Page 12 of The Only Way Out Is Up

“Right,” Somi says, looking relieved. “Just to make sure it’s healing properly.”

Somi learned basic cut-and-stitch medicine from Fara, but Ameliana’s father was a proper physicker, and she’s studying to follow in his footsteps. I really don’t feel like being around anyone right now, though.

“I’m a little busy,” I lie. “Can we do this later?”

“It’ll only take a minute,” Ameliana says, patting the kitchen table. “Come on. Get up here and take your pants off.”

“I’ll make sure Spike’s doing okay,” Somi says, fleeing the room.

Which leaves the two of us alone. I undo my trousers and slowly let them down.

The thing with Ameliana is—

All right. I had a crush on her. Of course I did! Her family lives across the street from the bakery, and she’s around our age, so she and Somi and I all grew up together. Just kids playing together, until we started maturing into different shapes. The two of them did, anyway. I stayed short and skinny while Somi got tall and round and Ameliana got… curves.

So obviously we both had a crush on her. She picked Somi. I’m over it.

She smiles at me. She has an upturned nose, light brown skin, and a scatter of dark spots across her cheeks.

Mostly over it.

“Somi says you were out scavenging again,” she says, turning her attention to my injury.

“Yeah,” I manage, looking at the wall over her frizzy bun.

“I wish you wouldn’t.” She sighs. “I worry so much about you.”

“It usually goes a little more smoothly,” I tell her. “And we need the money.”

She clicks her tongue disapprovingly and prods the stitching with a finger, which gives me a stab of pain I try valiantly not to show.

“You used a cauterizer,” she says. “This is going to make for a nasty scar.”

“At least it’s not where anyone is likely to see it.” Not anytime soon, anyway.

“Hmm.” She pokes it one more time, then straightens up. “Still. It’s healing clean. Somi’s good with stitching.”

“Glad to hear it. Can I put my pants back on?”

“Go ahead.” She clears her throat as I slide off the table. “You know, if you need money, my cousin just signed on with the Dreikin workhouse. It’s really not bad. He gets two days off per month, and there’s even a starting bonus. I think they’re still recruiting if you—”

“No.” It comes out too fast, and I cough to cover the awkwardness. “No, thanks. I’ll be all right.”

Fara said no workhouses. She made Somi and me promise. Crafting sigils like that, she said, burns you out from the inside. It’s a lucky workhouse inmate who makes it to forty, stooped and wrinkled.

“All right,” Ameliana says, not sure what to do with my vehemence. “Let me know right away if it starts to smell or leak pus.”

Right. The wound. “Believe me, I will. And thank you.”

She smiles again, and my heart does a weak double-thump. “It’s always good to see you, Taj.”

“Likewise.”

And she slips out of the room to go make out with my brother.

[Observation: when you are alone with Miss Ameliana, your heart rate rises significantly.]

I’d almost forgotten Star was in my pocket. When he’s that close, he can sense a lot about me, and he doesn’t have much else to do.