Page 52 of She Who Was Severed

I should walk away. I don’t.

He raises his left hand. Fingers steady. Veil script beginning to glow as he speaks.

“Grief,” he says, “is the chain that binds us to what we failed to protect.”

I brace, weight balanced over the balls of my feet. The chain coils again.

“You are not broken,” he continues. “You are bound by pain. That is a sacred state.”

I take a step back. Small. Enough.

He keeps going.

“Release what is false. Let go of what was forced on you. Unburden your path.”

It’s not a spell. Not like the ones I’ve learned to dodge. This is older. Slower. Meant to heal. A Veilmarked cleansing, one of the rituals they whisper through the courts when magic frays too deep.

The chain doesn’t like it.

Not even a little.

It doesn’t hiss, doesn’t rear. Just—strikes. A single coil lashes forward, silent and clean, and slices through the ritual mid-cast. The veil script shatters in the air. The priest reels back, arms up, robes catching the swing.

His wardstone lights up too late. The chain loops around his throat, not hard, just enough to bind the glyph stitched beneath his collar. One twist. One pulse.

He drops.

Not dead. Thank the gods.

The chain recedes. No violence in the movement. Just decision.

I don’t speak. There’s nothing to say.

He breathes. A harsh sound. His veil flickers like something shorting out. His hands twitch once in the dust. He mutters a name—I think it’s mine.

I step back. Another step. The distance helps. A little.

Then I turn.

And I run.

The chain doesn’t chase, doesn’t restrain, doesn’t rise. But it hums, slow and steady, like it’s filing the moment away for later. The warning lives in my spine now, not my mind. I don’t think the Chain cared what the priest meant to do. It only recognized one thing:

A threat.

And threats don’t get second chances.

- x -

The Veilmarked priest is far behind me by the time I stop. I don’t know which corners I’ve turned down. The last few streets are a blur—broken steps, a knee I must’ve slammed into stone, the sharp pull in my ribs that hasn’t stopped aching since the alley. All of it distant now. The chain has gone quiet again, but there’s a tension in the way it lies against my skin, like it’s still listening for another threat.

I don’t go somewhere safe. Instead, I head to where answers wait. Or where they should.

I take the same path I used before—around the perimeter, past the statue that doesn’t look like anything anymore, then down the slope where the drain collapsed into soil. The stone underfoot is slick with moss. My boots slide once. I catch myself against the outer wall, breath flaring hot in my throat. The cloak sticks where the chain cut through it earlier, but I don’t stop to check the wound.

My hand finds the seam in the wall like it’s muscle memory. Rough over smooth. Stone where there shouldn’t be.

I press.