By morning, Rooknest had decided it was beautiful.
This was untrue, but everyone worked very hard to support the lie.
The central hollow filled before first horn with workers carrying buckets, brushes, scrap hooks, old banners, cracked lanterns, and expressions of religious panic. Menders crawled over the lower bridges, scraping black mold from rail joints and arguing over which patches could be hidden behind cloth. Children were sent to collect loose shell flakes from the walkways. Moss-pickers trimmed the farm trays so the gray-green fronds looked less like something scraped from a corpse’s tongue. Even the old women near the heat jars had been given cloth and told to polish prayer posts, which mostly meant they sat there insulting the posts for being dirty.
Foreman Vekk stood beneath the duty board with three slates tucked under one arm and a look of controlled suffering on his face. He had not slept. I could tell because his torn ear twitched every few breaths, and because he was yelling with the focused precision of someone too tired to waste anger.
“No, not that banner. That banner has bite marks.”
A mender held up a faded strip of shellcloth. “All the banners have bite marks.”
“Then choose the one with the least political history.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means if an elder sees it and starts a feud, I’m assigning you to apology duty.”
The mender lowered the banner immediately.
Veyrun leaned toward me. “Apology duty sounds fake.”
“It sounds like something Vekk would invent after running out of legal punishments.”
“I respect him more every day and hate myself for it.”
We had been assigned to the central hollow cleaning crew, which sounded better than mining until I learned it meant removing ten years of dirt from places people had been pretending not to see. My job was to scrape old paste lumps from the base of a support root without damaging the root itself. Veyrun’s job was to hold the waste bucket and make every task worse by surviving it near me.
The root rose from the floor into the hollow wall, pale and ridged beneath layers of dust. It belonged to Saint Rook’s Domain, or grew from it, or fed it, depending on who was explaining and how much fermented moss they had been drinking. I worked carefully around the surface, loosening flakes of old sealant and grit. Under the dirt, the root glowed faintly, not bright, not dramatic, just alive in the way warm breath on cold hands was alive.
“Careful,” Veyrun said.
“I am being careful.”
“You look tense.”
“I am scraping a holy root while Vekk watches from twenty steps away.”
“That is fair.”
Across the hollow, Vekk turned his head.
We both looked busy.
Rooknest had never been clean in my lifetime. It had been functional. Patched. Swept when required. Cleared after collapses. Washed when stink became a structural concern. But clean was different. Clean meant someone was coming who might judge us for the dirt we had survived.
That bothered me more than it should have.
A Hollow Prophet was supposed to be above such things. If the stories were true, he had walked through deeper layers than ours, crossed living caverns, spoken to Saints, healed settlements, driven back things that did not have names because naming them invited attention. He should have understood that Rooknest was poor because it had spent generations refusing to die.
Still, everyone cleaned.
Hope made people strange. Not gentle. Not yet. But strange. Workers who usually cursed every extra task now scrubbed old soot from lantern cages without being threatened. A handler polished Skitter rail caps until they shone dull gray. Children braided scraps of red thread around prayer charms and hung them along the bridges. Even people who claimed they did not believe in Hollow Prophets kept glancing toward the eastern passage as if belief could arrive early and catch them unprepared.
Veyrun dropped a lump of old paste into the bucket. “Do you think the Prophet will care?”
“About dirt?”
“About us looking like we live inside a dead animal’s throat.”
I looked around the hollow. “We do live inside something’s throat. Probably.”
“That is not comforting.”
“You asked.”
He rested his chin on the bucket handle. “I think if I were a Prophet, I would enjoy seeing poor people panic-clean for me.”
“That’s why you’re not a Prophet.”
“That, and the lack of glowing eyes.”
“You don’t know he has glowing eyes.”
“All holy things have glowing eyes. It’s how you know where not to look.”
I scraped another line of grit from the root. “Saint Rook’s eyes don’t glow.”
“Saint Rook is polite. We covered this.”
A clatter came from the upper bridge. Someone had dropped a crate of old prayer shells, sending them skittering down the steps in a rattling flood. Three children chased after them while a mender shouted that anyone stepping on a shell would be cursed with weak ankles.
Veyrun watched the chaos with interest. “That curse seems specific.”
“Mender curse. Practical.”
“Better than romance curses. Those are vague and usually expensive.”
“You have never been cursed romantically.”
“Not for lack of trying.”
I was about to answer when I saw Old Jim near the lower heat vents.
He sat on an overturned feed crate, shovel across his knees, watching the cleaning crews with an expression that made the whole hollow look guilty. His bowl of morning broth rested untouched beside his boot. Dust clung to the fur under his chin. The cough had carved him thinner overnight, or maybe I was noticing more because I had started being afraid for him.
He caught me looking and crooked one finger.
I glanced at Veyrun.
Veyrun sighed. “Yes, obviously we are going to talk to the dying old man who says terrifying things near livestock.”
“He is not dying.”
Veyrun gave me a look.
“He is not dead,” I corrected.
“Better.”
We crossed the hollow when Vekk was busy threatening a banner crew. Old Jim watched us approach, then looked at the root I had been cleaning.
“Polishing bones for a guest,” he rasped.
“It’s a support root,” I said.
“Bones hold things up too.”
Veyrun shifted the bucket to his other hand. “Morning, Jim. You look cheerful.”
“I look awake. You’re confused because you rarely manage either.”
Veyrun nodded. “That was deserved.”
Old Jim picked up his broth bowl, sniffed it, and set it down again.
“You’re not eating?” I asked.
“I’m considering disappointing the broth by outliving it.”
“You need food.”
“I need many things. Food is just the loudest.”
The cleaning noise filled the pause around us: brushes rasping over shell, buckets scraping stone, children laughing too quickly, workers arguing over whether a crack counted as decorative if it had been there long enough. It should have felt normal. It almost did.
Old Jim looked toward the eastern passage. “They’re happy.”
I followed his gaze. A group of workers were hanging red cloth strips along the entry arch. One of them had started singing under her breath, and two others had joined in. Not a work song. Something older, softer, with words about open roads and warm hands.
“They’re hopeful,” I said.
Old Jim’s mouth twisted. “Same sickness, prettier name.”
Veyrun leaned on the bucket. “I enjoy how you make every morning worse.”
“Then you’re welcome.”
“Wasn’t gratitude. Just documentation.”
Old Jim’s eyes moved to me. They were clearer than they should have been in a face that tired. “Good things can still be bait.”
The words settled badly.
I wanted to dismiss them. I wanted to say a Hollow Prophet was not bait, that Saint Rook would know, that Rooknest deserved something good without someone souring it before it arrived. But Old Jim had said Skitters knew before Saints did, and then the Skitters had stopped eating. He had earned the right to be unpleasant.
“That doesn’t mean this is,” I said.
“No. It doesn’t.”
That surprised me.
Old Jim reached for his bowl again but did not drink. “A lie knows what it hides. Hope hides things by accident.”
Veyrun’s expression changed. He looked away first, which meant the words had landed.
I hated that they landed in me too.
“What are we supposed to do?” I asked. “Refuse help before it gets here?”
Old Jim gave a rough laugh that turned into a cough. He bent over the shovel handle, shoulders jerking. I stepped forward, but he raised one hand without looking at me. The coughing passed slowly, leaving him gray around the mouth.
“No,” he said when he could speak again. “You take help when help comes. You eat when food is given. You rest when a wall stops falling. Only fools bite every hand before seeing if it holds a knife.”
“That almost sounded reasonable,” Veyrun said.
“Don’t spread rumors.”
Old Jim’s gaze hardened again. “Just don’t let wanting make you blind. That’s all. Wanting has teeth.”
I thought of my mother’s cough, of her hands shaking over stitching, of the word Prophet sitting inside me like a coal I did not want to let go. Too late, I thought.
Vekk’s voice cracked across the hollow. “Khern! Veyrun! If that bucket is having an emotional crisis, carry it somewhere else.”
Veyrun lifted the bucket. “Our time of wisdom has ended.”
Old Jim snorted. “It never began.”
We returned to the root and worked until my fingers cramped. The central hollow changed by the hour. Dirt vanished. Hidden cracks were covered. Fresh lanterns were hung from shell hooks. The procession path from the eastern passage to Saint Rook’s Domain was swept so clean it looked like a different settlement had been laid over ours.
Not better, exactly.
Just ashamed of itself.
That thought made me angry, though I did not know at whom. The workers who cleaned? Vekk for ordering it? The Prophet for needing a path? Myself for noticing the dirt only when someone important might see it?
Near second horn, Sira and three elders came through with charm bundles. They tied old bone prayers along the bridge rails, each one carved with the mark of Saint Rook: a curved roof line over a hollow circle. Children followed behind with smaller charms made from shed Skitter plates, copying the elders badly and proudly.
One little girl stopped near me. She had a missing front tooth, a tail too short for her body, and both hands full of charms.
“You’re tall,” she said.
I looked down at myself.
I was not.
Veyrun coughed into his fist.
“For a root,” the girl added.
“That makes more sense,” Veyrun said.
She ignored him and held up a charm. It was poorly carved, the roof line crooked and the hollow circle lopsided. “This one broke. You want it?”
“Why would I want a broken one?”
She shrugged. “So it’s not wasted.”
I had no answer to that.
Veyrun leaned over. “Take it. Refusing children curses the knees.”
“That is not true.”
“It feels true.”
I took the charm. “Thank you.”
The girl studied my face with the brutal attention of children and old women. “Are you scared?”
“No,” I lied.
She nodded as if I had said yes. “My aunt says the Prophet will make the bad air stop hurting people.”
The charm felt suddenly heavier in my hand.
“Maybe,” I said.
“My brother says he’ll make the Skitters talk.”
Veyrun brightened. “That would be useful. I have questions.”
The girl’s face became very serious. “He says they’ll mostly complain.”
“That is believable,” I said.
She grinned, then ran after the other children before anyone could assign her more work.
I turned the broken charm over in my palm. The little carved roof was uneven, but the shape of it was clear enough. Shelter. Saint Rook’s mark. The thing everyone in Rooknest lived under whether they thanked him properly or not.
Veyrun looked at it. “You keeping that?”
“I guess.”
“Sentimental.”
“It was free.”
“Ah. Practical sentiment.”
I tucked the charm into my coat.
The day stretched long. Extra shifts always did. By late afternoon, the central hollow was cleaner than I had ever seen it, and everyone was beginning to fray. Hope was strong, but hunger remained persuasive. Children grew cranky. Workers snapped at one another. Vekk yelled at a crew for polishing the wrong side of a bridge rail until someone asked which side was wrong and he answered, “The visible one, you philosophical fungus.”
That helped morale more than it should have.
Then Saint Rook emerged from his Domain.
No one announced him. The hollow noticed him in the way rooms notice fire. Conversations lowered. Tools slowed. Workers stepped back from the procession path, some bowing, others only lowering their eyes because their arms were full and dignity had practical limits.
Saint Rook moved slowly today. The roots trailing from his back entered the floor and walls through pale seams, each one pulsing faintly. He wore no crown, no bright shell armor, no ceremonial cloak. Only layered white cloth, old prayer beads, and exhaustion that did not belong on something holy.
Vekk straightened immediately.
So did I.
So did everyone with enough sense to fear being seen slouching by a Saint.
Saint Rook looked around the central hollow. His eyes moved over the swept path, the patched rails, the hanging charms, the polished lanterns, the children with dirty hands, and the workers trying not to look proud of themselves. For a moment, I thought he would thank us.
Instead, he said, “You have cleaned very hard.”
The hollow went uncertainly quiet.
Veyrun whispered, “Is that praise?”
“Do not make me laugh in front of a Saint.”
“I am frightened and improvising.”
Saint Rook’s mouth curved slightly, as if he had heard.
He probably had.
“You have cleaned so hard,” he continued, “that some of you now look afraid to touch your own walls.”
A few people shifted. A child hid a dirty rag behind her back.
Saint Rook rested one hand against the nearest support root. Light moved faintly beneath the surface in answer. “Rooknest is not shameful because it is worn,” he said. “A place that survives leaves marks. Scratches where carts turned too sharply. Smoke above lamps kept burning through long shifts. Rail dents from children who were told not to climb and climbed anyway. Bad patches made in fear. Good patches made by tired hands. Names carved where people thought no one would look.”
His gaze passed over the hollow, and for one terrible second I thought he looked directly at me.
“This settlement is not beautiful because it is clean. It is beautiful because it is still here.”
No one spoke.
I had never heard someone call Rooknest beautiful without meaning to sell something or mock us.
Saint Rook’s hand remained on the root. “A Hollow Prophet comes to us. We will receive him with respect. But do not mistake respect for shame. Do not polish away proof that you lived. Do not hide the labor that kept your children breathing. Rooknest is poor. Rooknest is frightened. Rooknest complains with great dedication.”
A quiet laugh moved through the crowd.
Even Vekk’s mouth twitched.
Saint Rook’s voice softened. “Rooknest is also worth witnessing.”
Something tightened in my chest.
Around me, workers stood very still. The moss-picker with cracked hands lowered her brush. A handler near the pens wiped her face with the heel of her palm. One of the old women near the heat jar muttered something that sounded suspiciously like agreement, then threatened the other one for hearing it.
Saint Rook looked toward the eastern passage. “If blessing arrives, let it find us as we are: tired, stubborn, hungry, useful, foolish, afraid, and alive.”
The last word carried.
Alive.
Not productive. Not clean. Not impressive. Alive.
For some reason, my hand moved to the broken charm in my coat.
Saint Rook turned then, slowly, toward the lower pens. The Skitters had gone quiet during his speech. Not settled. Quiet. Brakka stood near pen four with both hands on the rail, face unreadable.
A tremor moved beneath the hollow.
Small.
Almost nothing.
The roots along Saint Rook’s back tightened. His expression did not change, but the pale seams in the floor brightened for one breath before dimming again. Vekk noticed. Sira noticed. I noticed because I had started noticing things I wished would leave me alone.
Saint Rook lowered his hand from the root. “Continue preparations. Work in pairs. Rest before last horn if you are ordered to rest. That is not a suggestion disguised as kindness.”
Several workers looked guilty. Vekk immediately pointed at three of them. “You heard him. Rest line. Now.”
One protested.
Vekk took one step toward him.
The worker rested.
Saint Rook returned to his Domain, and the hollow slowly found its noise again. Not the same noise as before. Less frantic. Less ashamed. People still cleaned, but they stopped hiding every scratch. One mender even removed a cloth that had been covering an old collapse scar near the lower steps. Someone had carved seven names into that scar years ago. I had passed it a hundred times without reading them.
Now everyone could.
Veyrun stood beside me, unusually quiet.
I glanced at him. “You okay?”
“I hate when speeches work on me.”
“Same.”
“He called us worth witnessing.”
“I heard.”
“That feels dangerous.”
“Everything feels dangerous to you.”
“Yes, and I continue to be correct.”
We finished our section near last horn. The procession path still looked cleaner than Rooknest deserved, but less false than it had earlier. A little dirt remained in corners. Old dents stayed visible along the bridge rail. The broken things were not all hidden. Some had been tied with red thread and left where they were, as if survival itself counted as decoration.
When Vekk dismissed us, he did it by pointing toward the exit and saying, “Go smell bad somewhere else.”
High praise.
I stopped by Old Jim’s crate before leaving. His broth bowl was empty now. I did not ask whether he had drunk it or thrown it away. Some questions existed only to annoy the dying.
He looked toward the eastern passage. “You hear the Saint?”
“Yes.”
“Good speech.”
That startled me. “You liked it?”
“No. I hate speeches. But it was true, which is rarer.”
Veyrun leaned against a post. “Careful, Jim. Complimenting authority weakens the bones.”
“My bones are already terrible.”
“Then you have nothing to lose.”
Old Jim ignored him and looked at me. “Remember what he said.”
“That Rooknest is worth witnessing?”
“That we are alive.” His eyes sharpened. “Alive things can still run.”
The warning should have annoyed me. It did.
It also stayed.
At home, my mother listened while I told her about Saint Rook’s speech. She did not interrupt, though her needle slowed when I repeated the part about not polishing away proof that we lived.
“He said that?” she asked.
“Close enough.”
“Do not say close enough if you are quoting a Saint.”
“I wasn’t writing it down.”
“You remember every insult Veyrun says.”
“That’s survival.”
“That’s poor storage discipline.”
She tied off a stitch and set the cloth aside. The room was dim, the lamp low to save heat oil. Outside, the eastern stack hummed with late preparation. Someone was singing the same old road song from the morning. Someone else kept getting the words wrong.
I showed her the broken charm.
“A child gave me this.”
Mara took it carefully. Her thumb brushed the crooked roof mark. “She gave you a broken charm?”
“So it wouldn’t be wasted.”
My mother’s face softened.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“That means something.”
“It means children understand the world better before adults train them out of it.”
She handed the charm back.
I sat across from her and turned it over in my fingers. “Do you think he’ll come tomorrow?”
“The Prophet?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe.”
“You keep saying maybe.”
“Because maybe is honest.”
“I hate honest.”
“I know.”
We ate quietly. The ration was still small, but she let me give her the larger piece of moss cake after only one argument, which meant she was tired. Her cough came near the end of dinner, rough but shorter than usual. I pretended not to watch too closely. She pretended not to notice me pretending.
After she slept, I went back out.
The central hollow glowed with extra lanterns. Red cloths hung from rails. Charms clicked softly in the drafts. The procession path curved toward the eastern passage, swept and patched, not clean enough to be false anymore. Above it all, Saint Rook’s Domain pulsed slowly, roots moving faint light through the walls like breath through a chest.
For once, Rooknest almost looked ready.
Not beautiful. Not safe. Ready.
I leaned against the overlook rail and watched the lower pens. Brakka stood with two handlers near pen four. The restless breeder had risen. So had the others. One by one, Skitters across the pens turned toward the eastern passage.
No clicking this time.
No chewing.
No panic.
They lowered their heads.
All of them.
A cold pressure moved through my stomach. The broken charm in my coat seemed to press against my ribs.
Below me, Brakka took one step back from the rail.
The Skitters were bowing.
Not to Saint Rook’s Domain.
To the east.
Toward the Ivory Gates.