Disclaimer: Uh, Corus does not belong to me, any of the characters that I mention later that are Tamora Pierce's do not belong to me. Last time I checked, Kalic and Nurmai were mine.
A/N: This is really short, I know, also the plot is not real clear. Hopefully the next chapter will be longer and also the plot will become clearer too (I still have to work out some of the minor details…). This is pretty much my first stab at an actual fic so comments on what to fix are definitely appreciated. Here goes.
Chapter One: A Day's Work
Kalic watched casually from the shadowy doorway as the people hustled by. There were merchants, walking down the street, screaming out their goods. There were children, of course, weaving in and out of the crowded bodies, no doubt acquiring a few pennies from someone's loose purse on the way. One could also see the huddled masses of rags and bones that were the beggars of this sad city; though they did not actually leave their self-appointed lookouts. Then there were the nobles. The rich, snobby nobles, with their filled purses that they strolled around so freely with. How Kalic hated them. Yet they were his source of money; he hated them like he hated Nurmai.
Nurmai was the one thing that stood in between Kalic and that wondrous, white powder. The powder, Haresfoot it was called, gave him a blissful release from all the horrors of Kalic's life in the slums of Corus. Though it was a short-lived reprieve, that was what Kalic lived for, for there was no other reason to wake up in the morning. This was how he saw it. So in return for the Haresfoot, Nurmai used Kalic to get all the money or information that he wanted. Nurmai was not a very patient man in the first place, so when he got angry his fuse was very short. That is, if Kalic did not get exactly what Nurmai wanted when he wanted it, Kalic ended up with quite a few bruises and no Haresfoot.
As Kalic watched through half-closed eyes, he saw a perfect target come into view. A rather large man, with high boots and a ruffled silk collar. He had one of those fake mustaches that curled up on the ends as if put in a ladies hair-iron. His fingers were covered with heavy gold and silver rings, set with semi-precious stones. How he could strut around the city streets with all his finery and expect to be unmolested by the starving creatures that lived near that lived everywhere was amazing. The man was either very stupid or he had special connections; the latter was very unlikely and hardly a possibility. He not only wouldn't notice Kalic lifting several of his rings and his purse, he probably didn't know he had half of what Kalic took.
Kalic stepped carefully out of the doorway, trailing the man slightly. His plan was laid out perfectly in his mind. First he got a little closer to the man and stuck out a foot to trip the woman next to him. She tripped and fell to her knees. As Kalic had expected, the man reached down to help her as the crowd continued to surge around him. When he was pushed next to the man, Kalic's fingers worked deftly, unhooking the purse with a small, but deadly sharp blade that he carried. Then he pressed his hand against the man's back, as if bracing himself from falling. The rich man's arm went out to balance the new weight and when he did this, Kalic surged forward with the crowd and slipped two rings of the man's little finger.
Kalic then left at a normal pace, so not to draw attention to himself. When he had gotten a good distance away, and filched a few more coppers from someone's purse, he turned into a side alley. He walked down this alley and ended up on a less crowded street. Today's work was done so from there, he started to make his way "home."