Chapter 52 The Price of a Pair of Shoes

Jin set the cage on the table and took Theo's good hand.

Mira stopped smiling.

The floor held steady beneath them.

Jin let go.

“Not yet.”

Theo looked down at their feet.

“All right.”

A second line opened beneath the failed attempt.

Jin read it twice.

Then he looked toward the balcony.

At the paper bag Mira had refused to let back into the kitchen.

“Your shoes.”

Theo followed his gaze.

“No.”

“I haven't explained.”

“They have been through enough.”

Jin took Professor back first.

The bird arrived in Calder's backroom, alive and indignant. She checked his perch, offered him a seed and took the cage with both hands.

“One copper,” he told her.

“Not from me.”

Jin described the human rejection and the shared reference to Calder and Selene.

“The shoes have carried me in both worlds. They belonged to him before that.”

“Belonging isn't the same as showing the other body,” Calder said. “Let him wear them where you can see.”

Selene traced the rim of the cage with one fingertip.

“The veil holds one life. You'll need two separate breaths, not two people pretending to be the same person.”

Jin opened the new page again.

The small living frame was there, complete. Beside it, a second outline waited.

He could recognize what was missing now.

Calder opened a drawer beneath the counter.

“For when you manage it.”

A blank trade-tongue pin lay on her palm.

Jin paid one silver for it, leaving thirty-four in his purse. Calder bound Common with her own voice; Jin lifted his own pin from his skin before adding Korean. He left both pins and his purse on the shelf before taking the empty cage back to Earth.

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“Keep the cage until you're done bringing people,” Calder called after him.

Theo was waiting beside the yellow trainers.

“I've decided,” he said. “If they have to die, I should at least be present.”

He put them on.

Jin rested one hand on his shoulder and opened the guest outline.

Theo's gaze tracked something Jin couldn't see. Then his breath caught.

“There's an invitation,” Theo said.

“Do you want it?”

Theo looked at him.

“Yes, idiot.”

Jin laughed.

Theo's fingers tightened once against his wrist.

“I'm saying yes to the trip,” he said. “Not to you picking everything once we arrive.”

“Good. I'm tired of being the only person who can order the wrong lunch.”

“I'll handle that.”

Jin accepted the body trace Theo offered.

The line through the shoes changed. The same material now held a fresh, willing trace from the other body that had worn it.

Jin sat down.

Theo looked at him.

“What?”

“Twelve hundred.”

“Bad?”

“I have eighty-seven.”

Mira put one hand over her mouth.

“Is there a discount for buying an idiot?”

Theo flicked a cushion at her.

Jin kept looking at the two numbers.

That was nearly half of his next Level. He could already feel the strength he wouldn't be buying if he spent it here.

Then Theo took the shoes off carefully and put them beside the chair.

“Go do the job,” he said. “Bring back enough for the ticket. I'll be here.”

“No more asking whether you want it?”

“I'm leaving the shoes out. Take a hint.”

Theo checked his own display again.

“I haven't got any,” he said.

“What?”

“EXP. In case you were about to ask your oldest creditor.”

Jin laughed.

“I wasn't.”

“Good. I'll pay for lunch instead. When we get there.”

Mira put a bowl between them.

“You can start here.”

They ate while the empty cage sat on the table. Professor had left one little feather beneath its door. Theo picked it up and turned it between two fingers.

Jin remembered him standing in the practice ring with one working arm, hauling that ridiculous dummy toward the line.

He couldn't buy Theo that choice. He could get him somewhere it would finally count for more than practice.

Theo set the feather beside the shoes.

“Go on,” he said. “I've got a rehearsal to annoy people at.”

Jin stood.

He'd seen the shape work around the bird. He had Theo's offered frame. The missing thing was a reward he hadn't earned, and this time he knew exactly what he wanted it for.

That, at least, he knew how to chase.

He left the phone on the table, carried the empty cage back and fastened his pin before meeting Selene at the shop door.

He fetched the new pin and his purse, then stowed the empty cage with his gear.

Lark had brought the wagon around. Kessa stood beside it with a leather roll under her arm.

“Aster has a bowyer Calder trusts,” she said. “I'm coming that far.”

Selene handed Jin a short steel blade from the wagon rack.

“For the road. Return it when we're done.”

He buckled its plain sheath beside his hip.

Lark held up a folded tent.

“Your heroic duties begin with this.”

Jin took it.

“I thought we were being paid to fight.”

“Mostly luggage.”

By noon, Riverbend lay behind them.

At the north crossing, six refugee carts waited beneath three leaning windmills.

Selene stood in the wagon.

No one waved.

Above the carts, a mill's great arms turned once.

There was no wind.