Page 114 of Zenith Tower

“Safe.”

Her eyes sharpened. She was not going to tell me where.

I took the cloth.

It had been cut from the hem of a gray work shirt. The edges were frayed, but the center had been folded around a single line of tiny stitches in thread only slightly darker than the weave.

Tell her the Dean stands where he stood. The ledger isn’t closed.

I read it again.

“Which ledger?”

“He didn’t tell me.”

“And this came from him directly?”

“Through two other people. I was given the words and told how to reach you.” Her gaze moved to my wrist. All three lines lay dark beneath my skin. “They said it had to be tonight, before the Council’s representative arrived.”

“Who is coming?”

“No one will say. The senior readers have been clearing the east rooms since morning. Marrow has requested authority over every review involving you.”

“I’m sure he has.”

She looked toward the door.

“I have to go.”

“Can we send an answer through you?”

“Not yet. The route that brought this to me is already closed.” She reached for the latch, then hesitated. “Aldric told the first courier that you would understand where he stood. Do you?”

I saw the formal hall at Zenith: Juno’s hand on the witness basin, Aldric beside her, Quill turning Article Seven into a sentence none of us had been allowed to appeal. Aldric had tried to stop him before he invoked it. He had stood beside Juno when Quill did it anyway.

“Yes,” I said.

She exhaled through her nose.

“Then whatever happens next, remember there are people outside this mountain who know the Council is lying.”

She opened the door. The corridor remained empty.

“Your sister,” I said quietly.

She glanced back.

“I’m glad she got out.”

The reader gave one quick nod and disappeared around the western turn.

I closed the door.

The cloth lay across my palm, ordinary except for thesentence stitched through it. I could not tell whether Aldric meant to reassure me or make me move.

The Dean stands where he stood.

I understood that much. Aldric had not bent to Quill after we left. Whatever the Council had done with him, they had not persuaded him that Article Seven was justice.