Page 49
The bells began at sunset.
Not the gentle chimes that marked the changing of the hours, nor the ceremonial peal reserved for festivals and Remembrances. Instead, the low, iron-throated toll only used in times of threat.
Maia stood at the edge of the gathering square as the people poured in from every direction, drawn by fear as much as command. Fear still overtook them every time, no matter how often the bells had rung.
Lanterns roared rather than flickered into life along the high terraces and archways, casting restless gold over anxious faces. Guardians in darkened armour moved with new urgency through the crowd, guiding people into tighter clusters, their hands never straying far from their weapons.
The storm clouds still hung low over the city, solemn and heavy, with a pink glow of the setting sun just about seeping through.
Maia folded her arms around herself, feeling the hum of the fragments deep beneath the Archive even from here; a low, uneasy vibration. Julen should have been beside her. Instinct kept turning her head, expecting to see his familiar presence that always reassured her.
But Julen lay in the healer’s wing, stitched and sedated, and far from the square where the world was shifting.
And Caelith. Well, she hadn’t seen him since the healer’s wing, and the not-knowing felt like she’d swallowed something the wrong way.
The Elders emerged at last upon the elevated dais at the far end of the square. Master Orell stood slightly apart, his gold-edged robes catching what was left of the sunlight, gaze sweeping the crowd without expression. It was Elder Maerin who stepped forward to speak.
When he raised his hand, the bells ceased. Silence fell in a single, collective breath.
“People of Eryssan,” Maerin called, his voice steady, practiced. “You were summoned tonight because the danger beyond our walls has reached inward.”
A ripple passed through the crowd.
“Last night, an unknown entity breached the northern wing of the Archive. Two scholars were attacked. One remains under healer’s care.”
The murmurs rose of fear, disbelief, anger.
“The creature was driven off,” Maerin continued. “But it has not been destroyed.”
Voices broke loose then.
“What kind of creature?”
“Is it from the Fracture?”
“Are we under attack?”
Orell lifted his hand. The effect was immediate. “Enough,” he said calmly. “Fear spreads faster than truth.” That phrase again - the same one he’d used in the healer’s wing, worn smooth from repetition like a phrase he’d rehearsed rather than a true answer. “We do not yet know what it is. Only that it learned our wards.”
The square stilled.
Maerin resumed, “And so, as of tonight, a citywide curfew is in effect from full dark until first bell. No one walks alone. All movement must be in pairs or under Guardian escort. The lower levels will be sealed entirely. Patrols have been doubled. And preparations are underway to send a full contingent to the Fracture’s perimeter.”
A full contingent. An army.
“This is not a punishment,” Orell said sharply. “It is protection. The Fracture is unstable. It has been unstable for some time, as we all truly know. We will not allow fear to undo what order remains.”
A woman near Maia whispered, “They’re too late.”
A man replied, “They waited too long. Why?”
Their voices dissolved into the wider noise of the crowd. But her eyes caught on a shadowed shape near the far colonnade; a tall figure half-hidden between two pillars.
Even at a distance she could tell something was wrong. He stood angled away from the light, his silhouette uneven. One shoulder dipped lower than the other. His head was bowed, hair falling forward to obscure his face.
Then slowly, as though drawn by the same invisible thread tugging at her, Caelith looked up. Their eyes met across the crowd, just as they had the day the young Guardian was stoned. But this time, the square seemed to fall away and neither of them forced themselves to look elsewhere.
Whatever passed behind his eyes was walled off from her entirely, but with an intensity that sent a shiver clean through her bones.
