Prologue

    The grime on the streets squelches beneath my feet but I keep my face forward. The light of the fire I am escaping lights up the streets around me and there are people all around me watching the Duchess' house burn. Let it burn. I think. There was no one in that house that loved me. A couple men on the street stop me as I walk by them in my bloomers. The first man is tall with a wonderfully made suit on. If I didn't know any better I would say it was the workings of Earl Conley but he's only wearing a cheap knockoff. The second man is shorter than the first, almost as short as I am and he's wearing the dirty clothes of a street urchin. They both smile slyly at me. Men are men no matter where you go. I think to myself. Always after the parts you want to keep hidden.

    "Hey little lady." Says the second man. "Where would you be going on a night like this dressed like that. You want to go someplace and have some fun."

    I rolled my eyes inwardly. This one was as incompetent as they come. Saying things like that weren't going to get you a girl no matter where the girl was from. The first man, the one I assumed was an aristocrat stepped forward and pushed the second man back just a little.

    "Leave the little lady alone Dirk." He said. "She looked like she was headed someplace. You could just let her go by this once couldn't you?" He turned and winked at me and I knew what was going on here.

    These men knew what they were doing. They were practiced at it and had a whole script set out depending on who came their way. The second man, Dirk, was like the bad guard and the first man, the aristocrat was the good guard. Maybe they assumed that women trusted the aristocrat more than they would trust a street man. But by the way they talked they were both aristocrats and one was just putting on an act. They were both in on this together and they were both awful at it. Besides they had gauged me all wrong. I wouldn't trust an aristocrat as far as I could throw them, which wasn't very far and I trusted the peasantry even less. This men weren't getting anything from me, not tonight and not ever. I crossed my arms across my chest and spread my feet to stabilize my center. I snorted and then spoke.

    "You blokes are awful at this ya know. Ya bot' ought to act bet'er than this or ya won't be get'in no where wit' no one."

    They both looked at me in surprise before the first man slipped back into his character. "I don't know what you are refering to my lady."

    "I fink you do." I said matter of factly. "Ya bot' be aristocrats and righ' filfy ones at that."

    "How did she figure us out Claude?" Said the Dirk, looking up at the first man, Claude. "She's just a filthy street urchin. How did she figure us out? What are we going to do?"

    Claude looked rather angry at me and I stared back at him until he snarled to Dirk. "We get rid of her."

    They both lunged at me and I danced back almost effortlessly. These two were amateurs at fighting. I bet they had never fought in a dual in their life. They probably made their servants do it like most nobility do. That was another thing I hated about them all so much. Couldn't do a single thing themselves. Thieving useless people. Never learning that what they wanted wasn't the only thing out there. Other people had wishes and dreams as well and they had no right to take that from them. They attacked me and it was really easy to take them down. I left them in a filthy heap in a nearby alley. Either they'd wake up and get home before their family noticed or the guards would find them, arrest them, and try to figure out what had happened to them. I wished I could be there when they try to tell the guards that a little girl no taller than the guards waists, rubbed their faces to their bums, so to speak. But I had things to do, things to steal, people to dominate, and enemies to make. I didn't have time for frivolities. I was going to become a street theif.

    And the best one at that.