THIRTY-FOUR
RATHOK
The vault is larger than I expected.
It stretches beneath the ruins of the Ledger Hall—a massive chamber carved from bedrock and bone, its ceiling arching so high the stasis-light doesn’t reach it, its walls lined with alcoves that glow. The Ledger Master’s final secret. His insurance policy against truth-speakers like Maren Vane.
Forty-three of them. That’s how many the rescue crews counted before they stopped counting and sent for help. Men and women frozen in magical stasis, preserved across decades and centuries, their gifts locked away where they couldn’t threaten the Contract Lord’s power.
They’re waking now.
The stasis-light flickers and dies as I watch. One by one, the alcoves release their prisoners. Some stumble forward, blinking, confused. Others collapse where they stand, their bodies too weak from the long sleep to support them. A few cry out—names, questions, pleas in languages I barely recognize.
Chaos. Pure, desperate chaos.
Healers move through the vault, catching the ones who fall, guiding the ones who can walk, speaking in soft voices that do nothing to cut through the confusion. They’re not equippedfor this. No one is. Three centuries of accumulated prisoners, waking into a world that’s moved on without them.
I stand at the vault’s entrance, watching. Not helping. I learned long ago that my presence in crisis situations tends to make things worse. The massive orc enforcer—former enforcer—doesn’t exactly inspire calm.
Besides. There’s only one person I’m watching.
Ivalys moves through the chaos like she was born to it. She catches an elderly woman who stumbles, steadies her, speaks words I can’t hear but can see the effect of—the woman’s panic fading, her breathing slowing. She guides a young man toward the healers, her hand on his arm, her voice cutting through whatever nightmare he’s trapped in. She crouches beside a child—a child, frozen for who knows how long—and cups her face, speaks truth over her until the screaming stops.
She’s exhausted. I can see it in the set of her shoulders, the shadows beneath her eyes, the slight tremor in her hands. She hasn’t slept properly in days. She poured everything she had into destroying the Ledger Master, and she’s running on fumes.
And still, she helps. Still, she gives.
That’s who she is. That’s who she was from the moment I met her—not prey, not collateral, but someone who looks at suffering and refuses to walk away. Even when it costs her. Even when she has nothing left to give.
I love her. The certainty of it settles into my bones, warm and terrifying and impossibly right. I love her, and I’m going to spend however many years I have left trying to be worthy of her.
A truth-speaker stumbles past me. A man, middle-aged, wearing clothes that went out of fashion decades ago. He freezes when he sees me. Recognition flickers in his eyes—not of me specifically, but of what I am. What I was.
“Enforcer.” The word comes out like a curse. He backs away, hands raised, fear and hatred warring on his face. “Stay back. Stay?—”
“He’s with me.”
Ivalys appears at my side. I didn’t hear her approach—too focused on the man’s reaction, on the guilt that twists in my chest. Her hand finds mine. Laces our fingers. A gesture that’s become natural over the past hours, as easy as breathing.
The man stares at our joined hands. At her. At me.
“He’s an enforcer?—”
“He was.” Her voice is quiet but certain. “He broke his oath to the Ledger Master. Helped me destroy him. Took a contract-heart to the chest to protect me.” She squeezes my hand. “He’s mine now. Not the Ledger Master’s.”
Mine. The word shouldn’t make my heart stutter. Shouldn’t fill the empty place in my chest with warmth. But it does.
The man looks between us. Whatever he sees—in her certainty, in my stillness, in the way we stand shoulder to shoulder—it makes him nod slowly.
“The world has changed, then.” His voice is rough. Unused. “If truth-speakers claim enforcers.”
“The world has changed,” Ivalys agrees. “The Ledger Master is dead. The fraudulent contracts are voided. You’re free.”
Free. The word hangs in the air. The man’s face crumples—grief and relief and disbelief warring for dominance. He turns away, stumbling toward the healers, and I watch him go.
“How many of them will react like that?” I keep my voice low. “When they see me?”
“Some.” Ivalys doesn’t lie to me. Never has. “They were captured by enforcers. Imprisoned for years, decades, centuries. You represent everything they feared.”
