Under the Lantern Truce
You walk in the front gate side by side with a pink unicorn, and the Midnight Market — which has seen everything twice — stops to look anyway.
A hush rolls down the lantern-strings ahead of you like a wave. Stall-keepers stand up. A tinker made of clock parts takes off his hat, and a whole tent of tiny winged folk rises into the air to see better. It isn't fear and it isn't even quite awe; it's the way people look at the sea, or snow at night. A guardian of the dawn, walking under the lanterns.
“They remember what I am,” Sera says softly. “Markets remember everything. It's their whole job.” She stands taller with every step, drinking the light. Out past the gate, at the black edge of the field, the wolves pace their line like a tide against a sea wall, and cannot come in, and you let yourself enjoy that a little.
A moth-winged usher bows you down the main row. “The Apothecary,” it whispers, when you say the word salve. “Third lantern, blue tent. Mind the prices, honey-child. He's fair, but fair isn't the same as gentle.”