Chapter 36
Elora
Black vials meant death.
Elora’s eyes refused to leave the monitoring contraption, its glass tubes glowing with sickly light in the sterile room. The mechanical hum filled the silence, a constant reminder that even here, in this pristine chamber with its scrubbed floors and bare walls, death had followed them.
Six black vials where green had pulsed just hours ago.
Her fingers twitched at her sides, phantom dust still coating her skin despite the vigorous scrubbing she’d given her hands in the washroom.
Her leg burned where the shrapnel had carved through muscle and sinew, each shift of weight sending ripples of pain through the wound despite the healing she received.
“Apprentices: Jax. Renna. Lily. Syrena. Helana.” Florence recited each name like items on an inventory list, her fingertip pausing above the corresponding darkened vial as she spoke. “And Meriel, from the navel team.”
Elora couldn’t look away from Lily’s vial.
The memory surfaced unbidden—Lily beside her at The Institute, their shoulders nearly touching as they measured reagents into glass beakers, Professors looming over them.
Even when his critical eye had focused on their work, Lily’s fingers never trembled, not once.
Those precise, confident hands now lay motionless, crushed under debris or stretched out on some sterile Empire table, just another nameless casualty to be documented and discarded.
The other vials—about a dozen of them—pulsed with varying colors. Yellow for the injured, their essence weakened but holding. Red for critical, hovering at the threshold. Symond’s vial glowed a deep crimson, the liquid inside sluggish and dark.
“This is why we monitor health,” Florence said calmly, her voice cutting through Elora’s thoughts. “Without it, we’d be blind right now.”
Elora didn’t respond.
Florence stalked around the table, her boots ghosting across the immaculate floor.
Her leather uniform remained immaculate—no dust, no blood, not even a single hair escaped her tight braid.
She stood before them untouched, as though the chaos they’d fled had parted around her, recognizing something in her that commanded even destruction’s respect.
“Whoever orchestrated this had two clear objectives,” Florence continued, her tone unchanged, as if discussing crop yields or supply routes. “First, kill as many bystanders as possible—the parents, the villagers who came to listen. Second, capture specific targets.”
The beast stirred beneath Elora’s skin, a low growl building in her chest that she forced down with practiced control.
“Capture?” Someone asked.
Florence nodded once. “The stage blew first. That’s where they wanted specific people—Symond, Renna, and the speakers. The second explosion came moments later, designed to kill everyone else. Maximum casualties with minimal Empire risk.”
“Who would do this?” Violette asked, her voice tight with restrained fury.
She stood near the door, arms crossed over her chest, the muscles in her jaw visibly clenching.
The dried blood on her sleeves had gone rust-brown at the edges but remained crimson at the center, still tacky where she’d cradled the apprentice’s head against her body during the desperate sprint to the sickbeds.
Florence turned, her blue eyes cold as winter ice. “The Empire benefits most from this. They must have discovered that some of the apprentices survived the pirate raid. They pose a threat. They know too much about the Empire’s processes and procedures.”
Violette pushed away from the wall, her steps punctuated as she approached Symond’s vial. “If they’re eliminating witnesses, why is he still alive?” She tapped the crimson glass, her fingernail making a sharp click. “His signal’s weak, but there. They could have killed him instantly.”
“They will keep him alive, for now.” Florence answered without hesitation. The certainty in her voice left no room for doubt. She looked directly at Elora now. “They’ll extract every piece of information they can before they dispose of him.”
“Then The Hive is compromised,” Elora said, the realization settling cold in her chest. “If they get him to talk—”
“Hardly.” Florence cut her off with a dismissive wave.
Elora pressed. “The Hive isn’t invisible. If someone is taken and forced to talk—”
“They won’t get what they need,” Florence said, her shoulders squared, chin slightly raised. “Knowing how to reach us is not the same as knowing how we function.”
Elora folded her arms. “Symond knows the way back here.”
“Yes,” Florence agreed. “And so do dozens of others. That hasn’t changed in years.”
Elora frowned. “Then why aren’t you concerned?”
“I am,” she said. “Just not panicked.”
Florence’s fingertips traced the wall where hairline fractures in the wall caught the light, pulsing faintly blue white with each heartbeat.
Elora squinted, finally seeing what had been there all along: delicate patterns like frost on a winter window, branching and connecting in geometric precision.
When Florence’s hand passed over one intersection, the light dimmed momentarily, as if retreating from her touch, then flared slightly brighter after she moved on.
“This estate has contingencies,” Florence continued. “Alarm wards. Delay fields. Escape routes layered into the surrounding district. If someone leads an enemy here, we gain time. Time to move people. Time to secure what matters.”
“And if they torture him?” Elora asked.
“Torture doesn’t automatically produce usefulness either.”
Violette’s jaw tightened. “So, you’re betting they won’t break him.”
“I’m betting that what they want isn’t something Symond possesses,” Florence replied. “He knows lessons, not logistics. Theory, not structure.”
Elora’s voice dropped. “You’re saying this was always a possibility.”
Florence nodded once. “We operate in contested territory. People are captured. People disappear. That risk existed long before the apprentices took their first steps through our gates.”
Silence settled, heavier now.
“And if they decide Symond isn’t useful anymore?” Violette asked.
Florence’s eyes flicked to the vial again, the faint pulse still there. “You know the answer.”
Rell spoke up from the back corner where he had been silently observing everything. “Now that we’ve completed the ‘Why Not to Panic When Everything’s Gone to Hell’ seminar, could we perhaps graduate to the part where we actually do something about it?”
“Yes, we need all hands available to care for the injured,” Florence announced, turning to Elora and the small group of apprentices who had gathered around the monitoring device. “Help Evryn in the infirmary. She’ll direct you to those who need immediate attention.”
The apprentices nodded, their faces pale and drawn as they filed out of the room. Elora remained rooted in place, watching as the last of them disappeared through the doorway.
“I should stay,” she said, her voice cutting through the grinding hum. “The others are better healers than I am.”
Florence’s eyebrow arched a fraction of an inch before her face resumed its mask of composure. “The Hive will handle this matter internally, Elora. Your involvement isn’t—”
“Symond knows our location,” Elora said, her words quiet but firm. “The Empire has him. That makes this everyone’s concern, including mine. I need to hear what happens next.”
Florence’s gaze sharpened, assessing her with those cold blue eyes that looked too much like a reflection of what Elora’s had once been.
“Fine,” Florence said finally, her lips curving into something not quite a smile. She gestured toward the door with a sweep of her arm. “My office. Now.”
Rell’s eyebrows shot up as he bit back words, his mouth tightening into that familiar half-grimace.
He adjusted his collar and fell in behind Florence, boots clicking against the floor.
Violette’s shoulders squared as she matched stride beside them, her jaw set like granite.
Five mercenaries—leather-clad, weapons glinting at their hips—followed them out and fell into formation.
The hair at the nape of Elora’s neck stood on end.
Florence’s office door swung open, revealing a space dominated by a massive table.
It consumed the room, its polished surface alive with blues and greens and browns.
Tiny ink buildings no larger than her fingernail cast microscopic shadows across paper streets.
Red dots clustered at crossroads, blue lines traced beneath city blocks, and gold stars marked positions Elora couldn’t identify.
The mercenaries spread around the table’s perimeter, their shadows stretching across the inked landscape. Florence circled to the far side.
“The Empire believes they have the advantage,” Florence said.
“They think that by taking one of ours, they gain access to everything—our location, our numbers, our plans.” Her hand disappeared into a pocket within the table Elora couldn’t see, emerging with a simple wooden spool, its center hollow where thread should have been.
“But they’re wrong.”
With a flick of her wrist, Florence tossed the spool onto the map. It landed with a soft tap over Aszona.
The spool began to move.
Elora stared as it rolled across the map with deliberate purpose, as if pulled by an invisible hand. It accelerated as it neared the northern section, its rhythm faltering before steadying again and coming to an abrupt stop over the Red District.
“There,” Florence said, tapping her finger beside the wooden spool. “Symond is somewhere in this area. Within half a mile, at most.”
Elora glanced around the table, waiting for someone to look surprised, disturbed, anything.
But the mercenaries nodded in unison, exchanging knowing glances.
Rell’s expression remained unchanged, as if watching a piece of wood find a missing person was perfectly ordinary.
Even Violette merely crossed her arms, her eyes narrowing at the location rather than the method.