Rocher paced.

  The camp was too small, the ring of tents and broken stone closing in no matter which direction he turned. He crossed it once, twice, boots scuffing over grit, then doubled back without realizing he had done so. His skin felt tight, fever-warm, as if the air itself were pressing in on him.

  Something was wrong.

  A bde edge of awareness that cut through the noise and left him breathless.

  He stopped, hands braced on his knees, and tried to breathe past it.

  There had been a moment. He was sure of that. A moment of awful, piercing crity, right before sleep dragged him under. If not the shape, he could remember the sensation.

  He'd crossed a line.

  The thought gnawed at him, relentless. It hollowed his chest and filled it with urgency all at once. He had to find Cire. He had to tell her he was sorry. He had to expin—no, not expin—that was the wrong word. He had to make it right. However that looked. Whatever it took.

  He went first to her tent.

  "Cire?" he called, his voice rough.

  No response.

  He pushed the fp aside. Empty. The bedroll y undisturbed, neatly arranged, as if she would be back any second. He stood there for a moment, staring at the space, his mind struggling to reconcile the absence.

  He turned and headed for the infirmary next, his steps quickening. The building loomed dark and silent, the door ajar. Inside, the cots were empty. Supplies sat where they had been left, untouched. No movement. No voices.

  His pulse began to race.

  He moved through the rest of the camp, faster now. Past the burnt-out cookfire. Past the supply crates. Past the padins' tents.

  Empty. All of them.

  The quiet pressed in on him, unnatural in its completeness.

  A thought formed, slow and terrible.

  They had taken her.

  The certainty arrived whole, fully formed, without argument. They'd taken Cire deeper. Somewhere he couldn't see her.

  Anger surged up, hot and immediate, cutting through the haze in his head. He turned and ran, boots pounding against the stone as he headed into the surrounding streets.

  They could not be far. They couldn't have gotten that much of a head start.

  The buildings at the edge of camp blurred past as he searched, forcing doors open, calling her name until his voice cracked. "Cire!"

  The sound echoed back at him, wrong and thin.

  How long ago had it been? Minutes? Hours? He couldn't tell. Time felt slippery, folding in on itself. Every corridor looked familiar in a way that made his head ache.

  Déjà vu hit him hard enough that he stumbled.He grabbed the wall and stared.

  The door ahead of him y shattered, wood splintered outward as if something enormous had burst through. He frowned, a vague unease stirring. He was sure—no, he knew—that this door had been intact.

  Hadn't it?

  But why was he so sure? He'd never been here before.

  He shook his head and moved on, heart hammering. Another building. Another ruined entry. The same damage, repeated. Again and again.

  It was as if a storm had already passed through, tearing the pce apart before he arrived.

  Almost... like he'd done it.

  The thought slid away before he could catch it.

  He searched until his legs burned and his throat ached. He found nothing. No sign of Cire. No sign of anyone at all.

  Eventually, the fury bled out of him, leaving only exhaustion.

  He found himself back at camp without remembering the walk.

  Why was he doing this again? He'd forgotten completely.

  The realization hit him hard. He sank down onto a crate, then slid to the ground, back against cold stone. His head fell forward into his hands.

  "I'm sorry," he whispered, though no one was there to hear it. Though he couldn't remember why.

  The words tangled in his chest, useless. He missed her with an intensity that hurt. Missed the sound of her ughter. The warmth of her shoulder against his. The way she said his name like it anchored her.

  He wanted to hold her again. Just for a moment. To feel that steadiness return.

  To know he hadn't broken something beyond repair.

  His eyes flew open. The memory entered, unbidden. The terrible crity.

  He'd crossed a line.

  The knowledge crushed down on him, familiar and unbearable, and the need to find her surged anew, tangled with shame and fear until he could no longer tell them apart.

  I pressed the back of my hand to my forehead.

  It came away slick. My skin burned beneath the touch, fever-hot, the heat rolling off me in waves I could not outrun. My clothes clung to me, soaked through with sweat and something sharper.

  I already knew all of this. But knowing didn't help.

  The pressure had crested into something unbearable, a constant, intrusive thrum that crowded out everything else. It was no longer background noise I could ignore or reason past. It demanded attention. It fractured my thoughts, splintering them the moment I tried to follow one to its end.

  I thought about the sedative.

  The fsk sat within reach, heavy with promise. One swallow and the noise would fade. The heat would blur. I would sink down into quiet.

  The idea terrified me.

  If I took it now, I would lose the thread I was holding onto with white-knuckled focus. The only thing keeping me anchored was the fact that I knew something was wrong.

  Lose that, and anything could happen. I might not wake up as myself.

  My gaze dropped to the map at my side, folded and creased from too many careful consultations. The realization struck with sickening crity.

  The fw had been there from the start.

  Even if the others did not know where one another were, I did. I had drawn the routes myself. Marked the distances. Calcuted how far the sound would carry.

  If I lost myself completely, if the pressure finally drowned out the st of my restraint, there would be nothing to stop my addled self from using it. From seeking out the others. From undoing everything I had put in pce.

  Destroying the map would not save me. I would still have the memory of it, etched too deeply to excise. It was the only throughline I had left in this vast, dead byrinth. The only way back to anyone at all.

  The only way back to Rocher.

  For a single, unwelcome heartbeat, an image surfaced—his size, his weight, the way his strength could hold something still when it needed to stop moving. Hands pinning my wrists. Weight bearing down.

  I tore the thought away at once, breath catching. No. That was wrong. That was the sickness talking.

  Panic spiked. The pressure surged in response, relentless, crowding out everything else.

  My hand slipped into my waistband without conscious intent. Not for relief. I knew better than that now. Just to press down, hard, as if I could contain myself by force. As if pressure could answer pressure.

  It didn't.

  The thought came back, heavier this time. Cruder.

  I didn't stop it this time.

  I let it sit there, ugly and wrong, because I needed something to keep me anchored. Something loud enough to drown out the noise.

  Shame burned through me even as the pressure eased by a fraction.

  Then something moved at the edge of my vision.

  I jerked upright, heart smming against my ribs. My hand flew for my crossbow.

  I sucked in a breath, sharp and thin.

  The darkness ahead of me shifted again, resolving into the suggestion of a figure moving slowly closer. Too slowly. Deliberate. My vision swam, the edges blurring, the world smearing into shadow and light I could not quite bring into focus.

  "Who's there?" I demanded, though the words came out unsteady.

  No answer.

  The figure kept coming, and I aimed as best I could, heat roaring in my ears.

  Someone was waiting at the edge of camp.

  Rocher's head snapped up. His heart lurched, hope fring so sharply it hurt. He surged to his feet, dizziness washing through him, and took an unsteady step toward the sound.

  "Cire?" he called.

  The ntern light wavered, catching on a figure just beyond its reach. Too still. Watching. The outline was wrong—height roughly the same, but slimmer, with longer hair—but his mind clung to the possibility anyway, desperate and unreasoning.

  Relief and dread tangled in his chest. If it was her, he could fix this. He could say the words this time, say them right. If it wasn't—

  "I didn't mean to," he said hoarsely, the confession tearing free before he could stop it. "I'm sorry."

  The figure stepped closer.

  Rocher moved to meet it halfway.