"You think giving me a roof and a name makes me your possession?" Hope snapped as she pushed the coffee cup away. Liquid sloshed, dark and bitter, and the vendor behind her stall wiped his hands and watched like a priest at a trial. Elden Matsumoto didn't blink. He looked at her the way you appraise a problem—cool, slow, as if measuring which corner to cut. He had walked through Riverside twice this week and never tempted the market's chaos until this morning, when his coat had brushed the awnings and his boots had left clean, deliberate prints on the mud. Clean hands. Expensive cut. A patient man. "You could have a roof and a name," he said. His voice was low enough that the gossip wouldn't carry too far, but loud enough for the man with the fish scales to hear. "And the child—" "The child," Hope repeated, louder. Laughter, sharp and brittle, spilled from her like spilled coins. "My child will be mine. Not a charity haunting your halls." A crowd gathered because crowds always gather when nobility visits a market. They came for the spectacle—silks against burlap, an old feud dressed in new clothes. Sophia hovered behind the stall, fingers working a braid with hands that never stopped. Legacy leaned on a stack of sacks and grinned as if popcorn were being passed out. Harriet hovered at the doorway of the loft stairs, expression folded tight like a saved prayer. Elden's