The market smelled of desperation.

Alex wove through the crowd, clutching the medicine vial to his chest like a stolen secret. His boots kicked up dust that clung to the sweat on his neck, and the midday sun glared down as if it, too, were in league with the guildmaster’s thugs. He could still hear their laughter echoing from yesterday’s visit—“Three days, runt. Then we take your mother’s lungs as collateral.”

A yelp split the air. Ahead, a stray dog—a skeletal thing with matted fur—cowered beneath the wheels of a merchant’s carriage. The driver raised his whip, cursing. Without thinking, Alex lunged, grabbing the dog’s scruff and yanking it free just as the carriage lurched forward. The crowd jeered.

“Heroics for a mutt?” sneered the butcher, his apron streaked with blood. “Save your pity. That one’s already carrion.”

Alex ignored him, setting the dog down. It limped into an alley, casting one wary glance back. Same look Ma gives when I promise her it’ll be okay, he thought.

He turned—and froze.

There she was.

Emily stood at the spice stall, her hair a dark cascade against the sun-bleached canvas. She was arguing with a guild enforcer twice her size, her voice steady as stone. “The child took nothing. Let him go.”

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The enforcer gripped an orphan boy’s arm, his grin revealing teeth stained black by betel nut. “Thieves lose hands, girl. That’s the law.”

“Your law,” Emily said, and slid a silver coin across the counter. “Not ours.”

The enforcer spat, but released the boy. As the child fled, Emily knelt, pressing a lotus-shaped hairpin into his palm. “Sell this, not your pride,” she murmured.

Alex’s throat tightened. He’d seen that hairpin before—she’d worn it every Founding Day since they were children. Fragile, he thought, but she’s not.

He didn’t realize he’d been staring until she glanced up. Their eyes met, and for a heartbeat, the market’s clamor faded. Then she nodded—not a smile, but an acknowledgment—before turning away.

By the time Alex reached home, the medicine felt heavy as a corpse.

The shack leaned into the hillside like a drunkard, its walls patched with tarpaulin and lies. Inside, his mother lay shivering, her breath a wet rattle.

“Liam…” she whispered, mistaking him for the brother who’d vanished last winter. Guild work, they’d said. A quick job.

“It’s me, Ma.” He uncorked the vial, fighting the tremor in his hands. “Drink.”

She pushed it away, her fingers brushing the faded tattoo on his wrist—twin serpents, the mark of their family’s debt. “Run, Alex. Before they…” A cough wracked her, crimson blooming on her lips.

He pressed the vial to her mouth. “We’re Kinsleys. We don’t run.”