The forest stayed quiet for too long.
Not peaceful-quiet—listening quiet.
Even the birds sounded careful, like they were choosing their songs around something they didn't want to wake.
Maera kept the pace brisk. Elowen matched it, cloak swaying, boots barely crunching frost. I stayed tucked in her arms with my hood up, my presence folded inward like a lantern covered with both hands.
I told myself it was "tactical."
It was also… warm.
After another ten minutes, Elowen finally spoke under her breath.
"You can walk now," she said.
I perked up. "Really?"
"No," Elowen said immediately.
My face fell.
Elowen's eyes softened just a little. "Not because you can't. Because you shouldn't have to."
That made my throat do the annoying tight thing again.
I tried to sound grumpy to cover it. "You're spoiling me, mommy."
Elowen stumbled for exactly half a step.
Maera glanced back. "Eyes up."
Elowen recovered instantly, voice calm. "Yes. Eyes up."
But the bond pulsed with embarrassed warmth anyway.
We crested a small rise, and the trees thinned just enough to reveal an old stone marker ahead—half-buried in moss, carved with ancient runes that didn't match the Sanctum style.
Maera slowed. "Mile-stone."
The air around it felt different—thicker, like the world itself had been stitched tighter in a circle around that rock.
Maera approached first and pressed her palm to the runes. They lit in a gentle ring, then spread outward into a dome you could only see when the light hit it just right—like heat haze, but colder.
"Ward is active," Maera said. "No scrying. No easy tracking. This is the first safe breath you've had since awakening."
Elowen exhaled like she'd been holding that breath for miles.
She finally set me down.
My legs wobbled, but the anchor held—no dizziness, no collapse. I stood on my own, swaying only slightly.
"See?" I said smugly. "Walking."
Elowen's hand hovered near my shoulder anyway. "Good."
Maera circled the stone once, checking the wardline. "We rest five minutes. Not more."
Elowen nodded, then crouched in front of me. "How's your core?"
I closed my eyes and felt the loop.
Steady. Smaller than yesterday, but intact.
"Better," I admitted. "Anchor's working."
Elowen's gaze softened with relief. "Good."
I adjusted my hood, trying to look serious and heroic. "So we're safe now."
Maera's voice cut in, flat. "Safer."
I frowned. "That's not reassuring."
"It's accurate," Maera replied, then tilted her head slightly. "And—"
I felt it too.
A ripple at the edge of the ward dome.
Not a bolt.
Not a scream of danger.
Something subtle, trying to slip in like a needle.
My runes prickled under my skin.
"Marking attempt," Maera said sharply.
Elowen's hand dropped to her belt. "Where?"
I turned my sword-sense outward—harder in kid form, but possible. The wardline shimmered near a low cluster of shrubs.
Something was there.
Not fully inside.
Just close enough to touch.
A thin thread of shadow stretched toward us—so fine it looked like a spider's strand, aiming for my hooded presence.
My stomach clenched.
Not because it would kill us.
Because it would find us.
Maera's crescent blade flashed into her hand. "Don't strike it. If you cut the thread, it snaps back and alerts the caster."
Elowen's jaw tightened. "Then what?"
Maera looked at me. "Rin. First self-defense lesson."
I swallowed. "Okay."
Maera's voice was precise. "You don't fight it with force. You fight it with denial."
Elowen bent closer to me, steadying my shoulders, breathing slow and controlled.
Stay with me. Shape, not power.
I followed her through the bond.
I felt the thread reaching.
I felt the urge to flare bright and blast it away.
I didn't.
I folded inward instead—tight, quiet, stubborn.
Then I formed a micro-shield—not outward, but around the point it wanted to latch onto.
A tiny, sealed shell around my presence.
The shadow thread touched—
—and slid off like water off glass.
For half a second it tried again, searching for purchase.
I held the shape.
It failed again.
The thread trembled.
Then recoiled.
Vanished back into the trees as if it had never existed.
Maera exhaled once, approving. "Good. No alert."
Elowen's hands stayed on my shoulders, grip warm. "Rin, that was perfect."
I tried to look tough. "I'm learning."
My voice cracked on the last word because I was still, technically, very small.
Elowen's mouth curved. "Yes, you are."
Maera sheathed her blade. "That means they're switching tactics. They're not just trying to kill you anymore. They're trying to tag you."
Elowen went cold. "So they can follow us beyond wards."
Maera nodded. "Correct."
Elowen looked down at me, and the bond swelled with fierce protectiveness.
I raised both hands. "Before you go full 'heroine rage,' I'm fine. I blocked it."
Elowen's voice stayed low. "You did. And I'm proud."
The pride hit harder than any attack.
I looked away quickly. "Don't say it like that."
Elowen leaned in and pressed a quick kiss to the top of my hood—brief, instinctive, the way you comfort a child without thinking.
Then she froze like she'd just realized what she'd done.
I froze too.
Maera pretended to inspect the mile-stone very intensely.
My face went nuclear-hot.
Elowen cleared her throat, regaining Heroine composure at lightning speed. "We move."
I grabbed her sleeve before she stood fully.
"Mamma."
Elowen paused and looked at me.
I swallowed, suddenly serious. "Thank you."
Elowen's eyes softened. "Always."
We started moving again under the ward dome's edge. Maera led, scanning. Elowen walked behind, and after exactly twenty steps she stopped and shifted her satchel.
"What are you doing?" I asked.
Elowen pulled out a wide cloth strap and looped it with practiced knots.
Maera glanced back. "Sling?"
Elowen nodded once. "Hands free. Keeps her close."
I blinked. "You just… know how to do that?"
Elowen's expression went faintly sheepish. "My youngest cousin used to fall asleep on marches."
My chest tightened. "Oh."
Elowen lifted me and settled me into the sling against her front. The strap supported my back and legs, snug and safe. My head rested naturally against her chest, right where her heartbeat was loudest.
"Comfortable?" Elowen asked.
I tried to sound annoyed.
It came out honest instead.
"…Yes."
Elowen adjusted the strap once more, then rested her hand lightly on my back as we walked.
A steadying touch.
An anchor that didn't require mana.
I closed my eyes for just a moment.
The forest sounds returned—wind, distant birds, crunch of frost—less threatening now that my world was pressed against her.
And then, because my mouth hates me:
"Mommy."
Elowen's steps didn't falter this time.
She only answered softly, without teasing, without shame.
"Yes, Rin?"
I hesitated, then admitted the thing that had been sitting sharp in my chest since the vault.
"I'm scared that if I go quiet… I won't come back."
Elowen's hand pressed gently between my shoulder blades. "Then don't go quiet alone."
I frowned. "What does that mean?"
Elowen's voice turned steady, like a vow she could fight on. "It means if you feel yourself slipping, you tell me. And if you can't tell me, I'll feel it through the bond and I will pull you back."
My throat tightened again.
I whispered, "Promise?"
Elowen didn't hesitate.
"I promise."
The bond flared—warm, bright, safe.
And right then, as if the world resented that warmth…
the mile-stone behind us pulsed once.
A deep, ancient thrum that went through my bones-that-weren't-bones.
My vision blurred with sudden memory-flash:
Black water.
Chains.
A voice—closer now, clearer—calling not "Lumenward," but something older.
Something that felt like my true name.
…Serin…
My whole body went cold.
Maera's warning rang in my mind: don't answer it.
Elowen felt my terror instantly. "Rin?"
I forced my breath steady against her chest.
"I'm here," I whispered. "I'm here. I'm—"
The voice pressed again, patient as the tide.
OPEN.
I clenched my tiny fist in Elowen's cloak.
"No," I whispered.
And I didn't know if I was answering the voice…
or answering the part of me that wanted to understand.
Elowen held me tighter in the sling, protective without needing to see the memory to know it was hurting me.
"We keep moving," she said softly. "You're not alone."
The forest swallowed us again, canopy closing overhead.
But the thrum of the mile-stone lingered in my chest like a distant drum.
Like a countdown.