“What kind of ‘strange stuff’?” asked the scribe in yellow, the spindly fellow who looked silly and balding without a hat. “Unusual things happen every day in the city! Do you want the report of the man who claims his pig was born with two heads? What about the man who says he saw the shape of Yaezir in the lichen on his wall? The woman who had a premonition her sister would fall, and then she fell?”

“Nah,” Lift said. “That’s normal strange.”

“What’s abnormal strange, then?” he asked, exasperated.

Lift started glowing. She called upon her awesomeness, so much that it started radiating out of her skin, like she was a starvin’ sphere.

Beside her, the seeds on top of her uneaten pancake sprouted, growing long, twisting vines that curled around one another and spat out leaves.

“Somethin’ like this,” Lift said, then glanced to the side. Great. She’d ruined the pancake.

The scribes stared at her in awe, so she clapped loudly, sending them back to their work. Wyndle sighed, and she knew what he must be thinking. Three hours, and nothing relevant so far. He’d been right—yeah, they wrote stuff down in this city. That was the problem. They wrote it all down.

“There’s another message from the emperor for you,” Ghenna said. “Um, Your Pancake … Storms that sounds stupid.”

Lift grinned, then looked over at the paper. The words were written in a flowing, elegant hand. Probably Fat Lips.

“‘Lift,’” Ghenna read. “‘Are you going to come back? We miss you here.’”

“Even Fat Lips?” Lift asked.

“‘Vizier Noura misses you too. Lift, this is your home now. You don’t need to live on the streets anymore.’”

“What am I supposed to do there, if I do come back?”

“‘Anything you want,’” Gawx wrote. “‘I promise.’”

That was the problem.

“I don’t know what I’m gonna do yet,” she said, feeling strangely … isolated, despite the roomful of people. “We’ll see.”

Ghenna eyed her at that. She apparently thought that what the emperor of Azir wanted, he should get—and little Reshi girls shouldn’t make a habit of denying him.

The door cracked open, and the guard captain from the city watch peeked in. Lift leaped off the desk, running over to her, then hopping up to see what she was holding. A report. Great. More words.

“What did you find?” Lift said eagerly.

“You are right,” the captain said. “One of my colleagues in the quarter’s watch has been watching the Tashi’s Light Orphanage. The woman who runs it—”

“The Stump,” Lift said. “Meanest thing. Eats the bones of children for afternoon snack. Once had a staring contest with a painting and won.”