracking open the lid of the basket. "Careful, though. He's stuffed full of grilled fish so I don't know what I'll use as bait if he gets out this time."
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"Did you find him?"
The child looked at her with wide eyes as Neve dragged herself up the stairs to the porch where the little girl sat. She lowered herself to sit beside the child and patted her shopping basket.
"I found him," she said. "Shall we take him inside? You don't want him getting away again."
The girl looked down at her knees and fiddled with the hem of her skirt. "He's not allowed in there," she said softly. "Mama said."
"That's a shame," Neve said, knitting her brows. "He'd be safer."
The girl shrugged. "I look out for him. Just… this time he got down somewhere I couldn't find him."
"That he did," Neve agreed, pulling the little white kitten out of the basket and placing it in the girl's lap. "What's his name?"
"Goose," she said. "Because he's all white like the ones at the market."
"An excellent name," Neve said, stroking the tip of the kitten's nose with her finger.
"What's this then?" A woman appeared in the doorway above them, looking worried. Then she seemed to recognize Neve. "Oh, it's you. You found the little monster? Maya's been pining after him for days."
She came down the steps to them and stroked the child's dark hair with one thin hand. "I can't pay you," she said with a lift of her chin. "But I can offer you a cup of tea. You look like you could use it."
"You're sweet," she said. "Maya and I settled up before I took the case. Isn't that right?"
The girl nodded. "Neve said all I had to do was keep an eye out for anything unusual. So I have." She looked up at Neve, an expression of faint concern crossing her face. "But I haven't seen anything."
"That's all right," Neve said, pushing herself up off the steps with a smile. "The important thing is to keep your eyes open."
She turned to the girl's mother. "She says the kitten isn't allowed inside. If it's a matter of feeding him, I can—"
"It's not that," the woman interrupted. "The landlord won't allow it. As often as he's here, he'd find out and then we'd be on the streets. He hates cats."
She looked up to meet Neve's gaze. "He likes to say he won't allow any animals to live here but us." Bright anger flared in her eyes and the tips of her long ears drooped.
"I'm sorry," Neve said, knowing it was inadequate. "Sorry you have to deal with such a rank asshole."
The woman laughed humorlessly. "He is. Wish you could be here next time he comes around. I'd love to hear you say that right to his ugly red face."
Neve froze. "Red face?"
The woman nodded.
"Red hair, too?"
"Like a copper coin. How did you know?" she asked quizzically.
Neve didn't answer. Her morning flashed through her mind at the speed of chain lightning. Heavy-lidded eyes. Wreaths of reeking smoke the color of seaweed. An Altus in Dock Town kicking a cat.
The musty, familiar smell in the tunnels.
"Maybe I'll take you up on that cup of tea after all," she said. "Does the back of the house overlook the water?"
It did, and as Neve sipped the brew — not coffee, but still the best pick-me-up she'd had all day — she watched the sun setting behind the Family Leandros fish factory. Below, she could hear the waves lapping in the narrow inlet, water that led out to the Nocen, and beyond that all the way to Seheron.
Everything was connected, after all.