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The road out of the city is nearly empty, and I’m glad of it. I hold my cloak closed at the throat with both hands, but the wool is thin and full of holes, and the cold comes through it anyway. My shoes are worse than the cloak. The soles have split along the sides, and I feel every rock on the road through them.

When the sky goes gray with feeble morning light, I stop and look back. Rosemere is behind me with its rooftops crowded together and its towers above them. Even from the outside it looks like a city its people are proud of. It’s a beautiful city, full of theaters, music, and people who dress well and know exactly who belongs on its streets. They keep monsters out whenever they can, and they keep this market out as well. Bride markets are legal everywhere on Alia Terra, so the officials of Rosemere can’t ban this one. They can only push it past the city boundary and act as though it doesn’t exist.

I’m one of the women its people don’t look at now. If a buyer takes me, I won’t come back here. I turn away from the rooftops and keep walking.

I know what I look like. I haven’t looked in a mirror since I woke up in the hospital, because I don’t want to see, but I know. My hair used to be so pale it looked white on stage, and silver in certain light. Now it hangs dark and heavy with grime. My dress is filthy, and so is my cloak. There’s dirt under my nails and in the creases of my hands. The people who run the bride market will take one look at me and decide I’m not worth putting on the stage. I keep that fear the whole way down the road, and focusing on one step at a time doesn’t get rid of it.

Beyond a line of bare trees, the field comes into view. The market has already begun.

There’s a stage in the middle of the grass, built from rough boards and raised on posts. It looks as though it was put together quickly and could come apart just as fast. A large tent is off to one side with its canvas sagging from the damp. Around the stage, a loose crowd of bidders waits in the cold. There are no chairs for anyone.

A woman is on the stage right now. I can see her from the road, and I can see a man beside her with his mouth moving. I don’t stop to watch. I go straight to the tent and push through the flap.

Inside, about twenty women wait on the trampled grass. Some stand, and some sit on the ground with their arms wrapped around their knees. None of them look at me. I keep my hood up and cross to the table at the far end, where a young man is bent over a ledger.

He looks up and speaks. He speaks quickly, and I catch nothing. I watch his lips and wait for him to slow down, but he doesn’t. He says something else and lifts his eyebrows, waiting for an answer I can’t give.

“I’m sorry,” I say, and I keep my voice very low, because I can’t hear it and I’m afraid of how loud it might be. “I didn’t understand.”

He frowns and says it again, faster, and points at the ledger. I look down at the ledger instead of at him. I should’ve told him before he opened his mouth, but saying it is asking for something. And I have no right to ask for anything.

“I can’t hear you,” I say, and I touch my ear, so he’ll understand. “I’m deaf.”

He stops. He looks at me for a moment with his mouth slightly open, then pulls a scrap of paper toward him, dips his pen, and writes. He turns the paper around so I can read it.

“Your name?”

“Aveline,” I say.

He writes again. “Your age?”

“Twenty.”

He writes one more line and taps it with the end of the pen. “Are you certain you want to enter the bride market?”

“Yes,” I say. “I’m certain.”

He nods and reaches for the ledger. Before he can write my name into it, I lean closer to the table and speak.

“I know what I look like,” I whisper. “I know I’m dirty, and I know I’m ugly. I know no one here will want me as a bride. I’m not asking for that. But someone might want a servant, and I’m a good worker. I’ll do any work in a house, whatever they need, and I won’t complain. Will you tell the auctioneer that? Will you make sure he says it?”

He’s watching my mouth now instead of my eyes. He nods once.

“And please tell him I know sign language,” I say. “And I can read lips, if the person faces me. I’ll stay out of the way. I won’t be any trouble to whoever buys me. I promise that.”

While I speak, his eyebrows come down and his mouth softens. I know the look because I’m used to it. I’d rather have pity than be sent away.

He writes on the scrap of paper again and turns it toward me.

“I’ll tell him. Wait with the others.”

“Thank you,” I say.

He writes my name in the ledger and points me toward the waiting women. I go and find a place to sit against the canvas wall where I can see the whole tent.

I can’t hear the auctions outside, and I can’t tell how long each one takes or how many are ahead of me. All I can do is watch the flap. A woman goes out, and later another woman goes out. I count them, then I lose count when I realize I don’t know whether the ones who left were sold or sent back home.

The cold has turned my hands white, and my stomach hurts. I fold my arms and keep my eyes on the flap.