"What will you name the child?" I managed, desperate to deflect from their gratitude, from the weight of their trust that I didn't deserve.
"Marcus, if it's a boy," the man said proudly, glancing at the baker with obvious affection. "After the baker here, who's been like a father to us both when we had no family to speak of."
"And if it's a girl," the woman added, her eyes meeting mine with shy hope, with an eagerness that made my stomach twist, "we thought perhaps... Aria?"
The world tilted. The floor seemed to shift beneath my feet. They wanted to name their child after me. After someone they saw as a protector, a hero, a symbol of everything good and safe in their world. The irony tasted like copper in my mouth, like blood on stone, like lies wrapped in good intentions and tied with ribbons of ignorance.
"That's... that's very kind," I whispered, barely able to force the words past the constriction in my throat.
"Kind?" The woman laughed, the sound bright and innocent and completely unaware of the devastation it caused. "It's the least we can do. You bleed for us, don't you? Every dawn, offering your blood to maintain the protections that keep us safe? How could we not honor such sacrifice?"
If only she knew what my blood really fed. If only she understood that my sacrifice maintained chains, not shields. That my suffering kept beings imprisoned who might be no more monstrous than we were.
Marcus saved me from responding, pressing a wrapped loaf into my hands with hands still warm from the ovens. "Fresh this morning. Rosemary and sea salt, your favorite. And here's your order, all packed and ready."
I fled.
There was no other word for it, no dignified description that would make it sound less like retreat. I took the supplies and escaped into the market square, their gratitude chasing me like accusation, like the voice of my own conscience given external form. Other villagers nodded respectfully as I passed, some murmuring blessings in that casual way people invoke the divine, some simply smiling with that same terrible faith. An old man touched his forehead in salute. A woman with a child onher hip whispered something that made the little one wave at me with chubby fingers.
They trusted us. Trusted me.
And we'd been lying to them for a thousand years.
The return journey felt longer than usual, each step weighted with questions I couldn't afford to ask aloud. The guards still trailed behind, shadows among trees, their presence a constant reminder that I was being watched, evaluated, judged. But I barely noticed them. My mind churned with the princes' words, with Master Theron's revelations about the carefully edited histories, with the grateful faces of people who had no idea what we really did in our stone tower. People who slept soundly in their beds, trusting in protections that might actually be chains.
The forest grew denser as I climbed toward the Citadel, afternoon light filtering through leaves in patterns that reminded me of the Threshold's chaos. Shadows lengthened as the sun descended, painting everything in shades of amber and gold. That's when I saw the first mark.
Burned into the bark of an ancient oak, still smoking slightly despite the moisture in the air. A symbol I recognized from the restricted texts in Master Theron's archives, a curved blade intersecting a broken circle. The wood around it was blackened, charred, the smell of burned sap sharp in my nostrils.
The mark of Khaos.
My blood went cold. My enhanced senses suddenly felt like a curse as I caught every detail—the precise angle of the burn, the way the smoke still rose in a thin tendril, the acrid chemical smell of whatever substance they'd used to make the mark.
Another tree, twenty paces on. Same symbol, fresher, the smoke still rising like incense to dark gods. The bark was hot when I touched it—recent, very recent. Then another. And another. A trail of them leading up the mountain, toward the Citadel, each one a statement of intent, a declaration of purpose.
Toward us.
The Order of Khaos. Fanatics who worshipped destruction, who believed the world needed to burn to be reborn from its own ashes. They'd been rumors mostly, stories whispered in dark corners about madmen who sought to destroy the Gate not to free the princes but to unleash total annihilation. They didn't want freedom or justice or even revenge. They wanted the ending of all things, the return to primordial chaos from which new creation might emerge.
They were getting closer.
Close enough to mark trees in broad daylight. Close enough that the smoke from their symbols still rose like prayers to gods of entropy. My heightened senses, the ones Natalia called corruption, caught something else on the wind. The acrid smell of crude magic, the kind that burned through practitioners like wildfire through dry grass, leaving them hollowed and consumed. The metallic tang of blood magic, forbidden and unstable, the kind that required sacrifice of self and others. And beneath it all, something worse—the smell of zealotry, of minds bent past breaking into absolute certainty.
They'd been here recently. Maybe within the hour. Maybe still close enough to see me if they cared to look.
One of the guards materialized beside me, no longer pretending to maintain distance. His hand rested on his sword, knuckles white with tension, his breathing controlled but rapid.
"You've seen them," he said. Not a question. A statement of fact.
I nodded, not trusting my voice to remain steady.
"How many symbols?"
"Seven that I counted. Maybe more further up the trail that I haven't reached yet."
His jaw tightened, a muscle jumping beneath the skin. "They're accelerating their approach. Testing our boundaries. Seeing how close they can come before we respond."
"Why?" The question escaped before I could stop it. "Why now? They've existed for years without making such bold moves."
