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"That's not ink." I grabbed the file from Finn's hand.
"No." Calder leaned over my shoulder, close enough I felt the heat coming off his stone skin. "That's a blood-seal. Old kind. The kind you don't break."
The letters were dark brown, smeared across the bottom margin in my father's handwriting. I'd know it anywhere. Cramped. Precise. Paranoid.
NEVER LET HER WEAR THE BADGE.
"Her who?" Finn asked.
"Me." My voice came out flat. "He meant me."
Calder's claw tapped the page, careful not to touch the blood. "When did he write this?"
"Two weeks ago." Finn was already backing toward the door. "Same day the ward-core went missing. Same day your name showed up on the suspect list."
"Convenient." Calder's jaw tightened. "Too convenient."
I turned on him. "You knew him. You knew my father."
"I knew a lot of people."
"Don't do that." I shoved the file against his chest. The cuff yanked my wrist back, burning. "Don't lie to me. Not about this."
His eye—the one good one—locked on mine. For a second I thought he'd push back. Instead he took the file.
"Yeah," he said quietly. "I knew him."
The floor shook.
Finn swore. "That's not good."
"What's not good?" I grabbed the edge of the table as another tremor rolled through the room.
"The archive's keyed to the wards." Finn was already pulling open drawers, shoving things into his coat. "If someone's pulling the core apart, the whole stack's going to fold."
"Fold?" I looked at Calder. "What does fold mean?"
"It means we leave. Now." He grabbed my arm and hauled me toward the stairs.
"Wait—" I twisted back toward Finn. "The file—"
"Got it." Finn stuffed the blood-marked page inside his jacket and bolted past us. "Move!"
The walls groaned. Dust sifted down from the ceiling in thick, choking clouds. I couldn't see the stairs. Couldn't see Finn anymore.
Calder's hand locked around mine, the one cuffed to him. "Stay close."
"I don't have a choice," I snapped, but I didn't pull away.
The first shelf came down behind us. The crash was so loud I felt it in my teeth. Then another. Then the sound of a thousand files hitting stone all at once.
"Faster," Calder growled, and then he wasn't pulling me anymore—he just picked me up.
"Put me down—"
"Shut up."
He ran. I'd never seen him move like this. Not shambling, not slow. Fast. His wings scraped the walls, throwing sparks. The cuff bit into my wrist where our arms pressed together.
I could feel his heartbeat. Slow. Steady. Nothing like mine.
"You're not human," I said, stupid, breathless.
"Just figuring that out?" He kicked through a door I hadn't seen. We tumbled into a stairwell, narrower, darker. The air stank of old copper and wet stone.
"Put me down," I said again.
This time he did. We were halfway down, caught on a landing between floors. Above us, something cracked like thunder. The whole structure swayed.
I braced against the wall. Calder braced against me.
His hand came up beside my head. His other arm locked across my ribs, pinning me in place as the ceiling buckled. I felt the weight of him, the hard edge of stone and muscle and something older than either.
"Don't move," he said, low, right against my ear.
I couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. The air between us was too hot, too thin.
"Why did my father write that?" I whispered.
His jaw was against my temple. I felt it tighten. "Because he knew what they'd do to you."
"Who?"
"The people who put the badge in your hand."
Another tremor. Smaller. The groan of settling stone.
I turned my head just enough to meet his eye. "You're saying someone set me up."
"I'm saying someone set us both up." His voice was rough, scraped. "Your father tried to stop it. That's why he's gone."
"Gone where?"
Calder's mouth was an inch from mine. Less. I could see the fine cracks in his lips, the place where stone met something softer, more vulnerable.
"I don't know," he said. "But he told me if anything happened to him, I had to keep you away from Vale."
"Seraphine Vale?" My boss. The senior officer who'd handed me this case.
He nodded once. "She's the one who wanted him dead."
The world tilted. Not the building this time. Just me.
"You're lying."
"I'm not."
"Then why didn't you tell me—"
"Because you wouldn't have believed me." His hand shifted, fingers curling against the wall beside my face. "You still don't."
I should've pushed him off. Should've cuffed him to the railing and left him there.
Instead I said, "What did she want him to do?"
Calder's expression flickered. Something close to pain. "Walk away."
"From what?"
"From the ward-core project. From the bellmaker contract. From you."
My throat closed. "He wouldn't."
"No." Calder's voice dropped, softer than I'd ever heard it. "He wouldn't. So she made sure he couldn't say no."
The stairwell steadied. The dust began to settle.
I pushed at his chest. This time he let me. We stood there on the landing, too close, the cuff humming between us like a live wire.
"If you're lying to me," I said, "I will bury you myself."
"Noted." He almost smiled. Almost.
Footsteps clattered below. Finn's voice echoed up. "You two dead?"
"Unfortunately not," Calder called back.
I wiped the dust off my face and started down the stairs. My legs were shaking. My hands were shaking. Everything was shaking except the damn gargoyle behind me.
Finn was waiting at the bottom, breathing hard, jacket streaked with ash. "We need to move. Half the block's coming to see what fell."
"Good." I stepped past him into the alley. The night air hit like cold water. "Let them come."
"Mara—" Finn grabbed my sleeve. "You can't go back to the guild. Not yet. Not until we know who else is in on this."
I knew he was right. Hated that he was right.
"Fine." I turned to Calder. "Then we go to Vale."
"Bad idea," he said flatly.
"She's the one who gave me the warrant. She's the one who'll answer for it."
"She's the one who'll put you in the ground," Calder shot back. "Just like your father."
"Then she can try." I pulled the cuff taut between us, forcing him a step closer. "You wanted me to believe you? Fine. Now prove it. Take me to her."
He stared at me. The streetlight caught the edge of his cracked horn, the deep gouge across his cheek.
Then he looked down.
I followed his gaze.
The cuff was glowing.
Not the pale flicker it gave off when we pulled too far apart. This was different. Brighter. Hotter. And the metal was moving.
Letters crawled across the surface, slow and wet, like something writing itself in fresh blood.
FIND THE BELLMAKER.
"What the hell—" I grabbed Calder's wrist, yanking the cuff into the light. The letters pulsed once, twice, then faded to a dull red stain.
"Someone's sending you a message," Finn said, voice tight.
"Who?" I looked at Calder. His face had gone still. Too still.
"Not who," he said quietly. "What."
Behind us, something scraped against stone. Low. Rhythmic. Getting closer.
Calder's hand closed over mine. "Run."
"What is that—"
"Run."