Chapter 131. Six Dawn Seats

The dark beyond the quarry kept its manners until the exact instant manners became inconvenient. Then a ring of careful air gathered over the waste ground as if a tidy god had dropped a saucer and hoped no one would hear it crack. Frost printed the hour on the post with the primness of a clerk using her last unbroken nib: FIRST LIGHT: SIT.

The well took the hint and held its breath. The hinge turned its edge toward the lane as though edges could behave like lanterns. The bench stayed solid under the vessel because furniture that has learned dignity does not flinch on schedule.

Aria walked with the child past the last wall where gossip is brave, spoon tied to the small wrist with string that remembered home better than maps. The ground out here was the color of decisions postponed—pale, granular, flat enough to teach humiliation how to balance. The circle sharpened itself over a rectangle of tamped dust as if trying to summon authority from good posture alone. On its rim