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"No, I am not sick," John said. "I need to buy bread. I need to fix the hinge. I need to sleep and wake and do work tomorrow and then the next day. I need to be a good student and a careful man."

Fizz nodded, very solemn. "We will do all those boring things," he said. "And then, when we are done being boring, we will make sure no one tries to put you in a sack again."

John's mouth almost smiled. "Yes, Lord Fizz."

They reached the corner with the small square. The one – hand clock hummed. The Bent Penny's sign swung, tongue – shaped and rude as always. Pim's silhouette moved behind the window, head tilting, trying to see if the two shapes in the lane were the ones he had been watching for without wanting to seem like he was watching.

Fizz slowed at the door. "Let me do the talking," he said. "I will distract the woman with tales of our heroism while you sneak the coin up to the room like a mouse with a crown."

"No tales," John said. "No coin shows. Not a flicker. Not a jingle. We are students who came home and will wake on time. Why are you so worried about a gold coin?"

Fizz sighed deeply. "Fine. I will be humble. I will be a small quiet cloud."

"You cannot," John said.

Fizz grinned. "Watch me."

They went inside. The tavern smelled like hot soup and old wood and a hundred decent evenings laid on top of each other like quilts. The woman behind the counter looked up. Her eyes went to John's face, then to Fizz's fur, then to the neatness of their shirts. She nodded once. "Honest trouble," she said. "Or foolish."

"Neither," John said. "Homework."

"Good," she said. "Stew is still warm. Bread is less warm. Water is free if you do not pretend it costs me a tooth to pour it."

"Two stews," John said. "Two waters. One big bread."

Fizz put a paw on the counter. "And a rumor," he added. "If there is one about anyone with missing pants."

The woman snorted. "There is always a rumor about missing pants," she said. "Sit. I will bring the food."

They sat in a corner of the tavern hall room and held bowls that made their hands remember softness. John ate slowly. Fizz ate fast and then stole spoonfuls from John when he looked at the door to see if anyone had followed. No one had. The lane had been cleaned, at least in the way that matters at night. He could feel the thread inside him hum once, faint, then go quiet again like a string in a wind that is not trying to play it.

He breathed in, four. Held, two. Out, four. He did not count the men. He did not try to name them. He would not forget them. He would not build a house out of them either. He would build a road, and the road would pass over that place and keep going because roads do not stop where a thing happened. They go on so other things can happen too.

Meanwhile, in the lane that had shut like a book, Edda finished her work. The cart came, creaked once like she had promised, and went again. The bell lay now in a pocket that did not make noise when she ran. The stones looked like they had looked at noon, which is all a stone asks for. A cat crossed and did not look twice. A man went past in a hurry to not be late for the night and did not see a story under his feet because there was nothing to see.

Edda stood in the empty and put a hand over her chest, where the small black comma sat in the dark place. It did not hurt. It did not feel like anything at all unless she thought about turning. She thought about turning. Her breath caught. She smiled, small and honest, at being caught honest by something that did not shout.

"Fine," she said to no one, and to the man with the neat jaw who had put that seed there, and to the small flame with the bad sense of humor. "Fine." She turned and went her own way to a bed that would not ask her what her work was if she gave the right coin to the right woman at the door.

Back at the Bent Penny, John set the small purse under a board with a loose nail, not under his pillow, not in his pocket, not on the table. He checked the hinge. He touched the slate token. He folded the rules. He did all the small boring things that make the big exciting things not end you.

Fizz flopped on the bed, full and smug. "I am rich," he whispered into the blanket. "I am rich in coins and in destiny and in the city. Tonight, I will dream of gold towers."

"You cannot eat that," John said. "You always dream about food."

Fizz rolled and peered up with big eyes. "You cannot," he said, "but I can digest anything. By the way, I can buy food with the money. Huh!"

John blew the lamp and let the dark come. He didn't argue with Fizz. This dark he liked. This dark did not pull. It just rested, the way night rests on good roofs. He closed his eyes and he dreamed. He saw a clean circle of light around a teacher's shoes. He saw a bright small thing holding a cookie and declaring himself master of something ridiculous. He saw a neat coat and a neat hat and a neat man who would never be neat again because the world had stepped on him in a small lane.

He breathed. The system did not speak. It did not need to. There was no question left in him tonight that could be answered by anything except morning.

Down the hall, Pim snored once and then stopped, like a boy trying on a man sleeping for size. The tavern woman sat with her ledger and drew a neat line under the day. She counted today's earnings of the bent penny. On the other side of the city, a steward put away a pen and told himself a story about how sometimes work goes how work goes and then went to bed and did not dream of holes.

In John's chest, in the cool room of his second ring, the small soul stayed occupied. A shadow that was not all of a person but enough of her to matter sat there, head down, not unhappy, not anything, just there. It would stay until told otherwise. It would watch until needed. It would pull if it had to.

John slept.

Fizz, in the dark, whispered one last thing to the room. "The League of Fizz will meet soon," he said. "I will demand justice in blood." He thought of his world. He thought of justice which he deserved.

The lamp was out. The city hummed. The new path went forward, even in sleep.

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