While he was under the obligation d'âme, nobody was supposed to pay him any mind, 'less Felix wanted it that way. And Mildmay'd always been good at blending in, long before he and Felix ever met. Couldn't be a good cat burglar – or assassin, but he didn't do that any more – without it.

"I guess," he allowed, half shrugging. "Mostly folks didn't care none about a lame annemer, 'cept if they thought I could get him to shut up about something. Usually when he was tearing strips offa somebody, or showing 'em up by being smarter than all the other wizards put together." But couldn't nobody shut Felix up when he didn't wanna. Trying just gave him a new target.