The pull in his chest sharpens, slicing clean through the memory.

  Aarav passes the corner where an old woman sells charms, feathers, bones, rusted coins tangled in wire. She looks up, eyes squinting like she almost recognises him. Maybe she does. He stole a bracelet from her when he was eleven.

  The streets narrow as he pushes deeper into the old quarter, where buildings lean too close and the air hangs still. Market noise fades behind him, swallowed by damp-stoned corridors and twisting alleys. With every step, the pull tightens.

  Then, footsteps. Light. Fast. Uneven. Panic beating through the rhythm.

  A figure flashes across the alley mouth ahead, white and gold robes smudged with dirt, hair wild, breath tearing from her chest. Her face pale, eyes wide and frantic, scanning for escape.

  Two men chase close behind. Broad-shouldered. A brutal look to them and cloaked in black. They move with military sharpness, their steps nearly silent despite the speed.

  Not thugs or guards, that is for sure.

  Something much, much worse.

  Aarav stopped dead, breath snagging as he pressed himself into the darkness of a doorway. She didn’t see him, not yet.

  But he saw her.

  He stayed low, melting into shadow as he followed. Footsteps soft. Shoulders angled. The narrow veins of Marrow curved around him like familiar hands guiding him through. Years spent hiding in places exactly like this had carved instinct into him, when to duck, when to slip behind a barrel, when to hug a wall so tightly you might as well be part of it.

  The girl never looked back. The soldiers never sensed him. But he kept close, his gaze locked on the flash of her gold-trimmed robes as she was pushed, breath by breath, closer to danger.

  He recognised the path almost instantly.

  The alley ahead wasn’t a way out. It looked like one, wide enough, open enough, but at the end waited nothing but a wall of moss-slick stone. No door. No window. No escape. A perfect trap.

  He cut away through a narrow side passage, fingertips brushing old mortar and warped wood as he moved. Every shortcut in this quarter lived in his bones. Left through a butcher’s yard, right under a collapsing trellis, vault the rusted fence behind a shop long abandoned. His body moved on muscle memory, fast, precise.

  But now there was something else riding beneath his skin.

  Power.

  A force pulsing behind his ribs like a second heartbeat.

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  Soul Fire.

  He knew enough about magic to understand the basics. Magic was theory and will. You reached inward, burned your Soul Fire, shaped it with intent and knowledge. The more fire you had, the more you could do. Most people barely managed enough for a sprint or a flash of strength.

  Aarav had never used his.

  Because he’d never found it. Not once. Not even a whisper.

  But now, now it blazed. A bonfire where before there was not even a spark. He didn’t know how or why but if he had the power, he was going to use it. He had little training, no discipline, nothing but scraps of knowledge. But he knew what that fire meant.

  So he reached for it.

  And he let it burn.

  The shift slammed through him instantly, heat tearing through his veins, every sense sharpening until the world snapped into focus. His legs surged with power, not straining but gliding, each stride smoother than the last. His feet struck the ground in perfect rhythm, as though the street itself angled to meet him.

  His thoughts raced too, quick and crystalline, movement and timing unfurling ahead of him as if he were reading the next steps of a dance.

  He vaulted a low wall like it was nothing, the cold air cutting across his skin but his body driving forward with something far beyond muscle. He caught the lip of a rooftop, hauled himself up in a single fluid motion, and rose to stand above the alley, higher ground, and with perfect sight for what was happening below.

  Below, she hit the dead end. She spun, breath ripping shallow from her chest, one hand hidden in her robes. On all sides the building had met each other. Some crumbling but a solid wall all around her.

  The soldiers slowed, fanning out with practiced precision. Daggers drawn. Steel flashing.

  Aarav scanned the rooftop, shattered tiles and loose stones are everywhere. Perfect. He snatched two, heat roaring through his arms until his skin prickled and his veins lit from the inside.

  The first stone left his hand like a thrown hammer. It smashed into a soldier’s temple with a sickening thud, snapping his head sideways. He dropped instantly, dead or unconscious didn’t matter.

  The second stone he hurled at the other. It slammed into the man’s thigh. The crack, clean and brutal, echoed up the alley. The man screamed, stumbling, dagger slipping as blood poured down his leg.

  Aarav didn’t wait.

  He leapt from the rooftop, fire blazing through his chest and legs. He caught a jutting beam mid-fall, swung, and dropped down like a falling weight. The injured soldier turned toward him, hand just getting their dagger, panic warping his face.

  Aarav’s kick crashed into the side of his head with bone-rattling force. The man flew across the ally, skull smacking against the wall, the impact hard enough to rattle the walls. His dagger hit the ground first. His body followed.

  Aarav landed in a crouch, breath burning. His fists tight. His balance perfect. Fire alive in every vein.

  For the first time in his life, he felt unstoppable.

  Then the blaze slipped.

  It dropped out of him so fast his knees nearly buckled. The rush drained from his limbs, leaving them heavy, dragging, breath shuddering. He’d pushed too hard, too fast, burned without control, and the fire guttered out before he knew it.

  His Soul Fire still glowed inside him, steady enough, but his body lagged, muscles aching, nerves buzzing with strain. Fear flickered through him. If he crashed like this again, mid-fight, outnumbered, he’d die.

  Silence stretched through the alley, broken only by his uneven breathing.