“Zrynok—”
“I said no.” He doesn’t elaborate. Doesn’t need to. The conversation we started in the storage chamber—the one Circe interrupted—hangs between us, unfinished but not forgotten. He’s not leaving me behind. That’s not negotiable anymore.
Warmth flickers in my chest. I crush it down. Focus on the mission.
“The cellar is ahead. Stay out of sight until I signal. If Cael is genuine, your presence might spook him. If he’s not?—”
“Then I kill him before he can raise alarm.” Matter-of-fact. The voice of someone who’s eliminated countless threats without hesitation.
I nod and move forward. The passage opens into a wider space—storage cellars that haven’t been used in decades, theirshelves empty, their air thick with dust and the ever-present sweetness of the Bloom. I can feel the spores in my lungs with every breath. Familiar. Almost comfortable, in the way prisons become comfortable to those who’ve been caged long enough.
A figure waits in the shadows near the far wall.
NINETEEN
ARWEN
Cael has changed.
The boy I remember was thin, fragile-looking, with nervous hands that never stopped moving. The Keeper before me is broader, denser, built for violence in ways his original body never was. His skin has taken on the texture of bark—rough, ridged, darker than human flesh should be. His eyes hold a brightness that has nothing to do with candlelight, an internal glow that marks him as fully transformed.
And from his shoulders, pushing through the fabric of his robe, crimson flowers bud. Small ones, not yet fully bloomed, but visible enough to remind me what the Bloom does to those who surrender to it completely.
He doesn’t move as I approach. Stands perfectly still, hands visible at his sides, posture deliberately non-threatening. The body language of someone trying very hard not to appear dangerous.
“Arwen.” My name sounds strange in his transformed voice—rougher than I remember, edges scraped away by whatever the Bloom has done to his throat. “You came.”
“You asked questions about me. About escaped initiates.” I stop a safe distance away, keeping my knife hand free. “Why?”
“Because I needed to know if you were alive. If you’d made it out.” He shifts—a small motion, almost human. “When I heard about the chapel attack, the Keepers who died... I thought—” He stops. Swallows. “I thought the Abbot might have finally caught you.”
“Would that have mattered?”
The question hangs between us. His luminous gaze studies my face, searching for an answer I’m not sure I want him to find.
“Yes.” Simple. Direct. “It would have mattered.”
I let the silence stretch. Test it. See if he fills the space with explanations or justifications or the kind of elaborate story a trap would require.
He doesn’t. Just stands there, waiting, the flowers on his shoulders swaying slightly in air that isn’t moving.
“Why are you helping us?” I ask finally. “You chose this. Walked into the Garden willingly. Became exactly what they wanted you to become.”
“I believed.” The words come out heavy with regret—unmistakable despite his transformed face. “The doctrine, the promises, the idea that surrender could bring peace. I believed because believing was easier than questioning. And by the time I started questioning, it was too late.”
“Questioning what?”
“Everything.” He moves—just a step, just enough to shift his position—and I catch a glimpse of his hands. The fingers are longer than they should be, the joints not quite aligned the way human anatomy expects. “The initiates who disappear without explanation. The punishments that seem designed for suffering rather than correction. The Abbot’s... interest in certain prisoners.”
His gaze flickers toward the passage where Zrynok waits. He knows. Senses the orc hiding in the dark, probably can hear his heartbeat through the stone. Keepers have enhanced perception—the Bloom grants them abilities that make them terrifying hunters.
“Your executioner can come out. I’m not going to sound alarm.”
I don’t signal. Don’t need to. Zrynok emerges from the shadows like violence given form, his blade already half-drawn, his body positioned between Cael and me.
“Talk fast,” he says. “Convince me you’re not bait.”
Cael’s expression doesn’t change. Doesn’t flinch from the threat in Zrynok’s voice. Whatever fear responses he had as a human, the transformation has muted them.
