“The sky is blue,” I finished.
He turned to look at me. “Yes, the sky is blue.”
I looked at the fire, at its low, steady burn in the large hearth. “Is it worth it?” I asked. “The heat. The noise. The people who talk too much.” I kept my eyes on the flames. “Is the blue worth it?”
He was quiet for long enough that I thought he wasn't going to answer.
“Yes,” he said. “It is.”
I looked at him then. At those warm brown eyes in the firelight, steady on mine, and at something in them I wasn't ready to look at directly but was becoming harder to look away from.
“Good,” I said quietly.
I stood and walked to the stairs.
Behind me, the fire breathed quietly, and I didn't look back, and it was
fine.
It was almost better than fine.
Chapter 36
Baxley discoveredthe work in his usual manner. Silently, without calling attention to it, and presenting it as a done deal during breakfast, with the relaxed confidence of someone who had been doing this so long that the process went unnoticed.
“I picked us up a courier job,” he said, setting down his cup. “A merchant in the upper city needs documents delivered to a contact in Virellan. Discretion required. Pays well.”
Larana looked up. “How well?”
“Well enough that we can leave Crystallese with full packs and still earn some coin.” He looked over at me. “It’s a four-way split.”
I thought about it. “Virellan is where?”
“Border town, in Florlunia. You’re barely out of it, and the border with Crystallese is there. It’s the only place in Florlunia where snow falls.”
“And then the snow just stops?” I asked curiously.
He considered it and gave a soft huff. “Yeah, pretty much.”
“Huh.”
“So courier job?” He looked at Larana. “Yeah?”
She nodded. Baxley looked at me. I nodded because I was just following Larana. Baxley looked at Nicco.
Nicco said nothing. He was looking at the table with the expression of a man who had decided something and wasn't sharing it.
“Nicco,” Baxley said. “You in?”
Wait, was there a chance he wouldn’t be? Was that an option?
“Fine.” Nicco picked up his cup. “Keep it clean.”
Baxley and Larana exchanged a look I didn’t understand and decided it was best not to ask.
The merchant was in the upper city, which meant we had to move through Glassfyr properly for the first time since we arrived. Not the stunned drift of the first evening. This was purposeful movement, navigating the streets with intention, and I was better at it now. Two days in the city had taught me its shape, the way the streets ran, the logic of a place built into a mountain.
That didn’t mean that I didn’t still look at everything.
