Kion's POV

  Hall of Accordance's Corridor, Brandholt City

  Drenna, Pious, and Caustic moved without a word, their steps steady until they reached a black-plated door. Silver metal letters glinted against the dim light.

  Black Quill.

  Kion closed the gap, wings tight, ready to slip through the threshold the instant they passed it.

  The trick had worked dozens of times. Ride the blind spot of a group, slip in unseen. Easy.

  The corridor spilled into a waiting room, the air dropping colder than the hall behind. The door was left ajar, deliberately so. A set of sofas hugged the wall.

  Across from him, another door. Heavier, likely the office proper, mirroring Tiran’s wing.

  Pious crouched at the lock, hands working over a glyph-sealed panel.

  Kion floated closer, gaze sharp.

  Then the crack of wood split the silence.

  Caustic’s clipboard slammed into him with surgical force, shattering in two.

  His barrier flared almost a breath too late, the impact still shoved him to the floor.

  A wet thud followed. Something sticky splattering where his body had been a blink ago.

  He jerked sideways.

  Red flecks spattered the air. Not paint. Thicker, darker.

  The scent hit him first. Iron, sharp enough to sting the back of his throat. Blood?

  Droplets hung unnaturally, suspended midair, strung together by threads he couldn’t see. When he shifted, the beads quivered, reacting as though they could feel him.

  Magic?

  Not cast, not drawn. It's simply there.

  His stomach turned. He backed toward the wall, slipping along the edge of the room.

  The curtain of blood droplets marked out a third of the space, enclosing Caustic and the others.

  His invisibility could veil him from sight and probe alike, but not from something this physical. One brush and he’d be painted alive.

  “Since when?” Drenna’s voice. Strange tongue, crisp.

  “After Harbringer office,” Caustic answered, clipped.

  “Hostile?” Pious chimed.

  Caustic shook his head once, “unsure. Not murderous.”

  Kion froze. The cadence... High Morthen.

  Old court tongue. Rare now, fossilized into noble education but almost never spoken aloud.

  They weren’t just speaking it. They spoke it fluently.

  The mechanism clicked. The inner door edged open, and even from where Kion stood, a sharper chill bled out. Colder still than the waiting room.

  Drenna and Pious stepped inside as the blood curtain stirred, swirling into a thin, pulsing veil across the doorway. Caustic remained outside.

  Another click. Kion felt it sweep over him. Clairvoyance glyph.

  He tightened his spell until it pressed into his skin like a second hide.

  “Nothing,” Pious called from within.

  Caustic’s gaze flicked to the broken clipboard, brows narrowing, “hm.”

  Drenna’s voice carried back, “nandle it. I’ll get inside first.”

  “Noted.”

  She and Pious disappeared into the inner room, leaving Caustic alone in Kion’s line of sight.

  The door, however, stayed open. Just wide enough for half a dozen faces inside to peer past the drifting blood-veil.

  Witnesses. On their side. Arranged on purpose.

  Kion’s throat tightened. His heart thudded with the tether’s lingering echo. Writ’s panic still clung to him, sharp and unspent.

  He considered stepping back. He should step back.

  But then Caustic spoke, switching back to common tongue. Calm and almost, strangely, measured.

  “I’m sorry for the harsh welcome. Must’ve hurt. I thought you were a threat. We get plenty of unpleasant visitors here.”

  Kion blinked.

  ...Did he just apologize?

  And... unpleasant visitor? Weren't they deep inside Accord's restricted building?

  Caustic’s gaze roved, voice steady.

  “Since you don’t feel like one, I’ll give you a chance. If you have any questions, maybe for yourself or your friend, ask away.”

  What?

  A trap? A trick?

  He offered that freely, just like that?

  Why did every Shadow in Accord act as if they lived by different logics?

  “If you need protection,” Caustic continued, tapping the doorframe, “step through. We’ll conceal you. Whoever you fear won’t touch you here.”

  His finger brushed the red film; the surface rippled, dark coils twisting in acknowledgment, “it won’t be comfortable. But it will hold.”

  Then his tone dropped, flat and cold.

  “But if you’re here to harm us... good luck trying.”

  The red swirls quickened, as though the liquid itself understood his words.

  He remembered the scene in Writ’s room.

  Caustic asking if she knew she could report a handler to them, to the Black Quill. Confirming she could file a report if she’d been mistreated.

  Why? What exactly did the Black Quill do? Were they enforcers? Judges between members?

  Despite the eeriness, Caustic had given him a chance to ask. No violence. No accusation.

  Maybe this was his only window.

  Kion’s wings twitched. Every instinct told him to leave. But Writ’s fear still clawed under his ribs.

  If he could bring back something solid, proof, it might ease her. Might stop her from drowning in her own terror.

  Voice risked tone. Words risked trace.

  Caustic could pick him apart if he slipped, just like Writ could. Better to write.

  The man must have expected that. He pulled a note and pen from his pocket, flicked it underhand.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  The items clattered across the tiles, sliding to a stop in the open.

  “If you’re afraid to talk, then write. Make it quick.”

  Kion eyed the stationery.

  Too neat, too easy. Evidence he couldn’t control. His jaw set.

  He reached into his satchel instead, pulling free his own fairy-sized notebook. The familiar weight steadied him.

  He drew a low-grade memory stone from his pocket and let it hover beside him, a device for recording voices. Writ wouldn’t believe him without proof.

  He breathed mana into it, and the glyphs around its edge lit in a faint ring.

  He ripped a page with an intentional snap, not caring who heard it.

  Ink bloomed under his illusion, reshaping into an unfamiliar hand, one that would fade to blank the instant he left. A quick squeeze of mana and the letters scrawled across.

  He balled the paper and flung it. In flight, it swelled to human size.

  Caustic caught it, eyes narrowing as he smoothed the page.

  He sniffed it, rubbed the ink as though testing its reality, then read aloud for the gallery behind him.

  “Are assessments always declared, or can some be exploratory?”

  He pocketed the sheet. His eyes narrowed faintly in thought before answering.

  “Possible to have undeclared assessments. But the command has to be clear. Case by case, always.”

  Kion’s chest eased, just a fraction.

  He ripped another page.

  Caustic caught that too, unfolding, “how to differentiate between normal interaction and concealed assessment?”

  A faint tilt of Caustic’s head, interest glinting behind still eyes as he slid the paper into the same pocket.

  “Depends on the handler. No general rule. If you want more than that, you’ll need to tell me the case.”

  No chance.

  Kion ripped a third sheet, ignoring the bait.

  “So not every interaction with you is reported?” Caustic read out, voice crisp.

  This time he exhaled softly through his nose, “I need more context. But if you mean daily life... No. We’re people. We talk, we laugh, we live. Not everything becomes a report.”

  Good.

  Enough.

  It had to be enough.

  Kion slid the memory stone back into his satchel, fingers tight on the clasp.

  Silence stretched. No more ripped paper. No more questions.

  Caustic’s head angled slightly, listening to that silence.

  “Indulge me a little," Caustic folded his arms, leaving one finger deliberately exposed instead of tucked under, tapping a quiet, deliberate rhythm on his sleeve, "why does nine fear seven? Replace all numbers with zero, don't show anything.”

  A riddle. Or something sharper.

  Drenna leaned into view from the office, lips curved just faintly, watching behind the black funeral veil.

  Kion froze, every muscle tight.

  Replace with zero? Don't show? Was the answer... nonsense? Wordplay? A code?

  His fingers twitched at his satchel clasp.

  “Answer in three,” Caustic said evenly.

  The corridor door behind Kion shifted as he turned. Red film sliding across it like a closing throat.

  “Two.”

  His breath caught. Run? Push through? The liquid pulsed in time with his heartbeat.

  “One.”

  Trap. It was a trap.

  “Zero.”

  The word dropped like a stone.

  And the room bled.

  Dark red welled from the seams of the walls, the ceiling, even the cracks in the floorboards, spilling into droplets that hung midair. They dangled on invisible threads, suspended, swaying.

  The stink of iron was immediate, raw, forcing Kion’s throat to tighten. The air grew heavier with it, humid, copper-slick.

  He jolted upward, pressing into the ceiling corner, his barrier a fragile skin between him and the wet curtain weaving below. Droplets trembled as though they could smell him, shivering when he shifted.

  The entire waiting room had become a lung filling with blood.

  Below, Caustic twirled his knife, the motion lazy, almost bored.

  His gaze swept left, then right, scanning for tremors in the lattice.

  Expecting a body to stand revealed, red dripping along its outline like paint on glass.

  Nothing.

  “Interesting.”

  The word slid into Kion’s bones.

  Of course it was interesting.

  They knew someone was here. He’d thrown paper minutes ago. They should’ve seen a man-shaped silhouette dripping in crimson.

  Instead, there was... nothing. No figure. No proof. No outline at all.

  Not a man. Not where a man should be.

  Caustic’s head tilted, eyes cutting upward.

  Cold slid down Kion’s back. He pressed tighter to the ceiling, praying the droplets couldn’t reach.

  Invisibility wasn’t invulnerability. These beads weren’t just trickles of water. They were eyes, a thousand, watching, waiting for something to brush them so they could cling, choke, reveal.

  “Last chance,” Caustic murmured, voice as smooth as blade against whetstone, “your answer.”

  Kion’s hand twitched. He needed noise, motion. Anything not himself.

  He coaxed a pillow from the sofa, slow, gentle, until the red clung to it like flies to meat. It drifted across the room, dripping scarlet with every inch, then slid through the corridor door.

  A knife blurred. Steel struck dead-center, splitting fabric.

  Caustic already had another blade in hand.

  The droplets shifted.

  What had been curtains dissolved, scattering across every surface in a frenzy.

  Red dots clung to the armrests, to the walls, to the very ceiling above him. And some, several, latched to his barrier, spreading wet stains across its surface like fingers pressing through gauze.

  Shit.

  The knife whistled upward.

  Kion twisted. The blade glanced his shield, leaving behind a smear of blood that throbbed, pulsing like it had a heartbeat of its own.

  Caustic stepped to the corridor door, his frame blocking escape.

  A woman slid in from the office, her hand tossing a small orb to the ground.

  The air rotted. Thin.

  Aetherspore.

  Mana stripped from the room like breath stolen from lungs. His barrier quivered.

  Kion abandoned it, forcing another into place just as Caustic’s knife sank into the old one, tearing it open with a hiss.

  Relief lasted a second. Then the droplets stirred again.

  The curtain re-formed. Tighter, hungrier, weaving across every angle of the chamber.

  A net of blood strung to catch him, to paint him, to suffocate him. Even the air felt viscous now, like he was moving through syrup.

  When he leaned forward, the droplets rippled, shuddering with awareness.

  Fuck.

  He split a bubble, flung it to the corner.

  The lattice swayed, chasing it.

  Caustic’s knife followed, striking true.

  Kion darted toward the corridor door in that split-second, crashing through the red film.

  And staggered as it clung.

  The blood coated his barrier whole, dripping down his limbs in streams, trailing behind like a kite-tail of gore.

  The droplets multiplied in the air around him, red beads forming out of nothing, flocking, swarming, tracking every twitch.

  He split another bubble. Watched the trail divide, thinning.

  So he did it again. And again.

  Each new shield weakened the stain’s grip, spreading it thinner, paler.

  Behind, footsteps. Two sets. Caustic and the woman.

  Their attacks came in rhythm, blade and orb.

  At first, a single knife flew back and forth. Hovering, guided by invisible force, darting at him with uncanny aim.

  But then it fell. Relief sparked, then vanished as a new pull seized him.

  Not the knife this time, but him.

  One of the bubbles he’d split shuddered, pulled, dragging him down.

  He fought it, kept himself aloft near the ceiling. Every time he gained height, their aim faltered. Distance and gravity blunting the impact.

  But the droplets didn’t stop. They climbed with him, quivering, clinging, marking.

  He flooded the intersections with more bubbles, dozens, splitting the stains until they smeared thin.

  The unmanned barriers dropped away, easy targets for the pull, distinguishing him from his fakes.

  The decoys didn’t confuse them, but they did dilute the film, weakening the trail.

  A sharp click of tongue sliced through the blood-heavy air. Caustic’s. Displeased.

  Kion didn’t look back. He couldn’t.

  He forced his gaze forward, bursting higher, faster, lungs burning against the copper-thick air.

  Bubbles, always more bubbles. Until the red thinned. Until it frayed to nothing.

  And then... silence.

  No steps.

  No knives.

  No orbs.

  But the claustrophobia remained.

  Even bursting out of the Accord’s doors, even into free air, the stink of iron clung.

  He fled skyward, casting still, until the rooftops spread beneath him, until no blood trailed his form.

  Only then did he let his lungs convulse on a ragged breath.

  Only then did he unclench his hands, trembling hard enough that mana wavered at his fingertips.

  The memory of those droplets lingered, suspended behind his eyelids.

  Watching. Waiting.

  He kept splitting barriers, praying no red trail lingered, no shadows followed.

  And praying more than anything none of it led back to her.