Part 2-Chapter 16

Part 2-Chapter 16
~KAISHA~

I woke with the taste of iron on my tongue and the certainty that I had been running. Not the kind of running dreams forced on you, through fractured landscapes that evaporated the moment you woke. This was deeper. My calves burned as if they’d carried me miles. My thighs ached with the dull insistence of overuse. My lungs felt scraped raw, like I’d been dragging cold air into them too fast, too hard, for too long, as if stopping hadn’t been an option even after my body demanded it.

I lay still, staring at the ceiling while my heart slowed inch by inch, each beat landing heavy against my ribs before finally easing into something less frantic.

The Manor was quiet. Not peaceful. Quiet the way a room went when everyone inside it knew something was about to happen and didn’t want to be the first to move. The kind of quiet that pressed against your ears and made you aware of your own breathing, your own pulse, your own thoughts trying not to spiral.

The wards murmured beneath the stone, low and constant, threading through the walls like a second pulse layered beneath my own. They weren’t alarmed. They weren’t calm. They were attentive. Focused... On me.

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and paused, bracing for dizziness that never came. Instead, there was a sharp, unsettling clarity, like the world had been honed overnight while I slept. Edges felt cleaner. Sounds carried farther. I could hear boots scuffing stone three corridors away, the muted clink of armor, the whisper of magic adjusting its grip on the walls as the Manor recalibrated around whatever new reality it was being asked to hold.

I pressed my palm to my sternum, grounding myself as the pressure answered instantly, familiar and unwelcome.

Still there. Not pain. Not hunger. Just awareness. Like standing in front of a door with my shoulder braced against the frame, knowing that if I relaxed even a fraction, it would swing open whether I wanted it to or not.

I dressed slowly. Buttoned my shirt. Pulled on boots. Smoothed my hair back with fingers that only shook when I let myself notice them. Normal movements. Rituals of now. Proof that I was still here, still in this body, still this version of myself.

The mirror caught my eye as I passed, and I stopped. For a heartbeat, my reflection lagged behind me. Not distorted. Not monstrous. Just…older. Sharper. Her gaze held a weight mine didn’t recognize, like she’d lived through things I hadn’t yet admitted existed.

My throat tightened. I swallowed and muttered, “Don’t start,” dragging my gaze away as my reflection snapped back into sync, ordinary and familiar again.

The corridor outside my room was already active. Guards stood at intersections that hadn’t needed guarding yesterday, their posture alert but restrained. Witches whispered behind half-warded doors, voices pitched low and urgent. Somewhere below, voices rose and fell in clipped, strategic tones that carried tension even when I couldn’t hear the words.

I’d barely reached the east stairwell when Redakai stepped out of the shadows. He stopped short when he saw me, his gaze sweeping my face with quick, precise assessment. “You did not sleep,” he said, folding his arms across his chest as if bracing himself for an argument he didn’t want to have.

“I did,” I replied, adjusting my sleeve to give my hands something to do, something to hide behind.

His stare sharpened. “You ran,” he countered, shifting his weight forward, just enough to be ready if I staggered.

“I dreamed,” I said, lifting my chin despite the way my stomach tightened.

“That was not what I said,” he replied quietly, his jaw tightening as the wards shifted at my back, the stone humming faintly under my boots like it was paying attention.

I opened my mouth to argue, then closed it when the vibration traveled up through my feet, subtle but unmistakable, as if the Manor itself had leaned in to listen.

“I don’t remember it,” I admitted instead, exhaling slowly. “But my body does.”

Redakai’s shoulders stiffened. He reached out, then stopped himself, curling his hand into a fist at his side like he didn’t trust what it might do if he followed the instinct. “Hamish is still here,” he said, glancing briefly toward the upper corridors.

“I know,” I answered, crossing my arms to keep my hands from shaking.

“You felt him,” he said, watching my reaction with a focus that made it clear this wasn’t a question.

“Yes,” I replied, nodding once.

Something dark and unreadable crossed his expression. “That worries me,” he admitted, his voice low enough that it didn’t carry.

“Me too,” I said softly, leaning back against the stone wall to steady myself when my legs threatened to give.

We stood there in silence, the space between us taut with everything neither of us wanted to say aloud. The weight of it pressed down on my chest harder than the wards ever had.

“I keep thinking,” I said finally, rubbing my thumb against my palm, “that if I don’t remember, I can’t be responsible for it.”

Redakai didn’t interrupt. He simply tilted his head, giving me room, letting the thought finish itself instead of cutting it off.

“But the city doesn’t care what I remember,” I went on, glancing toward the window at the end of the hall where the skyline loomed beyond stone and wards. “It’s reacting to what I am. Or what I was. Or what I might become.”

“That does not make you guilty,” he said firmly, stepping closer until I could feel his presence anchoring the space between us.

“It makes me involved,” I countered, meeting his eyes as the wards hummed softly, like they agreed.

Redakai exhaled through his nose. “People are starting to feel it,” he said, lowering his voice. “Not clearly. Not enough to understand. But enough to ask the wrong questions.”

“And when they ask,” I said quietly, my fingers curling at my sides, “someone will answer.”

“Yes,” he replied, nodding once.

“Not us,” I added, shaking my head.

“No,” he agreed, his expression grim and unreadable.

I held his gaze. “Then who?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

He didn’t answerm and that silence was answer enough. Something inside me shifted then. I couldn'y call it fear, but more ecognition. The sense that I’d been walking a circle my entire life and had finally noticed the path etched into the ground beneath my feet.

“I don’t want to remember,” I said, pressing my palm to my chest where the pressure waited. “Not yet.”

Redakai inclined his head. “Then we hold the line,” he said, his tone absolute, unyielding.

“For how long?” I asked, searching his face.

“As long as it takes,” he replied without hesitation.

The Manor shuddered faintly beneath us, stone settling, wards tightening, as if acknowledging the vow and bracing itself to keep it.

Somewhere beyond its walls, the city continued to move, unaware it had already stepped onto a path it couldn’t unwalk, and inside me, the door stayed closed: not locked, just...waiting.