A Candle Stub Weighed
- Cheap passage
- Busier than the day
Maren Felse set her candle stub on the oil-stall board, and Idris Lusk counted it the way he counted everything, by how much burn was left. Two thumbs of wick, he said, and wax that would gutter before the Book’s end. She counted her spans on her fingers, then the drops in her palm, then the cup he was pouring, slow as a sum. Her figure came one drop short of his. She paid the drop, and the cup came down wet on the board.