The balance trembled and tasted metal. The lantern dimmed, then brightened, and the paper filled with a sentence: GO BEFORE THE FULL MOON. The compass needle spun once, then settled so that when Arin held it, its tiny arrow pointed not to the city or the sea but toward a hill beyond the eastern fields—the hill his father had once pointed at with a sad smile.
Arin almost laughed. “Direction,” he said finally. “Something that tells me where to go.” gamato full
He stepped into the tent.
“It’s not the answer,” she corrected. “It is the beginning of a way to find answers. But you must place something else on the left bowl to balance it.” She tapped the blank paper. “What can you give up?” The balance trembled and tasted metal
“That’s not very helpful,” Arin muttered. Arin almost laughed
The woman looked at the compass in his palm, then at his face. “We trade what you can’t keep,” she said. “We balance things.”