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One day, we were making our rounds in the bazaar. It had been slow pickings because of a religious holiday that saw many people fasting and not spending their hard-earned coins.

With a kind smile, I managed to pull a young lad about five years my senior away from the street. I noticed he stared at my smile for far too long.

He didn’t give me any copper. It didn’t matter—Baylen swept behind him and snatched something off his belt regardless.

Except the thing he stole didn’t detach quickly enough, and the lad felt it.

“Hey!” he yelled as Baylen scurried off. “Get back here, you little brigand!”

The taller, older, longer-legged boy sprinted after Baylen. The chase was on.

My heart hammered against my ribs. I dashed away from the bazaar as people at different stalls turned at the sounds of our commotion.

I dipped into an alley—no longer scared of them after years of avoiding the dangers they housed. Baylen and I had planned for an occasion like this. Now the moment was upon us, my brain felt foggy and rushed.

I scampered up to a roof, jogging across it, and kept eyes on the action below. Bay weaved through crowds, even as the lad yelled for someone to stop him.

In the distance—further than Baylen could see from ground-level—I saw the shining bronze armor of guardsmen heading straight for Baylen, down the street. They were making their usual march, not yet noticing the tumult headed their way through the crowd.

“Bay!” I shouted, cupping my hands over my lips. “Veer right!”

The young man chasing him glanced up, saw me, and I dashed away from the edge of the building to hide. The man skittered right as my words left my lips—

Even as Baylen careened to the left.

A minute later, he had escaped from both the young man and the Bronzes, bobbing through familiar alleyways and streets until he circled back to where we started.

We quickly left the bazaar, agreeing we would not return for a few weeks after that chaotic moment. Still, it was hard not to smile when Baylen laughed loudly and joyously at our grand escape.

Before returning to the House, he pulled his winnings from behind his back, keeping it in his fist. “Could have nabbed his purse,” he said. “Got this instead.”

His hand opened to reveal a pretty blue hair bow.

My lips parted, eyes moving from the present to his grinning face.

I squealed like a proper girl.

I could never wear the hair bow, of course. I hid it beneath my cot instead, vowing to put it in my hair the moment I turned sixteen and left the House of the Broken.

That was how I discovered every Sister and Brother in the House was watched and monitored at all hours. Because three days later, Mother Eola barged into the eating room in the morning, during first meal, when every Trueheart child was congregated to eat before staking out for alms-collecting.

With wrath written on her face, she snagged my arm, hoisted me to my feet, and snarled, “Come with me, little hellion.”

I yelped as she dragged me off. My terrified eyes found Baylen on the other side of the room. He looked just as scared as I felt.

Eola brought me in front of Father Cullard.

“W-What’s going on, Mother?” I babbled as she shoved me forward.

In her hand, Eola held my pretty hair bow. “This was discovered under her cot during a routine search, Father. She must be punished for her sin. Surely she could not have afforded this. It was stolen.”

Cullard looked at me sternly. His face wasn’t so affable these days. I’d started to notice the first hint of old age creeping through his tired features. The gray hair at his temples was completely gone, making him fully bald. “Is it true, Sephania?” he asked.

I bowed my head. “I f-found it on—”

“Lie to us and your discipline will be twofold,” Eola cut in.

Fighting down the rise of my heartbeat in my throat, my shoulders sagged. “. . . I stole it, Father. I’m sorry.”

Cullard frowned. Worse than the anger on his face was the disappointment. “A shame. I thought I raised you better than that, child.” He flapped a hand at me and Mother Eola, then turned away and shuffled off to his chamber.

Tears bit at the corners of my eyes.

“Did you have an accomplice, hellion?” Eola demanded. “I know you did.”

I shook my head. I wouldn’t lie to Father Cullard . . . but Mother Eola? Different story.

The matron of the House took me to the courtyard where a fifteen-year-old boy wrapped a rope-whip around a paddle.

“Five strikes,” Eola told the boy, before setting me on my knees facing away from them.

My forehead was placed against the trunk of the lone tree in the courtyard. Brothers and Sisters popped their heads out of windows and crowded the entryways to watch me receive my punishment.

Eola pulled my tunic down from my shoulders, exposing my smooth back. It had the effect of baring my front side too—including my budding breasts—to everyone watching, and filled me with shame and embarrassment.

As the paddle-wielding Brother reeled his arm back for the first strike, a voice cut through—

“Stop!”

Baylen shoved his way past the crowd.

My heart soared as my gaze snapped over to him.

“It was me!” he yelled. “Give me the punishment, Mother Eola. I implore you. I’m the thief. I stole the ornament for Sister Sephania.”

Eola trudged forward, arms crossed, eyes narrowing on Baylen’s shorter frame. Her eyes veered to me. “So you lied.” Next, her eyes moved past me to the boy with the paddle. “Make it ten lashes.”

“No!” Baylen cried.

I gasped.

Eola shoved a gnarled finger toward Baylen. “You can join her for your malfeasance, Brother Baylen. Ten strikes for the boy!”

Housemates gasped at the cruel decision.

All thoughts fled my whirling mind when the paddle abruptly struck my back without warning. The pain was intense, fierce, cold, as the thick rope bit into my flesh and drew blood.

I wailed, unable to stop myself. Tears flung from my eyes. The pain scoured to my bones, zinging past muscle and veins and igniting something inside me that told of uncontrollable rage.

I was no longer sad or guilty about what I’d done. No, in my young mind, I was furious at the indignity, unfairness, and humiliation being doled out to me for no reason.

Baylen went to his knees beside me, reaching out to hold my hand as he was disrobed from his tunic and struck by another boy with a paddle.

The next lash across my skin was no less painful. It wasn’t until the fifth that my bloodied back grew numb.

I saw Father Cullard watching our disciplining from the window of his writing room. His face was concerned yet he made no move to stop the injustice.

I cried out with every hit, until my voice became hoarse. Glancing over at Baylen, his fingers squeezed tightly around mine. His eyes were screwed shut, fighting off tears from the paddle across his backside.

All because of a silly hair bow.

That was how I learned no good would ever come from someone standing up for me.