Chapter 82. What the Moon Takes

The Hall did not mend itself. Veilgrove likes a scar the way old soldiers like a story with the ending already agreed upon. Brooms whispered, glass sang in pans, and somewhere above us carpenters cussed in a dialect that made Syra look almost nostalgic.

We stood where the skylight had given up its argument with gravity. The moon stared through the wound, thin as a blade, cruel as a scale.

“Cost,” the Full Moon said again.

“I’ll set it,” I answered, stepping forward. The hush that followed wasn’t reverence. It was bookkeeping. The Court loves a tidy ledger.

The Waning Moon lifted a shallow basin of blackstone filigreed with silver threads. I knew it in my bones before she spoke. “The Tally Bowl,” she said softly. “It counts what you give and makes it true.”

“What currency?” Kael asked, voice careful as a hand close to fire.

“Not blood,” the New Moon said. “Blood is easy. Memory, perhaps. Name. Sight. Sometimes… song.”

“I don’t sing,” I said.<