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Julen looked away, jaw tight. “Stories aren’t just stories, Maia. They say Umbralyn don’t age, that they take what they want when it pleases them. They could have been plotting this for years. What if you get hurt?”

Her throat tightened. For a moment, she almost said Caelith’s name aloud. Then two other scribes passed by, calling for them to join the tavern. Julen seized the moment.

“I’m sorry, Maia. I didn’t mean to snap,” he said, voice low. He turned and looked at the others. “Come with me. We could both use a drink.”

Maia sighed. She had meant to return to her chambers, but this was no hour to make enemies.

Not long past the Grand Archive, a tavern glowed warmly, its air thick with the scent of ale. A small scatter of laughter and warm voices filled the crowded room. It felt rare, though she could still tell fear simmered just beneath the surface. She slipped onto a bench between Julen and Selinne, sitting opposite Marreck, whose cheeks already glowed red.

Selinne wrapped her hands around her cup, sliding closer down the bench until their shoulders touched. “If you’re about to tell me you’d rather be back at your desk right now, I don’t want to hear it.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything.”

“Your face was saying it.” Selinne took a long drink before her smile faded. “They say the Sanctum steps cracked clean through. The stone split completely.”

Marreck snorted. “Stones shift all the time around here. They always have done. It doesn’t mean doom’s coming.”

Julen leaned closer to Maia, voice low. “The Elders wouldn’t have called an Umbralyn otherwise, right? This is new. Something’s happening.”

“You’d know,” Marreck said, tipping his cup toward Maia. “Word is you’re the only one who can make sense of what they dug up. Orell’s new favourite.”

“I’m not anyone’s favourite,” Maia said. “I just happen to have wasted a childhood on dead languages nobody else bothered learning.”

“Luckily for you,” Julen muttered, not quite looking at her.

Selinne tried for a laugh and didn’t quite manage it. “I keep telling myself I’ll get used to the chains. But I haven’t.” Her fingers tightened slightly on her cup. “Why would they put someone like him among us?” She glanced at Maia. “They frighten me.”

Marreck leaned in, lowering his voice like he was passing on something forbidden. “My cousin knew a girl from the dockside quarter who took up with one. Umbralyn, I mean. Properly, for a season.” He paused for effect. “Said his mouth ran cold as well water, even at the height of things. Said his eyes changed colour when he—” He caught Selinne’s look and cleared his throat. “Anyway. She stopped sleeping after. Wouldn’t say why. Just kept saying he watched her differently once he’d had her. Like she’d become a door he could see through.”

Maia’s stomach twisted.

But better to say little, she thought. Better to watch and remember. She let the talk move past her after that - crop failures, a wedding delayed by the tremors, whether the tavern’s ale had gone thin - nodding when nodding was expected, her mind circling back again and again to silver at a wrist.

By the time Julen walked her home in the early hours, the streets were hushed. Lanterns guttered low, the sea air sharp in her lungs.

He hesitated at her door. “Maia,” he said quietly, “don’t let him get into your head. Promise me.”

She forced a smile. “I don’t know who you mean,” she said, trying to reassure him. “Goodnight, Julen.”

Inside, she leaned against the closed door, heart pounding, already knowing sleep would be another battle. As she got into bed, her thoughts tangled, circling the day’s events: Orell’s scorn, Julen’s warning, and the Umbralyn. She drifted at last, her dreams caught between silver light and shadow.

***

She had barely slipped under when she woke to the sound of stone screaming. At first, she thought she was dreaming; nightmares had become all too frequent since arriving in Eryssan.

She told herself the roar of shifting walls was just an echo of the whispers she carried to sleep. But then the floor lurched beneath her. Dust rained down, the rafters groaning like wounded beasts.

She sat bolt upright in her bed and watched a hairline crack split across her chamber wall. A stronger shudder tore through the floor, causing books to topple, lanterns to swing and shadows to twist wildly across the ceiling.

Then came a sound she would never forget: the crack of stone rending apart. Her door shuddered against its hinges, screams echoing somewhere down the hall.

Maia snatched her shawl and stumbled into the corridor. The air was thick with dust and the acrid stench of shattered mortar. Apprentices spilled from their rooms, eyes wide; some running, some frozen. Another tremor slammed through the Archive’s foundations. A section of ceiling caved, stones crashing to the floor with a thunder that rattled her bones.

“Outside!” someone shouted. “Get to the square!”

Maia coughed against the dust, clutching the shawl over her mouth. Her legs shook as she pushed toward the exit, but when she reached the outer steps, she froze.

The city itself seemed to shudder. Beyond the harbour, the cliffs glimmered with a terrible, violent light.