A Cat, a Thief, and a Wizard

Seth's only thought the instant he was falling was 'air cushion'. He'd formed most of the spell in his mind already, and he grabbed for it with all the intent and focus he could while panicking.

It mostly worked. A sharp gust of air broke the worst of the fall, but not all of it. Seth had the wind knocked out of him when he hit the cobblestones heavily, but not so hard that it broke bones. He'd be feeling it for a few days, if he didn't heal it away.

Hayfield was whimpering, and was catching his breath with soft sobs.

"Are you alright?" Seth asked when he had the breath to speak. A magical light on the warehouse across the street created a circle of light in the chilly night. The four of them were lying on the cobblestone street in front of the barn at the edge of the light.

"I think my leg's broken," Hayfield managed to say between sobs. "Booth?"

They both looked over at Hayfield's brother. Neither he nor Ned had moved yet. The next thing Seth noticed was all the blood. There was a lot of it. Both Ned and Booth had cut each other, but this was much more than that.

"Booth?" Seth asked, and rolled him over.

Booth coughed, and struggled to breathe. He'd had the wind knocked out of him too, and probably knocked his head pretty good too.

Ned, on the other hand, was dead.

Booth had stabbed him near the throat, and the fall broke his neck. The knife was the same one he'd made look like a ring. There was no sign of the white ring.

Seth stared at the body. Just to be sure, he cast Detect Life.

Dead.

It wasn't the first time Seth had seen death. It wouldn't be the last either. It was still jarring, even if this time was less personal.

Ned being dead solved some problems but caused others.

"You killed him," Seth said to Booth. "Did you mean to kill him? You had to. You stabbed him. Even if he didn't die in the fall, he'd have bled to death in another minute."

"I wasn't thinking about it. I was just fighting him," Booth said.

"You weren't thinking about it? Booth, this is murder." Seth thought he should be outraged, but his heart wasn't in it. While he didn't think Ned deserved to die, he wasn't bothered that it happened.

Seth was surprised at how little he was bothered by it. It was a problem to be solved, not the crippling moral dilemma he would have expected it to be. He wondered at who he was becoming that this was just another problem. His dad would be ashamed.

"I didn't mean to kill him, but I'm not sorry he's dead. Even if he didn't kill my sister, he was definitely going to kill me. It was either me or him."

"I didn't plan for covering up a murder," Seth said. He ran a hand through his hair and then looked at the blood spatters the hand came away with.

Booth got to his feet, still staring at Ned.

Seth tried to brush the blood off his hands. "If you'd just followed the plan, we'd have gotten everyone away. What in the darkness Below were you thinking?"

"I didn't think they'd followed us. They never made a move the whole time. When we were nearly to Duvessa's place and they still hadn't done anything, I thought they'd gone after you instead." Booth let out a long breath. "I thought I would be rescuing all of you."

"There was a plan. You showed up at the most dangerous point for us to get discovered. And you led him right to us. Why didn't you follow the plan?"

"You sound like Duvessa. She kept saying I had to follow the plan, too," Booth said. He was brushing at the blood on his clothes.

"Just how wrong do you have to be when Duvessa is more right than you?" Seth said. "Your siblings were put in danger because of you. First by the ring, and now by not trusting the rest of us."

"I know that. You can shut the fuck up about it now," Booth said, but he didn't have a lot of energy in it.

"There isn't a lot we can do. We need to clean up or run away, and do it before a patrol comes by," Seth said. Booth would never agree to reporting the death.

"Can't we just dump him in a passing corpse cart?" Booth asked.

"No. First, it's after dark. Second, they don't really have those in this district. The people here are used to funerals and stuff," Seth said. "Carrying him back to the East Side to find one would be a bad idea."

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Seth looked up at the loft door, but didn't see anyone there. Selendrith must have gone down to help Owen. Ned had said the summons were his, so the scorpion should have dispersed with Ned's death.

He looked around for Booth's other siblings, and for Mau. She should be here somewhere, but he didn't see her.

Selendrith opened the barn door and took a moment to look at them. She glared at Booth, stared particularly long at Ned, then turned to Seth. "I need help," she said, and led the way inside without waiting to see if he followed. "I gave Owen a general heal, and I don't have the mana left to run a diagnostic. He's not responding."

This was just getting worse.

If the scorpion had killed Owen… Seth couldn't finish the thought.

Selendrith had moved the barn lantern and it was on the floor next to Owen. Seth's heart clenched at how pale and still he was.

Seth quickly cast Detect Life, and it told him Owen was alive, and his life was strong. "He's alive," he said in relief.

"I knew that. What's wrong with him, and will he recover?"

He cast diagnostics next. Cuts and bruises, all minor. And venom, not so minor. "The scorpion stung him, at least twice that I can tell. I don't know what the venom does. We haven't gotten to poisons and that stuff in class."

"Is he in immediate danger, do you think?" Selendrith asked.

"No, Detect Life on him was really strong."

With Owen down, their chances of escaping were rapidly approaching zero. Even if Hayfield only had a single broken bone and got healing for it, he wouldn't be able to walk. He and the little ones would all need to be carried. Now Owen would need to be carried as well. There weren't enough hands to go around. And that still left Ned.

"Then maybe it's just a paralytic or a sleeping venom or something. I don't know what we could do for him right now anyway," Selendrith said. She looked past Seth's shoulder at the people outside. "Booth murdered that man."

"Yes. I don't know what to do either. They were planning on killing Booth, Ned said as much. He was also going to kill the older girl, Pantry. I don't think Booth intended to kill him, but I don't think I blame him."

Selendrith's gaze shifted to Seth. "You think this was self defense?"

Seth thought it over. "We went to all this effort because those kids were in danger. This is the danger we were trying to protect them from. Yes, Booth made mistakes. But I do think Ned's death was accidental. And, Ned was killed by the fall. The cut on his neck might not have killed him.

"Ned was the one to push you out when Pantry got away from him," she said thoughtfully, weighing the situation.

"Yes. I don't think Booth is a killer, Selendrith. He is a thief, and a bit scummy, but he's not a murderer."

"All right. I trust you. This is twice, Seth. I won't be helping him escape the consequences of his actions a third time."

"He is a loyal friend, Selendrith. He's doing his best to help his family."

"Then he should work harder at balancing his scales. He's taken quite a bit from all of you without giving back. Help me with Owen, please." Selendrith bent down to pick up Owen's feet.

"We should leave him here for the moment," Seth said. "We need a plan to deal with Ned first."

Selendrith put Owen's feet down. "Of course. Hiding dead bodies should come before moving living ones."

Seth couldn't tell if she was being sarcastic, or just had a dark sense of humor.

As far as Ned went, that started with a couple of choices. They could report the death as an accident. This was the right thing to do, but it would have repercussions. It was unlikely the authorities would believe the death was an accident, considering there was a stab wound near the guy's neck. That could result in all of them getting expelled, and Booth jailed.

So they wouldn't be reporting it. Next they could either leave the body, or hide it. Leaving the body could spawn an investigation. Depending on the diligence of the investigator, they could employ magic to trace the killers. This was unlikely for someone as poor and without social standing as Ned, but if the merchants of the area got nervous about random killings, it could happen.

That left hiding the body. Seth closed his eyes. It felt wrong to be covering up a death. He felt a little better that it did feel wrong to him. His dad's influence hadn't been completely lost. Maybe they should do the right thing and report it, and just face the consequences.

His thoughts chased themselves in circles. What was right warred with what was best. What would Mau suggest?

"Hey, have you seen Mau?" Seth asked Selendrith. "I haven't seen her recently."

"She's your familiar. Where is she?" Selendrith said, her tone completely neutral, as if he hadn't asked a really stupid question.

"Right," he said sheepishly. Seth reached for the familiar bond. She was outside, not far from where Booth and Hayfield were.

He found her, unconscious like Owen, lying in the remnants of an ink puddle. A quick spell reassured him that she was alive, and she was suffering from the same venom as Owen.

After checking Mau, Seth knelt beside Hayfield and cast a diagnostic. He'd broken his shin. The second bone in his calf was fine, and would help support the broken bone as it healed.

"It's not a bad break. Here, this will set it, and it should heal clean. Just don't walk on it for a week or so," Seth explained as he used his amulet on Hayfield's leg. While he was healing Hayfield, the distant sound of hooves caught Seth's attention.

"Someone's coming!" Booth said, hearing the hooves too, and scrambling over to his brother.

"Quick, everyone inside and get the door shut!" Seth scooped up Mau and scrambled inside.

Booth picked up Hayfield who whimpered when he was picked up.

Selendrith stopped at the puddle of blood surrounding Ned. "I'm not touching the blood," she said, "or the body."

Seth and Booth hurried to haul Ned's body inside the barn and around the corner. Selendrith started pulling the door shut when the coachman called out to her. She glanced back at the boys and didn't answer, but didn't finish shutting the door either.

They were caught. They couldn't flee with Hayfield, Owen, and Mau, and Seth didn't even know where Alley and the other little ones were.

The horses snorted as the carriage slowed to a stop. The coachman and a footman jumped down, the footman opening the carriage door.

Maybe it was because he'd been thinking of his father a few minutes before, or maybe it was because he was thinking about murders, but for some reason Seth thought the man climbing down out of the carriage was Gavin, the Palace guard that had killed his father. No sooner than he thought it, he realized it was impossible. Gavin was dead.

The man stepped into the light and picked up Loft's doll from where it lay on the cobblestones. He pulled a handkerchief from a pocket and dabbed at a blood spot on the doll.

"If you rinse it right away with hot water, the blood will come out," Benjamin said. He glanced around at the children. "It seems you've gotten yourself into a bit of trouble, Seth."