Chapter One
Mairi smoothed her long skirt and walked through the streets of Haven, looking around her and trying to act invisible. Her pale green eyes lit upon an old, fat man in a fancy chirra-wool coat. Setting her jaw, she walked towards him, the picture of innocence in her modest clothes and combed auburn braid. She seemed to stumble right before him and he caught her before she fell.
"Be careful, little one," he said. She thanked him sweetly, and set off, with a good part of the money from his belt purse and a gold watch and chain. She grinned at the extra weight and whispered beneath her breath, "Gotcha." Once again, her sweet childlike looks and thin, straight body had made her look younger than her fourteen years and too innocent to do any harm. Once he noticed his money was gone, he wouldn't suspect her, not with all those boys running around the streets. Three more times she repeated her heist, until dusk came and she felt much heavier than she had started when she had set out, after lunch. She turned around, and twisted her way towards the place she called home.
Home was a tiny inn called The Boar's Head. She had been born there but her mother died from the bleeding and she had been sent to live with an old midwife called Eulima, who had been one of her mother's closest friends. But Eulima had died when Mairi was six and Sorka, a serving girl in that same inn who had aided Eulima during Mairi's birth, had talked the proprietor, a beefy, unkempt man called Roskyter, into giving Mairi food and board for helping out. But when Sorka had left three years ago, Mairi's jobs of helping in the kitchen and running errands had been added to. Now she was also Roskyter's pet thief. He had noticed her slim hands with their narrow fingers and taught her the trade. Now, he marked out people that had come to his inn and sent her out to steal from them. Sometimes he let her choose and track her own targets but if she didn't bring in more than a certain amount by the time she had to be back to serve supper, he'd flog her hard. What he didn't know was that she was a far more accomplished thief then he knew and had her own tiny hoard stashed away from the excess of her allotment. She planned it so she'd carefully bring in just over her allotment most of the time. That normally got him in a good mood. Once in a while she'd have a "lucky day", and bring him a lot more which made him pleased with her and fed her more, while other days she'd bring home just barely enough. That got him in a fiery temper and she'd have to run hard to escape the blows. It usually led to a hungry night, but she could spare a half copper or so to by a roll and it wouldn't do to look to good and prosperous to him. She'd learned that lesson when she'd first started bringing back larger hoards and he upped the minimum. It wasn't the best system but she knew that there were far worse, and her way she could get money, food, and a place to sleep for only a little work.
Mairi turned down one of the roads in Exile's Gate at a first walk. Her target had taken her further into the better parts of Haven than usual and she would hurry or else she'd be late. As she walked, she carefully slipped a few coppers into tiny pocket of her skirt. She didn't have time to hit her hiding place and couldn't hide too much in her clothes or else she'd clink and Roskyter'd know. Oh, well. Today could be a lucky day, she thought with a little sigh. Finally she reached the ramshackle building that called itself The Boar's Head. She ducked around to the back and showed up just as the first customer. Damn, she thought. Roskyter'd be sure to notice.
"Where have you been?" he thundered, attempting to keep his voice low so the customer's wouldn't hear. His face burned red with suppressed rage. His free fist reached out to hit her for her tardiness, but missed as she ducked it and dashed towards the ale barrel in the back room where she stashed what she took. When she got back, he yanked on the ties of her shift so more skin showed and threw her out. No sooner than she reached the door to the common room, the customer raised his mug, and cried, "Ale, wench!" Mairi, feeling like hitting him for treating her so, ducked back in the kitchen and grabbed a barrel of ale. She figured she should be used to the language and the treatment after three years of serving in the outer room since Sorka left. She threw out her hand for the coins, then poured him a mugful. The common room had started to fill. The Boar's Head was popular because it served the cheapest ale and food that wasn't going to make stay in the privy all night like the stuff some of the inns served.
Mairi spent the rest of the evening serving ale, soup, and slices of hard, brown bread, all while getting catcalls by most and hands on legs and chest by some of the more adventurous. The Boar's Head didn't offer whores like some of the other inns, but Roskyter didn't care if you fondled his serving wench a bit. There was one person there who didn't though. He had a scared, hard face and, though he wore a sword, he had the air of one who didn't care if he used it or not if you got in his way. He drank only a single glass of ale and didn't even look at her when she poured it for him. Weird, she thought, but marked him because she had a feeling that Roskyter would send her after him.
By midnight, the last customer, a drunken man, had at last sought his bed, which meant she could see her's in an hour or so. She trudged to the kitchen with the last of mugs and looked at the stockpile awaiting her. Roskyter had found out that most customers would pay more for quality, and some of the richer preferred clean mugs flatware. Which basically meant that Mairi had a pile of dishes waiting to be scoured with sand and rinsed with rainwater before she could go to sleep. She grimaced and started on them