Chapter 15 · Her Mother’s Second Signature

The scream came from Nara’s shadow.

It tore through the market like a needle dragged across glass.

Every lantern on the street flared white. The rain hanging beneath the awnings froze in midair, each droplet shining with a tiny, distorted face. Lin saw her mother in every one of them—young, furious, soaked to the skin, one hand pressed against a black iron table while the other gripped a pen.

Signatures crawled across the glass drops.

LIN MEI.

LIN MEI.

LIN MEI.

“No,” Lin whispered.

The vendor leaned over the ruined stall. Her face was still Lin’s mother’s face, but the skin around her mouth had split into fine porcelain cracks. Behind those cracks, something pale and wet moved.

“Your mother signed,” the vendor said. “The city was collateral. You were the consideration.”

Tavi’s knife flashed. “Step away from her.”

The vendor turned her head without moving her body. “Courier. You carry messages for people who no longer remember sending them.”

“Then I’ll deliver one from me.” Tavi planted himself between the stall and Lin. “Get away from my friends.”

The vendor smiled with Lin’s mother’s lips.

The market answered.

A row of stalls snapped open at once.