Night in Hollow City wasn't night at all — no stars, no sky, just endless dark stitched together by guttering fires and the soft rustle of children shifting in their dreams. The old maintenance chamber stank of sweat, wet stone, and scorched tin from burned cans.
Rafi couldn't sleep. Not with the boy burning up in the nest of blankets beside him. Not with the hush whispering behind every drip and echo. He sat cross-legged, elbows on his knees, staring at Marrow through the thin veil of smoke drifting from the drum fire.
Marrow, hollow-eyed but never truly at rest, watched him back. Her broom spear leaned against her shoulder like a second spine. She twitched every time the pipes popped.
Rafi's voice scraped out low so the tribe wouldn't wake.
He needs real medicine, he said. Something to break the fever. He won't last another day on bean water.
Marrow snorted a humorless laugh that rattled her cracked lip. You think we got a secret doctor hidden under a tarp? Or a sack of pretty pills stashed behind the rats?
Rafi shook his head, fighting the bone-deep tiredness. Not here. Up top. Maybe an old clinic. A storeroom. Somewhere the hush doesn't rot everything before you touch it.
Marrow's eyes flicked to the boy, then to the braid girl curled protectively on the other side, dagger still in her grip even while half-asleep. Something flickered behind Marrow's anger — a memory of softer days, maybe. Or just the ghost of pity that hadn't yet starved to death inside her.
And you want to creep up there, she said, voice flat, like every fool who thinks the hush lets you steal from its garden.
Rafi didn't blink. You know the way.
The silence stretched so thin it hummed like a wire about to snap.
Then Marrow leaned forward. Her breath smelled of old canned fruit. What do I get, brave boy? This place runs on trades, not please and thank you.
Rafi's hands balled into fists. He hated her for asking, but more than that he hated the hush for making her this way.
When I come back, he said slowly, I owe you. Anything. You ask it — I don't say no.
Marrow's laugh scraped the stone walls like broken glass. Big promise for a gutter rat who'll likely come back as bones.
She tapped her spear against his boot. A soft warning that still felt like an iron brand. Fine. I show you the hole. The way up. You take your hush-bait and your shadow girl and dig for ghosts of medicine. If you bring trouble back — you're not kin anymore. You're quarry.
Rafi met her gaze, unflinching. Deal.
Behind him, the braid girl stirred. One bleary eye opened, reading him the way she always did. She didn't speak — didn't need to. Her expression alone asked: How far will you crawl for hope?
Rafi pressed a trembling palm to the fevered boy's brow. He answered her question without a word.
He would crawl through the hush's deepest teeth if it meant keeping one promise: no more dying in the dark.