Chapter 10 · Carve or Die

"Hold still, or I'll carve the sigil right into your chest instead of the gear," Lena snapped. Her voice was like ice, but her hand was shaking. Just a little.

I didn't answer. I couldn't. I was too busy trying not to choke on the metallic taste of blood filling my throat. My lungs felt like they'd been scrubbed with sandpaper, and every breath was a gamble.

"Stop shaking," I managed to wheeze, glancing at the jagged piece of scrap metal in my hand.

"I'm not shaking. You're vibrating," she retorted, though she stepped closer, her boots crunching on the shattered glass of the Guild's containment ward. She reached out, her fingers gripping my shoulder to steady me. Her touch was firm, the heat of her palm seeping through my soot-stained shirt.

I looked down at the engine core. It was a mess. A Guild-grade stabilizer, designed to keep the city's power grids from melting, now twisted into a heap of slag. And inside it, the dead sigil—the one that had been whispering to me since I touched it—was screaming.