“People going missing.” Her fingers tighten around the rim of a ceramic cup. “Men in cloaks slipping down alleyways at dawn. Questions being asked by those who aren’t from here. Tall men. Silent. No crests. No reason to be in Anvaris unless they’re hunting.”
The words settle like ash in my lungs. Shadeborne scouts, slipping closer than we ever imagined.
The vendor’s fingers hesitate on the rim of a steaming kettle, and for a moment I’m not sure if it’s the heat or fear that makes her hand tremble. She flicks a wary glance toward the stall across from hers, where a jeweler loudly advertises charm-lockets to a cluster of passing students, before leaning closer to me, her voice thinning to a whisper meant for no one else.
“You didn’t hear any of this from me,” she murmurs. “Not unless you fancy trouble.”
A curl of scented steam drifts between us, carrying cloves, dried rose, and something metallic beneath it. Her eyes, softbrown, too tired for someone her age, hold mine with a weight that makes the market around us dim.
“There’s been movement in the woods.”
My stomach tightens. “What kind of movement?”
“The kind no one’s supposed to see. Shadows when there’s no sun. Footsteps when no one is walking.” She reaches for a jar, stops halfway, then presses her hand flat against the counter instead. “I know the stories. Most people do. But this is different. These aren’t spirits, and they aren’t beasts. These are men with orders.”
Shadeborne. She doesn’t say the name, but I hear it anyway.
Her gaze catches on the faint scar along my forearm, the one I forgot my sleeve didn’t fully cover. Something uneasy flickers in her expression.
“They’ve been coming closer,” she whispers. “Three nights ago, someone spotted one standing at the ridge above Anvaris. A tall thing. Still as winter. Watching the roads like he was waiting for someone.”
A pulse kicks behind my ribs.
Blue eyes.
The thought is irrational, impossible, even, but it coils through me before I can stop it.
“Did anyone approach him?” I ask.
She laughs, but there’s no humor in it. “Approach? Child, no one with a beating heart would go near a creature like that. You feel it before you see them, cold crawling up your spine, your breath catching in your throat. They’re not meant for the likes of us. They come only when something is being hunted.”
Her words settle with the weight of prophecy.
The vendors around us keep chattering, tossing herbs, laughing with customers, bartering over prices. But none of it dulls the thin string of dread weavingitself through my spine. The world has tilted, and somehow only she and I are aware of it.
“Some say they’re searching,” the woman continues, lowering her voice even further, “for someone who broke the natural order. Someone with too much in them. A witch born wrong, or born… powerful.”
Her eyes linger on me. Not accusing. Not condemning. Just aware.
I force my fingers to uncurl from their tense grip on my cloak. “Rumors,” I say quietly.
“Most begin as such.” She lifts a tin cup, filling it with a tea so dark it’s nearly black. “Take this. On the house.”
“I didn’t order anything.”
“No,” she says, pressing the warm cup into my hands, “but you look like someone who needs something to hold.”
The simple gesture hits harder than I expect. My hands wrap around the cup, letting the warmth seep into my chilled skin.
“Whatever you’re mixed up in,” she says softly, eyes flicking briefly to the woods beyond the last row of stalls, “be careful. Autumn is a thin season. The veil is restless. And so are those who walk in its shadows.”
A gust of wind rushes through the market, rattling the strings of dried herbs overhead and sending a scatter of red leaves tumbling across the ground. The vendor tenses as if expecting something to emerge from that wind, something with height and weight and purpose.
Her hand closes around my wrist before I can pull away.
“If you see one,” she whispers sharply, “don’t run.”
My breath catches. “Why not?”
