Chapter Text
"Let go, unkeep you!"
Shouts and grunts of pain exploded onto the drowsy night street. Through the door knocked off its hinges, the police led out about a dozen people — humans and insectas, adults and youths. Those who weren't too hungover tried to fight back, kicking and biting, swearing when a police baton connected with their heads. Not yet knowing it would be their last night in Stoln for years to come.
From a dark roof opposite the numberless house, another youth was watching the arrest. A girl of nineteen with the wings of a clothes moth was crouching behind a brick pipe. Her human legs, the most nimble of the gang, never made a sound as they found purchase on the dingy roof tiles.
The girl's black ponytail fluttered in the harsh autumn wind, and her pale face caught the moonlight almost as well as the white keeper ribbon tied into her hair. The squint that never left the girl's grey eyes took on a vengeful quality tonight.
Below, a dark-curled woman and a fair-haired mantis man were fighting to reach one another, held back by police gloves. Next to them, a plump magineer with a brown braid and beard directed his familiar to fly into a policeman's nose, but the little red-and-yellow spider was promptly caught by the wings and stuffed into a pocket on a grey uniform. The girl on the roof chuckled incredulously.
Keeper's ass, they're even arresting Picky. What bastards.
The woman who was led out last, coat around her shoulders, paused for a second in a crowd of younger gang members. She looked up into the black sky, its jagged shape cramped between the closely built houses. The woman's mosquito wings and wavy auburn ponytail caught the light of the police lantern.
"This is your fault," the girl on the roof whispered, knowing full well she wouldn't be seen or heard. As always. Her voice, low but young, had a hollow, slightly raspy quality, like it had done a lot of screaming. "See you never, Zanthis."
The mosquito woman's eyes kept searching the rooftops while the gang, half-dressed, got pushed into a carriage with barred windows. Only Picky could pass through those. Floya waited until the carriage had rattled away — in terms of cobblestones, their nameless street had long been balding.
Once silence came, it pinned her to the roof, wings and all. For a minute, Floya leaned her forehead against the brick pipe. Tears of shock stung her eyes.
I... did it. Fuck. Never thought tonight would be the night. She really shouldn't have pushed me.
In the November cold, Floya noticed her hands shaking despite the thick dark coat over her wings. Put on your gloves for once, girl, Zanthis' annoyed voice sighed in her head. Don't wanna lose that sleight of hand.
Her palm still tingled with the fluffy warmth of Zanthis' heavy head on the table, amid the empty mugs and bottles. Floya clenched her fists.
I decide what I lose now.
She jumped off the roof, let the wind lift her coat, and landed on the next roof with a controlled burst of wingwork.
She'd taken what she needed from the numberless house when everyone was passed out, and left behind more than enough for the police. She wouldn't show her wings at the trials. And she most certainly would not return here while the trashes turned the place upside down to see if any more stolen goods fell out.
Would she go back to her old folks? Fuck no. At nineteen, Floya felt no more love for her parents than when she'd run away at thirteen in her long-unwashed school uniform.
As a flier, any attic was hers for the night. She'd long secured a few spots all over the south bank of the Serenka to store part of her precious catches. Only an idiot put all her eggs in one basket.
Only an idiot would marry that mousy atelier blondie and insist on calling it happiness for four years straight.
In a way, Zanthis had gotten herself the life that Floya had always aimed for. Found a Good Human Girl, moved into her cozy flat on the north bank, made a fat baby with mosquito wings. But if it was working out so well, why had Zanthis felt the need to sneak a visit to the numberless house earlier that night, unannounced and wistful?
She couldn't say she liked her new family just fine, and then turn around and claim she missed the gang. Couldn't sit on two chairs at a time. One thing had to be untrue. And when that woman in a too-loose coat, a visiting matron she barely recognized, pushed her away, Floya understood where the loyalties of Zanthis Jawkes lay now.
She was not the daring thief Floya had once followed back to the den to demand a place on the gang. Not the patient but ruthless teacher who'd made Floya the best flier in all of Stoln. Not the apothecary's daughter who treated all their wounds without fussing and calculated the risks and gently sucked bad blood out of wounds with her second tongue after shit went off script. Now, it was some hag of thirty with an attitude and tits saggy from breastfeeding.
And to think I'd waited around for her. Hoping she'd get bored of her Medchel for good.
Floya Ashinken had spent the last six years of her life competing — with other gangs, other youngsters, herself. She was nearly twenty, and done.
Once she made it to her main attic hideout, she'd wail all she want, like the kid they all still thought her to be. She'd mourn everything at once, from the rush of shared night escapes to the boredom of the fifteenth card game of the day in the living room, behind the back of Zanthis' armchair. But Floya had taken much more than money.
From Rix, she'd learned which spices made a soup sing. Caillie had drilled a pickpocket's caution into her. Erdik had proven a decent free source of magineering knowledge, the clown that he was. After five years of observing him, Floya could get a beginner job at a workshop, and the rest would follow.
As for Zanthis... if she hadn't been faithful to her new life, she did not deserve her old one back. She'd always insisted a true Woodsman was loyal. She let people go easily if she knew their heart was not with the gang anyway.
Now it was Zanthis' turn to go.
Over her narrow shoulder, Floya cast one more look at the numberless house, its windows empty now. A faint smile, and the girl continued her moonlit walk over the rooftops, her dark hair and coat blowing in the wind.
Here lie The Stoln Woodsmen, a dumbass, inept, patronizing lot. May the door close softly behind us.