Janice Hardy - The Shifter

Stealing eggs is a lot harder than stealing the whole

The Elder stared down at me, looking as solid as

Strength left my legs, and I flopped into the weeds

Dont hurt me, a low voice said matter-of-factly, as if

Wait! I called after Enzie, but she was already running

We left the Sanctuary and turned right, toward one of

I got as far as the bridge before I stumbled

The League had never looked so mean.

Are you a Healer or not?

No! It couldnt be true. Curling into a ball and

Punctual as well as smart, Zertanik said as the clock

Agony swiped my knees out from under me. I collapsed

I couldnt fail here. Tali wasnt safe. Danello and the

What do we do now? Soek whispered, his gaze darting

We hit the guards. I landed dead center on one

Nya!

Theyre alive? I repeated, wanting to believe it, but afraid

Moving with the mob was a lot easier than fighting

Danello! I dove forward as he collapsed, catching him before

Had my anger poisoned the pynvium?

Everyone raced forward and grabbed a cot, dragging them away

I gripped the arms of my chair. They couldnt prove

Pain exploded from the Slab, slamming me back against a

So I told him Id be delighted to empty it

Danello carried me out. No matter how hard I tried,

S tealing eggs is a lot harder than stealing the whole chicken. With chickens, you just grab a hen, stuff her in a sack, and make your escape. But for eggs, you have to stick your hand under a sleeping chicken. Chickens dont like this. They wake all spooked and start pecking holes in your arm, or your face, if its close. And they squawk something terrible.

The trick is to wake the chicken first , then go for the eggs. Im embarrassed to say how long it took me to figure this out.

Good morning, little hen, I sang softly. The chicken blinked awake and cocked her head at me. She didnt get to squawking, just flapped her wings a bit as I lifted her off the nest, and shed settle down once I tucked her under my arm. Id overheard that trick from a couple of boys Id unloaded fish with last week.

A voice came from beside me. Dont move.

Two words I didnt want to hear with someone elses chicken under my arm.

I froze. The chicken didnt. Her scaly feet flailed toward the eggs that should have been my breakfast. I looked up at a cute night guard not much older than me, perhaps sixteen. The night was more humid than usual, but a slight breeze blew his sand-pale hair. A soldiers cut, but a month or two grown out.

Stay calm, stay alert . As Grannyma used to say, if youre caught with the cake, you might as well offer them a piece. Not sure how that applied to chickens, though.

Join me for breakfast when your shift ends? I asked. Sunrise was two hours away.

He smiled but aimed his rapier at my chest anyway. It was nice to have a handsome boy smile at me in the moonlight, but his was a sad, sorry-only-doing-my-job smile. Id learned to tell the difference between smiles a lot faster than Id figured out the egg thing.

So, Heclar, he said over his shoulder, you do have a thief. Guess I was wrong.

Rancher Heclar strutted into view, bearing an uncanny resemblance to the chicken trying to peck meruffled, sharp beaked, and beady eyed. He harrumphed and set his fists against his hips. I told you crocodiles werent getting them.

Im no chicken thief, I said quickly.

Then whats that? The night guard flicked his rapier tip toward the chicken and smiled again. Friendlier this time, but his deep brown eyes had twitched when he bent his wrist.

A chicken. I blew a stray feather off my chin and peered closer. His knuckles were white from too tight a grip on so light a weapon. That had to mean joint pain, maybe even knuckleburn, though he wasnt old enough for it. The painful joint infection usually hit older dockworkers. I guess thats why he had a crummy job guarding chickens instead of aristocrats. My luck hadnt been that great either.

Look, I said, I wasnt going to steal her. She was blocking the eggs.

The night guard nodded like he understood and turned to Heclar. Shes just hungry. Maybe you could let her go with a warning?

Arrest her, you idiot! Shell get fed in Dorsta.

Dorsta? I gulped. Listen, two eggs for breakfast is hardly worth prison

Thieves belong in prison!

I jerked back and my foot squished into chicken crap. Lots of it. It dripped out from every coop in the row. There had to be at least sixty filthy coops along the lakeside half of the isle alone. Ill work off the eggs. What about two eggs for every row of coops I clean?

Youll only steal three.

Not if he watches me. I tipped my head at the night guard. I could handle the smell if I had cute company while I worked. He might even get extra pay out of it, which could earn me some goodwill if we ever bumped into each other in the early-morning moonlight again. How about one egg per row?

The night guard pursed his lips and nodded. Pretty good deal there.

Arrest her already!

I heaved the chicken. She squawked, flapping and scratching in a panic. The night guard yelped and dropped the rapier. I ran like hell.

Stop! Thief!

Self-righteous ranchers I could outrun, even on their own property, but the night guard? His hands might be bad, but his feetand reflexesworked just fine.

I rounded a stack of broken coops an arm-swipe faster than he did. Without slowing, I dodged left, cutting up a corn-littered row of coops running parallel to Farm-Market Canal. It gained me a few paces, but he had the reach on my short legs. No chance of outrunning him on a straightaway.

Swerving right, I yanked an empty market crate off one of the coops. It clattered to the ground between me and the night guard.

Aah! A thud and a crack, followed by impressive swearing.

I risked a glance behind. Broken crate pieces lay scattered across the row. The night guard limped a little, but it hadnt slowed him much. Id gained only another few paces.

The row split ahead, cutting through the waist-high coops like the canals that crisscrossed Geveg. I veered left toward Farm-Market Bridge, my side throbbing hard. Forget making it off the isle. I wasnt going to make it off the ranch .

More market crates blocked the row a dozen paces from the bridge. The crates were knee high and a pace wide, with tendrils of loose, twisted wire sticking up like lakeweed. Didnt Heclar ever clean his property? I cleared the crates a step before the night guard. His fingers raked the back of my shirt and snagged the hem. I stumbled, arms flailing, reaching for anything to stop my fall.

The ground did it for me.

I sucked back the breath Id lost and inhaled a lungful of dust and feathers. The night guard crashed over the crates a choking gasp later and hit the ground beside me. Dried corn flew out of the crate and speckled the ground.

I hacked up grime while he swore and grabbed his leg. Hed left a pretty good chunk of his shin on one of the crates, and his bent ankle looked sprained for sure, maybe broken.