The priests dragged their wounded brother into the circle of light, his chest a ruin of blood and blackened flesh. His breath rattled, broken and wet, but his eyes burned with stubborn clarity.
"He touched me," the man rasped. "The shadow… it tried to drink my soul. I felt it pulling—like a furnace with no end."
The others exchanged grim looks.
The lead priest pressed glowing hands against the wound, searing it shut with fire. The stench of burning flesh filled the ruin, but the wounded man did not scream.
"It was not supposed to resist the chains," one muttered. "No husker ever has."
The leader's face was hard as stone. "Then this one is not a husker. He is something worse."
Silence hung heavy. The night wind shifted, carrying the distant howls of scavengers—or perhaps just echoes in the ash.
The leader's voice was low, certain. "The Soul-Eater must not rise further. We will call the Flamebearers. No more half-measures."
Far above the camp, where the scaffolds of iron and bone swayed over the wasteland, a woman crouched in the dark. Her cloak wrapped tight against the wind, her eyes glowing faintly with etched sigils.
She had watched the binding attempt from a distance, seen the clash of flame and shadow.
The boy should have been taken. Bound. Broken.
Instead, he had escaped.
The sight had left her smiling.
She traced a finger through the ash on the beam, sketching his silhouette again. The trembling lines of his shadow-wings. The crackling glow in his eyes.
"A bearer strong enough to break priest-chains," she murmured. "Still raw. Still clumsy. But alive."
The wind tugged her hood back, revealing hair the color of pale steel, and skin marked with glowing scars that pulsed faintly like embers under the flesh.
"They will hunt you harder now," she whispered into the night. "But if you survive…"
Her smile widened, sharp as a blade.
"…you might be worth following."
She stood, vanishing into the ash-storm.