2.42.1-3.52.1-Cat

I’d had an itch between my shoulders blades for a while now, one I’d first believed to be the result of sweat and rough clothes. But it wasn’t going away.

“Hold your fire,” I told my guards. “Thief, come the Hells out. Let’s have a chat.”

There was a long moment of silence afterwards and I almost began to think I’d read too much into this. I hadn’t, though: the short-haired woman strolled out of a nearby alley, hands casually in her pockets.

- Book 2, Chapter 42: Flaw

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“Gods, that would outright kill a child,” I rasped out. “Should I pour you one as well?”

Thief was pouting when she came into sight, going from not to there in a heartbeat’s span.

...

“How do you do it, anyway?” Thief asked. “Tell when I’m there. I was under cover of an aspect, and I’ve stood inches away from men in broad daylight without them batting an eye.”

“I guess you could call it a Name trick,” I said. “You never had a teacher, did you?”

“Not one Named,” Thief frowned.

“Then I will share my hard-earned knowledge with you,” I affably said. “You know how when you came into your Name there was this set of instincts just under your skin?”

The brown-haired woman cocked her head to the side.

“It felt more like a hand guiding mine,” she said.

“Close enough,” I said. “When you’re about to get wounded or killed, you’re going to get a tingle just like it.”

She nodded slowly.

“I had no intention of striking you,” she pointed out.

“Yeah, but you were looking at me,” I said. “It does the same thing just… fainter. Black had people following for weeks back in Ater until I learned to pick up on it.”

- Book 3, Chapter 52: Tensile