“No,” she said under her breath. “You’re the real thief, Sagittaria Wonder!”
Silver melted backward, her head down. She used her peripheral vision to try to spot Brajon, but he stubbornly remained missing. There wasn’t time to track him down. She would have to go about her tasks and hope to run into him along the way. He couldn’t have gone far from the seawall.
Silver pushed through the festival crowds in and out of the center of Calidia, hoping to get to the shops she needed before the flyers did. She bought a new scarf and wrapped it around the bottom half of her face. Dull, inconspicuous brown this time. And she ducked into a cosmetics shop to pick up a kohl pencil, rubbing it against the back of her hand. It left a dark, oily black mark.
As Silver counted out the coins, she asked the shop owner, “Do you know where I can find a fibers shop?”
The shopkeeper gave Silver directions, and she set off again, tucking the kohl pencil into her bag and keeping her head low. Occasionally, racers were walking their water dragons in town, drawing admiring crowds. Energy and anticipation were thick in the air. Silver wanted to be in those crowds, but she pressed on, hoping that people would be more interested in the water dragons than the notices on the walls. After all, didn’t thieves run rampant here? But like the man who had bought her father’s ring had said, guards did, too.
Silver inhaled deeply. Food vendors were cooking festival breads stuffed with farmer cheese—some savory with a thick layer of herbs on top, and some sweet and drizzled with honey—for midmorning treats. Hunger and homesickness rained over her so hard Silver had to put her hand against a blue-and-white-tiled door to steady herself.
She bought a round of bread and some fruit on her way to the fibers shop, eating quickly as she walked. People in Jaspaton sat down for their meals, but it seemed that here in Calidia, everyone enjoyed street food.
When her eye caught a glimpse of another poster with her face, Silver broke into a jog until she reached the fibers shop. Upon entering, she was overwhelmed with all the types and colors of wool on the shelves.
“What’s this?” she asked a stock boy. Her fingers ran across a pale-blue fabric as slinky and smooth as water.
“Sea-crystal silk,” he said, swatting her juice-dotted hands away. “Don’t touch it. You’ll leave fingerprints.”
“Sorry.” Silver could imagine Queen Imea sweeping through her palace in a gown made from the luscious sea-crystal silk. Someday, maybe she would be as famous and loved as Sagittaria Wonder and would need sea-crystal silk gowns for all her visits to the palace parties and fancy dinners. She went to the purchase counter.
“I’d like thin wool yarn, please. In orange and white and brown. I’m in a hurry.”
The boy behind the counter—a taller and older version of the boy stocking the shelves—pulled down several balls of yarn. The counter boy squinted at her, as though trying to make out her features under her scarf.
“These will do.” Silver didn’t even inspect the yarn. She paid quickly, thanked the boy, and left.
As Silver blended back into the crowd, she noticed that the streets in midcity were a bit quieter. Perhaps everyone was already down at the seawall to watch the preparation for the races. With several hours before the first races began, she needed to find a safe and quiet space. And she needed to find her cousin.
“Why didn’t you just wait for me at the breakfast vendor?” Silver groaned out loud. Brajon was still nowhere to be seen, and they were running out of time. If only she could contact him just by thinking her thoughts at him.
Her head shot up. “Maybe Hiyyan can help.”
Silver tucked herself into a side street, pressed against a shaded wall, and closed her eyes to the streams of people flowing by. Hiyyan, can you hear me?
Instantly, that warm, comforting feeling filled her. Despite her worry, she couldn’t keep back a smile. Her Aquinder, her bond.
I’ve lost Brajon. Is there any way you can sniff him out?
Silver knew it was unlikely—Hiyyan was still some distance from the city, and there were so many people. The water dragon’s responding emotion was full of doubt.
Please try.
It felt strange to be part of Hiyyan’s sensory sweep of the city. Sort of like riding a dune board with her eyes closed. The smells came to her in a dizzying tumble: clay and dirt, bread and sweets, body odor and perfumes, animals of all sorts, and, strongest of all, the sea. But even Hiyyan couldn’t find the unique scent that was Brajon.
Silver gnawed her lip. She couldn’t leave her cousin lost in the city, but she couldn’t stay, either. She had a lot to get done before the races, and time wouldn’t stop while she searched for him—especially while people were searching for her. With one last glance around, she made up her mind.
“I hope you think to come back to the cave entrance, Brajon,” she whispered before pushing off the wall and away from the rings of midcity.
The roads zigzagged into the outer rings. Silver memorized the buildings she passed so that she could easily find her way back again.
“Tailor,” she murmured. “Sweetshop. Kite vendor.” She couldn’t keep herself from stopping to marvel at the kites. They were as tall as she was. Intricate cuts in the paper gave them a lacy look.
“Dragon kites for the celebrations,” the vendor said merrily.
She ducked her head and ran on. It had taken her and Brajon an entire day to cross the city when they’d arrived, but Silver didn’t have that long.
A boy was just finishing unloading a cart of fruit at a shop. He climbed up on his cycling contraption and put his feet on the pedals, ready to head off again.
“Wait,” Silver called. “Are you going back out to the orchards?”
“I am. Hopefully for my last delivery. I want to get down to the seawall!”
“Can I ride with you? I can pay.”
The boy gave a sideways grin. “Climb in. You don’t have to pay. I like the idea of carting a pretty girl around. It’ll make my friends jealous.”
Silver blinked, then shook her head. A pretty girl? He was just saying that. Probably the type to flirt with anyone, if it meant he could get his way. Just like Brajon.
Silver waved off his remark and climbed in the back as the boy braced himself and pushed. They flew through the city roads, swerving so hard that Silver gripped the sides of the cart until her knuckles were white. They passed a green-and-white-speckled dragon, which lunged toward them snarling, its trainers holding its chains as tightly as they could.
The boy laughed, but Silver’s stomach lurched with a combination of pity for the imprisoned Hop-Slawn and motion sickness. How could she ride Hiyyan through the air one day, soaring up and down and side to side and even spinning upside down without a problem, when one ride in a cart almost made her lose her breakfast?
The boy pedaled all the way to the outer circle of the city and beyond. He stopped at a smattering of low clay buildings. Silver hopped out.
“Are you sure I can’t pay you for the ride?” she said.
“No, but—”
The boy’s eyes narrowed, and in a flash like lightning, Silver realized her scarf had fallen down around her neck.
Silver didn’t wait around for the boy to finish what he wanted to say. She hastily pulled up the fabric and ran for the trees.
“I thought so!” he yelled. “You’re the thief!” The boy grabbed for her, but Silver twisted away from his reaching fingers and kept running.