AS THEY WANDERED down the crammed streets, she asked the boy, “Am I so obvious?”
“What, that you’re fresh from the hills, like the scratch said? Too right you’re obvious!” He had an odd way of speaking, and an accent she’d never heard before. His voice had a swing in its step, like someone walking in the city on his day off.
“No. Is it so obvious I’m not a boy?”
“Well …” he drawled. “It’s not like you’re the only one to have that idea. When we first arrived in Prague, my sis thought it’d be easier to move around the city alone as a boy than as a girl. Her getup worked for about five seconds. But she’s a real stunner, a drop-dead good-looker. She takes after me. Don’t worry, though. You do all right in a pair of trous, but I got a sharp eye.”
They reached the door of a pub called the Shorn Lamb and the boy led her through a maze of stuffy rooms. He brought her to a table in the corner and ordered two big bowls of stew from a woman with more blue tattoos on her arm than teeth in her mouth.
After she left, the boy stuck out his hand and pumped Petra’s when she took it. “Name’s Neel.”
“I’m Petra,” she said.
She still had her doubts about Neel, however, and so decided to warn Astrophil. She would try communicating with him silently. Yeah, right, she told herself, like that worked the last thousand times you tried it. But she concentrated. She felt something tickle in the back of her mind. Had she imagined it? She followed the slight buzzing sensation and focused on it. It was like the almost-silent hum of Astrophil’s internal gears, a sound she heard so often in her ear that she forgot about it. But the humming in her mind now was something she felt, as if Astrophil were inside her head. Certain she would not be heard, she nevertheless thought hard, Lie low. If he discovers and takes you, he could sell you for more krona than he can imagine.
The hum skipped. But Astrophil controlled his surprise, and sent this stern thought to Petra: There is no need to worry about me. Keep your eyes on him. I have been lying low, in case you did not notice.
An astonished, elated feeling washed through her. Astro! Astro?
What?
You can hear me! I can hear you! I did it! I did it!
Yes, yes. You did. But we can celebrate later. For the moment, I beg you to be sensible and pay attention to that street thief you have inexplicably decided to befriend.
Neel was studying her. Excitement had illuminated her face. “You’re a moody one,” he said. “Glowering one moment and glowing the next.” He paused. “And you’re quick, for a kitchin.”
“A what?”
“A kitchin morte.”
“Um …”
“A girl. A kitchin is a girl.”
“Oh. So … is that word from your language? Your voice sounds different. Of course, no one here talks like folk in Okno, but you … are different,” she finished lamely.
“Kitchin morte is Cant. I got my own language.”
“What is Cant?”
“Cant’s what the Company of Rogues speak. The Company’s like a … like a guild. A group of no-good-doers who work together.”
“You mean thieves.”
“Thieves, sure. And jugglers, tinkers, actors, hucksters, ruffians, coney-catchers, cardsharpers, play-beggars, hey-passers, pot-whippers, fortune-tellers, and the like. And their kids.”
“Are you part of the Company of Rogues?”
“Nah. I got my own people.”
“You’re a Gypsy.”
“The word Gypsy … well, it’s not exactly in a crate.”
Petra paused. “Do you mean ‘inaccurate’?”
He swallowed a mouthful of the stew and then pointed at her with his spoon. “It ain’t right, see? Gypsy means ‘Egyptian.’ I don’t come from Egypt. We call ourselves Roma, and we speak Romany. It’s a funny thing …” he trailed off, looking at her. “It’s strange you caught me lifting your purse. Roma are flash thieves. And I have never been caught.” He was silent for a moment. Then he lifted his right hand and pinched his forefinger and thumb together.
Petra yelped and dropped her spoon. She rubbed her left arm, which had been resting on the table several feet from Neel.
“Interesting.” He lifted his hand again.
Petra resisted the urge to slap it away. “It is not so interesting if you’re the one getting pinched.”
“Very interesting,” he pronounced, lowering his hand. “You weren’t supposed to feel that.”
“What did you do? How did you do it?”
Neel lifted his hand again. Petra’s spoon lifted into the air and plopped into her stew. “Eat up.”
She stared at him. “Can you move things with your mind?”
“Nah. It’s more like …” He flexed his hand. “Like I’ve got extensions. Like my fingers are real, real long but you can only see a little bit.”
“Doesn’t that get in the way? When you eat with a spoon, are you grabbing it with the tips of your real fingers? Are the invisible parts hanging around and jabbing into your face?”
He laughed. “That’d be awkward! No, the ghosts come and go. If I feel myself wanting something, like a fine ribbon for my sis or to play a joke on someone, my fingers just kind of grow longer. The ghosts go away when I don’t need em. It’s very useful.”
He took in her expression of rapt attention. Then he leaned forward across the table.
“Did you ever hear that people who lose a leg sometimes feel the part that’s missing?” he asked. “That they can twitch their ghostly toes and feel an ankle that ain’t there?”
“No. Is that true?”
“Of course it is. Why, I met a rogue who’d got his leg crushed by a horse. The mangled bits were chopped off below his knee, but he swore he could still feel jolts of pain in his ghost limb and had dreams of walking.”
“How do you know he could really feel the leg that wasn’t there? I’ve never heard of such a thing.”
“Just because you don’t know something doesn’t mean it’s not true.”
“I didn’t say I didn’t believe you.” Petra was uneasy at the thought that someone might still feel a missing part of the body. Could her father feel his phantom eyes? Did they cause him pain? He had never mentioned it.