An Apprentice Thief

The first moon of the year, Eos, nested snugly along the horizon. It cast streams of pale blue light across the sky, tendrils like the fingers of a hand, slowly darkening as they stretched ever further from their source. Night came harshly. It wrestled control of the land from the warm day, casting the world into chilly darkness broken only by the smoky gaze of Eos, the Little Sister. Though the cycle of days and nights shared roughly equal parts of the year, the murky blackness always felt intangibly heavier and longer than the bright, sunny days.

Ice and snow embraced the land like a frigid mistress. Semi-transparent snowflakes glittered as they fell, a radiant reflection of the twinkling stars overhead. A light breeze played through the snowfall, an ominous foretelling of the harsh blizzards to come.

A hollow building stood on the corner of a silent intersection, its tired face pockmarked by thousands of tiny holes where hail had bitten into the stone siding. Moonlight pierced the rotting husk in a hundred places, showing a collapsed roof buried under a mass of white. Outside, a sign hung on one rusted chain, undulating precariously in the wind. It bore a carved loaf of bread, blackened by time and weather.

Gala followed Robyn into the inky blackness of the alleyway that the bakery formed with the building next to it. Their feet slapped furiously against the frozen mud. With an outstretched arm, she ran her fingers lightly against the rough stone wall, delicately tracing the patternless indents all the way to the other end of the alley. Lost in thought, she nearly ran into Robyn when the older woman stopped abruptly.

Gala’s bare feet burned with sharp pain from the shards of glass-like ice that covered the ground. Despite the bone chilling cold, sweat ran rivulets down her dirty face. Puffs of white air escaped her mouth in labored pants. Knots of dirty blonde hair fell in heavy tangles to the crook of her back. She sucked air hungrily, her emaciated frame heaving with each breath. She looked up from the ground, and her eyes locked with Robyn’s for a split second.

Robyn was taller than most women. Her broad, well-muscled shoulders tapered down into lithe, strong arms. Short, curly brown hair hugged her scalp, refusing to stir in the light breeze that played through the city. Her face was all hard angular planes, intersecting like roughly hewn stone. A deep frown marred her countenance. Despite the chill, she did not shiver. She did not move, in fact, save for the quiet breath that escaped her lips. The streets were her domain, a fact none would contest. There, in that moment, she was the queen of all that lay before her.

“Keep your eyes on me,” Robyn whispered. A reflective sheen of sweat clung to her skin, but she did not gasp for air like Gala did. Robyn stood imperious at the mouth of the alleyway where it spilled out onto the muddy street beyond. Despite the dozens of ruddy gas lamps that lined the roadway, shadows veiled their position from onlookers.

Gala looked back and forth between the road beyond, and Robyn. Her mentor studied the haphazard buildings that lined the road opposite them. Light from the lamps danced crazy patterns in red flickers across their facades, giving the illusion of spectral movement where there was none. Many of the structures leaned to one side or the other, like tired sentries against change, ready to collapse from the exertions of time.

Curiosity scratched at Gala’s mind. She glanced at Robyn, and when she was satisfied that the woman was not paying attention, she leaned her head out of the alley. To her right, the street wove its way northward for several miles, before it intersected with the looming black wall that partitioned the city of Rudston. She swung her head around to the left. A thick, oily miasma of rot rushed up to meet her, and she recoiled with a startled yelp.

A withered hand to her nose, and she peeked out again. The moldy remnants of a grossly twisted street cart lay in a heap, barely visible in the dim light. Cold hardy insects scurried in and out of tiny, chewed out gaps in the rotten wood. Gala retched silently, and pulled back into the alley, pressing her back against the cold stone wall. Loose bricks showered mortar into her hair, which she absentmindedly brushed away. Robyn eyed her, rolled her eyes, and held up a hand for silence.

Night clutched the alley in a closed fist. Robyn was silhouetted against the ragged structures beyond, regal features only highlighted by the decomposing city around her. Though light reached the edge of the inlet, it shied away from the inky blackness, as if afraid to be consumed. Gala’s eyes traced her mentor’s features, and not for the first time, admired her solidity, her realness. Everything else in her life was fluid, but Robyn was like a granite foundation among shifting sands.

Robyn’s gaze swung left and right in smooth patterns, eyes always searching, body visibly tensed, like a coiled spring. Gala let out a soft breath and leaned forward.

“What do you see?” Gala asked. Her voice, barely a whisper, scratched at her parched throat. Robyn turned a glare on her that could have frozen fire, and Gala held up both her hands in apology. Several tense moments passed, and she could no longer contain her anticipation. “Is he coming this way?”

Robyn squatted low, then pressed her back to the wall as if sitting in an invisible chair. She slowly slid to the ground. Her rear crunched in the ice, and she let out a whoosh of pent up breath.

“He is not there,” she replied, her voice soft and low.

“That is a good thing, right?” Gala responded, hope bleeding into her small voice. She sucked in a sharp breath through her teeth, and held it in her lungs, waiting. Finally, Robyn nodded slowly, then leaned her head against the washed-out wall. Gala scrambled from the other side of the alley opening, and sat beside her mentor, seeking warmth. Sleep set upon her unbidden, as it often did in the cold, and with it came dreams of her past life.

*****

War. It came like a crack of unseen lightning, and tore Rebecca’s world asunder.

Still a child, she hid amongst the rubble of her hometown, cowering against the thunder of artillery bombardment. Her family had perished in the first twenty-four hours, casualties of the sudden nature of the invasion. Her school was reduced to ashes, the park down the road now played host to entrenched tanks, and the church she attended with her family now quartered resistance fighters instead of priests.

A shell burst overhead, and Rebecca screamed, covering her ears. She wanted to live, she wanted her family back, she wanted this to end. Another explosion sounded, closer than the last, and she caught a glimpse of the apartment complex across the road crumbling to dust.

“Why?” She asked aloud, her voice muffled by the chaos outside. “Why are they doing this? What did we do to them?”

Someone outside screamed, and the telltale popping sound of a machine gun cut them off. Rebecca hazarded a peak through a shattered window just in time to see a uniformed soldier throw a hand grenade into her hiding place.

“Why?” She asked a heartbeat before the grenade exploded, snuffing out another innocent life.

*****

Robyn looked at her pupil out of the corner of her left eye. Gala was pressed firmly against her side, breathing shallow, twitching along with whatever dream she was having. It took effort for Robyn not to push her away. Years of raising her did nothing to diminish the awkwardness she felt at physical contact, but she understood the weight it carried with Gala. Deliberately, she ran the fingers of her left hand through the girl's raggedy hair. She sighed at the weight of the knots, and had to remind herself that at the same age, her hair was likely worse. It was only after her parents died that she began to grasp how potent a weapon looks could be. She shuddered at the memories, and shook herself. Some things were better left in the past.

Several more moments passed before Robyn’s shoulders began to relax. Her mind drifted from the girl, to the job at hand. Like floodgates being closed, the fixation on work held back the tension she always felt around others. Her mind cleared, clouds parting before the sun. Everything came into focus.

The soft, jarring sound of boots crunching on snow came from north of where they sat. Robyn sprang to her feet, startling her apprentice awake. The young girl tried to contain a high pitch squawk with one bony hand, and catch herself with the other. Neither attempt worked, and she let out a loud screech when her face hit the snow. Robyn sighed. She never learns.

Robyn peered out of the alley, studiously avoiding the soft light of the lamps. A man walked slowly down the center of the road, where the ice was the thinnest. His figure was dimly lit by a handheld lantern. He walked with a mesmeric sway, almost as if he were drunk. Deep shadows played around the lantern light, cast across the road like a thick blanket.

Moment of truth, Robyn thought. She turned to Gala and whispered a command. “Stay here.”

“Is that him?” Came her reply. Robyn closed her eyes in frustration, trying to compose herself. “Are we hitting him today?”

“Did you hear what I told you?” She whispered furiously.

“Of course, I just—”

“Do as I say.”

Seconds passed like honey through a strainer. Robyn studied the path the man walked, gauging the distance she would have to travel to reach him.

“Yes,” She replied belatedly.

“Yes?”

“Yes, we are hitting him today. Now stay here, understand?”

“Yes ma’am.”

Robyn felt a twinge of guilt. Gala never used formal language unless she felt properly admonished. No time for that now, she thought. She went back to studying her surroundings.

Robyn slithered back into the complete darkness of the alley only seconds before the man passed them. His head was bowed, gaze firmly on his own feet. Fools, always worried about slipping, never about what is happening around them.

Robyn turned to Gala, and placed a broad, callused hand on her head. The girl smiled up at her, and Robyn smiled back, then winked. “Don’t move. I will be right back.”

She flowed forward, movement like quicksilver. Every step was calculated, planned and reiterated upon an incalculable number of times. She stalked forward on silent feet. Then, she was alive with the thrill of the chase.