Benji nods, gaze dropping to his final debt ring. “And this one’s…from my mom and dad.”
My arm wraps around his shoulder and he grasps it, attention shifting to the bands of black along my limb.
“You have a lot from your mom and dad. Like Jeremee has,” the child says, voice small.
I squeeze him closer. “That was his choice, and he wouldn’t have done it if he wasn’t okay with it.”
Only to stay in accordance with the law did Jeremee let Benji inherit one debt ring from their parents, whereas most siblings divide them evenly. For only children like me, there isn’t a choice. Regardless of the rings, it’s a surreal feeling to earn a salary larger than my parents’ combined now that I’m a Day Crest.
“What if Jeremee never gets his rings off because of me,” Benji mumbles.
“Hey.” I spin him in my arms so he’s facing me again. “It’s not because of you.”
“But what if he can never work it off?”
“Have you heard about the laundry Scarp named Nova?”
He shakes his head.
“Well, Nova cleaned clothes better than anyone else. He was fast, too. They get tipped for going above their quota, and he turned in more garments than required every single day. By the time he reached five hundred, he had worked off all his rings.”
“Really? So you think I can get off my birth ring today?”
“Maybe,” a voice says behind us. “Just don’t focus on that too much.”
Jeremee loops an arm around my shoulder, then tugs Benji from my side to his. Though he beams down at his sibling, I catch the weariness in his eyes. How can I blame him?
Nova left the palace inkless but marked in other ways. He had no wife or children; his hands shook constantly, fingers gone numb long ago; and a nasty cough always rattled his chest. An older laundress once told me he traveled west to Remiti, the Healing capital, to live in the constant sun. She also told me he was a great tale spinner.
We all shuffle closer to the front, Benji moving ahead of us.
“Let him hope,” I murmur to Jae.
“They’ll crush it.”
“Better them than you.”
“I should be the one to let him down easily. It’ll happen either way.”
I know. Planes, believe me, I know,I want to cry. I rememberthe gut-wrenching years of hope and defeat as the interest compounded on debt I was born into, that my parents were born into, that their parents were born into. We cannot control where the tattoos will appear or how many. All we can do is work until we earn our way out. Or take on more rings so that others do not.
“How was prepping the coronation hall?” I ask.
Jeremee shrugs. “The room hasn’t been touched in centuries, so while we weren’t the first cleaning crew, it still needed to be scrubbed down, windows washed, chandeliers dusted.”
The corners of his mouth pull tight. Turning my head into him, I whisper, “What’s wrong?”
He leans down, and for the second time today, we look like secretive lovers. His breath tickles my ear as he cups a hand over it. “The grout was pink, and no matter how hard I scrubbed, I couldn’t get the color out. Thought it was some strange fae fashion, but an older guard told me something else.” Jeremeegrimaces. “It was blood that had soaked into the floors during the Dark Rebellion.”
“Halfling prick,” I breathe. In front of us, Benji giggles, and we gesture him along.
“How many stones are in this room?” Jae asks.
“It must be hundreds,” the child says.
“Then you better get counting. Practice your numbers and I’ll get you a chocolate at the next Full Moon Festival.”
The boy gasps before getting started.
