CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX Volatile

Kvothe rises early, low on money but eager to use his new journeyman status, and heads to the Fishery to make blue emitters despite the risk of bone-tar. He notes unusual frost on the bone-tar canister and begins careful work.

Hours later, an alarmed remark draws his attention: the canister is leaking, its table leg dissolving. The canister shatters on the floor, spreading bone-tar that boils into caustic, flammable fog. The sloped floor channels the spill toward drains, forming two advancing fronts that trap Fela in a corner.

With seconds to act, Kvothe smears blood on a shard of glass, makes a binding to the nearby drench, and crushes the glass, shattering the twice-tough tank. Five hundred gallons of water drench him. As the fog ignites into violent red flames, Kvothe sprints through the shop, wraps Fela in his soaked cloak, hoists her over his shoulder, and charges through the burning fog. He inhales the ammonia-laced fumes, staggers, tastes chemicals “to make it volatile,” and blacks out.

Kvothe wakes in the Medica, where Mola reports Fela is mostly unharmed and that Kvothe’s legs and hands suffered burns but no permanent damage. Simmon and Wilem visit with clothes and concern. Determined to keep his promise, Kvothe limps across the river to the Eolian.

Deoch stops him outside: Denna waited nearly an hour but eventually left with an older, wealthy man who looked like a potential patron. Kvothe declines a drink and returns to Anker’s, where rumors of his rescue spread. Hearing others recount the event, he realizes the story has already taken root, giving him his first true taste of being seen as a hero.