Page 175 of She Who Was Severed

I stare at him.

“You’re saying the Chain becomes a real path again. Legal. Chosen.”

He tilts his head, mock-thoughtful.

“Legal? No. Gods, no. That would ruin the mystique.” A pause. Then softer: “But chosen? Yes. By those who do not bond with one of the five paths”

The weight of it drops slow. Not like thunder. Like a verdict you already feared and secretly hoped for.

“Unbonded.”

He nods. “The unchosen. The failed. The tossed. The ones the world currently discards at sixteen like bruised fruit. If Ashmere lives, the Chain can offer itself again.”

I go quiet. The stone seems to breathe under my boots.

“So the future of the Ashen Chain…” I begin.

“…isn’t built on what’s left,” he finishes. “It’s built on what’s next.”

The Chain coils once around my wrist. Not tight. Not urgent.

Just a promise.

Owen doesn’t speak right away.

He just stands at the edge of the platform, staring at a matchstick hos rolling between his fingers. Finally, he looks up.

“Anyway, I didn’t actually bring you down here for a history lesson,” he says, soft but amused. “Though I do give a spectacular one, if the mood’s right and the audience doesn’t interrupt.”

I raise an eyebrow. “You brought me here to monologue in riddles and burn matches dramatically.”

He tilts his head. “Also true. But no.”

His grin fades—not gone, just thinner. Like he’s folding it back to make room for something heavier.

“I brought you here to try.”

The word lands sharp.

“Try what?”

He taps the platform beneath us with the toe of his boot. Dust ripples in concentric rings.

“Link Four,” he says. Like it’s obvious. Like we’ve been circling this truth since the moment I stepped into Ashmere.

I don’t move.

The Chain doesn’t, either.

Owen crouches, fingertips trailing across one of the scorched judgment glyphs carved into the stone.

“This platform wasn’t decorative,” he says. “It wasn’t ceremonial. It was functional. A place built not to display power—but to weigh it. Every link was passed here. Quietly. Without witnesses.”

“And you want me to stand in it,” I say, gesturing to the ring. “Alone. Without knowing what Link Four even is.”

Owen grins, all bright teeth and bad intentions. “I want you to flirt with the unknown while standing on a judgment engine. Alone is just the aesthetic.”

I narrow my eyes.