Chapter 7 · Down Where the Wards Go Dark

"You're bleeding on my evidence."

Calder didn't look up. He sat slumped against the alley wall, one wing folded wrong, the other dragging in the trash water. The cuff chain between us hung slack. His claws were still out, still dark with someone else's blood—Finn's attacker, maybe, or whoever shoved that spike through my jacket two minutes ago.

"Mara." His voice scraped. "The page. Show me the page."

I pulled the ledger sheet from my pocket. Last entry, bottom line, ink still sharp: *Mara Voss, Ward-Core Keeper, Sector Nine, 12th August.*

"My father's handwriting," I said. "Want to tell me why he wrote my name next to a stolen core?"

Calder's eye cracked open. Yellow iris, slitted pupil, and something behind it I didn't want to look at too long. "Because he knew they'd come for you next."

"Who's 'they'?"

"Same people who sent me to steal it." He coughed. Stone dust came up. "Same people who killed him when he wouldn't hand you over."

The cuff burned. Not metaphor—actual heat, the kind that meant its binding spell was eating itself. We had maybe an hour left.