A boy with a scar on his face was talking to one of the other boys. He looked up at Lift. “Hey,” he said. “I know you. You saw my mom, right? Did she say when she was coming back?”

What was his name again? “Mik?”

“Yeah,” he said. “Look, I don’t belong here, right? I don’t remember the last few weeks very well, but … I mean, I’m not an orphan. I’ve still got a mom.”

It was him, the boy who had been dropped off the night before. You were drooling then, Lift thought. And even at lunch, you were talking like an idiot. Storms. What did I do to you? She couldn’t heal people that were different in the head, or so she’d thought. What was the difference with him? Was it because he had a head wound, and wasn’t born this way?

She didn’t remember healing him. Storms … she said she wanted control, but she didn’t even know how to use what she had. Her race to this place proved it.

The Stump strode back in with a large plate and began handing out pancakes to the children. She got to Lift, then handed her two. “This is the last,” she said, wagging her finger.

“Thanks,” Lift mumbled as the Stump moved on. The pancakes were cold, and unfortunately of a variety she’d already tried—the ones with sweet stuff in the middle. Her favorite. Maybe the Stump wasn’t all bad.

She’s a thief and a thug, Lift reminded herself as she ate, restoring her awesomeness. She’s laundering spheres and using an orphanage as cover. But maybe even a thief and a thug could do some good along the way.

“I’m so confused,” Wyndle said. “Mistress, what are you thinking?”

She looked toward the thick door to the outside. The old man was surely dead by now. Nobody would care; likely nobody would notice. One old man, found dead in an alley after the storm.

But Lift … Lift would remember him.

“Come on,” she said. She stepped over to the door. When the Stump’s back was turned to scold a child, Lift pushed up the bar and slipped outside.

Chapter 18

18

THE hungry sky rumbled above, dark and angry. Lift knew that feeling. Too much time between meals, and looking to eat whatever it could find, never mind the cost.

The storm hadn’t fully arrived yet, but from the distant lightning, it seemed that this new storm didn’t have a stormwall. Its onset wouldn’t be a sudden, majestic event, but instead a creeping advance. It loomed like a thug in an alley, knife out, waiting for prey to wander past.