Chapter 117 The Price
Daisy woke up with the taste of laudanum and burnt copper in her mouth, dragged from a dream where she was drowning. She opened her eyes to the lantern-lit gloom of Brightwater’s makeshift infirmary, her head heavy with fever. Long before the siege, healers had called Brightwater the Citadel of Chains, known across the marches for its restless magic and the strong wards woven into its foundations. The lanterns were glass globes shaped like coiled fish, casting golden light across the stone floor and making shadows dance over the embroidered banners above each cot. The cots stood in uneven rows, each holding a groaning patient. Delia Moss moved quickly between them, her hands slick with ointment, her white hair tied back with a bandage stained by old blood.
Daisy tried to sit up. The effort made the ceiling spin, but she managed to push herself upright, hissing as pain shot through her hands. The bandages were black at the edges, and the skin underneath was too sore to touch. To her left, a soldier convulsed in his sleep. Delia hurried over, cradled his head, and soothed him with a lullaby Daisy remembered from the orphanage.
“Still alive, then,” Delia said, not looking away from her work.
Daisy tried for a grin. “Barely.”
Delia cut a thread with her teeth and bound it tight. “You lost a pint or two. I had to patch your wrist myself. Don’t make it a habit.”
“I’ll do my best.” Daisy tried to flex her fingers and winced, remembering the time she almost lost them all to frostbite behind the orphanage stables—the helpless ache and the promise she made never to be that weak again. Years at Brightwater Orphanage taught her that survival had to be earned, not given, and every scar could be a lesson or a curse. It was there, hidden from the wardens, that she first sensed magic in her blood: scraps of warmth against the winter, sparks in the dark. Even now, pain ran through her hands, sharper because she needed them so much. “How bad?”
“Seventeen dead,” Delia said. “Thirty-eight more hurt. Some of them won’t wake up.”
Daisy swallowed. “And the wall?”
“We held. For now.” Delia’s voice wavered, but she covered it by pulling the blanket up over the patient’s chest. Along the far wall, a line of ward-light globes trembled, their golden glow flickering so faintly that shadows swallowed whole patches of stone. “They’re already repairing the damage. Mira says the chain is holding, but the wards are only at half strength.”
For a moment, Daisy let her gaze linger on the trembling lights. The wards were Brightwater’s enchanted barriers, shaped by threads of ancestral magic and drawn as sigils over every stone and border. They kept enemies and sickness away, flaring or weakening with the city’s strength. The chain, finer and deeper, wound through the heart of Brightwater. It was a living current connecting the wards and those who guarded them, passing power and warning from one to the next. When the chain weakened, every barrier in the city trembled. If it failed, nothing would hold back what waited outside.
Daisy closed her eyes. “Is Cornelius around?”
“War room,” Delia said. “He’s been sending patrols through the tunnels, but nothing gets through that many layers unless someone opens a door.” She shook her head.
Daisy felt the knot in her stomach tighten. “I need to see the breach.”
“Not till you can walk without falling over,” Delia snapped. “And eat something first.”
Daisy hesitated for a moment, her body aching and Delia’s words echoing in her ears. Her vision blurred, and nausea crept in at the edge of her resolve. Doubt gnawed at her—what if her legs gave out, betraying both herself and those depending on her? The memory of her past failures tightened her chest, stirring the fear that she might not be strong enough this time. Although every part of her longed for rest, another part insisted she had no choice but to rise and prove herself worthy of the trust placed in her. Taking a breath, she forced herself upright. Dizzy but determined, she ignored the soup on the stool next to her bed.
She found Cornelius Blackwood waiting outside the infirmary. His coat had two new bullet holes, and his face was set in grim lines.
They’re inside,” he said by way of greeting, voice edged with something unfamiliar. He opened his fist to show Daisy a scrap of tattered cloth, stained orange and marked with a jagged glyph that twisted on itself—a pair of black lines split down the center, resembling a lidless eye. “Found three bodies in the canal district. The sign was carved into their necks. Climbing hooks, maps of the outer wards, and one had a council passkey.” He paused, lowering his voice. “One of them died with their tongue split in two, murmuring ‘Iyash Mar’ even as the light went out.”
Cornelius let the cloth dangle and frowned. “They weren’t looking for loot or blood. Whoever sent them wasn’t just testing the walls—they were probing for a path inward, as if the wards themselves were the prize.” His thumb traced the edges of the glyph. “There’s talk among the guard, whispers that Iyash Mar means something like ‘the Unbinding’ or ‘the Awakening.’ I don’t know about gods or old curses, but these people act like they’re following a promise, or a prophecy, not just an order”.
“Any sign of who let them in?” Daisy asked.
He shrugged. “Someone who knows your magic. The wards were cut with something… precise.”
She nodded, feeling the blood start to move faster in her veins. “Where was the worst breach?”
“East wall. Xeris is waiting for you there. Said he needed your eyes.”
Daisy walked in silence beside Cornelius through the half-frozen streets, boots crunching old frost and broken glass. They both ignored the shouts and hammering from the repairs. The sky was a muddy gray, and the city felt drained, fear replaced by exhaustion. Cornelius glanced over at Daisy, his hand brushing the inside pocket of his coat. “My brother’s still inside Oldgate,” he murmured, too quietly for anyone else to hear. “If the wards fall, he won’t make it out.” Daisy met his eyes, the weight of her own promises tightening in her chest. She nodded, no words needed. By the time they reached the wall, Daisy was sweating and shaking, but she gritted her teeth and climbed the ladder with one hand.
Xeris stood on the parapet, back in human form. His coat was scorched, and his bare arms were exposed to the cold. The skin on his forearms was burned in overlapping rings, the pattern shimmering like forged chainmail left too long in frostfire—angry welts that seemed to glow with pain, marked by the tools of their world and the agony that shaped him.
He nodded at Daisy, then pointed to a patch of wall where the mortar was charred black.
“They knew exactly where to hit,” he said. “The ward sigils are gone. Clean as if you never marked them.”
Daisy crouched, ignoring the pain in her knees, and pressed her bandaged hand to the stone. The surface shocked her with a sudden, biting chill, cold so sharp it felt like knives on her skin. Beneath that first sting, the stone was unnaturally smooth, as if all texture had been scraped away by something strange. For a moment, her fingertips tingled and then went numb, a hush running up her arm and into her chest. The sense of forbidden power seeped into her bones, making every nerve want to pull back. Her hand shook as she brushed aside the ash and found a tiny white daisy set into the stone. It was made of ceramic, but the petals were marked with a black spiral that seemed to move. Traditionally, the daisy symbolized the city’s resilience. Historically, it was the emblem woven into Brightwater’s first magical defenses, signifying the wards’ dual role of shielding inhabitants and fostering restoration after conflict. Used as a conduit for healing magic, the original daisy’s form was outward and open, representing communal hope. Now, however, this flower had been altered: its spiral turned inward, the symbol constricted until nearly severing itself. The black spiral, once part of the chain sigil system she had drawn throughout Brightwater, now suggested inversion and containment rather than protection and connection. Instead of promising safety, the warped emblem betrayed: the magical protection had been subverted, transformed into something that mimicked the city’s defenses while undermining them from within. The pulse inside the daisy corresponded to the deep current of power in the wall, a chilling reminder that the very mechanisms of defense could be repurposed as tools of harm.
“See the pulse?” Xeris asked.
Daisy frowned and pressed her thumb to the center of the flower. A faint pulse echoed through her, matching her own heartbeat.
“Someone inside the walls,” she said. “Someone who knew the chain pattern.” For a heartbeat, a face flickered behind Daisy’s eyes—a sharp smile glimpsed in shadow, fleeting and nameless. She pushed the suspicion away before it could take root, forcing herself to focus on the task at hand.
Xeris flexed his hands, and the skin split at his knuckles. “Mira thinks it’s one of the old guard. Someone who helped set the original wards.”
“Then they can get in anywhere,” Daisy finished. “And we have no way to lock them out.”
Cornelius stared at the daisy, his face harder than usual. “You want me to run down the suspects?”
Daisy stood, swaying slightly, and brushed off her hands. “No. If it’s someone who can use blood magic, they’ll see you coming. We need to draw them out.”
Xeris grinned, showing teeth a little too sharp. “Bait?”
Daisy hesitated, her gaze flickering to the trembling ward-light and the smoky air above the broken wall. “If they take the bait and break through for real, we lose more than the wards. The canal gates won’t hold. Half the city could fall before dawn.”
Daisy nodded. “Let’s make them think the chain is weaker than it is. Give them a target. When they come for it, we’ll be waiting.”
She put the ceramic daisy in her pocket, feeling its warmth through the fabric. “Get Mira and Delia to the council chamber. We’ll need all the power we can get.”
Xeris touched her shoulder, just for a second. “You sure you can take another hit?”
Daisy looked at her ruined hands, at the bruise on Xeris’s jaw, at the cracks in the old city wall. “Doesn’t matter,” she said. “It’s not over till someone breaks.”
She climbed down the ladder, her legs shaking, feeling the weight of the city on her back. As she limped through the alleys, Daisy sensed the chain working inside her. Each heartbeat sent tiny, invisible signals to every ward, every defender, and every friend still alive in Brightwater.
She slipped her hand into her pocket and closed her fingers around the ceramic daisy, feeling its heat pulse stronger with her heart. The flower’s spiral seemed to ripple, alive against her skin. Let them come for her if they dared. This time, she would be waiting.
But this time, she would not be alone. As she moved through Brightwater’s battered streets and bannered halls, Daisy witnessed the enduring promise of its defenders: We keep the chain. The songs of healers, murmurs among the watch, and vows echoing through warded stones all testified to their shared commitment. With every lantern-lit glance and coordinated effort, Daisy recognized a unity forged by collective hardship. In this history of resilience, she drew strength and realized that shared resolve, not just magic or duty, sustained them. As Daisy pressed into the darkness, she understood that her determination was inseparable from the city’s enduring hope, and together, they would continue to endure.