If Marron hadn't tried using the bone charm before the diner closed, she might have walked back to the third floor's inn. To the dimly lit room carved of stone, with its strangely soft mattress and the chipped chest that stored her beloved hot plate.
That gave her pause.
I need to go back and get it.
She had just grabbed food and other essentials earlier, shoving them into her pack before the guard mimic arrived. In her haste, she'd left behind the one thing she couldn't bear to lose—the hot plate that had saved her sanity more than once.
Even if she was… special now, that didn't mean she could afford to leave it. So she marched back down the stairwell, bone shard tucked into her apron pocket, and pushed open the inn's door.
The air smelled faintly of soot and boiled roots. The familiar hush of the place pressed against her shoulders like a worn blanket.
