Little Thieves (Little Thieves, #1)

by Margaret Owen

To the gremlin girls, I would like to tell you something inspiring, but the truth is, when life closes a door for us, it doesn’t always open a window. The good news is: That’s what bricks are for.

Gisele-Berthilde Ludwila von Falbirg of the Sovabin Principality, Prinzessin-Wahl of the Blessed Empire of Almandy. Soon to be Markgräfin Gisele you-get-the-idea von Reigenbach of the empire’s largest territory, the border march of Bóern, once its margrave gets around to a wedding.

Komte Gustav is a withered ghoul of a man in a tunic pricey enough to feed Eisendorf Village through Winterfast, and yet incredibly it does nothing to help the piss-puddle where his personality should be.

He’s been instigating skirmishes like your garden-variety invade-a-kingdom-because-Papi-didn’t-love-me-best nobleman,

here’s the thing about stealing from people like the Count and Countess von Eisendorf: Odds are they deserve it. And instead of sitting around gathering dust, their riches can go to someone who deserves to be rich. (Me. That’s usually me.)

From Adalbrecht Auguste-Gebhard von Reigenbach, Lord of Minkja, Margrave of Bóern, High and Noble Commander of the Legions of the South, Loyal Servant of the Blessed Empire of Almandy: Greetings.’” Saints and martyrs, that has to be half the letter alone, right?

All in all, he gives the impression of a collection of billiard cues that unionized to solve crimes.

In the world I knew, there were three reasons a person would be wanted: for profit, pleasure, or power. If you could satisfy only one, they used you. Two, they saw you. Three, they served you.

My answer was what you would expect of a thirteen-year-old who was asked to choose between her parents: no.

I didn’t know how to tell them I didn’t want to choose which godmother I loved best. I didn’t know how to say I wanted to be more than a servant. I had no words at all to say I’d thought I was their daughter, not a debt to be collected.

Minkja isn’t so much a city as a hostile architectural takeover.

Two in the corner are in a bleary, heated debate, and from the sound of it, they’re agreeing, just too angry and beer soaked to know it.

Behind us, wooden stools clatter to the floor, and grunts and swearing tell me the not-a-debate has erupted into violent agreement.

The body problem, at least, I can solve. “Ragne.” I push myself back to my feet, inch by weary inch. “Have you had dinner?”

“I was already useful last night, and now I am tired,” Ragne says irritably, curling into a ball. “And you are mean, so I don’t want to help you. Good night.”

It turns out the keys to a child’s heart are weapons and card scams.

they got bored.” “And so they are throwing knives instead.” Umayya shakes her head, then surveys the damage. “Ah, it could be worse. At least they’re not throwing knives at each other. No one throw knives at each other!” At least three orphans sag with disappointment.

Only someone raised as a princess could believe that following the rules would protect her.

“I don’t think she likes you very much,” Ragne yawns, curling up for another nap. “No,” I agree, “she doesn’t.” “She smells nice, though.” “So does cyanide.”

Adalbrecht made a name for himself: the Golden Wolf of Bóern. (He’s a blond, and House Reigenbach’s symbol is the wolf. What can I say? Soldiers aren’t usually prized for their command of poetic imagery.)

Plenty of nobility shrug off a winter-spring romance for political gain, but I was raised to be a maidservant, not a princess. A maidservant learns quickly that when a full-grown man desires a girl half his age, it is not out of love, but hunger.

You see, Adalbrecht von Reigenbach is not just dangerous in the common way of Almandy’s nobles, the casual threat of working for those who value your obedience more than your life. No, the danger of the Golden Wolf is that he takes what he wants.

But I know what he is when there is no one around. I know what he is to girls who don’t have the protection of royal blood. I can only imagine he is worse inside his own castle.

(Ragne, at least, is more than happy to claim the cookies for herself. Unfortunately, that means I have to watch her eat them, which is a little like watching a gingerbread-family massacre.)

I realize I have made a truly unfortunate mistake. Is it that I just dropped another human being into an icy river in manacles and thus (probably) to his death? Hardly. I think we can all agree that the encyclopedic prick had it coming.

I shoot her a dirty look. “I liked you better before you figured out how to do smartass.”

Even now I can feel a tiny voice insisting, It was only when they were angry, they were scared, they gave you a place in their home, and you could have worked harder, and—and it could have been worse— But that voice comes from a part of me that would forgive anything just for a motherly pat on the head. And if I listen, it will eat me alive.

I contemplate breaking my plate over Adalbrecht’s head, but decide it would be too much effort.

It’s been over a year since I learned what sort of man Markgraf von Reigenbach is, but a lesson like that lives in your bones.

Lähl is the kind of district that you smell before you see,

Trinity of want, after all. When all you can offer is profit, they use you.

“STRANGER! KIDNAPPING! HELP!” Good instinct, but so unhelpful right now.

“I wanted to say hello again,” Ragne continues, smiling very toothily, “and to tell you it’s my job to look after the Vanja, even though she is mean. If you hurt her, I will turn myself into a bear and kill you. That’s all. Goodbye!”

All that time I spent stressing over the looming threat of this day-old breadstick with a thirst for justice, and it was all a bluff.

“I never wanted to be your servant!” I almost scream. “I wanted to be your daughter!”

For absolutely no reason whatsoever, I think about the knife in my boot. And the bottle of arsenic in my vanity. And the golden chain she’s wearing around her neck—if you don’t have your own garotte, you can always borrow a friend’s.

The most prominent dead soldier at Adalbrecht’s feet also bears an uncanny resemblance to the portrait of his father a foot away. You know, subtle.

Adalbrecht, I discover, is a lot like Yannec. (And not the way I’d prefer, which is dead in the Yssar.)

Careful what you say, for as long as the Tears hold you, you’ll speak only the truth.” What a fun, terrible new complication.

I don’t know if it is real, but what matters is that it is true.

No matter how many cards I lay between myself and the rest of the world, no matter how many lies I tell, how many lives I steal, it will never be enough. I will never escape the ghost in the mirror. I will never escape her, because I am haunted by myself.

I see myself for what I am: a scared girl, alone in a cruel world, abandoned by family and friend, who would rather turn herself to bloodstained stone than let anyone get close enough to leave another scar. A girl who would rather die than serve anyone ever again. Even myself. And it is killing me.

I don’t know what’s more annoying: that I might actually die here thanks to my own series of terrible decisions, or that with the Augur’s Tears in my blood, I know this guilt isn’t a lie.

You are far too aggravating to die here.

“Can you talk like me, though?” Ragne turns to the rest of the table and screws up her face into a garish leer. “I am the Vanja. I take things and I am mean for no reason.”

And just like that, we are back in the thorns, and I don’t care how much I bleed if it means I can wrap some around her throat.

“If we’re keeping ledgers, then I hope there’s a line for the scars on my back. I hope there’s a line for my damn childhood, Gisele, because your family stole that and got away with it. You’re angry over losing a year, I’m angry over losing a decade.”

I’m trying to think through what exactly I’m supposed to be apologizing for. The fact that there are multiple possibilities is, perhaps, part of the problem.

Just because you can survive without someone doesn’t mean they’re unwanted.

I know how to beg forgiveness and curtsy and tug my forelock like a good little maid trying to keep her job, but I don’t know how to apologize like I mean it.