It was the same voice Lecia had heard only moments before. A rich, powerful voice with an almost unfathomably deep cadence steeped in ancient occultism and the wisdom of forgotten ages. There was an undeniable strength in that voice, yet at the same time, it hit Lecia's ears like the warbling tone of an elderly man.

  Now that the Familiar had reined in its overpowering aura, Lecia took the opportunity to try and regain her bearings, though she never took her eyes off the giant bird before her. After speaking its piece, the raven had fallen silent once more as it looked down at her. Lecia was grateful. She'd needed the moment to calm her racing heart and come to grips with the situation.

  Thankfully, Lecia wasn't the type to dwell on things she couldn't control where most situations were concerned, and it wasn't long before she was back on her feet. Her small body still trembled slightly from the aftershocks of the raven's power, but her expression had returned to its naturally dispassionate state. Seeing that the child before her had calmed down for the most part, the raven inclined its large head in an eerily human-like manner before opening its beak to speak again.

  “Questions are the first thing the living bring with them,” the raven intoned. “They arrive heavy with them, clutched tight, as though answers might be bartered for breath. Answers, however… are rarer things. And I have fewer left to give you than my voice would suggest.”

  Lecia opened her mouth to reply, but the raven shook its head, cutting her off as it spoke again.

  “There is little time for unraveling,” he continued, the words measured, habitual. “Be silent and listen now. Understanding may follow in its own season… or it may never come at all. Comprehension will find you... should you prove a worthy inheritor.”

  Lecia paused a moment, then shut her mouth and nodded silently. The raven nodded in turn and continued.

  “I was called Eald Hr?fn,” the Familiar said. “The name belongs to an older telling of the world… one that has since lost its audience. Alas, names have a way of lingering, even when their purpose does not. For you, child, Elder Raven will suffice.”

  “I remain for one obligation only,” he continued, wings shifting with a soft rasp of feathers. “A charge set long before either of us stood here, by hands now dust and memory alike. I do not weigh its merit. I merely see it done.”

  The raven, Elder Raven, paused and shuffled his giant wings before lowering his beak to tap at the tattered leather book on the pedestal before him. The action brought Lecia's gaze back to the book, and both her excitement and the questions roiling unspoken in her mind doubled. Still, she held her tongue, not daring to miss a single word of what the large magickal corvid had to say as it spoke again.

  “What rests upon this stone has been handled, hidden, and returned more times than most histories care to admit,” the raven said, tapping the pedestal once more with a massive ebony talon. “It does not fade, nor does it forget. Through war. In peace. Across ages. It merely waits… and endures.”

  Lecia tried to take in the words. Her eyes unfocused for a brief moment before snapping back to the tome atop the pedestal. The book doesn't fade or forget? Lecia had no idea what the Familiar was talking about, but she at least gathered that the book itself was old. Very old.

  Ignorant, or maybe uncaring of her musings, Elder Raven continued.

  “Its pages were set down by hands that believed they had unearthed truths within depths yet unknown,” he continued. “That belief sustained them longer than wisdom ever did. In the end, those pages were writ in blood and broken ambition, and alas the cycle may yet continue...”

  Lecia caught a hint of something in Elder Raven's words. Sadness? Regret? Disappointment? Pity? She couldn't tell for sure, but it made her shift uncomfortably. The Familiar hesitated a moment, then turned its head sideways to focus one large beady black eye on the small girl.

  “Know this, child. That you stand here tonight is more chance than providence,” the raven said plainly. “Paths twist. Doors open when they should not. Feet wander where minds did not intend. That you would stand here eventually, however… was never in doubt.”

  The ancient Familiar’s unflinching gaze bore into Lecia, as though daring her to unweave the meaning hidden in his words. Her thoughts drifted back to what she had heard just before being drawn into the chamber—sounds that still rattled through her mind, alien and yet unsettlingly familiar. She hadn’t understood the raven’s language in any conscious sense, but recognition stirred all the same.

  As the memory settled, comprehension followed—not as translation, but as resonance. This was the language of magick itself, the bedrock beneath all Runic Arts. She could not name the words, yet their meaning pressed in with quiet certainty, something she felt rather than knew. Whatever path had led her here, intention clung to it. She was meant to stand before the Familiar, even if the reason remained just out of reach.

  Lecia’s expression scarcely shifted, yet Elder Raven seemed to sense her epiphany all the same. His dark, keen eyes glinted as he turned fully toward her, wings stirring with a soft rustle as he inclined his head in a slow nod. The gesture was graceful, and yet unmistakably avian in a way that set her nerves on edge. When he spoke again, approval lingered in his gaze, his deep voice rolling forth like distant thunder.

  “This grimoire upon this stone may call to you more strongly and answer you more readily than those who've come before or might come after,” Elder Raven explained. “That is no small thing… but do not mistake it for kindness or acceptance. It may answer, but it does not reveal its secrets so easily.”

  Lecia’s eyes once more found the tome and stuck there, her heart rate quickening. Elder Raven had called Lecia an "inheritor" earlier. She'd seen the word before in books back in the orphanage and knew what it mean intellectually. She also knew what a grimoire was. How could she not? Any Mage worth their salt had one.

  She knew they held all kinds of information on runes and sigils and how to cast spells. She'd been told about them, but never seen one in person until now. Given how she'd been drawn here and the raven calling her an "inheritor", was Elder Raven implying that this old grimoire was hers? Sure, he'd said some ominous things, but Lecia had already come to her own conclusions and was no longer worrying about the samller details.

  This was a book of magick. A book of real runecraft... and it was hers.

  Elder Raven’s feathers shifted, his beak clicking softly as his gaze sharpened.

  “Vigilance, girl! Neither my words nor this responsibility are to be taken lightly!" he intoned. He paused, waiting for Lecia to refocus on his words. When her taciturn gaze returned to the raven, he continued.

  “Now, what this tome teaches will not always ask your consent. Some knowledge settles gently. Other truths root themselves where they please, and once learned, these lesson can and will unmake those ill prepared.”

  Lecia felt her chest tighten. Her heart thudded hard in her ears as she tried to keep up with his words. She was certain that the Familiar was trying to warn her about the dangers of the grimoire, but his words were vague and complicated and most of it went right over her head. Still, she got the main point.

  She just had to be careful about putting what she read into practice. Her mentor had given her similar warnings, so it's not like she was completely ignorant of the consequences of blindly rushing in. Of course, that didn't mean she didn't desperately want to dive in and to the Abysses with whatever repercussions came after.

  Almost as if reading her thoughts, Elder Raven’s voice lowered, his tone shifting, a heavier weight settling into his next words.

  “Be mindful. What you do with it will not end with you—it never has. Deeds leave residue. Thoughts leave impressions. The world remembers long after intent is forgotten.”

  His words hung in the air, thick and heavy. Lecia felt them pressing down on her, though they were hard to grasp fully. But then something else caught her attention. Elder Raven's form wavered, growing hazy around the edges. It flickered briefly, like a shadow caught in a flickering light. Lecia tilted her head, brows furrowing slightly. Was she imagining it?

  The flicker came again, and this time she was sure. The raven was fading, his body growing more indistinct, like he was struggling to remain in this world. His tone grew sharper, more urgent, as if he knew his time was running out.

  “There are names the world refuses to bury. They vanish from ledgers and lips alike, yet surface again where the ground is thin. If the book answers to you...”

  A pause. Another full body flicker. Then he continued, his fading voice growing raspy with an emotion Lecia couldn't quite place.

  “...then it does so beneath a name long avoided, even by those who once bore it.”

  The raven snapped his beak, twisting his head toward her, his black eyes locking onto hers. The weight of his gaze was suffocating, as if he wasn’t just looking at her—he was seeing everything. Lecia felt small under that gaze, like the bird could see right through her.

  “My task is done... and my time here draws to a close...”

  The raven lifted his head, his wings spreading wide, his feathers shimmering faintly as his body flickered and wavered. Then, with a sharp, avian cry, Elder Raven’s form destabilized. His body blurred, almost dissolving into the air around him. The cry sent a wave of force through the chamber, a burst of energy so strong that Lecia instinctively threw her arms up to shield herself. The air itself seemed to ripple from the force, and the sound reverberated in her bones.

  As she lowered her arms, she realized the giant bird was fading, his form growing more and more indistinct. His last words echoed through the chamber, even as his body blurred into nothing, leaving only the weight of his final message behind.

  Elder Raven’s words hung in the air, heavy and thick with both hope and sorrow.

  “What lies ahead is not a path. It is an accumulation—of choices made, and choices deferred. Each step adds weight, whether you feel it or not.”

  “Step carefully... little scion of LeFay...”

  And then, just like that, the ancient bird was gone.

  His form twisted, warped, and unraveled into a pitch-black haze, dissolving into nothing with a whisper so faint it barely seemed real. The chamber felt impossibly still after his disappearance. Lecia stood there, unmoving, the silence pressing in around her. Her small body trembled—though not from fear. No. It was something else. Adrenaline. The lingering aftershocks of something far beyond her, something she could never have prepared for.

  Her thoughts churned. What had just happened? What had she been told? What had she been given? Lecia stood there for a long moment, frozen under the enormity of what she'd just experienced. The following silence was deafening, but her thoughts were loud. Louder than she ever remembered them being in her relatively short life. The questions spun in her mind, fast and frenzied—until they stopped.

  Her quiet gaze settled on the tome still resting atop the pedestal.

  Everything else fell away.

  Elder Raven’s cryptic words. The confusion. Even the tremors running through her limbs—gone. None of it mattered. The only thing that mattered was the book. All the complicated thoughts and feelings could wait. Right now, Lecia had something far more important: a magickal tome to scour.

  With quick, eager steps, she crossed the chamber. Her heart pounded—not with fear, but anticipation. Her hands trembled as she reached for the grimoire, fingertips brushing the worn black leather cover. She traced the silver-stitched raven with her eyes, followed the rusted corner guards clasped to its edges—

  —and then her thumb slipped.

  A sharp sting bloomed across her fingertip as it slid across the leather cover. Lecia hissed softly, reflexively pulling her hand back. A bead of blood welled at the cut, bright and startling against her dark skin. She watched, confused as the crimson bead trailed down her finger. There shouldn't have been anything on the book sharp enough to cut her.

  The metal corner guards were rusty, sure, but the edges weren't sharpened, and besides that, her fingers hadn't been anywhere near them. Still, the bead of blood struck the cover of the grimoire. Almost as soon as it made contact, the blood vanished, absorbed into the tome's cover like water into parched desert soil.

  For the briefest instant, the light around the grimoire dimmed—as though the chamber itself had blinked. Not darkness, exactly. An absence. A thin, complex lattice of lines flickered beneath the worn leather, visible only because the world around them momentarily failed to reflect light properly. A sigil, hidden and so impossibly intricate that it could have been a miniature sigaldric array, unfolded and collapsed in the span of a heartbeat.

  Lecia froze.

  Her breath caught as something shifted—not in the room, but inside her chest. A quiet pressure settled there, cold and unfamiliar, like a stranger's hand resting just behind her sternum. There was a brief moment of confusion, but before Lecia could wonder what was going on, the hand suddenly clamped down.

  The pain was immediate and overwhelming.

  Lecia gasped, her eyes widening from the shock as something viciously strangled the burning ember that was her aethercore. She fell to her knees, the book slipping from her violently trembling fingers. The pain came in waves ebbing and flowing but never abating. She didn't know how long it lasted, only the it had taken up her every thought.

  At some point she found herself curled up on the stone floor, her body shaking and her breaths coming in short, ragged, choking gasps. Tears streamed down her face, but she slammed her eyes shut. Somewhere, beneath the agony, something in her flared to life. Not defiance—something steadier. Sturdier. Lecia groaned through clenched teeth, shuddering with the effort of reining in her ragged, uneven breathing.

  Endure.

  Just keep going. Whatever this is... it'll pass.

  It would pass... or she would die.

  The thought slipped through the pervasive pain and with it came certainty and acceptance. She clung to that simple truth, holding onto it like an anchor as tremors continued to wrack her small, frail body. There was no point in worrying about the here-and-now. She was in pain, and however she came out this, whether dead or alive, the pain would pass regardless. All she had to do was endure.

  Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

  And so she did.

  And sure enough, eventually, the cold, cruel hand crushing the aetheric flame of her core eased its grip. Rather than vanish, the unnerving sensation within her aethercore settled, no longer like a hand, but more like a puzzle piece clicking into place. Gradually—more slowly than Lecia would've liked—the agony bled into a dull, throbbing pain, then receded entirely.

  With one final shaky gasp of relief, Lecia's eyes snapped open and found herself staring up at the cracked and vine-ridden stone ceiling of the small chamber. Face slick with sweat and tears, body sore and trembling, and breathing labored but no long desperate, Lecia lay there on her back. Her ivory hair clung to her sweaty face in messy clumps, but she couldn't bring herself to do anything about it.

  Unable to grasp even the edges of what she'd just gone through, Lecia let her jumbled thoughts slip away for a time as she recovered from the ordeal. Her eyes faded back into its lusterless golden hue as the adrenaline wore off and her face once more fell into its neutral impassivity. Finally able to rest a moment, she contented herself with the fact that she'd endured.

  She was still alive, and that was enough.

  Or no. No it wasn't.

  "The book..."

  A lump formed in Lecia's throat as she remembered the object that had caused all of that suffering. All traces of exhaustion fled as she scrambled to her feet and swept her gaze over the floor around her. It didn't take long for her to spot the grimoire; It sat just a few feet away, right where she'd dropped it.

  She allowed herself a quiet sigh of relief at the sight and hurried over to retrieve the tome. She reached down to pick up, but hesitated, but only for a brief moment. If whatever she'd gone through was the book's fault, then it could happen again, but Lecia had a strong feeling it wouldn't—though she couldn't say exactly why.

  Whatever that was, it felt... final. Like she'd paid some kind of price and now the transaction was complete. Pushing her doubts aside, she snatched up the book with both hands and looked it over, waiting for something else to happen. When it didn't, Lecia allowed herself to fully relax as she properly inspected the thing.

  The grimoire practically hum beneath her palms. The longer she held it, the more she noticed that there was something that wasn't there before. A... connection? Not loud, not strong, but close. As though the metaphysical distance between her and the book had been renegotiated. The sensation made Lecia's brows furrow slightly in confusion.

  The feeling—that strange almost-hum—lingered for a moment longer, then stilled. In the surrounding silence of the chamber Lecia could still sense traces of that heavy, ancient aether permeating the air, but there was no sign that the old Familiar would return nor that anything else would happen with the grimoire. As far as the chamber was concerned, there was no sign anything had happened at all—save for the faint smear of blood now gone from her fingertip.

  Unwilling to wait any longer, Lecia crushed her lingering hesitation and opened the grimoire. The pages were old, yellowed with age yet sturdy, filled with archaic runic script, sigaldric geometries, and arcane arrays she had never seen before. The ink almost seemed to shift when she wasn’t looking directly at it, lines subtly re-ordering themselves like thoughts mid-formation.

  It all felt... oddly familiar. Not in any way she could explain—familiar like a half-remembered dream, or the nostalgia of a long forgotten age she'd never lived. But as she tried to read, her excitement ebbed. The script was written in the same archaic language Elder Raven had spoken. She could feel the meaning pressing just beyond her grasp, tantalizingly close, yet unreachable. The more she focused, the more it slipped away.

  Like trying to hold water in her hands.

  Frustration flickered—but did not linger. It hardened into resolve.

  She sat, placed the grimoire before her, and studied. She memorized what she could. Every line. Every curve. Every diagram. Lecia didn't have much going for her; She was small, physically weak—weaker than many of the other kids in the orphanage, and socially inept. She knew the few incantations her mentor been kind enough to teach her on a whim, but even those were paltry cantrips meant for basic survival.

  Even if she had a grimoire now, she was no true Mage and she knew it. She couldn't even read the Void-damned thing. What kind of Mage couldn't read their own grimoire?

  Still, if there was one thing Lecia was proud of, it was her memory. She had no memory prior to a vague image of the Matron looking down at her from the orphanage's entrance, her expression bitter and exhausted. That had been when she was... much younger than she was now. But Lecia's mind otherwise was a steel trap when it came to information. Text, images, conversations, Lecia could recall them all with little effort.

  Sure, she might not understand everything she heard or read. She might not even have understood most things she heard or read, but that didn't mean it didn't stick in her mind. If she ever wanted to make a genuine effort to figure something out, the information was always there, ready to be pulled up at a moment's notice.

  It made her useful whenever Orin or the rest of his gang needed a gofer. It also helped a great deal in situations like this one. She might not have been able to comprehend what she was looking at, but she certainly wouldn't forget it. The fact that she wouldn't forget meant there was meaning in reading, even she didn't understand, so she continued to read.

  Time blurred, minutes creeping into hours. Fatigue crept in slowly, then all at once. Though she tried to remain focused, her eyelids began to slide, their weight growing heavier by the minute. Eventually, she had to close the book. She wouldn't have minded falling asleep right then and there, and under normal circumstances, she probably would've. Unfortunately, she was still in an unfamiliar place, vulnerable and exposed to who-knew-what.

  If Orin and his group caught her down here in this chamber...

  She didn't even want to think about it.

  With a quiet exhale, Lecia reached to tuck the grimoire into her cloak—and stopped. A sudden wrenching jolt ripped through her chest and her fingers closed around empty air as the book vanished. She pulled her hand from her cloak and stared at it, eyes growing wide. Her breath hitched. The book was gone. Panic flared sharp and sudden. She spun, eyes darting across the chamber. The pedestal stood bare. The floor was empty. No sound. No movement.

  Her heart thudded painfully.

  Then—pressure.

  Something clicked. That puzzle piece shifted, the sensation twisting back into the familiar chill of that alien hand in her chest. It stirred again, stronger this time, accompanied by a strange certainty. The hand twisted in a way she could describe, but it gave the feeling of a prompt, as if it was offering something and waiting for Lecia to take it. Lecia paused, thinking. Then, acting on a hunch, she reached out—not with her hand, but with intent.

  Another wrenching jolt and the grimoire was back in her hands. It emerged soundlessly, folding into existence as though it had never left, settling into her grasp with familiar weight.

  Lecia stared.

  Slowly, carefully, she released her hold. The book vanished again—drawn inward, collapsing into that same unseen absence. She tried once more and it returned once more. A shuddering breath escaped her, something between awe and understanding. Understanding insofar as she now knew how to hide her grimoire. Beyond that, she had no idea what she'd done.

  There was quite a bit she didn't know.

  She wasn't sure about this grimoire being an inheritance or what it meant to be a "scion of LeFay", but Lecia decided not to worrying about it. If any of it came up later, she deal with it if and when the time came. For now, she was perfectly content to set all of that aside and focus on what truly mattered, at least as far as she was concerned.

  The raven had given her something she could use. Something that would not be taken from her—not by theft, not by loss, not by circumstance. She wasn’t reckless. Elder Raven’s warnings still echoed in her mind. Knowledge was dangerous. And she was already an outcast—quiet, strange, watching the world from a distance no one else seemed to occupy.

  She would keep this hidden.

  The grimoire answered her intent once more, slipping away into nothingness. Lecia rose to her feet, legs unsteady with exhaustion. She couldn’t stay here. Orin would come in the morning, and if she wasn’t the, who knew what he would do? Lecia wasn't sure if the boy would even keep his word and show up, but she didn't want to remain here regardless.

  She turned toward the exit, heart still racing, body still aching from her prior ordeal—but steadier now.

  She was no longer empty-handed.

  Resigning herself to the long walk, Lecia turned toward the chamber door. She paused for a moment, frowning. She didn’t remember closing the door, but her mind was too tired to puzzle over it. Reaching for the doorknob, she pulled it open. Darkness greeted her.

  “Oh... right…”

  She blinked, remembering there were no torches. Though her body was weighed down with exhaustion, she gathered just enough mental strength for one more light orb spell and with a rapid flourish of her finger, the runes flared to life and the wordless incantation was cast. The orb of light flickered to life above her palm, casting a soft glow ahead of her.

  She stepped through the doorway, letting the light guide her. She yawned, a deep, bone-weary yawn, but as she moved further down the hallway, her steps slowed. After what felt like only a few moments of walking, she paused. Ahead of her, just beyond the edge of the light, were the stone steps leading up to the cellar doors. Lecia blinked, her mind sluggish with confusion. She turned back to the path she had taken earlier, only to find it blocked—a wall of rubble sealing the way she had come.

  Lecia’s lips pressed together as she moved closer, her hand reaching out to rest against the cold, hard stone. Solid. Real. The tunnel was gone, blocked as if it had been this way for years. She didn’t understand, but she didn’t need to. With a twitch of intent, she summoned the grimoire into her hand and brushed a tiny hand over it, feeling the rough, worn leather of the cover. A small, quiet breath escaped her.

  “Real…”

  That was all she needed to know.

  She gave a slow nod and dismissed the book, then turned back toward the steps. The cellar doors were still locked, as she expected. She made her way to the foot of the stairs, slumping against the stone wall. Wrapping her cloak around her, she settled in, the exhaustion finally winning out. Orin might leave her behind. He might not come back at all. But Lecia wasn’t worried. Somehow, she knew things would work out.

  The light faded as she let herself drift, sinking into the familiar darkness of sleep. There, just beyond her grasp, the warmth of that elusive shape waited for her again.

  ***

  The night draped its heavy, suffocating shroud over Darkreach, casting the district into a sea of shadows. Pale moonlight slid across the crumbling facades that lined the narrow, twisting streets, catching on broken shutters and wet stone before dying in the grime. Far from the stately bones of Old Noblecrest, a particularly decrepit corner of Darkreach housed a modest orphanage tucked behind a weathered wooden gate.

  It was unassuming, easily missed, but for many of the quarter’s forgotten children, it was the closest thing to a haven they would ever know. Inside, Melora Levimiere sat hunched at her cluttered desk, gray eyes scanning a tattered ledger with a hawkishness that belied her weary frame. The dim, wavering light of an oil lamp carved harsh shadows into her face, deepening the fine lines etched there by years of stubborn survival.

  Her light brown hair—shot through with gray—was pulled back into its habitual severe bun, though a few strands had escaped as if even her own head had grown tired of obedience. Her thin, weathered fingers flipped to the next page. Her mouth tightened when her gaze settled on the pitifully sparse columns of numbers. She read and reread the same lines again and again, pointedly ignoring the conspicuous letter lying next to an equally conspicuous stamp.

  Supplies were dwindling again. The meager stores of food and essentials, never abundant, were stretched thinner than ever. Fewer donations. More hungry mouths. It wasn’t new, but Melora felt the weight of it grow heavier with each season. Her faith—once a lantern she could carry through any dark—had become a frayed thread, still there, still held, but threatening to snap when she tugged on it too hard.

  The Church, once the orphanage’s patron, had long since turned its gaze elsewhere, leaving her to scrape by on whatever scraps of goodwill she could pry from the few souls willing to call Darkreach’s children “worth the trouble.” Shaken, she thought bitterly, but not entirely broken. Even so, she could no longer ignore the quiet sense that her struggles weren’t purely misfortune.

  The whispered remarks. The suspiciously timed “accidents.” Doors that once opened politely now closing just a little faster. It all painted a picture she didn't want to see, but nevertheless couldn't help but notice. Her gaze drifted to the window, where shadows danced in moonlight like nervous hands behind thin curtains. A storm was always brewing in Darkreach, but lately it felt personal—close, intent, and patient.

  Her thoughts returned, as they always did, to the children. Their lives rested on her shoulders—lives measured in scarcity, uncertainty, and the constant threat of being swallowed whole by Veilheim’s underbelly. They deserved better. But Veilheim had little to offer the children of Darkreach besides disappointment dressed up as inevitability.

  And then there was Lecia.

  Melora’s scowl deepened at the thought of the peculiar girl. Sharp-minded. Too quiet. Unsettlingly still for her age, as if the world had never quite managed to pull a proper reaction out of her. Lecia had been left at the orphanage’s doorstep as a toddler barely three years of age, which in Darkreach was hardly remarkable.

  No—what unnerved Melora was that first night, when she’d found the child sitting in front of the gate, an abandoned enigma with a singular name devoid of any kind of past.

  She didn’t cry. Didn’t fuss. Didn’t call for anyone. She simply watched. Observed. As though she were taking stock of the building, the street, the sky, of Melora herself—like a small judge measuring whether any of it was worth acknowledging. Her golden eyes hadn't had any of that defiant youthful spark she'd seen in other children. That in and of itself wasn't strange either.

  There were plenty of kids who showed up at the orphanage carrying some kind of pain or trauma. That being said, the Matron couldn't shake the feeling that this wasn't what that was. When she looked into that child's eyes, she didn't see trauma or pain or sorrow. She didn't see anything. That was the problem. It was like staring into a bottomless pit in which no light was allowed to penetrate.

  The memory still raised a faint chill along Melora’s spine.

  Needless to say, Lecia was difficult to care for—not because she was cruel, but because she was absent in a way that made ordinary comforts bounce off her. The Matron had managed anyway. The girl was bright, unquestionably, but her relentless fascination with the Runic Arts—bordering on obsession—set her apart even among Darkreach’s oddities.

  That fixation, coupled with her quiet, almost ghostlike presence, made it hard for her to bond with the other children. It didn’t help that Lecia had a habit of slipping out into the night, as she had tonight.

  In Darkreach, that kind of habit was dangerous for a child at the best of times. It was why Melora had set the curfew in the first place, a curfew Lecia was entirely content to ignore. But to disappear now of all times, with the rumors she'd heard spreading around the district—

  A sharp knock cut through Melora’s thoughts.

  Her hand froze mid-tap against the desk, and she turned toward the sound. After a heartbeat, she straightened and set aside the ledger and the dip pen she’d been unconsciously turning between her fingers.

  “You may enter,” she called, her voice firm—authority worn smooth by decades of being the only thing in the room that had to hold.

  The door creaked open, and Orin slipped inside, his lanky frame swallowed by the dim hallway behind him. His presence did nothing to calm the storm brewing in Melora’s chest. The boy had a talent for stirring up trouble with the other kids and unfortunately, Melora had yet to curb the boy's troublesome habits.

  She snapped open a small pocketwatch resting atop her desk, giving it a quick glance before eyeing the child standing before her. He shifted awkwardly under her stern stare, but the Matron didn't pay his obvious discomfort any mind as she spoke.

  “It’s fast approaching midnight, Orin,” she said, clipped and cold as she fixed him with a stare over her spectacles. “Where is she? Or does your return mean you and Derik failed the task I assigned?”

  Orin started to chuckle nervously, but the sound died in his throat, his careless bravado thinning into something more cautious. He scratched the back of his neck and tried for a sheepish grin that didn’t quite land. “Yeah, about that…” he began. “We couldn’t find her, Matron Melora. Sorry.”

  Melora’s expression darkened—not with surprise, but with the tired irritation of hearing the same lie in new clothing. Lecia had a talent for disappearing, slipping through cracks like water. Still, each absence gnawed at Melora in a different way: a reminder that the orphanage was not a sanctuary so much as a pause between dangers.

  “I see,” she said at last, the words heavy with restraint. “We’ll resume the search at dawn. There’s no sense in stumbling through Darkreach blind.” She waved a hand once, dismissive, final. “Go on, Orin. Get some rest. You’ll need it.”

  Melora would've rather not sent the boy. She would've rather sent someone like Badi to go searching given the dangers of Darkreach, but the orpahange didn't have the extra manpower to spare—not anymore. It was just her, a few other adults, and those kind enough to occasionally come by to assist with some of the other tasks that needed doing that couldn't easily be filled by what little staff remained at the facility.

  But, at thirteen, Orin was the oldest of the kids in the orphanage, and so these kinds of tasks fell to him more often than she would've liked. The Matron had simply resigned herself to working with what she had.

  Orin hesitated as if something hovered on his tongue. His eyes flicked up, then away. Whatever he’d considered saying, he swallowed it. He nodded and slipped back out, closing the door with practiced quiet.

  Alone again, Melora leaned back in her chair and let her eyes drift shut for a moment. Darkreach was merciless—an old maze built to lose people. She had seen too many children vanish into it, swallowed by hunger, violence, and the city’s indifferent machinery. Lecia was resourceful, yes, and strangely capable in her own muted way… but odds did not care about resourcefulness. Odds were blunt. Impersonal. Patient.

  A different weight drew Melora’s gaze down.

  The black-and-gold sigil stamp sat atop her desk like a piece of someone else’s authority left behind on purpose. A reminder. A threat that didn’t need to raise its voice. The “gift” it had arrived with—a heavy pouch of gleaming gold crowns and a silence that had teeth—had been spent long ago on soup and blankets and repairs that were already being tested and found wanting. But the expectations attached to it had not diminished with the coin.

  With a slow, resigned breath, Melora picked up the pen again.

  Her hand hovered, the decision pressing down until it felt less like a choice and more like an inevitable step. The letter she wrote was short, precise, and damning in its restraint. When it was done, she folded it, sealed it in an envelope, and pressed the sigil stamp into the wax. The sigil flared white-gold—clean, bright, and wholly out of place in Darkreach—then vanished with a sharp crack and the faint bite of ozone.

  Melora sat back and stared at the empty space on her desk where the letter had been, as if her eyes might follow it through the walls. Melora had hosted a few abandoned heirs throughout her years as Matron, and reclamation was exceedingly rare. That said, it did happen, but for her to be reclaimed? By that man?

  Why her?

  Why now?

  For what purpose?

  She could've refused, but that likely would've spelled the end for the orphanage and, by extension, all the children living there. No, as much as it pained her to do so, Melora's choice was no choice at all. For a long moment she did not move. Then, in a voice too quiet to be called prayer and too tired to be called defiance, she whispered into the dark.

  “May Bellatina forgive me... and may She have mercy on that poor girl…”