Chapter 69: Perric in the Crowd

"That man paid Ketta with a blue coin and a lie."

Mara said it into Lina's ear while the orchard cheered a knife-juggler who had wisely not asked to juggle near the lantern oil. Mara wore a red support cord, a plain brown dress, and the calm expression she used when she was scared enough to become precise. Lina followed her gaze through the Moonwake crowd.

"Which man?"

"Brown river cloak. Left of the cider stall. He has been watching the station marks, not the dancers. He asked Ketta whether wrist chalk washes off better with vinegar or spit, then laughed like that was flirting."

Lina saw him then. Perric. Same narrow face. Same restless mouth. Same gift for standing where a person forgot to look until coin changed hands. He had trimmed his beard and tied a festival ribbon around his hat, which made him look less like a thief only if one had never met thieves.

Tamsin appeared beside Lina as if anger had summoned her. "Where is Ketta?"

"Water tent," Mara said. "Vex has her. She did not give him anything except a curse and directions to the latrine."

"Good girl," Tamsin said.

They found Ketta before they confronted him. She sat on a crate behind the water tent with both hands wrapped around a cup she had not drunk from. Her festival sash was crooked. A smear of chalk marked one cheek where she had wiped her face without thinking.

"He was polite first," Ketta said before Lina asked. "That was the ugly part. He said I had quick hands and that quick hands deserved better coin than honest women paid. Then he asked whether the wrist mark mattered more before or after the sip, whether the chalk came from temple stores, whether vinegar made it blur, whether anyone checked the cup token against the mark if a crowd got busy."

Tamsin crouched in front of her. "And you said?"

"I told him my hands were quick enough to slap him if he stepped closer. Then I called for Mara." Ketta swallowed. "I did not know if I should have shouted sooner."

"You shouted before harm," Lina said. "That is the mark we count."

Vex, standing behind the crate, added, "And from this moment forward, no server answers technical questions from guests. Compliments, complaints, flirtation, requests for water. Not procedure. Procedure belongs to station leads."

Ketta nodded, steadier. "I can do that."

Tamsin stood. "Good. Now we make him regret choosing a festival with witnesses."

Mara took the untouched water cup from Ketta and replaced it with bread. "Drink after you chew. Fright goes through an empty stomach too quickly, and I am tired of useful women shaking because useless men own coins."

Lina's first instinct was to cross the orchard and put both hands around Perric's collar. Her second was worse: to chase the thought of what he had learned. Wrist marks. Chalk. Timing. Refusals. Pot coverage. Lantern placement. How much had he seen? How much could be copied badly enough to hurt someone?

Tamsin touched her elbow. "Do not run. You look important when you run."

"I am important."

"Yes, but make him wonder which part."

They moved through the crowd as if checking stations. Lina stopped twice to compliment bread compliance and once to deny a second cup to a man who tried to claim he had two throats. By the time they reached the cider stall, Perric had shifted toward the bridge exit.

Maelis intercepted from the other side, smiling too brightly. "Master Perric. I did not see your name on the vendor permit list."

Perric placed a hand over his heart. "Mistress Dorn, I am wounded by the implication that a man cannot attend a festival without selling something."

"You can attend. You cannot buy my servers with river coin."

He sighed. "Everyone says buy as if conversation has become illegal."

Tamsin stepped into his path. "Conversation is legal. Bribing a server for dosing marks is not conversation. It is the kind of stupidity that gets women blamed when men poison strangers."

Perric looked her up and down. His gaze lingered on the blue bodice. "You were better on stage."

Lina moved before she decided. Tamsin caught her wrist. Hard.

Tamsin smiled at Perric without warmth. "That sentence was free because I am generous tonight. The next look costs a tooth."

Vex arrived with Ketta beside her. Ketta was twenty-four, round-faced, dark-haired, and so angry she looked close to crying. She held up a blue coin between two fingers.

"He said if I showed him how to make the chalk mark blur, he would pay enough for me to stop carrying cups for women who get rich on heat," Ketta said. Her voice shook, but it carried. "I told him I carry cups for women who pay me to say no, which is more than he offered."

Several people nearby turned to listen. Good. Public shame could do work if aimed properly.

Perric spread his hands. "A misunderstanding."

"Then clarify it," Vex said. "Use generous sentences. I am told they reveal character."

His smile thinned. "The whole town is drinking from a cup Mistress Beren claims cannot be copied, while she hides the true price under temple glass and Rose skirts. I asked a practical question. If the mark matters, people should know whether it lies."

Orin, arriving breathless with his harp still strapped across his back, said, "That is not a practical question. That is how counterfeiters speak when trying to make theft sound like public education."

Perric gave him a lazy glance. "And you are?"

"A man currently resisting the urge to rhyme you with something obscene."

Old Pero appeared with a bread basket. "I am not resisting."

The circle around them widened. Perric noticed the audience, recalculated, and smiled toward Lina.

"You cannot own desire forever, Mistress Beren. Someone will make a cheaper cup. Someone will make a stronger cup. Someone will make one without your rules and sell it to people tired of being told to eat bread before pride."

Lina stepped close enough to smell river mud and clove on him. "Then someone will hurt people. And when they do, every worker here will remember you stood in my festival asking how to blur marks."

"Your festival." Perric's smile sharpened. "Listen to yourself. The tax stamp dried yesterday and already the square belongs to you."

That hit too close. Tamsin felt it land and tightened her grip on Lina's wrist.

Maelis said, "Master Perric, you are removed from Moonwake grounds for attempted bribery, interference with public safety, and being exhausting without permit."

One of Brana Pike's guild assistants stepped forward with two town guards. The guards were not quick enough. Perric flicked the blue coin toward Ketta's feet. Everyone looked down for half a breath. He used the half breath well, slipping backward between two cider barrels and through the hanging cloth behind the stall.

Vex swore and moved after him. Tamsin kept Lina still.

"Let Vex," Tamsin said.

"He will run."

"Yes. And if you chase him, every gossip in Valmora sees the brewer sprint after the man who named her hungry."

Lina hated that. She hated it because it was true.

Vex returned three minutes later with a torn piece of brown cloak and no Perric. "He had a horse beyond the wash lane."

Maelis closed her eyes. "I assigned two assistants there."

"One was flirting," Vex said. "Poorly."

Ketta bent to pick up the coin. Mara stopped her.

"Cloth," Mara said. "Do not touch it bare. He wanted you to."

Isolde brought a linen square. The blue coin went into it. Lina saw the mark stamped on one side: not a Valmora mint. River trade. On the other side, scratched by hand, was a tiny cup shape with three lines rising from it.

Orin leaned in. "That symbol was on the counterfeit wax Maelis described."

"Yes," Maelis said. Her voice was quiet now, all charm gone. "And on a sealed report I hoped not to discuss tonight."

The festival continued around them, but its laughter sounded farther away.

Tamsin turned to Ketta. "You did right."

Ketta swallowed. "I wanted to take the coin for one second. I did not, but I wanted to. It was more than three nights' wage."

Tamsin took both her hands. "Wanting money is not failure. Giving him the mark would have been. You stopped before the harm. That counts."

Thessia, who had arrived with ink somehow already open, said, "And now we create bribery refusal pay."

Lina almost laughed. It came out rough. "Another deduction?"

"Another invoice," Thessia said. "Panic becomes policy, remember?"

Lina looked toward the bridge exit where Perric had vanished. Somewhere beyond the lantern light, a man with partial knowledge was turning her rules into market research.

Then Orin's harp gave a sour note.

At the bridge station, three adults had dropped their bread and were clutching their wrist marks as if the chalk burned.

The festival heat had not stopped for Perric.

It had changed key.