Ashreign did not sleep.
Not in the way normal cities did. It dozed, eyes half-lidded behind stained-glass windows and crumbling arches, but it never truly rested. Somewhere in the walls, in the bells that rang without wind, in the breathing statues that bled dreams instead of marble, Ashreign kept its vigil.
Cassiel stood on a high ledge that curved like a falcon's wing over the eastern quarter, his coat flaring from the night wind. The rooftops beneath him resembled broken chessboards, black tile, cracked tile, rust tile, gold. Some were gardens, others ruins, but all were woven together by high stone bridges that twisted like roots.
Behind him, Rue stretched. "Still don't know how this place even functions."
They waited, watching.
Down below, Mirae crouched near a crumbling spire's edge, her hand against the warm stone. The wards along the alleyway shimmered, golden threads laced through ash and brick, too faint to be traps. Too deliberate not to be.
She narrowed her eyes. "He's coming."
And then he was.
A figure flickered across the opposite rooftop. Fast. Lean. Cloaked in something like ink and silver. Bastion's breath caught. Loup swore from somewhere above, unseen.
The thief ran along the curved bridge, not looking back.
Cassiel leapt first.
His boots struck the opposite ledge, sparking white across aged tile. Bastion followed a half-second later, lighter on his feet. Rue didn't jump. She stepped into the air, and vanished.
Mirae muttered something ancient under her breath and sprinted the lower path, between burning wards and ghost-moss vines that lit up as she passed. Her magic tethered behind her, a comet tail of violet runes.
They chased the thief across five rooftops, two crumbling arches, and a broken greenhouse that had become a shrine to silence.
He was fast, too fast.
"This isn't normal," Bastion said between gasps, vaulting over a shattered column.
"He's leading us," Cassiel growled. "Not escaping."
That was when Rue reappeared. She landed ahead of them, directly in the thief's path, twin blades drawn and shimmering like starlight poured into silver.
"Stop."
He didn't.
Instead, he threw something to the ground. A flash of light burst upward, momentarily blinding. When it cleared, he was gone, but not far. His laugh echoed across the tiles like a wind-chime unraveling.
"Found you," Loup said cheerfully, dropping upside-down from a stone gargoyle. He grinned. "En garde?"
They clashed.
The thief's weapon wasn't steel, it was some jagged, red-crystal dagger that bled when it moved. Loup dodged, danced, teased.
Rue and Cassiel approached, weapons raised.
Then a voice from above said, "Stop."
Everyone froze.
The thief tensed. His cloak shifted as if sensing the command. From the edge of the bridge, framed by the moon and old vines, stood Ashwen.
Her expression unreadable. Her blade glowing.
"Who sent you?" she asked.
The thief looked from her to Rue. And then, softly: "You don't remember, do you?"
Rue stepped closer. "What?"
The thief reached into his coat. Cassiel moved forward, too late.
He held out a mask. No tricks. Just a cracked porcelain mask, with twin slashes down each cheek.
Rue paled. Her voice broke. "Where did you get that?"
"Ilyan left it."
The world stopped moving.
A long, dragging silence followed.
Cassiel lowered his blade slowly. "You know Ilyan?"
"I did. I do. But… the version of him you're chasing?" The thief's face tilted. "He's already been rewritten once."
Rue's hand trembled. Bastion stepped beside her, unsure if to hold or to shield.
Ashwen approached last. She studied the thief with narrowed eyes. "You're not here to steal."
"No. I'm here to warn you."
Cassiel folded his arms. "About?"
"The Sleepless Heir."
The name uncoiled like a serpent from memory. Mirae shivered, her magic faltering in the wind.
The thief tucked the mask back inside his coat. "Ilyan is being watched. And not just by you."
He turned.
Ashwen moved. "Wait—"
But he vanished.
Not teleported. Not fled.
Vanished.
The group stood in quiet. The rooftops moaned under the shifting weight of the city. Bells tolled faintly from beneath the earth.
Ashwen looked at Rue. "You recognized that mask."
Rue nodded, quietly. "It was Ilyan's. The one he used when infiltrating the Eclipse Envoys. But that mission was erased."
"Not erased," Mirae said. "Buried."
Cassiel finally asked, "What's the Sleepless Heir?"
Bastion didn't answer. He was staring at the direction the thief vanished, as though trying to see something only he could.
Rue whispered, "A ghost that shouldn't breathe."
They regrouped at an old cathedral-turned-inn, where glass had long since forgotten to be colored, and the walls hummed with outdated wards. It smelled of moss, candle ash, and old memory.
They sat in two clusters. Still not one group, not fully.
Loup balanced upside-down on a chair, watching the ceiling. Cassiel brooded. Rue stared at a fireplace that held no fire. Mirae and Bastion whispered over torn maps.
Ashwen stood. "We need to talk."
Everyone looked.
"There's something beneath Ashreign," she said. "Something that's been trying to wake up."
She gestured toward a spread of parchment.
"I think that's where Ilyan is."
Mirae narrowed her eyes. "How do you know?"
Ashwen said nothing for a moment. Then:
"Because when I slept last night, I dreamed of him. But he wasn't Ilyan. And he looked at me like I was the one who vanished."
Bastion stood. "You dreamed of him?"
She nodded.
Cassiel stood beside her now, instinctive. "Then we follow that."
Rue's gaze sharpened. "Into what?"
Ashwen turned toward the cracked windows, where moonlight painted old saints in shadow.
"Into the bones of a city that won't stop dreaming."