Hollow Deep's markets always sounded busy, but there was a difference between the hum of trade and the ripple of unease. This morning, it was the latter — voices quieter, footsteps quicker, merchants casting glances toward the main road before looking away.
Zayway didn't ask why. He'd learned quickly that in Hollow Deep, answers often came with the kind of attention you didn't want. Instead, he followed a scent that drifted between the sharper smells of fish and iron: bitter herbs, crushed leaves, and a faint tang of something metallic.
The herbalist shop sat just past a crooked alley, its paint faded to the color of dust. The door stood open, steam curling out into the street.
⸻
Inside, the air was warm, thick with scents that clung to the skin. Shelves crowded the walls, loaded with jars of dried roots, bottles of colored liquids, and tightly bound bundles of plants hanging upside down from hooks. A long counter divided the room, covered in stains from work that had clearly been going on for years.
A girl stood behind it, sleeves rolled past her elbows. She was maybe three months younger than Zayway, though her eyes carried the weight of someone who'd seen too much to be naive. Her hair was tied back, though a few loose strands curled against her cheek as she worked a knife through a stalk of something dark green.
"You buying or staring?" she said without looking up.
⸻
Zayway stepped farther inside. "Depends on what you've got."
"That depends on what you can pay." She slid the chopped stalk into a bowl, added a pinch of powder from a jar, and ground them together with a pestle until the air between them smelled sharp enough to sting the nose.
He glanced around the shop, letting his eyes wander. That's when he noticed it — hanging on the wall behind her, half-hidden by a drying rack of herbs. A flat disk of polished bone, etched with lines that spiraled inward. The same kind of lines he'd seen carved into a smith's arms and across the box in the lower streets.
Sigils.
⸻
Before he could ask about it, the street outside erupted in shouts.
The girl froze for half a breath, then moved faster than he expected — sweeping the bowl and pestle into a drawer and slamming it shut. She reached for something under the counter.
"Trouble?" Zayway asked.
"In this city?" She gave a humorless smile. "Always."
⸻
The shouting grew louder, followed by the crash of wood splintering. Through the open doorway, Zayway saw three figures spill into the street — two running, one chasing. The pursuer wore an Iron Veil armband, black fabric slick with rainwater.
The two ahead skidded around a corner, and one slammed into a cart stacked with jars. Glass shattered. The herbalist's doorway filled with the smell of crushed root and spilt oil.
The Iron Veil Hunter kept coming.
⸻
One of the runners stumbled inside, wild-eyed and bleeding from a cut along his forearm. He didn't even look at Zayway, just blurted out: "Hide me—"
"Out," the girl behind the counter snapped, her voice like a blade.
The Hunter appeared in the doorway, gaze sweeping the shop. The air seemed to tighten between the three of them.
"You seen him?" the Hunter asked, voice low and dangerous.
⸻
Zayway didn't answer. The girl didn't either.
The Hunter stepped inside, boots leaving wet prints on the worn floorboards. His eyes flicked to the shelves, the jars, then to the bone disk on the wall. Something in his jaw tightened.
Without warning, the girl reached into a jar, pulled out a pinch of pale powder, and tossed it onto the floor between them. The dust hit the wood and hissed, releasing a sudden burst of green smoke.
"Out," she said again — this time to both of them.
⸻
The Hunter stepped back, coughing. The runner used the moment to bolt out the rear door. By the time the smoke cleared enough to see, the Hunter was gone too, boots pounding after him.
Zayway stayed where he was, watching as the girl moved around the shop, picking up jars that had fallen during the chaos. She didn't look at him until she'd righted the last one.
"You planning to help, or are you just going to stand there?" she asked.
He stepped forward, stacking the jars she handed him. "I'm Zayway."
"Aubrey," she said, like it was information and nothing more.
⸻
As they worked, his eyes drifted again to the disk on the wall.
"What's with the carving?" he asked casually.
Her hands paused for half a beat before she set another jar on the shelf. "Decoration."
"Looks like something I've seen before," he said.
"Then you've been in the wrong places."
She didn't say more, and he didn't push. But the way she avoided the question told him enough — whatever that disk was, it wasn't just decoration.
⸻
When they finished, she leaned on the counter, studying him with an unreadable expression. "You're not from this side of the Deep, are you?"
"Not exactly."
"Thought so. People here keep their eyes down. You keep yours everywhere. That'll get you into trouble."
"It already has," he said.
She smirked faintly at that, but it didn't reach her eyes.
⸻
The noise outside had faded, replaced by the usual uneven hum of the city. Aubrey moved to the door and pushed it mostly shut, letting only a thin sliver of light in.
"If you're smart," she said without turning, "you'll stay out of the lower streets for the next few days. Iron Veil's twitchier than usual."
"And if I'm not smart?"
She glanced over her shoulder. "Then maybe I'll see you again sooner than I'd like."
⸻
Zayway left the shop with the smell of crushed herbs still clinging to his clothes and the image of that etched bone disk burned into his mind.
The city outside looked the same as always — damp stone, quick footsteps, the restless shifting of Hollow Deep's endless layers.
But now he knew there were people in it who could throw smoke into a Hunter's face and not flinch… and that some of them were hiding secrets carved in bone.
And he had a feeling he'd be seeing Aubrey again.