They had not called him there to argue.

  That was what Rocher kept telling himself as he stood in the briefing chamber, hands braced on the map table. The Tower seal gred up at him from every corner of the parchment. Red markers ringed the city like a noose tightening by the second.

  The White Warden finished reading from the writ in his hand, then folded it with idle precision.

  "Until this morning," he said, "the Tower was prepared to honor your request, Sir Rocher."

  The words made the room feel briefly rger, then much too small.

  Rocher stared at him. "My request?"

  "Conditional transfer of custody," the Warden said, as if reciting a docket. "After a period of supervised confinement and questioning, Cire de Lune would have been released into your care."

  Lumiere stiffened beside him. Evelyn's fingers drummed once, sharply, on the table.

  "You were going to tell us this when?" Evelyn drawled. "Before, or after you finished torturing her?"

  The Warden did not flinch.

  "Unfortunately," he continued, as though she had not spoken, "events have rendered that accommodation impossible."

  He nodded to the adjutant.

  The younger padin stepped forward, ying out the contents of a wooden evidence tray with practiced care: a length of rope, burned halfway through. A sketch of the interrogation cell. A chalk outline where a body had been found on cold stone.

  "At dawn watch," the adjutant said, "a guard failed to report for relief. When his repcement went to check his post, he found the cell door unsecured."

  He pointed to the sketch.

  "The rope securing the prisoner showed signs of concentrated heat damage. The charring suggests sustained application of fme at close range. Far greater than what we would expect from a torch."

  Rocher stared at the bckened fibers. His fingers tightened on the edge of the table.

  "Her reading was weak," he said before he could stop himself. "You saw it yourselves. Amber. Smaller than a coin."

  "We did," the Warden agreed. "Which means one of two things. Either the apparatus was tampered with, or she concealed the true extent of her capacity."

  He let that hang a moment.

  "Both possibilities are troubling."

  "The guard was discovered inside the cell," the adjutant went on. "He'd entered alone, in viotion of protocol. A length of the same rope had been looped around his neck and used as ligature. His rynx is crushed. He remains alive only by the intervention of the priest who found him."

  Lumiere's hand flew to her mouth. Color drained from her face.

  Rocher felt his stomach twist.

  "She didn't kill him," he said.

  "Not for ck of effort," someone muttered near the back.

  The Warden lifted his hand; the room fell quiet.

  "Intent will be weighed ter," he said. "For now, we must contend with the fact that a detained suspect, assessed as low-risk, incapacitated an armed officer and escaped a locked chamber beneath our own halls."

  His gaze shifted back to Rocher.

  "You must see what this means for us."

  "What it means," Rocher said, fighting to keep his voice level, "is that she was desperate enough to do whatever she had to in order to live. You know precisely what you put her through. So do I."

  Something flickered, briefly, at the corner of the Warden's mouth. Not a smile. Not entirely annoyance either.

  "Desperation does not erase responsibility," he said. "Nor does it expin how a lone girl managed to escape without colpsing from the effort."

  He tapped the sketch once with a gloved finger.

  "There were no other mana signatures in the room. No trace of external spellwork. Yet the outcome does not match the profile we were given."

  Lumiere found her voice at st.

  "It does not occur to you," she said quietly, "that a person may reach beyond your measure, when the alternative is dying on your rope?"

  The tension in the room tightened another notch.

  The Warden inclined his head to her, a gesture that might have been respect in another context.

  "It occurs to me," he said, "that we have underestimated her, Your Holiness. That is why we are all here."

  He straightened.

  "As of this moment, Cire de Lune is no longer a passive subject of inquiry. She is a fugitive who has contravened the Tower, grievously injured one of its servants, and fled justice. The provisional offer of transfer to your custody is revoked."

  The word hit Rocher harder than he'd expected.

  Revoked. As if it had been real enough to stand on, once.

  "But your involvement," the Warden added smoothly, "is still... desirable."

  Rocher forced himself to meet his eyes.

  "You want my help tracking her," he said through grit teeth.

  "I want the people of this city to see their Hero standing with the Tower against corruption," the Warden replied. "It will soothe fears. Contain rumors."

  He gestured at the map.

  "The escape route suggests she used the old drainage tunnels under the western wing. There are only so many pces she can emerge without drowning. We will deploy search parties accordingly."

  Red markers began to appear along the river and in the lower districts, pced by quick, efficient hands.

  "You and your companions," the Warden went on, "will lead the western sweep."

  "Under whose command?" Evelyn asked.

  A faint curve touched the Warden's lip.

  "Under mine, of course. But you will have the opportunity you asked for."

  He turned to Rocher.

  "If you find her first, and she surrenders without further violence, I will reconsider the matter of custody. In that scenario, I am prepared to allow you to escort her back. Personally."

  Rocher's heart lurched.

  "On my terms," he said. "No more cells. No more ropes. I will not hand her back to the same hands that broke her."

  "We will discuss the particurs when she is in front of us," the Warden said. "I do not bargain over hypotheticals, Sir Hero. But understand this: if my men reach her before you do, I cannot promise the restraint you desire."

  His gaze cooled.

  "You wish to save her? Then find her before my order does."

  Rocher heard the warning. He chose to hear the sliver of promise inside it instead.

  "I will," he said.

  The Warden nodded once to the assembled officers.

  "Then let us begin."

  The doors opened. Orders echoed down the stone stairwells. Outside, horns began to sound over the city.

  Manhunt.

  The sewers did not have the courtesy to pretend to be anything but what they were.

  The air was thick, wet, close. Each breath tasted like something dying. Sludge slicked the stones; rats skittered in the dark.

  I kept moving.

  My shoulder throbbed in time with my heartbeat, a hot, sick pulse beneath the skin. The joint held, barely, a fragile truce brokered by weak healing magic and stubborness. The burns on my wrists had cooled to a steady, vicious sting.

  Barefoot, I had to watch every step. Broken gss, sharp stone, a mispced nail—any of it could drop me.

  In the game, this tunnel had been just a line on a minimap.

  Now it was stone, stink, and miles of treacherous dark.

  I hugged the wall, letting the stone take some of my weight. Above me, somewhere, horns bred faint and far-off. Dogs barked. Voices echoed in snatches I couldn't make out.

  The city was waking up to the idea of a witch.

  I spshed through another shallow run of water and nearly slipped. My palm caught the wall, skin scraping.

  "Perfect," I muttered. "Bleed more. That'll help."

  The stink here had yers. Sour waste. Mold. Rust.

  This was where Seraphine had disappeared in the game. Down the Tower's forgotten underbelly, out along an old smugglers' run, then to a culvert that emptied near the river.

  From there, she went to ground. The Hero followed her weeks ter, once he'd pieced together her scattered telepathic pleas.

  I ducked beneath a low arch, breath fogging in the chill. My legs shook. I didn't know how long I'd been walking. Time blurs when pain becomes the clock.

  "Seraphine," I whispered into the void, because saying her name felt like anchoring myself to something beside stone.

  The sewer opened into a wider junction—three tunnels branching outward like spokes. The water here ran faster, pulling filth toward some distant outlet.

  I tried to remember the path as it had looked on a screen years ago. The stylized maze. The blinking icon. The quest marker.

  Left was a dead end. Middle led to a locked gate you could open from behind. Right... right was the correct way.

  I turned right.

  The ceiling dipped lower; I had to hunch. My shoulder protested, a hot line down my back. The smell narrowed to something concentrated and foul.

  "You better be worth all this," I muttered.

  Then—

  ...don't come...

  I froze. Water pped softly at my ankles.

  "Seraphine?"

  No answer. Just dripping in the dark.

  Then, clearer:

  ...stay away...

  The voice nded not in my ears. It was in the cracks between thought and fear.

  The words were meant for Rocher. In the game, they were psychic trail leading him to Seraphine.

  Somehow, they had reached me instead. Now I had to be the one leaving breadcrumbs.

  I ughed once, hollow.

  "Of course even your magic is broken now."

  ...it hurts...

  That st whisper frayed through with something I had never heard from her—pure, unarmored fear.

  I put a shaking hand to my temple.

  "I'm coming," I whispered. "Just wait for me."

  I forced myself forward.

  The tunnel narrowed again. I crawled, grit digging into my palms. My shoulder screamed; my knees burned. Each movement felt like peeling myself out of my own skin.

  The sound ahead changed.

  No longer just the slow drip and murmur of underground water. A heavier roar, muted but distinct.

  The river.

  I swallowed hard and kept going.

  By the time I reached the culvert, my whole body was shaking.

  The opening was half-choked with debris—branches, trash, the remains of old pallets washed down in storms. Beyond, I could see a slice of gray sky and the distant gleam of moving water.

  Fresh air hit my face.

  I dragged myself through the gap, splinters catching on my cloth. Then I was out, half-colpsing on the cold mud of the river's edge.

  For a moment, I just y there, cheek pressed to the earth, chest heaving. The sky above looked washed-out, pale and thin.

  I made a sound. Not ughter, but close enough.

  "Made it out," I croaked. "That's step one."

  Somewhere behind me, back toward the city, the horns changed pitch. Closer now. Sharper. Like dogs that had finally caught a scent.

  I pushed myself up on my good arm and staggered to my feet.

  "Right," I muttered. "Now for step two."

  Stay alive.