Pete sighs and I exhale. “You mean ‘I haven’t seen anything.’ Schools these days,” he mumbles. “Okay, go about your business. Find Olaf if you hear of anything.” I hear Pete kick the horse’s sides with his small feet and gallop off into the square.
I reach into the pocket of my overalls Mother just patched and give the boy two pence. “Thanks, kid,” I say, patting the satchel under my cloak. I lifted that this afternoon when the royals left the bakery. No surprise it took Pete ’til now to realize it was gone.
Then I disappear through a narrow alleyway off the square that leads to the smaller, poorer streets on my side of town where oversized teacups, boots, and thatched huts replace the nicer brick buildings. The streets are already dark—we don’t have lanterns to light the way—but I would know this trail blindfolded. I hurry past the panhandler, dropping a biscuit into his outstretched hand, and move toward the smell of shoe polish that always leads me home. My boot is one of four on this tiny block. With one last look around to make sure I am not being followed, I turn the key and head inside.
“Gilly!” My four-year-old twin brothers, Han and Hamish, knock me backward into the door I just came through. They’re so light, they roll off me. I see they got into the shoe polish again. There is black all over their cheeks, foreheads, and identical plaid rompers.
“What did you get?” Six-year-old Trixie, with her rosy cheeks and bright red hair, runs into the room at the sound of the collision. “Jam? Cheese? That good pepperoni you got last week?”
“Shh….” Felix, my five-year-old brother, hushes her as he comes down the ladder from the loft where we all sleep in bunk beds. Felix is the wise-beyond-his-years one and looks the most like Father. His dark brown eyes seem to see right through me. “You didn’t get caught, did you?”
“No,” I assure him and lift my cloak to reveal a satchel full of dinner rolls. My siblings try to grab some. “Wait!” I say, looking around the room. We can barely fit in the living room despite only having a fireplace and one shabby couch.
The walls of the boot have patches to keep out the cold from cracks in the leather exterior. The patches look like paintings, of which we have none. A single drawing of a field of lilies hangs above our fireplace. My sister Anna drew it one night when we were too cold to sleep. The cuckoo clock on the wall chimes six, and I know Father will be home from the shop soon. “Where’s Mother?”
“Mother is in the kitchen with Anna, finishing her birthday cake,” Trixie says. “Do you want me to go around the back of the boot, knock, and leave the rolls there again?”
“Yes, after you’ve each eaten a roll first.” I open the satchel again and let them each take a roll. They devour the bread within seconds.
The shoe business isn’t what it used to be and money is scarce. Sure, we have three meals, if you call half a cup of chicken broth a meal. If it weren’t for my hauls from the market, my siblings would waste away. Instead, the twins finally have a little weight on them and the dark rings around Trixie’s eyes have disappeared.
I do what I can to help out around here. And that includes making sure my siblings are fed enough and get a birthday gift. I could buy a lot with that dragon tooth clip I stole today, but the minute I saw it, I knew I was going to keep it for Anna. The green in the clip matches her eyes, and I could picture her using it to pull back her long hair. She will never let that clip out of her sight, unlike that spoiled royal. That’s for sure.
That’s why I targeted Blondie today. I only pluck from people who can afford to lose things. Royals can definitely afford to lose a few trinkets. So can the baker whose business is booming and who treats Mother poorly whenever she comes in to see if he has any day-old bread on sale. The royals are part of the reason we live in this overcrowded boot, so I don’t feel bad taking from them.
“Gilly? Is that you?” I hear Mother’s voice and quickly give Trixie the satchel to deposit on the back steps.
Mother looks tired as she comes over to give me a hug, smelling like a mixture of flour and leather, which means she must have had to help Father in the shop earlier. I sink into her like I would a soft pillow.
“You okay?” she asks. Her blue eyes look tired. “Your cheeks are flushed.”
“Fine,” I say. “I just hurried home from studying so I wouldn’t miss cake.”
“How do you think you did on your test?” Mother asks.
How hard can a test on shoe polishes be? I took it and then left school for the rest of the day to find Anna’s present. “Great,” I say with enthusiasm. “Probably got an A.”
“You’re home.” Anna removes her apron. She has flour on her cheeks and in her brown curls. She’s wearing that Rapunzel perfume I snagged her a few weeks back (and claimed it was a free sample. Anna hates my thieving.). “You’re just in time for cake!”
“Cake? What happened to presents first?” I tease.