Page 127 of She Who Was Severed

Vale drops beside me at the stairwell, bumping her shoulder into mine like we’re just leaving a bar fight instead of a war council. “Three days,” she mutters. “They’ll all be calling you Mother of Chains, guaranteed.”

“They won’t.”

“No,” she says, grinning. “If Owen’s involved—and he is—it’s already being said.”

It’s my turn to sigh now.

Kellen joins us without a word.

His steps fall in beside mine.

And the Chain hums again.

- x -

The bar doesn’t have a name. Just a blood-slick threshold and a reputation for people not making it out with both eyes.

We enter anyway.

It smells like burnt liquor and bad decisions. Tables sag from old weight and older grudges. Two ceiling beams are missing entirely—replaced by a knotted net of rusted chains and splintered bone to hold the roof together. A girl in a Siltborn shawl is passed out in the corner, knife still clenched in her hand like it owes her something.

Perfect.

Vale struts in first, because of course she does. One boot dragging a squeal across the cracked stone floor, cloak already half-off like she’s deciding whether this is going to be a conversation or a murder. The crowd doesn’t turn. Not yet.

They wait for me.

I step through the warped door frame and the whole room shifts—like the air recognizes the tension I carry and wants no part of it.

“Table,” Vale mutters, spotting a group near the back. “Middle one. Broken knuckles, decent scars. The woman with the gold eye runs this district’s blade caches.”

I nod once.

There are six of them. All armed. None bothered to hide it. A relic-glow hums low from under one of their cloaks—a brute with a shattered jawbone necklace and a cross-hatched tattoo up his forearm that marks him as a former Council enforcer. Good. Someone who knows exactly what I’ve been marked as.

We don’t wait to be invited.

Vale kicks a chair aside and leans on the splintered table. I stay standing. Every movement’s calculated—not stiff, not defensive, just measured. The Chain doesn’t stir. I don’t need it to.

“You’re the Chain girl,” the woman says. Her gold eye doesn’t blink. “Or the pretender. Depending on who you ask.”

“I’m not here for stories,” I reply.

“No,” she says. “You’re here to conscript.”

A knife glints. Not thrown—yet. Just shown. Vale watches it like a dog watches thunder. Interested, but already bored of waiting.

“You think you can walk into our ground, our den, and what? Ask for blades?” the woman asks.

“No,” I say, calm. “I came to offer something better.”

The brute scoffs. “What, judgment?”

Vale moves before I can blink.

One heartbeat, and she’s slammed the edge of her boot into his kneecap. The sound it makes is wet and decisive. He collapses with a grunt, already reaching for a weapon, but she’s crouched on the table now, grinning like a war criminal, one hand behind her back and the other flicking a smoke vial under his nose.

She doesn’t throw it.