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"Move." Kael shoved me through the stairwell door before the next shot punched through the frame.
I stumbled down three steps, caught myself on the railing. My ears rang. The bond pulsed hot where his hand had been on my spine.
"They locked the building," I said. "We're trapped."
"Not if we go down." He was already past me, taking the stairs two at a time. "Sub-level parking. I've got a car."
"You planned this."
"I planned for you being stubborn." He didn't look back. "Also for people trying to kill us. Seems like a safe bet these days."
Another shot ricocheted off the concrete above. I ran.
Two floors down, Kael kicked open the emergency exit. The parking garage smelled like oil and cold air. He grabbed my wrist again and pulled me toward a black sedan that looked too expensive for a man fresh out of prison.
"Where'd you get this?"
"Don't ask questions you don't want answered, Judge." He opened the passenger door, practically shoved me in, then rounded the hood and got behind the wheel. Engine started on the first try. He floored it.
We blew past the exit gate. The barrier snapped clean off.
"You know they'll track this car," I said.
"They'll try." He took a hard left out of the garage, merged into late-evening traffic. "We've got maybe eight minutes before they lock down the district. I need you to listen."
"I'm not going anywhere with you until—"
"Marcus Dane had a personal locker in the Moonsworn Council evidence vault." He cut me off, eyes on the road. "His effects from the night he died. No one's touched them yet because the inquest isn't closed. If there's a second recording, it's there."
I stared at him. "The Council vault is inside the Judiciary tower. I can't just walk in and—"
"You can. You're a chief justice. You've got clearance."
"The second I use it, they'll know exactly where I am."
"Yeah." He took another turn, too fast. "That's why we're doing it now, while they're still scrambling. In eight minutes they'll have drones overhead and a perimeter on every exit. Right now, they're blind."
My pulse hammered. The bond throbbed at the base of my skull, a constant ache that hadn't let up since the courtroom.
"This is insane."
"This is the only move." He glanced at me, just for a second. "Unless you want to spend the rest of your very short life wondering who killed Marcus Dane and why."
I didn't answer. He took that as a yes.
We ditched the sedan two blocks from the tower and went in on foot. Kael walked like he belonged there, hands in his coat pockets, shoulders loose. I kept my head down and my judicial badge ready.
The lobby guard barely looked up. "Evening, Justice Hale."
"Evening." I swiped my badge at the elevator bank. The scanner blinked green. Kael stepped in beside me.
The doors closed.
"See?" he said. "Easy."
"Don't." My hands were shaking. I curled them into fists. "Just don't."
He didn't say anything. The elevator descended.
Sub-level three. The evidence vault. I swiped my badge again at the reinforced door. Another green light. The lock disengaged with a heavy click.
Inside, the air was cold and sterile. Rows of steel lockers lined the walls, each tagged with a case number and date. Kael moved fast, scanning the labels.
"Here." He stopped in front of a locker marked DANE, M. - INQUEST PENDING. "Open it."
I hesitated.
"Sienna." His voice dropped. "We don't have time."
I pulled the master access card from my pocket and slid it through the reader. The locker popped open.
Inside: a wallet, a set of keys, a phone with a cracked screen. And a small digital recorder, the kind old-school investigators still used for interviews.
Kael picked it up, turned it over in his hands. The casing was dented, scorched along one edge.
"This was in his pocket when he died."
"You don't know that."
"I know what burn patterns look like." He pressed the playback button. Nothing. He swore under his breath and pulled a small tool kit from his jacket.
"You just carry that around?"
"Six years in a cell. You learn to fix things." He pried open the recorder's casing, hands steady. "Watch the door."
I moved to the vault entrance, listened. The hallway outside was silent. Too silent.
That's when I saw it: the security camera in the corner. The red light was on, but the lens wasn't moving. It was frozen.
Looped.
"Kael."
"Almost got it."
"Kael, the cameras are looped. Someone—"
The vault door slammed shut.
I spun. Grabbed the handle. Locked.
Then the vents hissed.
Smoke poured in, thick and gray. Not gas. Fire-suppression foam. It hit the floor and spread fast, creeping toward us.
"They're sealing us in," I said.
Kael didn't look up. He was still working on the recorder, fingers moving fast. "Thirty seconds."
"We don't have thirty seconds!"
"Then hold your breath."
The foam was at my ankles now, rising. I could feel the cold through my shoes. My chest tightened. The bond flared hot, like it knew we were trapped.
Twenty seconds.
Fifteen.
Kael pulled a wire loose, twisted it, jammed it back in. The recorder's cracked screen flickered.
"Got it." He grabbed my arm and yanked me toward the back wall. "There's a service duct behind this panel. Help me pull."
We both grabbed the edge of the steel panel and wrenched it sideways. It shrieked and gave. Behind it, a narrow maintenance shaft.
The foam was waist-high.
Kael pushed me in first, then squeezed in after me. His chest pressed against my back in the tight space, his breath warm on my neck. The bond snapped tight, a live wire between us, and for a second I couldn't breathe for a completely different reason.
"Go," he said, voice rough.
I crawled.
The shaft opened into a sub-basement hallway. We dropped out, hitting concrete hard. I rolled onto my back, gasping. Kael landed beside me, the recorder still clutched in one hand.
For a moment we just lay there, breathing.
Then he sat up, held up the recorder, and pressed play.
Static crackled.
Then a voice. Marcus Dane's voice, thin and distorted.
"...can't meet in person anymore. He's got eyes everywhere. If something happens to me, you need to know... the evidence was planted. All of it. Thorne didn't kill anyone. It was—"
More static.
"...orders came from the top. Council vote was unanimous, but he's the one who pushed it through. You can't trust—"
A long hiss of white noise.
Then, clear as a bell, one last sentence:
"Don't trust Asher Lockwood."
The recording cut out.
I stared at the device. My mouth was dry.
"Asher Lockwood," I said. "The Council Speaker."
"Yeah." Kael's jaw was tight. "The man who personally recommended your appointment to chief justice three years ago."
My phone buzzed.
Then his.
Then again. And again.
Kael pulled his phone out, and his face went stone still.
He turned the screen toward me.
A system-wide alert. Moonsworn Network emergency broadcast.
Two faces, side by side.
Mine.
And his.
Below the photos, bold red text:
WANTED - FUGITIVE JUDICIAL OFFICER & ACCOMPLICE ARMED AND DANGEROUS - CAPTURE ALIVE REWARD: 200,000 SILVER
And at the bottom, a timestamp counting down:
LOCKDOWN PERIMETER ACTIVE IN 00:04:17
I looked up at Kael.
He looked back at me.
"So," he said. "Still think your system's clean?"
The countdown hit 00:04:00.