Borderland 02: Borderland by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General Fiction
ISBN: 9780451145277
Publisher: ROC
Published: 1986-10-01T00:00:00+00:00

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BELLAMY BACH

Exile

She never talked about Elfland.

She had lost all but the echo of her accent, dressed pure Old City from the fairy dust in her hair to her boots' pointed toes—she should have fit right in with the street rabble down in Soho. But even if one did not immediately guess her origins, there was something noticeably odd about the girl (this in a city where oddity is the norm), a fey sort of wistfulness that had nothing to do with this world or life on the Border.

I first saw Dez on Chrystoble Street, my eyes caught by her halo of hair the color and texture of dandelions that have gone to seed. From that color, and the slanted eyes, the high cheekbones, the death-white skin, you did not need to see the ears hidden by the dandelion fluff to know of a certainty that they were pointed. I was startled to see her there, calmly eating a bagel on the steps of the Light-works. Trust Dez to never notice that she had stumbled into a human neighborhood, and was holding her picnic on the Pack's front stoop. There were a couple of Pack members watching her from the center courtyard, probably too surprised to find an elf on their turf to decide just what to do about it. I considered rescuing the girl, hustling her away before the Pack made their move. But I'm not prone to gallantry, not when I have to risk my ass to do it. I shrugged and went my way.

The second time I saw her she was also in trouble-squeezed between drunken toughs and a brick wall in a rowdy crowd milling around the Dancing Ferret. Dez, as you may have gathered, was often in trouble—that girl could get herself mugged in a room full of grandmothers. She attracted the unsavory element the way the Riverside Market attracts flies. It was terribly unsporting, two big humans against one slender elvin girl; but once again I did not feel compelled to play knight errant. You learn to take care of yourself first down in Soho. If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.

The third time I saw Dez, I was the one in trouble.

I'm one of the fastest lock-pickers south of Ho Street, a skill that earned me half a year in the Juvie Jail on Water Street before I made good my promise to my mother and went legit with my current job in the kitchen of the Hard Luck Cafe. But I was seriously contemplating returning to a life of crime when I spotted the sweetest, sleekest motorcycle I'd ever seen, a vintage 1989 Italian racer imported up from the World and modified for the Borderlands, locked only with a flimsy human lock and a chain. The chain was wrapped around a steel post in the alley behind Danceland. Anyone stupid enough or cheap enough to leave the bike alone without a proper spell-lock deserved to have it carted away.

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