I grabbed the handrail and took the stairs two at a time. The wood was silent under my fingers, drowned under the weight of too much paint and too little care. Even the building’s song was hushed to the point of being inaudible. The floorboards had been treated as badly as the handrail, and the building’s network of golden rivers fractured by too many extensions. Neither was able to give me anything on our suspect’s location.
At the top of the stairs was an open door, its lock smashed and the frame splintered. I called a knife to my hand and warily stepped through. Little in the way of light crept into the room, despite the windows on the street side of the building being uncovered and quite large, and the shadows were thick and heavy. I couldn’t immediately see our thief—or anyone else for that matter—and there was no sound beyond the normal creaking of an old building. I had no sense that he or anyone else was up here. But unless he’d gone out a window—and the breakage I’d heard hadn’t sounded like window glass—then he had to be.
I edged forward, keeping my back to the wall and the knife in front of me. The inner tension ratcheted up several notches with every step, and its force echoed through the knife, sending littlejabs of lightning into the air. In the deeper reaches of the room, the shadows briefly stirred.
“I know you’re there,” I said softly. “You need to come out.”
He didn’t reply. No surprise there.
I took several more sideways steps and raised the knife. The lightning leaping from its tip caressed the stained glass pendant light almost directly above me and spun rainbows across the ceiling. It revealed that this section of the upper floor had been converted into a proper living space. Immediately in front of me was a living area, while to my right were two doorways—the one closest to the stairs being a bathroom while the other appeared to be a small bedroom. I continued on warily, the knife’s dancing light slowly revealing the rest of the room. Beyond the living area was a tiny kitchenette, and beyond that, a number of bookcases and— The thought froze as a figure darted across the room and disappeared through a door down the far end.
My first instinct was to run after him, but with the building’s song giving me almost no information as to whether he’d been up here alone, I wasn’t about to take any undue risks, no matter how desperately we needed to catch the bastard. I continued on warily, sweeping the knife’s light in front of me, seeing nothing beyond the glittering glass shards lying at the base of the cabinet he’d broken into and the dust that danced through the air. I paused at the door and cautiously peered around the frame, discovering a staircase leading up to the roof rather than another room. The steps were metal and didn’t look particularly safe, but if our elf had gone up them, they should hold me. Of course, he was a young dark elf, and not only walked lighter, but probably weighed a whole lot less, too.
I moved up warily, my footsteps echoing softly and the knife’s little flicks of lightning continuing to fold the shadows away. At the top was a rather ratty-looking metal door; at the base of it lay the remains of a padlock. If our thief had beenresponsible for the lock’s destruction, it was unlikely the door held any other magical protections, but just to be sure, I touched the knife’s tip to the handle. Lightning buzzed around it for a few seconds then danced away. The door itself held no threat; there was no guarantee the same could be said for whatever lay beyond it.
Again, the thunder rumbled. This time, Beira’s voice was clearer and sharper.You’re letting him get away. Move.
Don’t you have something else to do?I snapped back in annoyance.
Yes, so hurry up so I can get to it.
I swore at her, heard the distant echo of laughter in the thunder, and kicked the door open with a little more force than necessary. It crashed back against the frame of a covered rooftop terrace—a very old one, if the rusted state of the metal framework and the amount of moss and mold covering the polycarbonate roof was anything to go by—sending sparks flying. The wind sharpened around me, whispering of movement. Our thief had just leapt over onto the next building. I swore, caught the wind, and cast it after him, then hurried after it. He swung around, eyeing me, his expression amused—arrogant—as he slapped a hand to his shoulder. The harp came to life, the notes once again forming their conga line as the thief’s body began to dissolve.
The bastard was not going to get away from me. Not this time.
I split my leash, ordering one arm around his body and the other at the object he was gripping, ripping it out of his fingers. The notes died, and our thief solidified.
He swore—long and very colorfully—and tried to run. I tightened my leash around his waist, ripped him off the roof, into the air, and let him hang there for several seconds. The darkness within wanted to do far more; wanted to damage himas he’d tried to damage me, but I swallowed the urge and plucked the still-glowing pectoral from the wind’s grip, shoving it into the back pocket of my jeans as I walked over to the edge of the roof.
“You down there, Mathi?”
“I am indeed.” He appeared from under the awning covering the next building’s back door. “I take it from all the bellowing that you’ve caught our thief?”
“Yep. I have the pectoral, too, so he can’t escape. I’ll lower him down to you.”
“You able to keep him bound by the wind until Henrick gets here and we can contain him properly?”
“Sure.” I paused. “You keep restraints in your car?”
“I keep many things in my car. Some of them would probably horrify you.”
Of that, I had no doubt. I guided our thief over the rooftop and down into the laneway. He was still screaming, but with the air now whirling around him, keeping his voice contained, it didn’t really matter. Once I’d placed him next to Mathi, I severed my direct connection to the wind while keeping our thief restrained, then turned and made my way back down the old metal stairs to investigate what he’d been doing in that room. The glass case he’d broken into was one of four sitting on the top of a wide display table, and the three he hadn’t touched held rather ancient-looking leather books, meaning there was a fair chance that the one he’d broken into had held something similar. But how had he known which of the four... The thought stalled as the soft sound of wood creaking rose from the floor below.
Someone had just entered the shop. Slowly. Cautiously.
I had no idea if that someone was a thief taking advantage of the front door being open or one of the many police officers whodid regular patrols around this area, but I wasn’t about to chance being sidelined for hours explaining myself to a copper.
I quickly but carefully made my way back to the metal stairs and went up. After closing the upper door, I hurried over to the terrace’s side, called to the wind, and asked it to lower me down. It did so with such vigor that it tore a gasp from my lips. I hit the ground a little too hard, heard Beira say,Next time, order a soft landing,as the wind whipped her presence away, and would have fallen had Mathi not grabbed my arm.
“Seriously?” he said. “We’re now leaping off rooftops when there’s a perfectly good fire escape not ten meters away?”
“I wasn’t to know that, and it wasn’t like I had time to look. Someone else was in the building.”
“Then we had best move.” He grabbed our thief and dragged him toward the parking area behind the Mediterranean restaurant a few doors down. Henrick waited near the Merc’s trunk, several thin strips of plastic in his hands.
“The usual, sir?” he said.
“You have a ‘usual’?” I glanced at Mathi, eyebrows rising. “Just how often to you indulge in a little kidnapping?”
