The morning after the lock clicked open, Kael sat with his back against the stone wall, fingers blistered from the chalk, the stolen iron shard hidden in his boot. His skin still bore the lattice of bruises from the Overseer's lash, but his mind was sharp, alive, humming with possibility.
Renn broke the silence first. "Why not just open the gates and run?" he whispered.
Kael didn't look up. "And go where? We're in the deepest pit of Thorne's spine. If the dogs don't find us, the cliffs will eat us."
"Still better than rotting here," Brenn muttered.
"No," Kael said quietly. "Not yet. Not until it matters."
The others stared at him. Something in his tone had shifted. It was calm, calculating—not the voice of a slave boy. Something more.
"You mean...?" Mira asked.
Kael nodded. "We need to be more than escapees. We need to be a threat."
The chance came sooner than expected.
The body was found at dusk, face-down in the trough. A guard named Dren. His throat had been opened like fruit, and no one claimed the deed.
Kael had seen it happen—though he'd never admit it.
He'd watched as Mira stood frozen nearby, caught between panic and horror. It had been Renn, his usually soft face clenched like stone, who had done it. No flourish. No revenge. Just necessity.
"He was taking her," Renn said afterward, voice flat, eyes empty. "He was going to take her again."
No one argued.
But now the camp buzzed like a kicked wasp's nest.
The Overseer was furious.
He had the slaves lined up in rows beneath the dusk sun, the guards behind him with whips and brands in hand. His voice roared over the broken souls.
"One of you thinks you can take a life without cost. Fine. We'll find the price together."
He pointed. "Ten lashes. Each. Until someone speaks."
The first crack rang like thunder. Blood followed soon after.
Kael clenched his fists.
Mira can't take ten. Maybe not even five.
He felt the glyph flare behind his eyes—Eidon's Vein—but he shoved it down.
No memory could save them now.
He needed more.
That night, after the punishment, Mira lay trembling in the darkness. Kael sat beside her, soaking a cloth in old herbs Renn had scavenged.
"I can't do this," she whispered. "Not again."
"You won't," Kael said.
She looked at him, hollow-eyed. "You don't know that."
"I do. Because the next time they touch you, one of them dies. And then another. Until they learn."
She didn't respond. But she didn't turn away either.
Later, Kael sat against the far wall, the others sleeping in uneasy shifts. He traced a new symbol into the dust—not one from memory, but intuition.
🜁⟁ᛃ☍
He whispered the name aloud: "Nahran's Silence."
It was meant to still sound. To muffle a presence. The glyph shimmered faintly, lines of chalk pulsing, then fading like a heartbeat.
He stood. Took a breath. And walked to the gate.
There were two guards. One drowsing, the other bored.
He closed his eyes, whispered the glyph—and felt it click inside his mind.
Silence.
He moved like a shadow. His bare feet didn't stir the dirt. He walked past the guard, heart pounding.
He didn't kill.
Not yet. He stole Maps, a Knife, and A scroll with strange script—symbols that felt familiar
He slipped back into the pen, breath shallow.
The glyph faded.
Morning came.
No alarm was raised. They hadn't even noticed.
Kael unrolled the scroll on the ground. Mira and Brenn leaned in. "It's old," she whispered. "Temple script."
"It's glyphwork," Kael said. "But deeper. Etched, not drawn. These are meant to bind."
"To what?" Brenn asked.
Kael didn't answer.
His eyes caught on one glyph in particular—shaped like a coiled serpent swallowing a star.
He touched it and felt something behind his eyes shift. Cold. Hungry.
"Kael," Mira said, her voice uncertain. "Let's stop. Just for a day."
"We can't." His voice was quiet, but resolute. "They're already hunting us. They just don't know it yet."
That night, the four sat close. Fireless. Silent.
Kael looked at Renn and Brenn, eyes fierce. "I don't care what they made you before. What they stole. From now on, you're not tools. Or numbers. You're my brothers."
Renn blinked, then nodded. "I'll kill for you."
"I already did," Brenn muttered. "Guess that means something."
Mira didn't speak. But she reached out and clasped Kael's hand, and that was enough.
Something was building. A current beneath the skin of the world.
Kael could feel it.
He didn't know how to win a war yet.
But he was beginning to understand how to start one.