The Boss looked Soren up and down with the practiced appraisal of a man who had spent years sorting people into categories: threat, mark, or irrelevant. The young man at his stall fit none of them cleanly. He was speaking Mandarin, which in this part of the Frontier Republic was not unusual. The border with the mainland ran close, and the city had absorbed enough of its northern neighbor's population over the decades that Mandarin was as common on these streets as the local tongue. Mainlanders came to work, to trade, to disappear. They came with money, sometimes, and occasionally with more money than they were careful about.
The Boss stood up from his chair with the enthusiasm of a man who had just revised his morning upward.
"My friend, take your time, take your time. Everything here is
