On the surface, the city had turned into a maze of suspicion.

  Sweeps of armored padins moved through the streets in coordinated lines, shields glinting, boots striking the cobbles in practiced unison. Tracking mages walked at their centers, eyes half-lidded, hands hovering over pendulums that swung and jumped whenever they brushed a trace of mana.

  Rocher trotted beside one such formation, his cloak pulled tight against the wind. Evelyn paced on his far side, arms folded, expression sour. Lumiere walked a little behind, her gaze flicking anxiously from window to window.

  They had started with the lower ward.

  "All citizens remain indoors," a padin shouted as they passed. "By order of the Tower, no one crosses the bridges without inspection."

  Faces peered from behind shutters. Whispers followed them like smoke.

  "A witch escaped."

  "From the Hero's own party, no less."

  "Red hair? No, that was the other girl."

  "It was the nun. The little one."

  Rocher's jaw tightened.

  "Cheerful lot," Evelyn muttered. "They hear one rumor and it's already grown fangs."

  Rocher adjusted his hold on his spear. He had not raised it once. Steel felt wrong in his hands today. He might need those same hands open if he found her.

  At the st crossroad, the Warden had split the sweeps into wedges.

  "The sewer routes empty toward the river," he had said, indicating with a long finger. "Half our forces will sweep from upstream down. The rest will take the old access points. Sir Rocher, you may lead the vanguard along the western river."

  It was a generous assignment on the surface.

  In practice, it meant putting him where the danger was thickest. Under the watchful presence of three senior padins.

  They fnked him now, courteous, silent, eyes quietly counting every misstep.

  "How far are you willing to go for her?" Evelyn asked suddenly, low enough that only he and Lumiere could hear.

  Rocher didn't answer immediately.

  It was the wrong question anyway.

  "She trusted me," he said. "I'll go as far as it takes."

  Evelyn exhaled through her nose.

  "Then here's the part you're not thinking about," she said. "Even if you find her first, even if she walks over and puts her hands out for shackles, these people are not going to treat her as a frightened girl who made a desperate choice."

  She jerked her chin toward the nearest padin column. "They already see her as an object lesson."

  Lumiere's voice was soft. "A cautionary fable."

  Rocher looked ahead, where the street sloped downward toward the river district.

  "I know how they see her," he said. "That's why we have to get there first."

  Lumiere hesitated, then spoke again. "If she runs when she sees you...?"

  He swallowed. "Then I will chase her with words before I chase her with anything else."

  They moved on.

  Evelyn's people were already at work. Rocher saw them in glimpses—an urchin slipping down an alley, a woman at a vegetable stall gesturing once, sharply; a man mending a boot who shook his head almost imperceptibly and pointed the questioning padins down the wrong street.

  He had asked her, quietly, to slow them down without making it obvious.

  'I can mispce reports,' she'd said. 'Redirect a few sweeps. But if they catch me at it, they'll come down on the Guild too.'

  'We can't afford that,' Lumiere had said.

  Evelyn had just shrugged. 'We can't afford any of this. Yet here we are.'

  Now, as they reached the riverfront, an exhausted-looking sergeant jogged up from a lower pathway, saluting the Warden.

  "Report," the Warden said.

  "Possible sighting, sir," the sergeant panted. "Fisherman says he caught a woman stealing his boat not half an hour past. Soaked, injured. Said she was wearing light-grey cloth, like Tower robes."

  Rocher's heart lurched.

  "Where?" he demanded.

  The sergeant flinched at the interruption, then pointed downstream.

  "Old stone outflow, just past the st warehouse. Opens onto the bank before the trees."

  The Warden's pale eyes flicked between Rocher and the sergeant.

  "Form a perimeter," he ordered. "No lethal force unless provoked. Sir Rocher, you will have your chance."

  How magnanimous. They'd drawn a circle for him and were waiting to see how he danced.

  They moved as a unit toward the indicated point, the river wind sharpening the air. Banners snapped; horns signaled positions. Somewhere behind them, more squads were being pulled in, closing like a second jaw.

  As they neared the tree line, Rocher broke forward.

  "Hold," he called back over his shoulder. "If she sees a wall of steel, she'll run. Let me make the first approach."

  The Warden lifted one hand. The padins stopped, ranks holding.

  "Hold until my command," he said quietly.

  Rocher didn't wait to see which command that would be.

  He headed for the riverbank.

  The riverbank should have felt like freedom.

  Instead, it felt like a throat.

  The culvert's mouth yawned behind me, low and dark. The river rushed in front of me, gray and relentless, currents dragging filth downstream. A thin strip of muddy ground stretched between them, hemmed in by a rise of scrub and low trees.

  If I went left, I'd be in open view of the warehouses.

  If I went right, I'd hit more rock and eventually a cliff face.

  "Options," I muttered. "Always nice to have options."

  My whole body shook. I wrapped my bad arm across my stomach, more to hold myself together than anything. The fabric of my sheer robe clung cold to my skin.

  I dragged the boat along the gravel and pushed it to the river's edge.

  ...stay away...

  Seraphine's voice brushed my mind again, faint and echoing.

  "Too te," I whispered.

  With my good shoulder, I heaved once against the boat.

  Then again. Each push made my vision pulse at the edges.

  The first horn sounded—closer this time.

  A shout followed. Boots on packed earth. The ctter of metal.

  They were faster than I'd hoped. But a few more pushes were all I'd need.

  The current would take me past the bend. I'd be out of bow range in seconds.

  I turned.

  A line of padins crested the slight rise between the trees and the warehouse road, shields up in a half-formed wall. Their tabards snapped in the wind. Behind them, glints of drawn steel and the faint glow of spell-light.

  In front of them, moving just a little ahead like he always did, was Rocher.

  His eyes found me almost instantly. They widened, relief and horror hitting at once.

  "Cire!" he called. His voice carried easily over the river.

  Some stupid part of me wanted to correct him. Tell him I was not the kind of girl you shouted across a battlefield for.

  The smarter part of me was busy counting distances.

  He was close. Too close to run before he reached me, not close enough for me to reach him before everyone else did.

  Padins were fanning out on either side, forming a crescent around the little strip of bank. They held back, for now, at a gesture from the Warden who had taken up position on the rise.

  Rocher stopped a few paces in front of me, hands empty and raised to show it.

  Up close, he looked tired. Dark circles under his eyes. Jaw clenched hard enough to tremble.

  "Don't move," he said softly. "Please. Just... stay where you are."

  The absurdity of the request almost made me ugh.

  "Doesn't seem like I have much choice." My voice came out raw and wrecked.

  His gaze flicked over me—burns, torn cloth, the way I cradled my shoulder. Something ugly and furious fshed across his face before he smoothed it away.

  "I'm so sorry," he said.

  "For what?" I asked. "You didn't tie the knots."

  "I wasn't there to stop them," he said. "I should have been."

  I swallowed.

  "Regret ter," I said. "Right now you should focus on the part where your betters want to burn me at the stake."

  A muscle jumped in his cheek.

  "I can get you out of this," he said. "If you come with me. Now."

  Behind him, I could feel the Warden watching. His presence pressed on the back of my thoughts like cold fingers.

  "Come with you where?" I asked.

  "Back to the Tower," he said. The words sounded like they hurt on the way out. "To formal judgment. But under my guard. The Warden agreed—"

  "The Warden agreed to many things," I said. "None of them pleasant."

  "Cire—"

  "I strangled one of his men, Rocher," I said bluntly. "Do you really think they're going to pat me on the head and send me home with a warning?"

  Rocher flinched.

  "The man survived," he said. "Barely. If you cooperate, we can argue duress. We can show what they did to you. Lumiere will testify. I will testify. They can't ignore all of us."

  He believed it. That was the worst part.

  Behind him, padins adjusted their stances. Bows now. A mage began quietly tracing sigils in the air, readying a binding spell.

  I looked up at the rise.

  The Warden stood there, coat perfectly white, hands folded.

  He watched as if this were a well-staged py.

  "If I go with you now," I said, keeping my voice low, "they'll make sure you never stand in front of me again."

  "I will protect you," he said. "I won't let them stop me this time."

  For a stupid, dangerous heartbeat, I almost moved toward him.

  His eyes met mine, pleading.

  "Cire... you trusted me. You—" His voice caught. His hand lifted, then faltered in midair. "You wrote it down. You said I could try..."

  The letter. The half-confession I'd left in my desk. His voice trailed off, tinged with desperation and regret.

  A hysterical part of me wanted to point out that this was not how I'd imagined it being cited.

  "I said I trusted you," I said, hurt in my voice. "I didn't say I trusted them."

  He winced and took one step closer, as if spooked by how easily the conversation had slipped to the edge of something neither of us could walk back.

  "If you run now, they'll use it against you," he begged. "You'll become what they want you to be. A witch. Conspirator. Apostate."

  "And if I walk back into their cells," I said quietly, "I'll die the way they want me to. On their schedule. In whatever way makes the best sermon."

  We stared at each other for a fraught few seconds.

  I wanted, more than anything, for him to say something so convincing that I could hand myself over and not feel like I was signing my own execution.

  He didn't. Couldn't.

  My knees buckled. His hands reached out to steady me, like they usually did, but I caught myself.

  "Cire... you're hurt. You're barely able to stand." His voice frayed. "Let me help you."

  Something in me twisted. How unfair—that he could sound this gentle now.

  The edges of my vision were starting to darken. The pain and exhaustion were taking their toll.

  Fine. If he really wanted to help, I wasn't going to refuse him.

  "Rocher," I whispered. "I’m calling in my favor."

  His face went white.

  "Cire—"

  "You promised me," I said. "One request. No questions asked."

  "Please don't do this—"

  His throat worked. His jaw clenched. He already knew what I would say next.

  "Help me get away."

  Rocher stared at me—really stared—the cost of defying the Tower fshing behind his eyes.

  The cost to him. To the party. To the kingdom.

  To me.

  For a moment, the rest of the world fell away.

  Something in his expression broke. Then he exhaled once, putting the pieces back together.

  "They'll fire the moment we move," he said, steady now.

  His fingers wrapped tightly around his spear. "I'll give you an opening. How long do you need?"

  "Twenty seconds," I said. "That's more than enough."

  "Then, on the count of three—"—he froze.

  The tiny hairs on my arms lifted.

  Mana in the air surged—thin and sharp all at once, like the pressure before a storm.

  The magic in the padins' prepared spells stuttered; the binding sigil flickered. Several of them gnced around uneasily.

  "Do you feel that too?" Rocher whispered.

  I nodded, throat tight.

  The pressure built, not around us, but above.

  The first padin to see her shouted something wordless and choked.

  Red hair. A swish of robes. The smell of ozone and ash.

  Seraphine stepped out from the shadow of the trees on the rise, just beyond the Warden's right shoulder.

  She looked like herself and not like herself.

  Her travel cloak hung open, scorched at the hem. Her hair was loose and wild, brighter than any dye the capital could boast. Dark filigree traced faint lines along her neck and the backs of her hands, pulsing with an inner, sickly light that made the surrounding air warp.

  Her eyes had changed the most.

  The red was still there, but something else ringed the iris—a thin, luminous band that hummed with demonic resonance.

  Every padin on the ridge reacted at once. "It's the apostate!" one shouted. "The witch!" another spat. Steel rasped from scabbards; sigils fred and wobbled.

  The Warden didn't move. His gaze flicked to the demonic glow tracing her skin, and something cold sharpened behind his eyes.

  "So," he said, almost conversationally. "The prodigal mage returns."

  Rocher's head snapped up, shock written pin across his face.

  "Sera?"

  Her gaze cut past him like he wasn't there.

  She locked straight onto me.

  For a second, everything else—the Warden, the padins, the river, Rocher—fell out of her field of view.

  "Cire," she said.

  Her voice buzzed in my teeth, settled behind my eyes.

  It was still hers—sharp, impatient, edged with irritation—but yered over something deeper, a resonance that made the air vibrate.

  The padins began shouting orders. Half raised their weapons higher. The others lunged for restraints and charms.

  Seraphine lifted one hand.

  The mana pressure spiked.

  "Sleep."

  The word hit like a hammer wrapped in velvet.