I lie down. Close my eyes. Try to steady my breathing, to quiet the racing of my blood.
Sleep doesn’t come. But something resembling stillness does—a suspension between waking and dreaming where thoughts drift without anchoring.
I think about Gror. About the brother who made stupid choices because he wanted to help. About what the Ledger Master has done to him, is doing to him, while I lie here in the dark.
He was four when our mother died. He barely remembers her face, her voice, the way she made everything feel safe. I’ve spent my whole life trying to give him what she would have given us both. A home. Protection. Someone who believed in him even when he made it hard.
And now he’s in the Ledger Master’s hands. Being transformed into something unrecognizable. Because he wanted to help me.
The guilt twists in my chest like a blade.
I think about Rathok. About the orc who should have handed me over and didn’t. About the history of violence written on his body, the emptiness in his voice when he talks about what he’s done, the way his hands trembled when he couldn’t make himself touch my face.
He’s sitting against the far wall. I hear his breathing—slow, controlled, the rhythm of someone who’s trained himself to rest without sleeping. Guarding. Even now, even here, he’s positioning himself between me and the door.
Protecting me.
He feels something.The realization lands in my chest with unexpected weight.He’s fighting it. But he feels it.
I don’t know what to do with that. Don’t know what I want it to mean.
The marks on my arm burn.
∗ ∗ ∗
The pain rips through me without warning.
I gasp, jackknifing upright, clutching my forearm as fire races beneath my skin. The mark glows white-hot, bright enough to cast shadows across the cramped room. The marks climbing my arm shift, rearrange, letters reforming into words that burn themselves into my flesh.
Rathok is at my side in an instant. His hands find my shoulders, steadying me as I convulse against the agony.
“What’s happening?” His voice is sharp. Urgent. “Ivalys?—”
“The marks—” I can barely get the words out through gritted teeth. “They’re changing?—”
The light peaks. The pain crests. And then—silence.
I look down at my arm.
New words have appeared below the original contract terms. Not the angular script of debt-magic, but something different. Elegant. Almost beautiful, if beauty could be carved from malice.
GROR VANE: DEBT TRANSFERRED. ORIGINAL DEBTOR: ARCHIVED.
The words pulse once. Twice. Then a new line appears beneath them, searing itself into my skin with fresh agony.
ARCHIVED STATUS: TRANSFORMATION IN PROGRESS.
I can’t breathe. Can’t think. Can’t do anything but stare at the place where my brother’s fate is written on my flesh.
“What does ‘archived’ mean?” My voice emerges hollow. Broken. “Rathok. What is he doing to Gror?”
His hands on my shoulders are firm. Grounding.
“The Ledger Master doesn’t only consume defaulters. Sometimes—when he wants something specific—he transforms them.” His voice is flat. Clinical. The voice of someone delivering truths too terrible for emotion. “Archived means the Ledger Master is keeping him intact. Rewriting him. Turning him into something that serves.”
“Something like what?”
“A weapon. A tool. A creature of contract-magic that wears a human face but serves only the Ledger Master’s will.” His hands haven’t left my shoulders. The pressure is the only thing keeping me from flying apart. “Your mother feared it because truth-speakers are especially vulnerable to it. Your gifts—once twisted—become the Ledger Master’s most powerful instruments.”
