Kids running about the place. The air was moist and soft. The sun was not yet up in the sky, but the city was awake. All around were people rolling out their wares. Shops were opening. Foodstuff was being wheeled past, and friends were calling out to each other with hearty greetings. The city of Mora was alive with peasants who had woken up to make a living again as they so often did.

At the corner of a street, Tum sat near a truck of cucumber, chewing thoughtfully on one. He was the son of thieves although he knew nothing about this. All he knew was that he was abandoned by his parents and brought to an orphanage.

No one knew who brought him there, and he only had to live with the imagination of what his parents must have looked like. If they looked anything like him, then his father had to be tall with blue eyes, dark, long lashes, and sumptuous lips. Were it not for the tattered clothes that Tum had about him, he would have been mistaken for royalty. Buckle would often tell him that he had the nose of the aristocrats.

Maybe your father was royalty, Buckle would say. Tum would dismiss it with a lazy wave of his hand while thinking seriously about it, and hoping it was true—if it were true, maybe his old man could come back for him again. Bonnie, Buckle's female twin, whose head was always up in the clouds would snort at this insinuation.

Tum chuckled, watching the early morning scene unfold before him. He missed the parents he had never seen, but he never let this bother him for long. He was a youth, strong and fast, and willing to do work. He had taken upon himself the task of sewing clothes for the other children in the orphanage. He could make them feel loved even if he did not feel that way himself.

He scratched his head and wondered where his friends were. They had left early in the morning without waking him up. In the house where they lived and always had to avoid the troublesome house owner, he had woken up alone, and for some minutes, he wondered if the rapture had taken place without him knowing. Then he remembered that Buckle was a rascal. There was no way that son of a gun would make heaven and he would be lost on earth.

"Tum," a voice called.

Tum turned around and saw the old woman that they normally pushed her carts and sold her watermelon. An old woman with a full hair of gray. She always wore a black robe and was suspected to be a witch. Her sharp, beadlike eyes and jutted-out jaw did not help matters, same as her robe. Maybe the costly ornaments she wore around her persons kept the attacks at bay. She was looking distraught when she saw Tum near the truck of cucumbers. At first, Tum did not understand the reason for the expression on her face.

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"Madam Caro," he said, smiling wildly.

"I see you have already started working," the old woman grumbled.

Tum understood then. His eyes followed the woman's gaze and he realized she thought he was already selling someone else's wares.

"No, no, not at all, madam. This is for Bonnie. I am just keeping watch for her."

The woman's face brightened quickly at this.

"Well, come around then," she said. "The carrots will not sell themselves."

Tum knew that he and his friends were paid the lowest possible wages for the work they did in the city. They had often talked about moving outside the city to the place of peasants, but only one thing prevented them: the revolt being planned by the peasants. Sometimes, Tum thought it was necessary. Madam Caro was not a peasant.

She had never planted a seed in her life, but she bought from these peasants when she went to their fields and returned to the city to sell her ware at exorbitant prices. Oh, she did not sell them herself anyway. Tum and his friends were tasked with that. After a hard day's work, she would pay them meager wages. Tum was getting tired of all of it. But who would take care of the orphans if he did not work?

"I would be with you in a heartbeat, madam. I just have to wait for Bonnie to get this cart," Tum replied.

"Why? My business suffers because you wait on your friends?"

If only you understood what friendship means, Madam Caro.

"Are you not going to say anything?" Madam Caro asked when Tum remained silent. "Are you not going to do something?"

Tum tried to smile, but his cheeks were hurting.

"I will be with you soon," he said finally, wondering where he got his courage from. Even though they were the best salesmen in the city, there were many people who were close behind them, people who would stab them at the back without a second thought to take over their positions.

"Twenty pieces for one cowrie," Madam Caro finally said before she turned and walked away, grumbling.

Tum sighed, watching her go away. Someone ran up to her. It was Kettle, the red boy, called so because he whistled a lot. He had had his eyes on Tum's odd jobs for a long time now, stalking Tum, hiding in the shadows, and waiting for his chance.

Tum wondered how the boy ate. Most of them were homeless, having been ousted from the orphanage when they turned fifteen, so they could fend for themselves. The ones who lived in terrible houses, like Tum and his friends, owed for years and were always thrown out of the house. Then they would move to another house until they were know all over the city and no landlord would accept them.

Kettle lived on the street. He was older than Tum and came out here first. Already, he had outlived the goodwill of the landlords and could no longer find a place to sleep. Tum watched him with worry in his eyes. Lines appeared over his forehead as he wondered what the old woman would do.

Buckle would not be worried. He had often said they were the best salesmen and the people knew it. He seemed to know with an unshaken assurance that people would not pick Kettle over them. Tum did not have that kind of faith. He knew how the heart of man was, and the things that he was capable of.

"Hey!" Someone screamed from behind him.