Maleah was screaming when Lucian opened his eyes in fright, and sat bolt upright in bed. The sound of her playful giggles then flooded his senses when he realized she was sitting on his bed and slapping his knees with little weak hands.

"What are you doing!" he demanded wearily, in no mood to entertain his sister after being startled so suddenly.

"Trying to wake you up!" more obnoxious giggles. Lucian threw back the blankets in annoyance and scrubbed his face with his hands.

"Oh, come on!" Maleah continued, playing patty-cake on his back. "You get to leave today and I'm going to school. Isn't that exciting?"

Lucian turned around and dragged her kicking and screaming beside him. The exchange of words between he and Platina suddenly became familiar to him. "School? What? I thought Mama pulled you out of there already," His hands wandered to her sides and he watched her laugh uproariously as he found her ticklish spots.

"She…she did! But some, some of the other- HEY-kids told me that Teacher wants to continue reading with us every morning," Maleah was red with laughter and continued slapping at his hands, to no avail.

Lucian knitted his brow, perplexed, but said kindly, "Then I can see why you are so rambunctious,"

"Rum-bunk-shus," she repeated and her feet finally hit the floor and she darted out of the room, still laughing. Lucian felt happy for his sister but couldn't help but feel sad in knowing that her reading sessions wouldn't last forever. The time of the season was demanding on every family and after a few days, Lucian knew that the group wound disband, all of the children being asked back to work with their families in the drying, unforgiving heat. He remembered her disappointment in the beginning of spring, the last time it happened.

It took him no more than a few minutes to shed his sleeping gown and climb into his day clothes, hanging from a nail on the wall. He noticed that the bandana strung around his neck was dark with soil and sweat. With trembling fingers, he took it off and placed it in a small, cloth knapsack his father had given him the night before, on top of his folded pyjamas. After a moment's hesitation, he fumbled around in the straw stuffing of his pillow and pulled out two silver coins and a gold.

"You'll eat breakfast on the road," Mama said offhandedly, as she swept into the room and started to tug at the corners of his bed, "The oatmeal jar is low this morning," Lucian brushed past her disinterested, pocketing his money against his chest.

Creeping down the stairs gave him a whole new momentum. Usually, the creek and groan of the strained steps annoyed him; with each plunge closer to the kitchen, he was reminded of one more thing that needed to be mixed within his household. Mama had not taken the dust mop to the floorboards, and Lucian's toes brushed past the grime lodged into the wooden cracks. Still nothing could dishearten him as he pulled on his stockings.

"I want a blue one…" Maleah breathed from behind, and silently tucked a cruddy, brown coin into his palm, slipping back into a chair. Pity seized Lucian's heart as he stared at it and realized that it could buy no more than a near empty jar of sugar. He slipped it in with the rest of his coins as Mama came flying down the steps, Lucian's departure an obvious interruption in her morning tasks.

"I threw in your spare stockings and that tattered garment you like sleeping under. It may be chilly at night," she said crisply, gazing absentmindedly out the window with a broom in hand.

"Thank you Mama," the boy murmured, and stood to fetch his shoes near the door. Standing silent for a moment, he approached her gently and bent forward to kiss her cheek.

She gave no indication that she was aware of him as Lucian once more, climbed the steps to his corner to retrieve his few personal belongings. Before he had one foot out the door, Maleah had leapt from her chair and embraced his waist, a wide, knowing grin on her face.

"Be good, Mally," he said, patting her head affectionately, "and be good for Mama and Father."

With that, Lucian left his house behind for the first time in his life.