Morning light found the workshop already open. The crowd was smaller than the night before but steadier—people who had decided the threshold was real enough to risk a second visit. Lira worked the furnace while the lens rested in its cradle. The spiral scars on her hands caught the glow each time she turned a gather of glass.
The boy from the canal no longer sat half-hidden in corners. He stood at the door with a slate, recording names and the order of petitioners in a careful, uneven hand. When Lira asked what he was called, he looked surprised, as if no one had required the information in a long time.
“Cal,” he said. “Just Cal.”
The older workshop hand—broad-shouldered, gray at the temples, with a burn scar across the back of one wrist—introduced himself properly while repairing a cra
