When Teclos woke up, he had a blindingly painful headache again.

At least he had made it to his bed this time, though some of his clothes pressed uncomfortably against his skin, leaving sore spots where the fabric had rubbed against him all night.

He sat up slowly, one hand gripping the edge of the bed. His clothes still smelled of smoke, sweat, and tavern ale.

It felt like déjà vu.

This whole week had been nothing but jobs, drinking with the mercenaries, and waking up feeling half-dead.

"Ugh... my head..."

Then he remembered the kid again, and his mood sank to rock bottom.

The hatred in the boy’s eyes at the end had been jarring. It reminded Teclos of himself. If he ever had the chance to stab that orc in the neck, he knew he would do it instantly, even if he died in the process.

He got up, washed himself with water that was not exactly clean, and stretched the soreness out of his body.

Then he threw all his clothes into a basket and put on a fresh set. Lastly, he picked up his coat from the ground, ready to leave.

That was when he remembered.

The pouch.

The pouch full of coins.

His hand searched the coat once.

Then again.

Nothing.

The pouch was gone.

Panic instantly flooded his mind, and his headache suddenly became ten times worse.

He checked the pockets one last time, just to be sure. Then he looked under the bed, beneath the blanket, and searched through his other clothes in the basket.

Nothing.

"Fuck!"

He swore as a cold feeling crawled up his spine.

No.

No, no, no.

That coin could have helped them immensely. Saldia could have gotten new furniture with it. They would not have had to starve, and the existing walls could have been replaced with real ones that shielded them from the heat and cold.

"Idiot," he whispered.

He forced himself to stand again and nearly stumbled into the wall. For a second, he remained there, breathing through the nausea. After a few moments of fighting it back, he straightened himself as best he could and stepped out of his room.

The house was quiet.

She had probably left to work again.

But when he entered the kitchen, he saw that was not the case.

She was sitting right there at the table.

After a brief moment of confusion, his eyes drifted toward the coins arranged in front of her in neat little rows.

Copper on one side.

Silver on the other.

Teclos was sweating bullets as she looked at him, her face so calm it felt eerie. His mouth went dry, and he swallowed audibly.

"Morning..." he said.

Saldia looked at the coins, then back at him.

"Where did this come from?"

Teclos rubbed at his face, buying himself a heartbeat to think.

"I have work now."

"What work?"

"Just... work."

He cursed his brain for not functioning properly because of the hangover.

Her expression did not change, but her eyes were stone cold.

"Do you think I’m stupid?"

Teclos leaned against the doorway. His head hurt too much for this shit. His stomach was still turning, his throat was dry like the desert, and every part of him only wanted water and peace right now.

Instead, there was silver on the table, and Saldia was staring at him like she had already judged him guilty.

"I earned it," he said, still hopelessly trying to deflect the situation.

"Earned it how?"

"With my hands..."

Her gaze moved to the bruise along his jaw, then to the dried scrape near his knuckles.

"With your hands," she repeated quietly.

Teclos looked away, and Saldia stood. The chair scraped against the floor.

"You come home drunk every day for the past week, bruised, stinking of smoke, and with more silver than we make in months. And you want me to believe this is honest work?"

He only looked away and stayed silent, although the nervous tapping of his leg betrayed him.

Saldia’s face hardened.

"No," she said. "Of course not."

He looked at her. "I... I’m not doing anything wrong."

He lied.

"I said don’t take me for a fool!" Her voice rose for the first time. "I know. Gods, stop lying to me and tell me where you got this from. Then return it this instant."

Teclos clenched his jaw.

Saldia stepped closer to the table and placed one finger against a silver coin.

"Who gave this to you?"

He kept his mouth shut.

"Teclos!"

He swallowed, anger stirring beneath the shame.

"I think you should be happy we can finally buy more than stale bread and stop freezing every winter."

Saldia stared at him as if he had struck her.

"Dirty money isn’t going to solve our problems," she said. "It will only create more of them."

The room felt colder.

Teclos’s hands curled into fists.

"You are standing in my kitchen with dirty silver on the table and lies in your mouth."

The words hit their mark.

For a moment, Teclos tried to calm himself. His head pounded, but anger was burning through the hangover now.

"You know... I did this for us," he said. "So we could live better."

Saldia’s expression twisted.

"No. Do not dare dress this useless pride of yours up as sacrifice."

"It is just money!" Teclos snapped.

His fist struck the wall hard enough to punch a hole through it.

Saldia fell silent from shock.

But Teclos continued.

Because once the words came out, he could not stop them.

"It is money for food. Money for repairs. Money so you do not have to work yourself sick at that stall every day, praying no guard or some godforsaken drunk decides to touch you. Money so we do not have to live like beggars and pretend not to be hungry."

Saldia’s face paled, but he pressed on.

"I am tired of scraping by. I am tired of watching people spit on us and laugh. I am tired of being careful, and polite, and fucking poor. You think your honest work saves people here? It does not. It just keeps them taking advantage of us."

"Teclos—"

"No." His voice cracked, but he did not lower it. "I will not be a bottom feeder anymore. I will not spend my life waiting for good times to come along. If there is a way to make things easier, then I will take it."

Saldia looked at him with something worse than anger.

Disappointment.

Then shame rushed in, and because he could not bear that shame, he walked to the table, swept the coins into his hand, and left.

Saldia did not stop him, which somehow made it worse.

"I am going out," he said.

But there was no reply.

The morning air hit him cold, foul, and damp. He walked quickly, trying to get away from this situation.

When he gathered his bearings slightly, he was already near the edge of the slums, where the road dipped toward a drainage ditch that could kill a man with the smell alone.

He looked around and saw a beggar huddled beneath a torn blanket.

At first, he thought it was just another old drunk sleeping off the cold.

Then the man coughed.

He sounded sick and ruined from the inside. His skin had a grey-yellow tint, stretched thin over sharp bones. He had dark spots everywhere. One hand trembled around a wooden bowl with three copper pieces in it.

Other people just stepped around him without even looking.

The beggar lifted his head slightly as Teclos passed.

His eyes were cloudy and lifeless.

"Spare coin?" he rasped.

Teclos stopped.

And for one moment, he did not see a stranger, but a possible future.

Just a half-dead beggar, abandoned by the world.

His hand moved toward his pocket instinctively.

The silver that could save this man was there.

But Saldia’s voice echoed in his mind.

Dirty silver.

Teclos stared at the man’s shaking hand and smirked.

This was what "honest" work led to. This was what happened when people worked until their bodies broke, borrowed coin, swallowed drugs, and owed everyone coin.

He turned away, intending to just walk on, but as he saw the already lifeless eyes turn even more hopeless, he stopped... and gave the man one copper.

The beggar clutched it like treasure.

Teclos frowned and walked on.

"I’ll never become like that," he whispered to himself, like a promise.

By the time he reached the tavern, the promise had hardened into something sharp.

Derrick was sitting by the counter, eating bread with one hand and counting coins with the other. He looked up as Teclos entered, then grinned.

"Oh! Kolma boy, you look like you had a rough night."

"I feel worse than I look. Also, stop calling me Kolma boy."

"Haha! But it suits you."

Teclos ignored that and approached the counter.

"Got work?"

Derrick’s brows rose slightly.

Behind him, Marek also looked surprised as he wiped the glasses.

"You are eager today, kid," Derrick said.

"Do you have work or not?"

"Not in the mood, I see..." The grin faded, and a thoughtful look appeared.

Derrick wiped his fingers on a cloth, then reached into his pocket and pulled out a few folded scraps of paper.

"Small collections," he said. "Nothing grand, just some people late on loans."

Teclos took the first paper and walked to a corner, where Falcon was already sitting.

They went over the list and made a plan on who to visit first.

The first debtor was a tanner with cracked hands and red, pleading eyes. He owed three silver from a winter loan and had only one.

Falcon did not beat him immediately and instead let Teclos talk.

The man begged, explaining that his wife had been sick, that the hides had spoiled in damp weather, and that he needed another week.

As Teclos listened, he tried to feel sympathy and did feel some.

But behind the man’s words, he saw the beggar by the ditch. He saw Saldia’s stall overturned by one bad day. He saw hunger and begging waiting patiently outside his door.

"Two days," Teclos said.

Falcon looked at him and shook his head.

He was still too soft.

The tanner sagged in relief.

"Thank you. Thank you, I swear—"

"If you run," Teclos continued, "we will find you and take everything away then. Not just what you owe right now."

The tanner’s relief vanished, and Falcon gave a small approving nod.

Teclos felt strange threatening him. He did not feel guilty... but he did not feel good either.

The second debtor was easier to shake down.

A gambler who tried to slam the door in their faces.

Falcon kicked it open before it closed fully and rushed inside. As Falcon was beating the man, Teclos asked where the money was. And when the gambler tried to spit at him, Teclos kicked him in the face.

After a while of this "interrogation," they found the money under a loose floorboard.

Five whole silver.

The gambler, spitting blood, cursed them out as they left.

The third was... harder to extort.

A woman with sunken cheeks and drug-stained fingers owed them two silver. Her room had a foul smell to it, like decay. Two children sat in the corner, keeping silent.

She had no money.

Nothing worth taking either.

Falcon searched the shed anyway.

It was hard to watch for Teclos as he imagined her to be Saldia.

The woman cried quietly, saying she only needed it to sleep. That the hunger was too strong. That she would pay when work came.

Everyone was always waiting for work or a miracle, it seemed.

After a few minutes of searching, Falcon found a small silver ring hidden inside a cracked cup.

The woman reached for it.

"No," she whispered. "That was my mother’s."

Falcon tossed it to Teclos.

"Think this is enough?"

Teclos looked at the ring in his palm.

It was small and worn. Worth maybe one silver if sold to the right person.

The woman stared at him.

"It’s not enough," he said.

Falcon watched him carefully.

The woman began to sob.

Teclos hated the sound.

He took pity on her and her children, placing the ring back on the table.

"You have two days," he said. "Then someone crueler than me comes to pay you a visit."

Falcon said nothing until they were outside. Then he looked at Teclos.

"You’re too soft on them, kid."

Teclos’s anger flared.

"She had nothing."

"A lot of people who owe us have nothing, kid." Falcon’s expression remained calm as he explained further. "Besides, she did have ’something,’ and I’m not talking about the ring. We could use her as unpaid labor and her children too, until she pays the debt off."

Teclos looked at Falcon, stunned, then back at the building.

The children were still watching through the cracked window, and for a moment, his resolve wavered.

Then he thought of the beggar again.

The diseased skin. The dead eyes. Begging for mercy.

Anything but that.

Anything.

By evening, Teclos’s pockets carried way more coin than they had that morning. Not all of it was his, but a lot of it would be once he reported to the boss and took his share.

The tavern was loud when they returned.

Smoke clung to the ceiling in thick layers. Men shouted over dice games. The counter was full of thirsty mercenaries who laughed and occasionally fought.

Falcon and Teclos went to the back room, where Zamas counted the money, asked a few questions, and smiled when Falcon gave his report.

"Not bad," he said to Teclos. "You are still soft in some places, but not bad, kiddo."

Teclos should have hated the praise, but instead felt proud as warmth spread through his chest.

Zamas gave him and Falcon each two silver and some change.

"Your cut."

Teclos stared at the money.

And the guilt from the morning, after Saldia’s anger, disappeared. Forget about being a beggar like that old man near the ditch. That would not happen to him—

As the beautiful silver in his hands would prevent that.

After they stepped out from the back room, Derrick pushed a cup into his hand.

"Hey, kid! Drink with me. We have to think of a new nickname for you, since you didn’t like the last one, haha."

Teclos hesitated.

"It better be a good one this time."

Then the mercenaries nearby began calling his name, laughing and making room at their table. One clapped him on the shoulder. Someone else shoved a plate of greasy meat toward him.

At home, he had been a liar and scum.

But here... he felt welcome.

Useful.