"This is a stupid idea," Aldo observed. "You don't got to play nice with those jerks."

"I don't want to play nice, but I figure I should try," I whispered back.

One of the most common street games in Floria is a game called 'shake' where dice with four, six, and eight sides are placed under each of three cups. The audience gets to see which die goes under which cup, and the cups are then shuffled around by the 'dealer', ostensibly to roll the dice and confuse the audience. A player pays a tollo to pick two cups - one for herself and one for the dealer, and the dealer then jostles them together in a cup before revealing the rolls. The person with the highest roll wins - though, in the event of a tie, the dealer wins. Obviously, you want to pick the die with eight sides for yourself and the one with four sides for your opponent. Theoretically, this makes shake a game of some skill. One where a savvy player can routinely trounce the dealer, winning about two thirds of the time. Surely, only a fool would run such a game!

In reality, the odds are stacked against the player because the dealer is subtly cheating. The eight-sided die is loaded to only roll 1-4, but the dealer keeps an unweighted die handy, too. If the player chooses the loaded eight-sided die, the dealer has the advantage no matter what the other die is (since he wins with a tie). Likewise, if the player chooses anything else, the dealer swaps his own die (whatever it is) with the unloaded eight-sided die, giving himself the advantage. What separates this scam from most street scams is that the mark can win, and does so about a third of the time. Thus, while having a confederate (posing as a player to make the game look fair) is helpful, it isn't necessary, and marks rarely feel cheated so long as they don't catch the dealer swapping dice. Add in the fact that confederates routinely wander in and 'win' a substantial chunk of the dealer's cash, and you've got yourself a convincing street scam.

Shake was the favorite scam of the Tetrad of Terror because Oltzen was pretty good at nudging out the dice using his innate magic, further increasing the dealer's odds of winning, and Nima was naturally skilled at sleight of hand. The other two, Tizzie and Thero, usually scouted for marks and acted as confederates.

Aldo cleared his throat. "We're really doing this?"

"I promised Reverend Nuches I'd try… I figure I can play at their game and, since I don't know what I'm doing, I'll lose some money and I'll let them keep it and they'll be happy. If I do that a time or two, maybe they'll like me?"

"They're not gonna like you," Aldo stated. "Not ever. If you give 'em money, they're just going to want more and more. And you can bet they'll call you princess if you just throw tollos around. They'll be the kings of Floria before they let you limp away."

"And queens," Mailyn added.

"Sure, and queens," Aldo allowed. "They tried to drown you, Vix."

"They stole your books," Mailyn added. And, frankly, I agreed and was conflicted as to which I should be angrier about. But still…

"I promised," I reiterated.

Aldo sighed. "Not my problem." He mimed himself washing his hands of the problem - he'd seen Solomon do that and decided it looked mature. "And what's with the pen?"

"It's a present." The glossy wood and brass fountain pen had cost me two tollos at Mrs. Roost's stationery shop, so it had better be appreciated.

Zev and Nate were off running messages somewhere, and Mrs. Choso and Mrs. Roost weren't scheduled to start their game of citadel for another hour. I had an hour to make nice with the Tetrad. And, if I managed that, I could stay on friendly terms with them and my problems were a thing of the past. Surely, it would be clear sailing until I made Sneak in a few years. And, if that carrot didn't work, I'd just have to employ the switch.

"I, um… I got some messages I should deliver," Mailyn said in a small voice.

I turned toward her, hands on my hips. "Mailyn!"

"What? I do!" she said. In truth, I couldn't blame her for not wanting to be part of my peace overture. Plus, if all three of us approached, there was more potential to cause a scene than with just me and Aldo.

"Fine," I puffed out my cheeks and waved dismissively. "We'll be fine without you."

After Mailyn scampered off, Aldo and I proceeded down the market way, down the golden sandstone courtyards, street vendors shouting out their wares, or else lazing in the shade and fanning themselves as customers perused through their displays. Workers stood on ladders or teetered on stools, hanging up streamers, icons, and pennants for the upcoming St. Lethis celebration, important for both of the Avatarine faiths. Business was swift in anticipation of the long weekend, when most of the shops would be closed. Teams of draft horses tromped up from the river, dragging heavy wagons laden with holiday supplies. And Aldo and I slipped through unnoticed, our eyes peeled for any sign of the Tetrad.

Once we got near the alleyway where I'd seen Tizzie hole up for the night, we inspected the narrow side roads and cul de sacs, wandering through tidy tenements and subdivided shops squeezed among the older cobblestone streets, walking past day laborers and guildspeople lazing in the shade during their breaks, some smoking sweet tobacco or drinking chilled groja, a Florian drink of diluted, chilled rum flavored with spices and citron or lime.

We eventually found the Tetrad (or, more precisely, half of the Tetrad and the locale of their 'shake' scam) along a little winding road through the run-down neighborhood just east of the old arena. They'd set up a makeshift booth with a broad plank of lumber and the mouldering remains of two shipping crates and were currently running their game in front of a small crowd of guild apprentices and other neighborhood kids our age or a bit older. To my surprise, Tizzie was running the scam (my understanding was that it was usually Oltzen or Nima who was dealer for their little game) - all the better, since it was her I wished to appease the most.

"One tollo get you two, two gets you four!" Thero called out - he was a slight Kronojic boy with the curly dark hair and medium tan skin typical of that nation. He usually played lookout and gofer for the Tetrad, and it was he who'd kept a lookout while Oltzen and Tizzie made a go at drowning me not so long before. I didn't care for him, but I disliked him marginally less than the others. It would take serious willpower for me to make nice with Tizzie, but Thero I could stomach. If smiling and playing nice with him would get them to stop bothering me, I was willing to bite that snake.

"I'll play!" I blurted - for the most part, the scam could only squeeze a dozen or so tollos out of a poor audience before people decided that the pickings were too slim to be worthwhile. It might be a few weeks before kids remembered the wins and forgot the losses and the Tetrad could return to the same scamming grounds. Surely, a sizable boost to their income would ingratiate me. I was willing to lose a few tollos if it meant peace between me and the Tetrad. A foolproof plan!

Tizzie scowled when she recognized me - my busted lip had already healed, while she still had a trail of tiny scabs on her cheek where I'd clawed her like a little wildcat during our tiff. She scowled, but neither she or Thero call me out when I offered up a copper tollo.

Tizzie nudged Thero aside and then made a show of throwing all three dice a few times to convince the audience that they weren't loaded. She dropped them into their respective cups and made a show of deftly shuffling the cups around. I didn't even attempt to track which die was under which. "Pick two," she grumbled.

"One… and two!" I said, pointing to each of two cups. Tizzie lifted them to reveal… the six-sider for me and the eight-sider for her. Hers would have been the four-sider but, with a sleight of hand, she'd just swapped it out. She masked any telltale sound of the swap with a clunk of the wooden cup against the game table. The smoothness of the move spoke of considerable practice.

She placed both dice in a cup, jumbled them around, and dumped them out on the table. "A… five for the young lady and… four for the dealer. You win," she grumbled. She slid two tollos across the table, her eyes flashing with anger… and possibly a bit of actual magic. She was a Collegium student, after all. Through clenched teeth, she said, "would you like to play again?"

"Yes, please," I said, far less certainly. I slid another tollo across - I could still salvage the situation. I'd just have to play longer.

Tizzie put the die back in the cups and shuffled them around. This time, I paid special attention and was sure to pick the eight-sider for her and the four-sider for myself - it was pretty easy to track which cup was which if I paid attention to the little scuff marks and wear patterns on the three wooden cups. "Two… and three!" I said - and she lifted the cups, revealing a four sider for me and the eight-sider for Tizzie.

I had a less than one in five chance of winning. And Tizzie rolled… "A… three for the young lady and two for the dealer. You win," she seethed, her pale cheeks going red with anger. "Would… you… like… to play again?"

"Y-yes?"

To my horror, I won the third round too, rolling a four on my four-sider versus a one on Tizzie's eight. The chance of winning three in a row against the dealer in a loaded game was less than one in twenty, and I'd just threaded that needle. "Would anybody else like to play?" Tizzie asked - and, to my great relief, my winning three tollos in a row had sparked a lot of interest among the guild apprentices. At least half a dozen ruddy tollos flashed in the afternoon sun.

I felt the smooth gloss of the fountain pen in my pocket and remembered that it was a gift to appease Tizzie - perhaps it would make the three tollos I'd just won sting less. I leaned over the table and placed the pen in her palm, whispering, "This is for you… I promise I'll give you your tollos back." I was savvy enough to know I couldn't just hand them to her in front of her marks.

"Hey… do you know her?" one of the apprentice kids asked. Uh-oh.

"Um… no?" I said unconvincingly. I hadn't yet mastered the art of bald-faced lying. I pushed the pen into Tizzie's hand and turned to face the crowd…

And I must have jostled Tizzie's sleeve a bit too much. The sleeve she'd been hiding the loaded (or maybe unloaded - I hadn't been keeping track) die in. It tumbled to the table next to the other eight-sider.

"Hey! They been muddling the dice!" one boy shouted.

"Boo! Cheaters!" another screamed. Somebody grabbed at the collar of my shirt. I felt a tug on my arm. I shot Tizzie one panicked look - the bigger girl's face was a conflagration of fear and livid fury - and then I found myself stumbling back out of the agitated crowd and into a nearby alley.

I shrugged off my 'rescuer', hand reaching for my little knife, only to register that it was Aldo. He laughed uproariously, wiping tears from his eyes. "I think you're the least street-smart person I've ever met, Vix."

"Um…" I said. Given the circumstances, I couldn't exactly refute the claim. I probably wasn't the least street-smart girl in the world, but I was almost certainly the least street-smart in Aldo's social circle. Seven tollos jingled in my pocket - the four I'd been carrying on me, plus the three I won from Tizzie. "I guess lunch is on me."

That evening, the moment I stepped into bunkroom two in Scamp Hall #5, Thero shoved me - it wasn't a 'we're fighting' shove so much as an 'I'm damn well going to get your attention' kind of shove. My friends were nearby and Thero was even more cowardly than most of the Tetrad, meaning there wasn't much chance of a drag-out brawl with him. He glowered at me, his upper lip curled to bare his teeth like a snarling wild animal might.

"What in the actual hell you think you were doing, Princess Manure? Now we can't hustle at that spot for months! If you wanted enemies, sister, well you got 'em!"

Even then, I thought his melodramatic grandstanding was a bit amusing - but I was angrier than I was amused. I shoved him back, not that it did much; he wasn't much larger than me but had positioned himself to rebuff a shove. "I'm your enemy, Thero? Gee, what a surprise! I thought you might be trying to be friends when you played lookout boy for Oltzen and Tizzie when they tried to murder me! I guess I'm the bad one here!"

"Thought you were trying to make nice?" Aldo mumbled, the smirk audible in his voice.

"I was," I snorted. I put my hands on my hips and looked Thero in the eye. "You better stop bullying me…"

"We barely even started bullying you," Thero spat back. "You're in for it now, you Seelie runt."

"Fine! But don't blame me for what happens, you, uh… Kronojie!" I said.

For those of you looking for an impolite epithet for folks of Kronojic persuasion, it's 'Snuffin', by the way… don't ask me why, for I do not know.

Thero was the kind of kid who always needed the last word, so he started to reply, but I stormed off before he could get his retort in. I stomped into the bunkroom, took my bedtime things out of my locker, and clamped my new, sturdier lock on the box, glaring at Oltzen and Nima the whole time, all but daring them to try to crack this one, too.

And, surprise surprise, of course they did…