The scream tore out of me before I could stop it—raw, instinctive, ripped from whatever part still believed my body belonged to me.

  They hoisted me further, the rope jerking with a sickening pop.

  Something in my left shoulder gave way—something deep and essential and wrong—and for a heartbeat the pain was too sharp to feel. A white fsh, a sound like rushing blood, a sudden, terrifying quiet.

  Then it came back all at once, and I screamed again.

  Not words—just sound. The cell made the echo ugly.

  "Again," someone said. Calm. Bored. The rope pulled higher.

  I lost track of time. Pain became a pce, or a nguage without grammar—just noise and white heat. I tried to breathe but my lungs forgot how. Gravity fought the rope, and the rope always won.

  Finally, they lowered me enough that my toes brushed the stone.

  That was when the priest stepped forward.

  A shimmering aura gathered around his hands as he pced them carefully over the joint. I could feel the bones slide back into pce, ligaments and skin weaving together, as if nothing had ever been broken at all.

  Except something had.

  "Proceed," he murmured, stepping back.

  They let me drop. My knees hit the salt again. This time I heard myself gasp—small and human, like something wounded and alone.

  "Pray," the padin said.

  I didn't move.

  He reached for the rope.

  "I said pray."

  How absurd, I thought. With my hands bound behind me, I couldn't csp them together to humble myself before the Goddess.

  The salt bit into every raw inch of skin. Tears welled—part pain, part rage at myself for kneeling because they told me to.

  Pray.

  I prayed I wouldn't break.

  I prayed the rope would snap instead of my resolve.

  I prayed for Seraphine, wherever she was. And then, because I couldn't help it, I prayed for Rocher. Not for his safety—but for his patience. Because if he charged in here now, they'd destroy him too.

  Footsteps approached.

  The White Warden didn't announce himself this time.

  "Where is Seraphine Maxwell?"

  The question was a formality. We both knew the answer was irrelevant.

  I kept my head bowed. Salt stung my lips. "I don't know."

  A lie. Not by omission. Not by misdirection.

  A raw, unvarnished lie.

  And I knew—and he knew—he would hear its cadence instantly.

  Silence stretched between us.

  He didn't call me on it. He didn't need to.

  Patience was his expertise. He would let the pain do the talking.

  He stepped away. The padins took the rope.

  "No," I whispered. "Please—"

  They pulled.

  Everything was fire again.

  The rope dug into my wrists, my shoulders twisting out of alignment, and I screamed. The sound was trivial compared to the pain—the smallest measure of a magnitude that had no words yet.

  When the world swam back into focus, I was kneeling again.

  Salt. Blood. Breath like broken gss. The rope sck but ready.

  "Where," the Warden asked softly, "is Seraphine Maxwell?"

  My heart hammered. My answer was the same.

  But I knew I couldn't lie twice the same way. Not with him standing there.

  So I said nothing at all.

  That earned me a nod—from the Warden, toward the rope.

  I let my eyes fall shut, because there was only one thing left to grab onto—and it wasn't prayer. It was thought.

  Happy thought. Stupid thought.

  I never gave Rocher his Courtship Moon gift.

  It was sitting unfinished in my desk drawer, wrapped carelessly in scrap cloth and bundled like a secret. I'd meant to give it to him in private, to find a moment to say—well—to say something.

  He probably thought I'd forgotten. Or worse—never cared.

  I pictured his face when he noticed I'd left his basket smaller than everyone else's. The hurt in his eyes, muted as a stormcloud, as if he was quietly bming himself for expecting more.

  "Cire de Lune."

  The Warden's voice cut the air cleanly. It wasn't angry.

  That made it worse.

  "My patience," he said, "is not infinite."

  I lifted my head, just enough to meet his pale gaze.

  "I'm counting on it," I rasped.

  He didn't frown. Didn't sigh. Just nodded once—to the rope, to the salt, to the waiting pain.

  The rest of my scream hadn't even formed yet when the world went white.

  They hadn't even sent for him. Not at first.

  Rocher paced the length of the receiving hall with a restless fury he barely knew how to contain. The marble floor was polished to perfection, every surface immacute—a contrast so sharp it made the wait feel like mockery.

  Lumiere sat stiffly on a bench, hands folded tight in her p. Evelyn stood like a statue by the far wall, arms crossed, jaw clenched, every angle of her posture saying: I'm here, but I don't trust any of this.

  None of them had been brought in for questioning yet.

  Only Cire.

  The first knock—any rational person would have expected it to be for the Hero. Or the Saintess. Or his Rogue lieutenant. But they had passed everyone by and gone straight to the sick girl in bed.

  The moment Rocher heard, he understood nothing at all.

  "She's just a nun," he said for the fifth time, unable to sit, unable to stop moving. "An apothecary, barely even a combatant. What could they possibly need from her first?"

  Evelyn's voice was low. Controlled. "It's not about who she is—it's what they think she knows."

  He looked at her sharply.

  "You're saying they think she's hiding Seraphine."

  "I'm saying they need a narrative," Evelyn said. "And Cire's always been the weird one. The easy one to suspect."

  Lumiere's voice trembled slightly. "She's alone in there."

  He didn't need the reminder.

  That's what tore at him.

  She should've been under his protection. He should've stayed closer, insisted she stay with him, insisted that they all stay together—but she had waved him off with a fond exasperation.

  'I'm just pying sick. Go be Hero somewhere else.'

  The door at the end of the hall opened, and two padins swept in. The robe designations and rune sashes marked them both as command-level interrogators. Neither of them carried weapons. Rocher's pulse spiked anyway.

  "Your Holiness. Sir Hero," one said, inclining his head respectfully. "We apologize for the dey. The inquiries are ongoing."

  "We need to see her," Rocher said immediately, stepping forward. "Now."

  "I'm afraid that isn't possible at this time," the other replied smoothly. "She is undergoing interrogation for potential apostasy."

  "Apostasy?" Lumiere gasped. "That's—she's a nun. A priestess."

  "Priestess," the padin said, almost gently, "is a title. The practice is another matter, Your Holiness."

  Rocher felt the breath leave his lungs.

  "No," he said, voice low. "No. Cire isn't—she wouldn't—"

  "Per Tower protocol," the first padin continued, cutting across him with professional calm, "you are entitled to review the evidence submitted for the inquiry. At this stage, we cannot allow direct contact. But you may view her case file."

  They produced a sealed evidence folder and a small wooden crate. Evelyn stepped in front of Rocher—just enough to give him space to process.

  "Discovery," the padin added, as if describing an academic process.

  They set the crate down and opened it piece by piece.

  Herbs. Dried petals. Phials. Strange gssware with chalk residue. Alchemical tools. Perfectly ordinary for an apothecary—but id out like contraband on a tribunal table.

  "This suggests intent to concoct illicit reagents," the padin said. "The quantity and nature of the materials used indicate private experimentation without guild sanction."

  "She makes healing balms," Lumiere whispered. "She gives half of them away."

  Next, they held up a small notebook—bck leather, the edges worn soft from use. Rocher stepped closer before he realized it.

  That notebook had never left her room.

  "She refused to expin the contents," the padin went on. "It appears to be written in a cipher or foreign script."

  Rocher stared at the symbols—that looping, sharp handwriting, familiar in shape but impossible to read. He felt something twist in his chest.

  Cire never shared this. Never showed it to anyone.

  "It's her journal," he said quietly.

  "An unregistered codex of unknown origin," the padin replied. "We believe it to be encrypted communication or documentation of anomalous practice."

  "It's private," Rocher snapped. "That's all it is. She writes when she's upset. She writes when she's overwhelmed."

  Evelyn gnced at him sharply, but said nothing. The padin remained unmoved.

  "This degree of secrecy," the padin said, "suggests occult practices or forbidden knowledge."

  "No," Rocher said, shaking his head. "It just means she gets lonely sometimes."

  The padin did not blink. Did not react at all.

  "And this," he continued, opening the final envelope, "was found among her belongings. Addressed to you."

  Rocher reached for it before he could think.

  A wrapped parcel. Small. Wrapped in scrap cloth tied with a ribbon—simple, uneven, Cire-like. And beneath it, a letter.

  He opened it with shaking hands.

  Rocher,

  I wasn't sure whether this was the right time, but then again, it probably never is. You're still learning how to take things slowly. I'm still trying not to run from everything good.

  So I made you something. It's silly and unfinished. I thought about giving it to you with everyone watching, but I think I'd like it better if you opened it somewhere quiet.

  I'm not ready to return your feelings.But I trust you.

  If you still want to try—then consider this permission to court me.

  Yours, if we don't ruin it,Cire.

  The words blurred.

  Rocher stood there, breath caught in his throat, while the padins looked on with professional indifference. Perhaps they had already read it. Perhaps someone in the Tower had weighed this letter, measured it, searched it for hidden spells.

  To them, it was evidence.

  To him, it was everything.

  And now…

  He imagined her voice breaking. Not just from pain—but from shame. From feeling worth less than dirt under the padins' boots.

  Imagined her shrinking into herself so small that he might never see her reach for someone again.

  He closed the letter slowly, fingers trembling.

  "We're not leaving without her," Rocher said.

  His voice shook.

  But his resolve did not.