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Maia traced the edge of the glass lightly, not enough to draw reprimand. Although what the actual fragment said was nothing new, the hum beneath her fingertips felt wrong somehow. It was like the energy was being drawn in rather than out, like the sea pulling back before a breaking wave.
By midday, the surveillance teams had grown even more. Julen had tried, once, to reach the merchant quarter - some half-formed plan to see his father, to warn him, to say something before whatever was coming arrived. But he came back an hour later, jaw tight, and said nothing about it until Maia asked directly.
“They wouldn’t let me through,” he said. “Said the quarter was under structural review.” He laughed, but not with humour. “My father is being ‘reviewed’, apparently. Along with several thousand other people.”
“Julen—”
“Don’t,” he said, not unkindly. “I can’t think about it, otherwise I’ll not be able to do anything at all today.”
Maia nodded. She looked around as more people were being redirected, one thing bothering her.
No one resisted. To them, there was nothing to resist. Each change arrived with explanation, and each explanation made sense in isolation. Taken together, they formed a cage.
“They’re stopping people leaving at all,” Julen said under his breath as they crossed into the adjoining corridor under watch.
He pointed to the outer stair where a family - two children, a woman with an infant bundled against the cold - stood pleading with a pair of Umbralyn. She spoke of a sister in the lower villages, about needing to leave before the roads closed for nightfall. The Umbralyn didn’t raise their voices. They didn’t need to. The family simply turned back towards the city instead, the woman’s shoulders curling inward around the child she carried.
Maia took half a step towards them before Julen’s hand closed on her sleeve. Not here. She hated how easily she needed to obey.
***
That evening, they were to report to Master Orell in pairs. Another new order given without explanation.
Orell’s chambers remained unchanged. Papers lay in ordered stacks across his desk, annotations surrounding his notes and scripts. He did not look up immediately when they entered, only finished the line he was writing before setting the stylus aside.
“Maia,” he said. “And Julen. Welcome back.”
He looked at them both, measuring their responses. “You’ll have noticed the increased Umbralyn patrols.”
“I didn’t really notice,” she said dryly.
Orell cleared his throat, frowning in irritation. “Regardless, it is my job to let you know that as you have both experienced danger from shadow-born creatures, we are taking measures to ensure stability over the coming days.”
Days. That was all they had. They hadn’t even had a chance to get to Caelith.
Maia stepped forward. “Why are sectors being sealed without record? With no new fragments?”
“Because instability has increased,” Orell said. “You have seen the data. The fragments.”
“I have seen curated data and the already-catalogued fragments, yes,” Maia replied. “What about the cause?”
His expression did not change as he stared at her. “Cause is irrelevant if the outcome is predictable.”
“People are being moved,” Julen cut in. “Quietly. Without notice.”
“They are being reassigned according to risk,” Orell said. “As they should have been from the beginning.”
“What about the Archive’s annexe?”
“Compromised.”
“How?”
Orell’s gaze sharpened slightly. “You are both asking questions outside your remit.”
Maia held his stare. “Master, you trained us to ask them.”
For a moment, something flickered across his face, his fingertips pressing into his desk. Then his expression settled back into careful neutrality.
