Refusal doesn’t sound like rebellion at first.
It sounds like hesitation. Like a pause where obedience used to live.
By morning, the city is quieter again—but not the calm the Candles prefer. This quiet hums with attention. With people watching corners they never watched before. With neighbors standing in doorways longer than necessary, eyes following patrols as they pass.
The force has been seen.
And seeing changes things.
The Candles expect retreat.
That’s the mistake.
They expect people to shrink back into private fear, to accept the lesson Toren’s detention was meant to teach. They expect gratitude to return once the threat is withdrawn.
Instead, refusal starts showing up in places too small to crush.
A woman refuses to close her stall early and keeps selling bread until sunse
