The journey down felt shorter this time, her feet remembering the path. Through the oubliette corridor, eyes carefully averted from that terrible room, past the shimmer of the hidden door, down the endless stairs where moss bloomed at her touch.
"Thomas?" she called softly as she entered the dungeon chamber. "It's me. I brought food."
Movement in the far cell. He lurched forward faster than last time, chains rattling, and in the mosslight she could see him better. Still gaunt, still filthy, but his eyes burned brighter. Hungrier.
"You came back." His voice cracked with emotion. Was it relief? Desperation? "I thought... I thought I'd dreamed of you."
"I promised." She approached the bars, pulling the food from her pockets. "It's not much, but—"
"It's everything." He reached through the bars with shaking hands, taking the bread first. "Oh god. Oh god, actual food."
He tore into it like a starved animal, and her heart clenched. How long had he been down here? How long since anyone had shown him kindness?
"Slowly," she cautioned. "You'll make yourself sick."
But he barely seemed to hear, moving on to the apple with the same frenzied hunger. She watched him eat, this broken man who might have answers, who might understand what she was becoming.
"Thank you," he gasped between bites. "Thank you, thank you. You don't know what this means."
"You said you'd tell me about the flowers," she prompted gently. "The golden ones. You said you knew their secret."
He paused mid-chew, eyes sharpening despite the hunger. "Yes. The flowers." He swallowed hard. "But it's... it's complicated. Dangerous knowledge."
"I need to know. They bloom for me sometimes. From stone, from nothing. I don't understand why."
"From stone?" His eyes widened. "Show me."
"I can't control it. It just... happens. When things feel hopeless. When I'm drowning." She pressed closer to the bars. "Please. You said you studied the marks. Found patterns. What did you learn?"
Thomas finished the cheese, licking every crumb from his fingers. Already he looked stronger, more focused.
"The marks," he said slowly, "are more than just claims. They're... connections. Threads that bind soul to soul." He gestured to her arm where thorns wound beneath her sleeve. "Yours is spreading, isn't it? Growing stronger?"
"Yes. He said when it completes, I'll become part of him. Part of the forest."
"That's what he wants you to think." Thomas leaned forward, voice dropping. "But the marks can be reversed. Even broken, with the right knowledge."
Her heart leaped. "Broken? How?"
"Ah." He sat back, chains clinking. "That's where it gets complicated. The flowers, they're the key. They grow from the intersection of power. Where claim meets resistance. Where binding meets freedom." His eyes searched hers. "You've been fighting the mark, haven't you? Fighting him?"
"Every day."
Liar.
She shoved the thought aside.
"That's why they bloom. Your resistance, your will, it transforms the binding. Makes it... malleable." He rubbed his wrists where old scars showed. "I learned this through pain. Through trial. Through years of study before I was locked away."
"But how do I use that? How do I break free?"
He gripped the bars, knuckles white. "Alone it’s impossible… but together, we might... we might actually do this. Escape from this place. Both of us. I know the old paths, the secret ways.”
Briar leaned closer. “Where are they? How do we get to them?”
“It won’t be easy, and I’m still so weak, but…” he said, his voice low, hopeful.
“What?”
