28. The Veilweaver
The Veilweaver
Recovered from within a folded tunic, slipped beneath a ceremonial sash. Written in the Prismatum cipher, its angular loops and mirrored glyphs disguised it as a devotional prayer.
Auryn translated it with shaking fingers.
From: M. F.
Date: 15th Day of the Cycle of Dark
To the Sokar, if these words reach you unscathed—
It has been four years since your breath broke the Ninth Lattice. Four years since the temples in the Commons first lit their lanterns in your name. Four years since the Companions began to whisper behind their veils and the Council learned how far your mercy could reach.
I remember the day you signed the Writ. The ink had barely dried when the city began to shift.
Slowly. Reluctantly. But it shifted. The Commons still speaks of that morning like myth: the Sokar who turned her gaze downward, who wrote a blessing in a language the gods had forgotten.
For a time, they believed you could save them.
Now, they watch you burn for it.
We all watch you burn.
In temples, praying for the sick. Holding their hands. Praying even as they scream obscenities and claw at their skin in madness.
In processions, you stop and let the People pray for you. Touch the hem of your gown. Kiss the cobblestones at your feet.
We have never known one like you.
One so determined.
One so foolish.
One so beloved. One so reviled.
You tasked me with retrieval of information, and I repay the favor you have done to save my son’s life with this missive.
If it was not for your Decree of First Breath—fleeting as it was before the Council unmade it—he would have been Repurposed at birth.
Now, he wears a Batcher. He has a Role. A chance.
For that, I will always be grateful. For that, I will lay down my life for your cause.
There are whispers in the Commons I can no longer ignore for fear of their weight.
They speak of a place beneath the city. Older than the Veinroads and far more dangerous. A forgotten nervework carved into the marrow of Krystopolis before the Lattices rose. Some claim it predates even the Shields.
They call this network the Cataclyss.
I know the name sounds like myth. It is not. Not anymore.
Over the last three Cycles, I have followed a thread of rumor through the Han District—old market tongues, forgotten pipeworks, Selenite porters too drunk to guard their speech. I found markings. Runes etched into the stone where no footsteps should reach. I found footprints where no gates exist.
Something moves beneath us, Sokar.
A second city, hidden in the bones of the first and growing like roots into the earth. It breathes in silence. It speaks in tradesong and whispers. It belongs to those who do not belong. Solutus. Dissidents. Children of no Batcher. The hungry. The cast aside. They follow you.
The Soundings ring with prayer to the Child of the Void. Even here, where your name is rarely spoken aloud, they call you Our Star Below.
But they are not alone.
These veins are claimed, and not by Solutus alone. Others make their home here. Taller. Leaner. Feathered.
I write this in haste because I believe they are using the Cataclyss to bypass the Shield perimeter entirely.
They call themselves Gliders.
Their colossal wings are adorned with beads and charms. They carry long weapons with blade-tips sharp enough to slice living stone.
I spoke with a Selen Temple healer whose colleague vanished in the Flowe and returned days later—raving about wings in the dark.
She said they flew without sound. That they bled grey blood and left no bones.
The whispers say they hunt alone, but when they gather, it is for bounty, glory, legend. And that they have marked you.
The Commons still speak of the day you signed the Writ. Some say the sky cracked when your ink met parchment. Others say the Lanterns burned brighter, that for one breathless moment, the city paused. They remember. But now, they speak of you differently.
In the Selen sanctuaries, the healers call you Star of Mercy. In Han, the artisans murmur Weaver of the Ninth Light. In the Prismatum, no one speaks your name aloud. Only your shadow.
But below?
They call you the Veilweaver.
They whisper it in the stone-veined dark. Etch it in Polis and crystal. Carve it into altar ash and Lustrals, thinking just its presence will create a miracle. The name moves in silence and rebellion, in fever and prayer.
You are seen.
You are feared.
You are theirs now.
My favor is complete.
My debt is paid.
I will go silent after this message.
If I write again, it will be from the dark.
May the Destroyer and the Void keep you.
— M. F.