Where You Land

Morning found Wyrm’s Crossing already awake.

The Chionthar moved beneath the great stone arches, river wind climbing to the bridge with the smell of salt and rot. Above it, the bridge lived by its own rules: crowded stalls, awnings stitched together, and carts arguing with feet down the narrow lane.

Maeril’s canopy sat in the crush like it had grown there: plank counter, bowls within reach, cookfire smoking, a short line of regulars with work in their shoulders.

She fed them.

Not charity—she needed coin like anyone—but because hot food kept tempers from sharpening.

All morning, Maeril busied herself while her attention kept returning to her hawk as it circled Wyrm’s Rock. From her counter, the prison was only a distant mass, a block of stone rising above the water. She could make out only the guardwalks and a few moving figures: close enough to haunt her, too far away to be of any use.

By noon, the morning rush had eased, but hunger was making the wait harder. Customers pressed against the counter, and Wyrm’s Rock stayed stubbornly closed.

That was when Rook appeared at the edge of her canopy. Instead of coming up to the counter, he slipped in at the side, into the shadow, pretending he had not come at all. His hair was damp. One cheek was bruised dark. The corner of his mouth was split.

Maeril kept serving her customers. “You look terrible,” she said.

Rook’s eyes flicked to the pot, then away. “Always so kind.”

“Only to my favorites.”

He sneered. The motion pulled at the split in his lip, and he failed to hide the wince.

She slid a bowl across the counter to a waiting carter, took the coin, and turned back to Rook without changing her face.

“How did you get hurt?”

“Bridge,” Rook answered.

“The bridge hit you?”

“Dangerous bridge.”

“Mm.” She wiped the ladle against the pot’s rim. “Must have chased you into Ragpicker’s Alley too.”

Rook went still.

Not completely. His shoulders locked for half a breath, and his eyes cut upward before he could stop them.

When he looked back at Maeril, the lie had left his face. “You saw me.”

“Yes.” Maeril lowered her voice so only Rook could hear. “And I saw him.”

Rook’s eyes narrowed. “Lantern Hall one?”

“You mean he’s the Lantern Hall monk?”

“Grey robes. Wrapped hands. Patches people up when they’re stupid enough to bleed where he can see it.”

His jaw shifted around the next words, reluctant despite himself. “That’s him.”

Lantern Hall.

Maeril knew the name: a place for the dispossessed, where the wounded went when they had nowhere cleaner to bleed. Bridge talk told of a monk who moved through the streets, patching people up where he could.

That changed the shape of the man without making him less strange.

Rook looked at her, expecting her to do something foolish now that she knew who the monk was.

Maeril set another bowl down for a woman who had been waiting too long, murmured an apology, and came back to him. “We should help him get out.”

Rook’s face twisted with disgust. “I don’t owe him.”

“No,” Maeril said. “You do not.”

That answer caught him worse than argument would have.

“But I am not asking what you owe,” she said. “I am asking what you know.”

Rook rubbed the back of his wrist under his nose. “You don’t get people out of Wyrm’s Rock.”

“I have noticed.”

“You make them not worth keeping.”

“That sounds dangerously close to useful.”

“It’s not a door problem,” he said, as if it should have been obvious. “Don’t steal a key. Keys make them angry. Paper makes them lazy.”

Maeril stopped serving for a moment and listened. “Who matters?” she asked.

“Not the ones who hit him. They’re boots. Boots walk where they’re pointed.”

“Then who points?”

“Older sergeant. Scar here.” He dragged a finger across the bridge of his own nose. “Lower gate sometimes. Intake sometimes. Release if the paper’s small enough. Likes things tidy. Hates captains asking too many questions.”

“And you know all that from standing politely where you belong?”

“I deliver messages.”

Maeril smiled faintly. “Messages. Right. I see.”

“People talk in front of young messengers,” he said. “They think we’re too lowly to matter.”

Maeril’s smile vanished.

Rook glanced toward the prison tower, then back at Maeril. “You know the sergeant. Comes here sometimes. Acts like soup is beneath him, eats it anyway.”

“That describes half the bridge.”

“He’s got a girl,” Rook said.

Maeril’s expression went still.

“A daughter,” he said. “Bad cough. Heard him talking by the lower gate. Not regular coughing. The kind adults pretend isn’t scaring them.”

For a moment, the bridge seemed to press closer: wheels, feet, river wind, a laugh too loud.

Maeril looked toward Wyrm’s Rock.

Not a prison door, then.

A human one.

Rook shifted his weight. “That’s what I know.”

Maeril reached under the counter and brought out a small heel of yesterday’s bread. She set it beside the steam where he could take it without anyone seeing her give it.

He looked at it as if it had insulted him.

“No debt,” she said.

“I didn’t ask.”

“I know.”

His hand moved fast. The bread vanished into his coat.

“Don’t tell him,” he said.

“Who?”

“The monk.”

Maeril studied him.

Rook’s jaw hardened. “I didn’t do it for him.”

“No,” she said. “For me.”

Rook laughed once, loud enough to turn a head and short enough to deny afterward.

“Good,” he said. Then he slipped backward through the shadow of the canopy and was gone.

For the next few hours, Maeril kept serving her customers. Bowls emptied, customers came and went, and her hawk continued circling Wyrm’s Rock so she would not miss the monk if he walked out.

Between orders, she thought. Little by little, an idea took shape. She chose a few bitter herbs, wrapped them in a scrap of cloth, and tucked the packet beneath her counter.

The sergeant showed up like he belonged there.

Cloak dulled by use. Boots planted wide at her counter. Not in line. One elbow settled on the planks, his weight pitched forward, leaving everyone else to shift around him.

Maeril didn’t blink at it. She reached for a bowl.

“Today’s soup?” she asked.

The man grunted, the sound halfway between thanks and complaint.

She filled the bowl, set it in front of him, then placed the little packet beside it.

He looked down at the packet, brow furrowed, then back at Maeril. “What’s that?”

“For your daughter.”

The sergeant reached for the packet, then stopped halfway.

Maeril kept her voice ordinary. “Steep this. Do not boil it. If she coughs it back up, use half as much and honey if you have any.”

His brow furrowed deeper. “How do you know about my daughter?”

Maeril felt the small, cold drop in her stomach that meant she had moved too fast.

“People talk on the bridge.”

“About my girl?”

“No,” Maeril said. “Not loudly.”

His stare stayed on her long enough that the steam between them thinned. Then his eyes dropped to the packet.

Maeril let her breath settle without showing him she had needed to.

“And if it gets worse?” he asked.

“Then bring your girl to the Lantern Hall monk.”

His jaw shifted once.

“That would be difficult.”

“Would it?”

“He is in a cell.”

“Ah.”

The word landed softly enough to be mistaken for surprise.

The sergeant stared at her.

Maeril turned to the pot before the sergeant could ask more questions, stirred the broth, and set another bowl on the counter.

“I would rather not bring my daughter into Wyrm’s Rock,” he said.

“I imagine not,” Maeril said.

He said nothing.

She slid a bowl to a waiting worker, took the coin, and came back to him as if they were discussing weather.

“That is unfortunate, then.”

His mouth tightened.

For a moment, Maeril thought he might push the packet back across the counter out of pride, but he took it carefully—too carefully for a man pretending not to be afraid.

He tucked it inside his coat. “That monk,” he said at last.

“Yes,” Maeril answered, keeping her hand on the ladle.

His eyes flicked past her shoulder toward the Rock, then back to the bowl as if he had never looked away.

“That one made trouble.”

“I heard.”

“Quiet sort, though. Patches people up.” The sergeant hesitated. “Can put a drunk on the floor without spilling blood, if he has to.”

Maeril let that land without smiling.

The sergeant scraped the bowl once, slow. “I’ll see what can be done.”

Maeril nodded like he had said the weather might hold.

“That would be kind.”

His eyes sharpened at the word.

Maeril reached for the next bowl.

Rishi woke to stone and iron.

Cold stone under his cheek. Iron bars in front of him. And the ache—a deep, heavy ache—settling into every part of his body.

He didn’t move at first. He lay still long enough to map the night into his bones: bruises blooming under skin, a cracked rib that scraped when he breathed too deep, his jaw throbbing where the blow had landed.

He pushed himself upright with care and sat cross-legged on the cell floor.

A thin shaft of light cut down from a tiny window high above, turning dust into a lazy fall. The air tasted of old iron and stale breath.

He set his hands on his thighs and slipped into his practiced rhythm.

Breath first—measured, disciplined. Then warmth, quiet and steady, the small internal glow of his blood spreading through him like a candle lit behind ribs. Then fingertips pressing and tapping along collarbone, sternum, the bruised ladder of his ribs—awakening what still answered, easing swelling by degrees, and settling the dizziness.

Healing came slow.

By afternoon, the pain had changed shape—manageable, contained, no longer drowning him.

Footsteps echoed down the corridor. Measured. Unhurried. Coming straight for his cell.

Rishi straightened. He let his face go blank.

The sergeant stood before the cell, hands hooked on his belt, shoulders squared.

Not one of the two from the alley. Older. Scar on the bridge of his nose. A face that had learned to stay bored so nobody could read it.

“You,” the sergeant said. “You’re the one who stepped between my lads and that brat.”

Rishi nodded.

“They say you caught a blade with your hand. Didn’t swing back.”

“A hand was enough.”

“Most folks don’t put themselves on the line for alley trash.”

Rishi’s fingers found the red cord at his wrist and pressed it lightly, like a habit of prayer. “It would have ended him.”

The sergeant studied him longer than courtesy required. Finally, his gaze dropped to Rishi’s wrapped hands. “Lantern Hall, are you?”

“Yes.”

“Figures.”

The sergeant grunted. “Paper says disorder, obstruction, interfering with lawful punishment.” He paused. “Paper also says no guards were harmed, and keeping you here would make my life more complicated than letting you walk.”

Rishi inclined his head. Not gratitude. Acknowledgment.

“I’ll see you out,” the sergeant said.

He turned, then stopped with one hand on the bars.

“Heard you mend bones,” he said. “Try not to break your own.”

Rishi let out a dry breath—almost a laugh, cut short by a sharp pain in his side.

“I’ll try.”

The sergeant walked away down the corridor. The sound of his boots faded into stone.

Rishi let the promise of release settle.

Her hawk had been watching Rishi for some time. When he finally set foot on the bridge, Maeril saw him too.

Grey robes. Wrapped hands. That careful, controlled walk that pretended he wasn’t in pain. He moved with the crowd instead of against it, letting carts and shoulders slide past him.

If she waited, he’d be gone.

She needed to act.

“Sorry—hold that thought,” she muttered, already stepping out from behind the counter.

A customer complained. Another leaned forward, offended.

Maeril didn’t look back. She left the ladle where it was, steam still rising, and threaded herself into the lane without blocking it.

Maeril came up alongside the monk, close enough for her words to reach him, but not so close she forced him to stop.

“Hey,” she said, and let it sound ordinary.

He didn’t slow.

He turned his head a fraction, looking behind him as if the person she meant must be there.

Maeril felt her pulse jump—annoying, bright—and kept her face steady.

“I watched,” she said. “Last night. Ragpicker’s Alley. Through different eyes.”

That did it.

He looked at her. Then the hawk passed overhead, its shadow sliding across the boards.

Maeril held his gaze and let the bridge keep moving around them—carts complaining, boots clacking, merchants calling out.

She kept her voice level anyway. “Easy,” she said. “I’m not the Fist. I just wanted to make sure you made it out in one piece.”

She tipped her chin toward the canopy. “Come on. Food first.”

Maeril walked as she talked—one step ahead of him, just enough to make “come” feel like the obvious next thing, not a command.

Her stall was only a few strides away. A cart shouldered through, and the cookfire’s smoke snapped sideways in the river wind and stung her eyes.

“One breath,” she called, already sliding behind the plank counter again.

Rishi stayed where he was for a beat, like he expected a trap. Then—hesitant, careful—he nodded and followed her to the canopy.

He stopped beside it where there was room to stand without being pinned. He kept his shoulders still, containing the pain through practiced discipline.

Maeril moved fast. One bowl out, a quick coin taken, another ladled and slid across with a murmured, “Sorry—keep moving.” A few words, a few motions, and the line was moving again.

Then she turned back to Rishi.

She didn’t reach for him. Didn’t ask his name. Didn’t ask why. She only lifted the ladle again.

“This is the part where you let me be stubborn,” she said, low enough that the offer stayed between them. “You eat. You walk. No debt.”

His eyes flicked to the crowd streaming past, the open lane where he could vanish, and the hawk.

Something in him tightened.

For a heartbeat, he looked like he might choose disappearance on pure reflex.

Maeril didn’t insist. She simply held the bowl between them—warmth and steam.

Rishi exhaled, lowering his shoulders. “Thank you,” he said simply. Then he stepped in that last half pace.

Maeril set the bowl down in front of him as if it were an ordinary gesture. Steam rose between them, softening edges. The broth smelled of onion and pepper.

He took the bowl in both hands and lifted it to his lips. The first sip was careful. The second was real.

Maeril returned to her work, because watching him too closely would make it a thing.

She wiped the counter, answered a question, and kept the line moving.

Under all that motion, something in her chest unclenched—a small, private release she didn’t allow herself to show.

He stayed.

Great.

Now I have to keep him here.