The archway loomed larger as they approached—twenty feet tall at least, carved from sphere-stone that had been shaped into flowing curves suggesting sound waves frozen mid-ripple. No guards. No checkpoint. Just an open passage into the city beyond, framed by artistry that must have taken decades to complete.

  And just inside, positioned on a small, raised platform to the left of the entrance, sat a man dressed more plainly than the rest.

  Cade heard his music first—a single clear melody cutting through the cacophony that had been assaulting them since the forest's edge. As they passed through the archway, something shifted. The overlapping songs that had blurred together into noise suddenly... receded. Muted. The man’s voice and instrument rose to prominence while everything else became background murmur, present but ignorable.

  The isolation field, Cade realized. We just stepped into his.

  And something else stepped into him.

  His Oath essence stirred—not screaming, not the acute alarm of immediate suffering, but... humming. A background awareness that settled over his senses like fog. The city was full of people, and beneath the music and the laughter and the commerce, something was wrong with too many of them. Not agony. Not torture. Just a low, persistent wrongness—the particular flavor of suffering that came from constraint. From choices not freely made. From lives lived under weight that had been carried so long it no longer registered as weight at all.

  He couldn't pinpoint sources. Couldn't identify individuals. The sensation was too diffuse, too distributed—a city-wide ache rather than specific wounds. But it was there. Undeniable. The beautiful music and the curved architecture and the freely-given clothes couldn't quite mask it.

  But that was far away. Here, at the entrance, there was only the background hum—and the children.

  A handful of small figures sat before the stage, watching the amber-gold musician with rapt attention. Small figures. Very small, ranging from perhaps eight inches tall to nearly three feet. Children.

  Cade stopped walking.

  The children weren't suffering. His essence registered them as clean—unburdened, free, carrying none of the constrained wrongness that touched so many of the adults he could sense nearby. Whatever afflicted this city, it hadn't reached them yet.

  That made it somehow worse.

  "Three Came Walking" (improvised at the gates of Fermata)

  Three came walking through the gate today, Bare as hatchlings, not a thread to display! No silks, no linens, no ribbons in rows— Just skin from their scalps to the tips of their toes!

  (children giggle)

  Did you lose your clothes to a beast in the dark? Did a scenario strip you down to the mark? Or maybe you're making a fashion statement— "Naked is honest, and cloth is... abatement?"

  (laughter, the musician grins, then his playing softens)

  Once we all walked with nothing to hide, No colors to choose, no patterns to guide, Just the name we were given and the road ahead, Before we learned... dressing...

  (catches himself, shifts back to bright)

  The spotted one! Look at his face, little ones! Like someone flicked paint at him, just for funs! Dots on his cheeks and his nose and his chin— Did the labyrinth sneeze on your lovely skin?

  (children point at Cade, delighted)

  And thick like a boulder! Wide as a door! Did you eat your rooms? Did you ask them for more? Arms like the trunks of the heartwood trees— Little ones, look! He's got two of him in each of his knees!

  (the children's eyes go wide, one mimes flexing)

  The small ones behind him, proper and slight, Four feet exactly, compressed just right, But the big one forgot how shrinking is done— He's a tier-five-and-half, or a tier-five-plus-one!

  (his voice drops, almost to himself, the melody turning minor)

  Some don't fit the shapes we're given to wear, Some carry more than the rest of us bear, Walking ahead with the weight of it all, While smaller ones follow and...

  (a child tugs his sleeve, asking for more funny verses; he blinks, returns)

  Welcome, you bare ones! You odd-numbered three! The city of music will dress you for free! We'll find cloth for the big one—we'll need the whole bolt! And ribbons for small ones who came at a trot!

  Come in, come in, leave the road at the gate, Fermata is waiting—don't make the strings wait! We'll find you some fashion, we'll find you some sound, And maybe, just maybe...

  (quieter, watching them pass)

  ...you'll like what you've found.

  Cade had seen Kindred of many sizes by now. Tier differences created dramatic height variations, and he'd grown accustomed to interacting with people who ranged from palm-sized to towering. But these weren't just small Kindred. These were children. He could see it in the way they moved—fidgeting, elbowing each other, one picking their nose while another tried to catch a floating leaf. No patience. No measured calm. No ancient wisdom lurking behind young eyes.

  Just... kids. Being kids.

  The musician was singing something playful—Cade caught fragments about nakedness and spotted skin before the words fully registered. The children were giggling, pointing at something.

  Pointing at him.

  Cade looked down at himself. Naked. Completely naked. He'd somehow forgotten—weeks in the labyrinth with only Rhys and Zyrian for company had normalized it, and the walk through the forest hadn't offered any reminders. But now, standing in a city entrance with actual children staring at his exposed body and laughing at a song about his unusual appearance...

  He stepped behind Zyrian.

  The rust-red Kindred was shorter than him by over a foot and a half, which made the attempt at concealment absurd—Cade's head and shoulders and most of his torso still visible above his companion. But it was the instinct that mattered, and the children found it hilarious. Their laughter doubled, one of them falling over backward in their mirth.

  "The shy giant!" one of them shrieked, delighted.

  Rhys was trying very hard not to smile. "You've faced tier-four shadows in combat," she murmured, "but this embarrasses you?"

  "They're children," Cade hissed back.

  "They're Kindred. They've seen naked bodies before. It’s impractical to maintain fitting clothes until we stop advancing."

  "That doesn't help."

  The musician's song was winding down now—something about fashion and finding cloth for "the big one." His pale green eyes tracked them as they passed, curiosity evident, but he didn't interrupt his performance. Professional, Cade noted. Finishing what he'd started before pursuing his interest.

  They moved deeper into the space beyond the archway, and Cade finally processed what he was seeing. A market. Stalls and tables and display racks spreading across a broad plaza, Kindred of various heights browsing and exchanging goods. The architecture opened up here—the cramped entrance giving way to an expansive square bordered by curved buildings that seemed to lean inward protectively.

  "Do they enter the labyrinth?" Cade asked quietly, glancing back toward the children.

  "What?" Rhys followed his gaze. "Oh. The young ones. No—well, not exactly."

  "Not exactly?"

  "There are children's versions of battlegrounds. Playground activities, essentially. Games that let them accumulate anima slowly, safely, without real danger." She steered them toward a quieter corner of the market, away from the densest crowds. "Born children progress differently than spawned souls. They skip the advancement challenges entirely, moving through tiers as they accumulate enough anima naturally. No essence types until they reach their parents' tier and the special connection breaks."

  Cade absorbed this. "Special connection?"

  "Children can't nourish themselves normally. They can't eat fruit, can't process eggs the way adults do. They're dependent on their parents for anima—direct transfer, like nursing but with energy instead of milk. The parents can also choose to help them advance directly, without the penalty that normally involves being put on the child. The connection that enables that also locks their prior memories until they either match their parents' tier or..." She hesitated. "Or their parents die."

  "And then?" Cade asked.

  "Then the memories unlock all at once. Whatever lives they lived before, whatever they did, whatever they were—it all comes flooding back." Rhys's expression was complicated. "It's meant as reform, I think. The worst souls, the ones who've lost their way across too many lives and incompatible migrant souls, they get reborn to loving families. Given childhoods full of care and affection, years or decades of being loved before they remember who they used to be. I think the hope is that those new memories will... temper the old ones. Provide counterweight."

  "Does it work?"

  "Sometimes. Sometimes not." She shrugged. "Parents always fear the day their child's memories return. You never know what's locked away in there. The sweetest child might have been a monster in a hundred prior lives."

  Cade thought about that. A reform system built on love and time, gambling that enough good experiences could outweigh whatever darkness a soul had accumulated. It was either beautiful or horrifying, depending on how you looked at it.

  "The children I saw back there," he said. "Ranging from tiny to... what, three feet?"

  "Tier-zero through four, probably. They'll keep growing as they accumulate anima, same as anyone, but without the compression cycles. A born child at tier-five would be full-sized, ready to break the parental connection and start their adult life." Rhys smiled slightly. "It's a gentler path. Slower, safer, but gentler."

  Behind them, the musician’s music stopped.

  Cade felt the isolation field collapse—or rather, felt the other songs rush back in to fill the space it had occupied. The market's ambient noise swelled, dozens of melodies competing for attention again, and beneath it the murmur of commerce and conversation.

  Footsteps approached. Light, quick, deliberately audible.

  "Welcome to Fermata!"

  The musician had caught up to them, his stringed instrument slung across his back, his angular features arranged in an expression of genuine warmth. Up close, Cade could see the age in his eyes—not physical age, but the depth that came from accumulated lifetimes. This was no young soul, despite his easy manner.

  "I’m Vessin, and I couldn't help but notice your arrival," Vessin continued, falling into step beside them. "Fresh from the labyrinth, unless I miss my guess. And traveling together at matched tier—that's unusual enough to warrant curiosity."

  "We appreciate the welcome," Rhys said carefully. "Your song was... memorable."

  Vessin laughed. "The children enjoy novelty. Three strangers approaching naked and odd-proportioned? I couldn't resist improvising something. No offense intended."

  "None taken," Cade said, though he was still hyperaware of his nakedness in a way he hadn't been before entering the city.

  "I could introduce you to them, if you'd like. My little audience—they're always eager to meet new people, pepper them with questions, learn about the wider world." Vessin gestured back toward the entrance. "They'd be delighted."

  Cade shook his head. "Thank you, but... maybe later. We're still getting our bearings."

  "Of course, of course." Vessin's unforced acceptance felt genuine, not the practiced deflection of someone hiding an agenda. "First time in a city, I'm guessing? For the thick one, at least."

  "For me, yes," Cade admitted. He was studying the market as they walked—Kindred exchanging goods, but not in ways that made sense to him. No coins changing hands. No obvious pricing. Just... things moving between people, conversations and negotiations and selections. "I'm trying to understand how this works. We have nothing. We arrived naked with nothing to trade. How do we afford anything?"

  Vessin's laugh was warmer this time. "Afford? Money is a concern for city officials, for managing exports and imports and the tedious logistics of inter-tier trade. Here in the market?" He spread his hands. "It's political."

  "Political?"

  "Fashion is influence. When you wear a particular style, a particular color combination, you're endorsing the artisan who created it. You're saying this aesthetic represents me. The more people who wear a maker's work, the more that maker's vision shapes the city's identity." Vessin plucked at his own modest clothing. "I dress simply because I don't want to participate in those games. But for newcomers? You'll find plenty of people eager to dress you. They want fresh canvases. Unclaimed aesthetic territory."

  Cade processed this. "So the clothes are free, but choosing what we wear... matters? Gives influence to whoever made them?"

  "Essentially, yes. The same applies to instruments, at least those not marked for export. What you carry, what you play, who crafted it—all statements. All politics." Vessin shrugged. "People will always take eggs as currency, of course. For things off the open market, for private transactions. But tier-five eggs aren't particularly rare in tier-five. You'd need higher-tier eggs to really buy influence."

  "Eggs as currency," Cade repeated. The eggs he and Rhys had produced during their time in the labyrinth—consumed for nourishment, enjoyed for taste. He hadn't thought of them as money.

  "Among other uses, yes."

  Cade looked around the market with new eyes. Not a commercial exchange, but a political one. Every piece of clothing, every instrument, every crafted item—a vote for someone's vision. A statement of alignment. The Kindred weren't shopping; they were positioning.

  He loved it. The concept felt almost utopian—basic needs freely met, with status games layered on top for those who wanted to play. No poverty. No desperation. Just art and influence and choice.

  How could a place like this be a source of suffering?

  Maybe he'd been wrong. Maybe the faint wrongness he’s feeling was something else—personal grief, individual tragedies, the normal background noise of any population. Not systemic. Not the kind of suffering he'd been called to address.

  But the thought didn't quite settle. Something still felt off, even if he couldn't identify what.

  "I'd like to be less naked," Cade said finally. "Is there somewhere you'd recommend?"

  Vessin's eyes lit up. "If I may be so bold—I know the best dyer in the city. Or at least, my favorite. She does remarkable work with color, and she won't try to conscript you into any particular faction's aesthetic wars." He gestured toward the far side of the market, where the crowds thinned and a building of sweeping curves rose in layers of colored stone. "This way."

  Miravet's shop was chaos made beautiful.

  The building twisted upward in rounded arches, each level a different hue, the whole structure looking like someone had frozen a rainbow mid-spiral. Inside, fabric covered every surface—draped from ceiling hooks, layered across tables, hanging in curtains that created semi-private alcoves throughout the space. The air smelled of dye and fixative and something floral Cade couldn't identify.

  The dyer herself matched her domain. Deep blue skin, but her hands and forearms were a patchwork of every color imaginable—stains from her work, worn like badges of pride. She greeted Vessin with familiar warmth, assessed the three newcomers with quick professional eyes, and immediately began pulling fabric samples.

  "Fresh from the labyrinth, yes? Untouched canvases, how delightful." Her voice was bright, her manner cheerful, her questions surface-level and easily answered. What colors appealed to them? Any textures they preferred? Practical needs or purely aesthetic preferences?

  She made no mention of the political implications Vessin had described. No pressure toward any particular style. Just options, presented with enthusiasm and expertise.

  Cade found himself gravitating toward something that might actually provide coverage—a length of artistic fabric in muted earth tones that draped across one shoulder, wrapped around his torso, and attached at the opposite ankle. The design was complex enough to seem intentional rather than desperate, but its practical effect was simple: his groin was covered, from most angles at least.

  Rhys selected a hat—wide-brimmed, silver-blue to complement her skin—and wraps for her wrists and ankles in the same shade. Her torso and everything Cade had grown quite fond of remained exposed, which he suspected was deliberate.

  Zyrian surprised them both by choosing yellow and purple. Bright colors that clashed deliberately with his rust-red skin, patterns that drew the eye away from his natural earth tones.

  "Hiding your essence type?" Rhys murmured as they dressed.

  "Seeming less threatening," Zyrian corrected. "Since I want to use my Earth essence for combat if I need it, I'd rather be misunderstood."

  Miravet made pleasant conversation throughout, but revealed nothing of substance. When they finished selecting their pieces, she simply wished them well and expressed hope that they'd return to tell her about their adventures. Friendly. Warm. Utterly opaque.

  Vessin led them out and through increasingly quiet streets, away from the market's bustle.

  "I have spare beds," he offered, "if you need somewhere to rest from your travels. The labyrinth takes a toll, and proper sleep in a proper space does wonders for recovery."

  Cade hadn't slept on anything but stone floors and labyrinth platforms in months. The offer sounded almost unbearably luxurious.

  "We'd appreciate that," he said. "Though I have to admit—this city seems almost too good to be true."

  He watched Vessin's face carefully as he said it.

  Something flickered there. The musician's open warmth didn't disappear, but it... tightened. Just for a moment. A muscle in his jaw shifting, his eyes cutting away before returning.

  "Too good to be true?" Vessin repeated, his tone light. Deliberately light. "Fermata has its problems, like anywhere. Politics, as I mentioned. Petty rivalries between crafting schools. The usual tensions of any community."

  "But nothing darker? No hidden troubles beneath the beautiful surface?"

  Vessin was quiet for a moment. When he spoke again, his voice was softer. "Perhaps we could revisit that topic tomorrow. After you've rested. After you've seen more of the city." He gestured ahead, toward a modest building tucked between two larger structures. "My home. Such as it is."

  If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  The deflection was obvious. The discomfort was obvious. Something was wrong here, and Vessin either couldn't or wouldn't say what.

  But he also wasn't throwing them out. Wasn't warning them away. Wasn't doing any of the things Cade might expect from someone trying to protect a secret.

  He was helping them, even as he avoided their questions.

  Why?

  Vessin's home was cluttered with instruments.

  They hung from walls, stood in corners, lay across tables and chairs and any flat surface that could support them. Stringed instruments mostly—variations on guitars and cellos and things Cade had no names for—but also drums and wind instruments and devices that seemed designed to make sounds he couldn't imagine.

  "I compose," Vessin explained, clearing space for them. "Or I used to. These days I mostly improvise. The children appreciate spontaneity more than structured pieces."

  The beds he'd mentioned were simple pallets in a back room, but they were beds—soft surfaces, actual cushioning, a luxury Cade hadn't experienced since Earth. He lay down experimentally and felt his body relax in ways he hadn't known it was tense.

  "Sleep," Vessin said from the doorway. "I'll be in the main room if you need anything. We can talk more tomorrow."

  Cade wanted to press. Wanted to demand answers about the wrongness he still felt buzzing at the edges of his Oath awareness. But exhaustion—not physical, but mental, the accumulated weight of months of constant vigilance—pulled at him.

  Tomorrow. They'd figure it out tomorrow.

  He closed his eyes.

  Something woke him.

  Not sound exactly—more the absence of expected sound. A sudden silence where there should have been ambient noise.

  Cade opened his eyes to darkness. Not true darkness—the light never fully vanished, even indoors—but the dimness of a shaded room in what passed for night. Rhys and Zyrian were still sleeping on their pallets nearby.

  From the main room, voices. Low, urgent. Vessin's measured tones and someone else—younger, more agitated.

  "—can't just keep them hidden forever.”

  "Keep your voice down." Vessin, sharp in a way Cade hadn't heard from him before. "The walls aren't thick, and they're strangers. We don't know what they might overhear or how they'd react."

  "But they have no connections here. They could help us."

  "Halcin." Vessin's voice dropped to a hiss. "Your parents are three streets away. If you're caught here at this hour, if anyone reports seeing you with newcomers, the questions that raises—"

  "I'm careful."

  "You're young. You think careful and reckless are the same thing because you've never seen the difference." A pause. Heavy. Weighted. "Go home. Let me handle this. If there's anything to your hopes, I'll find out. But not like this. Not with you barging in and potentially exposing everything."

  Silence. Then footsteps, receding. A door opening and closing with exaggerated care.

  Cade lay still, breathing evenly, pretending sleep. Vessin's footsteps approached the doorway of their room, lingered for a moment, then retreated.

  No connections here—

  What? What did this young Kindred think Cade might be able to do?

  And what was Vessin trying to protect them from?

  Cade stared at the dim ceiling for a long time before sleep reclaimed him.

  Morning—or what passed for it in a world without true night—brought the smell of something cooking and the sound of Vessin humming in the next room.

  They ate a breakfast of fruit that Vessin had prepared, the taste rich and complex in ways Cade was still learning to appreciate. Rhys and Zyrian were subdued, exchanging glances that suggested they'd heard some of the nighttime conversation as well.

  No one mentioned it directly.

  "I thought I might show you Toreth's workshop today," Vessin offered as they finished eating. "She's the finest instrument-maker in Fermata—strings especially. Even if you're not musicians, the craftsmanship is worth seeing."

  Cade nodded. Whatever game was being played here, going along with Vessin's guidance seemed wiser than striking out on their own. The amber-gold Kindred was clearly trying to protect them, even if his reasons remained opaque.

  The city looked different in the morning light. Calmer, somehow. The music was still omnipresent, but it felt more intentional—performers at designated spots rather than the chaotic overlap they'd heard approaching. The streets were wide and curved, designed for wandering rather than efficiency, and the buildings continued the theme of impossible architecture that defied structural logic.

  Toreth's workshop occupied a corner building near the market's edge—older than its neighbors, its sphere-stone worn smooth by millennia of hands touching it. The interior was all function over form: workbenches covered in tools, half-finished instruments hung from racks, the smell of wood shavings and lacquer and the peculiar tang of processed resonance-tree fiber.

  And a stranger.

  Cade noticed her immediately. A Kindred of average height, yellow-orange skin that reminded him of autumn leaves, dressed in deep blue and purple clothing that seemed deliberately understated—quality fabric, but nothing that would draw the eye. She moved through the workshop with practiced efficiency, examining a rack of strings with the careful attention of someone who knew exactly what she was looking for. Nothing about her appearance demanded attention.

  But his Oath essence—

  It screamed.

  Not the diffuse background hum he'd sensed throughout the city. This was different. Sharper. He could see it now—not with his eyes, but with whatever new sense his essence had given him. Something wrapped around her soul like wire, cutting in with every breath, every movement, every thought that brushed against its restrictions. A bond. A contract. And unlike the older, settled constraints he could feel from others, just now seeing how to pinpoint them with focus—Vessin's mild discomfort, Toreth's measured frustration—this one was fresh. Recent enough that the wounds it created hadn't scarred over yet. Recent enough that every moment still hurt.

  The bond wasn't just present alongside her suffering. It was causing it. Actively. Continuously. Each restriction carved into the contract was a blade pressed against her will, and she couldn't stop pressing against it, couldn't stop bleeding, couldn't stop hurting because the alternative was to stop being herself entirely.

  He stopped walking.

  Rhys glanced at him. "Cade?"

  He was staring at the yellow-orange woman. He knew he was staring. He couldn't stop. His essence was pulsing with awareness, refocusing on the binding instead of generalized suffering, and for the first time since entering Fermata he focused with that lens in place.

  The city bloomed into suffering.

  Not everyone. Not all at once. But as he concentrated, he could feel it—threads of wrongness woven throughout the population. Half the people he'd passed on the street, maybe more. The same grinding chronic pain he felt from this stranger, varying in intensity but present. Constant. Inescapable.

  Vessin had it. Mild, almost imperceptible compared to the woman examining strings, but there.

  The whole city is in pain, and they're hiding it. Obligated to hide it.

  The woman finished her examination and moved toward a side door, her selection made.

  "Orvenne." An older voice from the back room—weathered and direct. "Those strings will be ready tomorrow. I'll send word."

  The yellow-orange Kindred—Orvenne—paused at the door. "Thank you, Toreth." Her voice was flat, studiously blank, revealing nothing. Then she slipped out, gone before Cade could even think to follow.

  Toreth emerged fully from the back room. Iron-grey skin and rust-red eyes, stocky and strong-handed. The workshop's owner and Vessin's contact. She moved like someone who had spent lifetimes working with tools, every gesture economical and precise.

  "Young man." Her gaze fixed on Cade. "You're staring at my doorway like it owes you money."

  "Sorry," Cade managed. "I was just—that woman who left. Orvenne?"

  Toreth's expression flickered. Just for a moment. Then it smoothed into neutral professionalism. "A customer. Why?"

  Cade glanced at Vessin, who had gone very still. Then back at Toreth.

  "I have a covenant essence," he said. "A specific type. It lets me sense suffering in others. And she—" He stopped, recalibrated. "Most of the people in this city are suffering. Half of them at least. Including you, though less than most. Including Vessin. And no one's talking about it."

  The silence stretched.

  Toreth looked at Vessin. Something passed between them—a question, a calculation, a decision made in the space of a heartbeat.

  "Close the door," Toreth said.

  Zyrian moved to comply, his expression wary but curious. Rhys positioned herself near Cade, ready to react to whatever came next.

  "A covenant essence that senses suffering," Toreth repeated slowly. "And what else does it do?"

  "It makes me stronger when I'm acting to minimize that suffering. Baseline increase, scaling with how well my actions align with the essence's purpose."

  "And?"

  Cade hesitated. "It can advance. Unlock new abilities. But I haven't triggered the next stage yet. I don't know what it would give me."

  Toreth studied him. Weighing. Assessing. Then she turned to Vessin. "Get Orvenne back here. If he can really see what he says he can see..." She trailed off, glancing at Cade. "I want to know exactly what he's perceiving."

  Orvenne returned within fifteen minutes.

  Up close, the wrongness was even more apparent. Not in her appearance—she looked healthy enough, moved without obvious pain—but in the flatness of her voice, the careful neutrality of her expression, the way she held herself like someone walking through a minefield.

  Toreth explained the situation in clipped, careful sentences—a stranger with an unusual covenant essence, the ability to sense bonds, potential usefulness. Orvenne listened without visible reaction, though Cade noticed her hands tighten slightly at her sides.

  "You want him to examine me," Orvenne said. Not a question.

  "I want to know what he sees. What he can do." Toreth's voice was measured. "If there's anything to this."

  Orvenne was silent for a long moment. Then she nodded, once, and turned to face Cade directly. Her yellow-orange features were carefully blank, but something flickered in her eyes. Hope, maybe. Or fear. Or both.

  "Look all you want," she said. "But don't try to undo anything. The one who made this"—she gestured vaguely at herself—"would feel it instantly. They'd be here within the hour."

  Cade nodded. "I understand. I'll just observe."

  He focused on her bond.

  It was like looking at a knot—an impossibly complex tangle of threads, each one a restriction, a compulsion, a blade pressed against her will. The threads wound around each other in patterns that seemed almost deliberate, almost elegant, if you ignored what they were doing to the person trapped inside them. Some were old and settled, worn smooth by time. Others were newer, sharper, still cutting fresh wounds with every movement.

  He'd sensed lesser versions of this from Vessin, from Toreth, from half the people they'd passed in the streets. But Orvenne's knot was denser. More complex. Layered in ways the others weren't, with redundancies and failsafes woven throughout. Whoever had crafted this had wanted absolute control.

  Cade didn't try to unravel it. Didn't push against it or attempt to force it open. He just... tested. Found a single thread near the edge of the tangle—something that looked like it might have a fraction of give—and pulled. Gently. The barest pressure, just to see if there was any slack at all.

  This isn't undoing anything, he told himself. Just seeing if there's any give. That's not the same thing.

  Orvenne flinched.

  It was subtle—a slight tension in her shoulders, a fractional widening of her eyes—but Cade caught it. She'd felt him somehow. Felt his essence touching whatever bound her.

  "Stop." Toreth's voice, sharp and low. "Whatever you're doing, stop it now."

  Cade released the thread immediately, pulling back. "I barely—"

  "I know what you were doing. And if you keep doing it, you'll alert the one who created that bond. They'll feel you tugging at their work, and they'll come to investigate." Toreth's rust-red eyes were hard. "Is that what you want? To bring that kind of attention down on all of us?"

  "I didn't know—"

  "Now you do."

  Orvenne had gone very still. Her flat expression hadn't changed, but something in her posture had shifted—a kind of desperate hope warring with ingrained caution. She wanted to speak, Cade realized. Wanted to tell him something. But she couldn't.

  The contract wouldn't let her.

  "I'm sorry," Cade said quietly. "I didn't mean to cause problems."

  Orvenne's eyes met his. Just for a moment. In that moment, something passed between them—acknowledgment, perhaps. Recognition of what he'd almost done and what it might have meant.

  Then she looked away.

  "I should go," she said, her voice flat again. "The delivery schedule is confirmed. I'll return tomorrow with the shipment."

  She left without looking back. The wrongness went with her, fading as she moved away, but the memory of its intensity remained.

  Toreth waited until the door closed before speaking again. "You have a rare gift. And absolutely no idea how dangerous it is."

  "I'm beginning to understand."

  "Are you?" She moved to a workbench, picking up a half-finished instrument and examining it as if the conversation were casual. "You can sense bonds. Fine. Many covenant types can do something similar, with practice. But you were doing more than sensing. You were pushing. Testing the edges. Seeing if you could find a way through."

  Cade didn't deny it. He hadn't consciously intended to do that, but she wasn't wrong.

  "If you'd pushed harder, even tried to really unravel it, the one who made it would have known immediately, thinking you'd started a sunderchain. Location, direction, intensity. They'd have been here within the hour." Toreth set down the instrument. "And then everyone you've met since arriving would have had a very bad day."

  "Including you."

  "Including me."

  Vessin had been silent through all of this, but now he spoke. "So what do we do? He has potential, clearly, but potential isn't—"

  "Potential needs development." Toreth cut him off, her tone decisive. "You three came from the labyrinth, yes? Recently advanced to tier-five?"

  "Yes," Cade said.

  "Then go back." She met his eyes directly. "Your essence hasn't reached its next stage. Whatever abilities it might unlock—abilities that could actually help rather than just sense—they won't come from sitting in Fermata asking questions. They'll come from acting on your oath. From facing challenges that force growth."

  Cade felt the truth of it. His first oath—I will seek to minimize suffering—had unlocked through action, through choosing to side with the beetles against an invading force. The next stage, whatever it was, would require something similar. Meaningful action at scale, not just awareness.

  "You want us to leave," Rhys said carefully. "Develop Cade's abilities elsewhere. And then...?"

  "And then, if what develops is useful, you come back." Toreth's voice was measured, each word chosen with care. "The labyrinth connects everywhere. Fermata's portal will still be here. If you return with more than just good intentions and vague sensing abilities, perhaps something could change."

  She couldn't say more than that, Cade realized. Couldn't suggest they tell anyone outside. Couldn't ask them to bring help or spread word of the city's situation. Her contract permitted suggesting they develop and return—the controllers probably welcomed capable people walking into their territory—but anything that might bring external attention was forbidden.

  "Cade already established that he can’t advance his Oath essence in the labyrinth?" Zyrian asked. "We have no idea how long that would take, and if we advance we’d have no easy way to get back to the tier-five ring."

  "I don't know, then. I just know that you aren’t capable yet of helping" Toreth stated. "Staying here, untrained and obvious, poking at things you don't understand? That's dangerous. For all of us."

  Cade looked at Vessin, who nodded reluctantly. "She's right. I brought you here hoping—" He stopped, reconsidered. "I brought you here because you seemed different. Special. But special without capability is just... a liability. If you genuinely want to help, becoming capable is the first step."

  It made sense. Painful sense. Cade had walked into this city hoping his essence had guided him somewhere he could make a difference, and instead he'd discovered a situation far beyond his current abilities to address. A tier-six at minimum behind this, given the level of control they are able to impose, possibly more. Contracts he could sense but not risk touching. Suffering he could feel but not stop.

  "The labyrinth," he said slowly. "Back into the labyrinth. Find somewhere that I can develop my essence more. Return when I'm actually useful."

  "Yes." Toreth's expression softened slightly. "It's not abandonment. It's preparation. There's a difference."

  The workshop door burst open.

  Halcin stood in the entrance, coral-pink skin flushed darker with agitation, young features arranged in an expression of barely contained excitement. He was shorter than Cade expected—maybe five feet—and he moved with the restless energy of someone who'd never learned patience.

  "I'm coming with you."

  Silence.

  Vessin recovered first. "What?"

  "To the labyrinth. You're going back to develop his essence, right? I heard you through the wall—don't look at me like that, Vessin, the walls in this place are practically paper. If you're going somewhere that isn't here, somewhere you can actually train and grow and become strong enough to do something, I want in."

  "Halcin—" Toreth started.

  "I know, I know, I'm reckless, I'm young, I don't understand the dangers. I've heard it all before." Halcin stepped fully into the workshop, letting the door swing shut behind him. "But I'm also not bound. I'm the only one in this room who can actually speak freely, who isn't wrapped up in—in whatever's strangling the rest of you. If these strangers are going to come back and help, they need someone who can actually tell them things."

  "You can't go," Vessin said quietly.

  "Why not? Because I'm young? Because I'm—"

  "Halcin." Vessin's voice was gentle, almost kind, which made the single word land harder. "Your parents."

  Halcin's mouth was still open, ready to argue. Then it closed. His hands, which had been gesturing emphatically, dropped to his sides.

  "I..." He stopped. Swallowed. "I forgot."

  Cade looked between them, confused. "What about his parents? Why does that stop him from coming with us?"

  The question seemed to startle everyone. Toreth studied him with renewed interest—the fresh soul who didn't know things that every Kindred learned in childhood.

  "Born children can't nourish themselves," Vessin explained. "Not until they reach their parents' tier. They can't process food directly—no fruit, no eggs, nothing. They need their parents to transfer anima to them. Daily. Without it..." He spread his hands.

  "I'd starve," Halcin said, his voice hollow. "A week, maybe two, before I started weakening. A month before I died. Less than that in the labyrinth—combat burns anima faster." He laughed bitterly. "I'd be a liability before I could be any help."

  Cade absorbed this. And Halcin, standing at the threshold of tier-five, so close to independence he could taste it...

  "How close are you?" Cade asked. "To reaching their tier?"

  "A few more months. Maybe less if I push myself in the children's battlegrounds." Halcin's jaw tightened. "But I can't push myself outside of Fermata. Can't leave for more than a day without coming back for feeding. Can't do anything except wait while the people I care about stay trapped."

  He stood there trembling slightly, caught between his desperation to act and the fundamental constraint of his existence. Late tier-four, almost at the threshold—Cade could see it now, the way Halcin's height nearly matched his own, the way his body was on the cusp of that final push before compression. So close to freedom. So close and yet utterly dependent on parents who were themselves bound to something worse.

  "Then what am I supposed to do?" Halcin asked, and his voice was young now. Genuinely young. Not the performative youth of someone playing at rebellion, but the actual helplessness of someone who'd just run into a wall they couldn't climb or break or go around. "Just wait? Just watch? Just hope that strangers come back someday with abilities that might help?"

  "You could tell us things," Cade said.

  Halcin looked at him.

  "You said it yourself—you're not bound. You can speak freely. Everyone else in this room is choosing their words carefully, talking around things they can't say directly. But you don't have those limits." Cade stepped closer. "So tell us. Everything you know. Everything you've observed. Names, patterns, locations, whatever you've pieced together from living here your whole life. Give us information we can use when we come back."

  "If you come back."

  Cade held his gaze. "When I asked the labyrinth to take me somewhere I could minimize suffering. It brought me here. That's not a coincidence, and I don't intend to ignore it. We'll develop my essence. We'll get stronger. And we'll return, no matter how long it takes." Cade didn't put to words his intent to tell Ouric about the situation in the city, worrying it may trigger a condition on the contracts of those present with them.

  Halcin studied him for a long moment. Searching for deception, maybe. Or for hope.

  Whatever he found seemed to satisfy him.

  "There's a tier-six named Jolo," he said. "They're the one everyone knows about. The face of the Unbound, they call themselves, in defiance of Preservation. Jolo is the one who does the day-to-day enforcement, who makes sure people stay compliant."

  Toreth's expression flickered. Her mouth opened, closed. She looked away, frustration etched into every line of her face.

  She couldn't correct him, Cade realized. Whatever Halcin was saying, it wasn't entirely accurate, but Toreth's own bond prevented her from providing the fuller picture. She was letting a partial truth stand because she couldn't offer the complete one.

  Jolo was part of it. But not all of it. Maybe not even the most important part.

  Still. A name. A target. A starting point.

  "What else?" Cade asked.

  Halcin talked. The others listened—Vessin and Toreth unable to add or correct, Rhys and Zyrian filing away information, Cade building a picture of a city under quiet occupation.

  When Halcin finally ran out of observations to share, silence settled over the workshop.

  "So we go," Cade said. "Back into the labyrinth. Get stronger. Return."

  He didn't mention his Oath essence. Didn't point out what he'd realized months ago—that labyrinth creatures couldn't suffer, that the scenarios were designed for combat and challenge but not for the kind of meaningful action that would advance his particular abilities. His essence had stagnated the entire time he'd been inside, growing no closer to its next stage despite countless battles.

  Toreth's plan made sense on paper. Gain tiers. Accumulate power. Come back at tier-seven or eight with the raw strength to challenge whoever was behind this. But it felt like it was treating symptoms instead of causes. Like building muscle to punch harder when the real problem requires a different kind of strength entirely.

  A thought occurred to him.

  "The contracts," he said slowly. "The bonds. I can sense them, and when I touch that thread on Orvenne's..." He hesitated, trying to articulate what he was thinking. "What if I could learn to break them? Not by getting stronger in the labyrinth, but by practicing on bonds directly?"

  Toreth's eyes sharpened. "You'd need a bond to practice on. And touching anyone else's would alert—"

  "I know. But what if I made one myself?" Cade looked at his hands. "Created a contract on myself. Something unjust, something my essence would recognize as wrong. Then tried to break it. Learn the mechanism from the inside."

  The room went quiet.

  "That's..." Vessin started, then stopped. His expression was complicated—hope and fear and something else Cade couldn't identify.

  "Insane," Zyrian finished. "You're talking about binding yourself. What if you can't break it? What if the act of creating an unjust bond damages your essence somehow? Covenant types are supposed to be delicate. Self-contradictory actions can destabilize them."

  "He's right," Rhys said quietly. "Your essence is built around minimizing suffering. Creating a bond designed to cause suffering—even on yourself, even for practice—that might register as a violation. The essence might punish you for it."

  Cade had already considered this. The First Oath was I will seek to minimize suffering. Creating suffering, even strategically, even temporarily, even on himself... would his essence understand the difference between genuine cruelty and calculated practice? Or would it treat any unjust bond as a betrayal of his purpose?

  "I don't know," he admitted. "But I also don't know how else to advance. The labyrinth won't do it—nothing there suffers, nothing there needs freeing. I could spend years gaining tiers and come back no closer to actually helping anyone here."

  Toreth was watching him with an intensity that bordered on desperate. Her mouth worked silently, fighting against whatever her contract forbade her from saying.

  "Last resort," Cade decided. "If we get clear of the city and nothing better presents itself, I'll try it. Trust my essence to feel the difference between creating harm and learning to undo it." He met Toreth's eyes. "If it works, I'll have a way to practice. If it doesn't..."

  He didn't finish the sentence. They all knew what failure might mean.

  Still. He had nothing better to offer, not overtly. And staying here, weak and obvious and apparently setting off alarms just by poking at contracts too closely, wasn't helping anyone. He couldn't test his abilities here safely.

  Toreth nodded slowly. Something worked behind her eyes, a struggle Cade could almost feel through his Oath awareness. Her jaw worked silently, struggling to form words.

  "Getting stronger, practicing are... good," she managed, each word pulled out like a splinter. "Coming back is... good." She paused, visibly straining. "That's... good enough."

  The words sounded wrong even as she said them. Good enough. Not the best option. Not exactly what we need. Just... good enough. A phrase of reluctant acceptance, not enthusiasm.

  Cade understood. Whatever she wanted to suggest—going to the tier-nine city, perhaps, or spreading word of Fermata's plight to outside authorities—her contract forbade it. She could only agree with the plan they'd already proposed. Anything better was locked behind restrictions she couldn't break.

  "We'll move fast," he said, trying to offer what reassurance he could. "We won't forget what we've seen here."

  Toreth nodded again, but the frustration didn't leave her eyes. Cade suspected she knew the same thing he did—that raw power alone wouldn't solve this. That his Oath essence was the key, if only he could find a way to advance it.

  But neither of them could say that out loud. Not here. Not now.

  "You should leave shortly," Vessin said. "Slip out when it's quietest. The fewer people who see you go, the less attention—"

  Half an hour later, a scream cut through the air.

  Distant. Muffled by walls and distance. But unmistakable.

  Everyone froze.

  Another scream, from a different direction. Then shouting—not words Cade could make out, but the tone was clear. Angry. Demanding. Afraid.

  "What's happening?" Cade asked.

  No one answered. Toreth had gone pale. Vessin's affable manner had vanished entirely, replaced by something tight and controlled. Halcin looked like he wanted to bolt.

  More shouting outside. Closer now. The sound of doors being thrown open, of heavy footsteps, of questions being asked in tones that didn't accept silence as an answer.

  "Jolo," Halcin breathed. "He's searching for something."

  "Back room," Toreth said, already moving. "There's cellar access. If we're lucky, he won't—"

  A fist hammered on the workshop's front door.

  "Toreth." A voice from outside—smooth, controlled, carrying the casual authority of someone who'd never been refused. "Open up. Just a few questions. Nothing to worry about."

  Toreth's eyes met Cade's. In them he saw fear, yes, but also something harder. A calculation being made.

  "Go," she mouthed, pointing toward the back.

  The hammering came again. Harder this time.

  "Now."