Free Cast in Flame by Michelle Sagara Page A

3B.”
    The man relaxed slightly; he glanced at Bellusdeo and Emmerian, his eyes narrowing. Neither of the two looked like they lived in this part of town. Ever. “Marten Anders. These your friends?” he asked, stepping into the hall with a very obvious ring of keys in his left hand.
    “Yes. This is Bellusdeo. She’ll be sharing the space with me for the time being.” Kaylin failed to introduce Emmerian. Mr. Anders noticed, of course.
    “She’ll be marking the lease?”
    “No.”
    The man shrugged. “We don’t want trouble here,” he told them both. “I run a respectable, quiet place.”
    “That’s why we’re here,” Kaylin replied—quickly. Bellusdeo looked as if she was about to speak.
    The small dragon squawked instead. The man’s eyes rounded instantly as the transparent troublemaker sat up on Kaylin’s shoulders.
    “He’s house-trained, and he doesn’t bite. He doesn’t make much noise.” She resisted the urge to clamp a hand around his mouth, because she was fairly certain ‘doesn’t bite’ would be instantly disproved.
    “What is he?”
    “A lizard.”
    The small dragon squawked.
    “You know how there are albinos? He’s like that, but with even less color.”
    Mr. Anders nodded slowly. Since Bellusdeo and Emmerian kept glacially stiff expressions plastered to their faces, he accepted the off-the-cuff lie and headed up the stairs.
    * * *
    There were actually two rooms, although the bedroom was about the size of the smallest of Bellusdeo’s closets in the Palace. The floors were covered by a rug that had seen better decades, and the boards made a lot of noise. To Kaylin, this was familiar and almost comforting. There were windows; they were glassless, but shuttered—and barred.
    “Are the bars necessary?” Bellusdeo asked.
    “They’re decorative, ma’am,” the landlord replied.
    “Good. You won’t mind if we remove them, then. I don’t particularly like the idea of living in a cage.”
    Emmerian turned to the landlord before he could reply. “Would it be permissible to make alterations to these rooms and the hallways themselves?”
    This was not a question to ask a landlord who was looking less eager by the passing second. If Emmerian had been anything other than a Dragon, Kaylin would have stepped, hard, on his foot.
    “What kind of alterations?” was the entirely reasonable response.
    “They would be both physical and magical in nature. You clearly have rudimentary mirror grids within the building, but we would require something with a little more power. The windows would have to be changed; we would install glass—at our expense, of course. Are the rooms above this one currently occupied?”
    “Yes.”
    “If we take this room, we would require it. For the sake of safety, we would also require the room directly below.” Emmerian held up a hand before the man—whose mouth had compressed into a line that sort of matched his narrowed eyes—could interrupt. “We would, of course, be willing to double your current rents. Or possibly triple.” It was the only thing the Dragon Lord had said that might possibly appeal to a landlord, but given the pinched expression on this one’s face, it didn’t appeal enough.
    A thought struck Kaylin in the deepening gloom. “I’m not willing to pay triple the rent for these rooms—I can’t afford it, given what I’m paid.”
    “No, of course not. We have agreed that we will not interfere materially with your living quarters.”
    “And glass windows that practically scream out to enterprising thieves aren’t materially interfering?”
    “No. They serve several functions, they increase security, and they add value to the building itself in the event that you choose to leave. The modifications will,” he added, turning once again to the landlord, “remain your property when Private Neya chooses to vacate these premises.”
    When. Not if.
    Kaylin could feel herself losing inches of height as Emmerian continued. This was possibly