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[indent]Lies.

They weren’t obvious lies, at least not to anyone who hadn’t spent years in places like this. The kid’s voice was steady, his expression casual—but Selene had lived among ghosts before. She knew when someone was trying to slip through the cracks.

And right now, this boy was looking for an exit.

Selene tilted her head slightly, watching as he inched backward—just enough that she’d have to move to reach him. Smart. It meant he thought ahead. It meant he knew how to survive.

It also meant he was afraid.

The best way to test a liar wasn’t to press—it was to wait. Given enough space, a liar invariably betrayed himself, filling the silence with truths he’d never intended to share.

Selene adjusted her stance imperceptibly, the case still cradled securely beneath one arm. “People don’t follow strangers into the depths of the Grey Market just because they looked ‘interesting.’” Her lips twitched faintly, not quite a smile, more a knowing acknowledgment of hidden machinations. 

A second passed.

Then another.

“But let’s play along. Let’s say you really are just another street rat with an eye for ‘interesting’ people. That still leaves the question—” she lifted a brow, “—why me?”

She had become numb to the calculating gazes that followed her—the kind wielded by merchants coveting her surname’s influence or smugglers scheming to exploit her. But this was different. This wasn’t the look of someone with a grudge or a debt to collect.

This was the look of someone who had been given a job.

The difference between a stray and a hound.

And this boy was decidedly not a stray.[/indent] 

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