--22--
	On foot, weighed down by his backpack, it took Sebastian two hours to walk from his mother’s house to the coaching inn in town.  The day had warmed up along the way and that brightened his spirits quite a bit.  It hadn’t completely stopped raining, but now that he was on his way he didn’t mind it so much.  His rabbit ancestors came from the swamps and it was only in the last hundred years that they had settled in town.  He kept himself warm with thoughts of them and tried to forget that he had never slept without a roof over his head before.
	He got to town at noon, leaving him only half an hour before the stagecoach left on the first leg of its trip to the city.  Because of the rain, most people were still indoors which left the streets emptier than he had ever seen them.  He went in through the South Gate and felt the familiar chill as he passed under the squat stone arch.  Five hundred years ago, Shelby's Ford had been a walled city, built around a squat stone keep that had been Jaspertree's first line of defense against attacks from the south.  It was a center of trade now, and the keep and its soldiers were gone, but the city had never quite lost its military flavor.
	The town had still kept its circular shape, too, though that was beginning to disappear as new houses were built.  The streets were built to be a winding maze, something to confuse and slow down attackers.  It wasn’t really very complicated, though, and most people could figure it out after a day or two.  It did mean, however, that he had to walk through a full quarter of the city to get to the coaching inn.
	He passed by a blur of food stalls, all carefully sheltered now to stay dry, but some leaked smells of an early lunch.  There were other shops that sold cheap trinkets or expensive weapons, and there was one old lynx in a blue dress, pulling a big cart through the narrow streets.  He smiled at her as he squeezed past, but she bristled and hissed at him with her ears flat.  People in Shelby's Ford were often hostile to strangers, and they liked to keep to themselves, though it was rare for any of them to do more than threaten.
	The inn was a square barn that was mostly empty space with a roof where they housed the coaches.  Shelby's Ford owned three coaches and private ones sometimes came in, but there was only one in the barn this morning.  Nobody stayed in Shelby's Ford who didn’t have to, but there were still a few rooms in the roof of the inn where people could sleep.  There was a booth at the front, with one window where tickets were sold.  The window was protected by a thin wire mesh, and the booth was run by a skinny rabbit doe with the most incredible collection of earrings he had ever seen.  She wore so many studs and hoops up the sides of her ears that she looked like she’d been riveted together.
	Thanks to the rain, the line at the ticket office was short.  He only had to wait while one grey-furred old rabbit searched his pockets for his ticket stub, and while a tall vixen dressed all in black paid her fare in a heap of small change.  After the fox was gone and the clerk had finished counting each penny into the till, he put his ticket on the window sill.  The clerk pushed it back at him and pulled a screen down over the window.
	“The coach is full,” she said.
	“It isn’t.  I can see it from here, and there are only three people in it,” he said.
	“It doesn’t matter anyway, you’re too late.  Tickets are only good for the week, and that’s it.   We don’t carry half-breeds, anyway,” she said.
	“Yes, you do.  Give me another ticket, I can pay for it,” he said.
	After leaving home, he’d stopped and put the five dollars his mother had given him in his pocket so he could hear them jingle as he walked.  He slapped them down on the sill, so the clerk could see them.  She opened the screen wide enough to snake a hand out and take them, then slammed it down again.
	“You don’t have enough.  Tickets are twenty-five dollars,” she said.
	“Since when?  A first-class ticket to Jaspertree has never been more than two dollars,” he said.
	“Twenty-five for dangerous animals,” she said.
	“I’m not!” he said.
	“You’re a half-breed, aren’t you?  That’s good enough.  If things like you are going to dirty up our coaches, it’s only fair that you pay for it,” she said.
	She took an open book out from under her side of the window and waved it at him, too fast for him to read what was on the pages.
	“New rules.  Come back with the rest, and if the coach is still here I might give you a ticket,” she said.
	“Twenty-five dollars?  That isn’t fair.  Give me back my money and I’ll walk,” he said.
	“I’m not allowed to give refunds,” she said.
	She turned her back to him and dropped his money into the steel strongbox bolted to the wall behind her.  He snarled at her and wanted to beat on the window until it broke, but that would only make her think she was right about him.
	“You’re a cheat, and a thief.  When I tell Mayor Palmer about this—“ he said.
	“He’ll say the same as me.  The problem with you mongrels is that you act like spoiled children and don’t understand when you get punished for it.  Good-bye,” she said.
	He slapped the window once, bending the screen, and stomped away from the booth.
	He forgot to look before he stepped into the street, and he collided with a little mouse who was running the other way.  She grabbed the front of his shirt to stop herself from falling, but the rain had turned the road by the booth to mud and she dragged him down with her.  He landed under her with her legs straddling his waist and her muzzle pressed against his collarbone.  She scrambled up at once, but in the moment before she did, he saw the fear in her eyes.
	“A lovely way to start the day.  No luck with the coach?” she said.
	“The coach is full.  They’ll rob you, too, if they can, so I wouldn’t bother,” he said.
	He couldn’t keep the anger out of his voice, and she flinched a little and scratched at a the side of her neck.
	“Yes, I heard.  I didn’t mean to, but this is such a small town.  I’m sorry,” she said.
	She was a pretty girl with chocolate brown fur that was peppered with little flecks of white.  Her clothes, a blouse and an ankle length skirt that nearly matched the brown of her fur, were neat, if a little threadbare.  She wore a pair of wire-framed glasses and her thick black hair reached past her waist.  Everything about her was remarkable, but the strangest thing was the black leather collar around her neck.  It was plain, except for a small silver 'S' by the clasp, and it was the most erotic thing he'd ever seen on a girl.
	“Why should you be?  I’ve lived here all of my life and I’ve never been treated like that before,” he said.
	“You’ve been lucky, then.  You’ll have to get used to it if you’re going very far,” she said.
	There was something odd about her, too, though he couldn’t have said what it was.  She looked like a mouse, and she smelled like one, but there was something predatory in the way she stood.
	“The big problem is the way you smell.  If you cover it up with perfume, that’s usually enough for people who just pass you on the street.  But you’re always going to smell like a wolf, whatever you do, and that’s going to make some people nervous,” she said.
	“I don’t smell like that,” he said.
	She leaned close to him, until he could have touched her, and sniffed.  She had white fur on her throat, and over the top of her breasts.  He hadn't meant to look, but the way the collar of her dress fell open when she leaned over was too inviting to ignore.
	“I just found out today,” he said.
	“All you had to do was look in the mirror,” she said.
	“The best we had was puddles when it rained.  It wasn’t something that ever mattered before,” he said.
	“Half rabbit, and half wolf.  Not the best combination, but not the worst, either, I suppose.  And it’s not a bad smell,” she said.
	“What is that supposed to mean?” he said.
	She straighted up again and took a pack of cigarettes out of the pocket of her skirt.  She lit one with one of the matches she’d tucked into the wrapper and stuck the cigarette in her mouth.  Smoking was a rare habit in Shelby's Ford, and it was something that no female ever did.
	“I mean, you’re a wolf to the rabbits and a rabbit to the wolves, and that’s just the start of your problems,” she said.
	“I guess you’d know,” he said.
	She snorted, shooting streams of smoke like dragon's breath at him.  The smoke mingled with the steam of her breath in the cold air, wreathing her briefly in white.
	“Point taken.  Who am I to stick my nose in someone else's private life?  If you’re going to walk to Jaspertree, you’d better get going.  Or you can wait here while I try.  I have enough to pay for you, too,” she said.
	She flashed a large gold coin, worth a hundred dollars, and smiled.  It was more money than he’d ever seen, and the offer was tempting.  Pretty girls offering to give him anything were a new experience.  But his pride told him it was too late to turn back now.
	“I’ll walk.  I wouldn’t ride in one of their smelly coaches if they paid me,” he said.
	He stepped out into the road, and this time she had to jerk him back by the scruff of his neck so he wouldn’t get run down by an ox-cart loaded with bags of grain.  The drover lashed at him with his crop and the mouse clucked her tongue disapprovingly.  Sebastian flattened his ears and jerked away from her.  What she thought didn’t matter to him in the least.
	The main road wound through most of the town, so anyone who used it would have to see all of the shops and merchants booths before they got to the north gate.  It was part of the original cart road that had existed since before there had been a town, or even any of the rest of the maze that was Shelby's Ford.  It had been paved once or twice, but nobody had the money to keep it up so there were plenty of potholes for him to step in.  After five minutes of walking, his feet hurt and the cuffs of his pants were dripping wet.
	He was almost to the north gate when he heard the coach rattle past on its road, which ran around the outside of the city just in front of the ruins of the old wall.  He stifled a flash of anger and quickened his pace, like he'd meant to walk all the way to Jaspertree in the first place.  When he reached the gate and saw the little brown mouse leaning against the crumbling stone pillar that was all that was left of that part of the wall, he couldn’t but feel a little bit satisfied.  He pushed that away, too, and gave her as friendly a wave as he could manage.  She only frowned and stuck a fresh cigarette in her mouth.
	“I always used to think that rabbits were nice,” she said.
	“They are.  If you’re a rabbit,” he said.
	“Well, the coach was probably too cramped anyway.  I can’t stand sitting in one place for too long.  I’ll find some other way,” she said.
	“From here?  It’s take the coach or walk.  But walking isn’t too bad, if you’ve got someone to talk to,” he said.
	She sucked on the end of her cigarette and shot jets of smoke out of her nose again.
	“Why should I go anywhere with you?  Whatever else you are, you’re male,” she said.
	“What does that have to do with anything?” he said.
	“Maybe a lot.  I’ve never known a male I could trust,” she said.
	“But we’re both going to Jaspertree anyway, and going together would be safer than being alone.  All I want is to get there, and what could I possibly do to you?” he said.
	She scratched at the side of her neck again, digging her claws under her collar like she wanted to tear herself open.  Her fur was thinner there, and between the strokes of her fingers, he could see fresh scars on her skin.
	“Oh, fine.  You’re only a kitten, and you won’t last any time in the city without help.  But keep your hands to yourself,” she said.