Aiden decided—very deliberately—that he would do something normal.
Not heroic.
Not clever.
Not useful in a way that came with consequences.
Normal.
He went to the market.
It was a simple enough choice. The city still needed food. Vendors still shouted prices. People still argued over the quality of bread as if bread were the most important thing in the world.
Aiden told himself that was a good sign.
He stood in line for fruit, hands folded, posture relaxed in the way he'd observed other people doing. He even practiced the faint, polite half-smile that suggested he was present but not inviting conversation.
It almost worked.
The woman in front of him glanced back once. Then again. Her eyes lingered—not with fear, not with awe, but with curiosity that had sharpened into something else.
Recognition.
"You're… him," she said quietly.
Aiden blinked. "I'm… sorry?"
A man nearby looked over. Then another. A whisper rippled—not loud enough to be accusation, not soft enough to be nothing.
Wish.
Miracle.
Trouble.
Aiden felt it then—not power, not intent, but the subtle pressure of attention. The city's awareness brushing against him like static.
"I just want apples," he said, attempting lightness.
The vendor hesitated.
Then slowly slid the basket closer—too close. Reverent.
"Take them," the man said. "No charge."
Aiden recoiled. "No—please. I can pay."
The vendor shook his head, eyes shining. "It wouldn't be right."
That was worse.
Aiden left without the apples.
---
Across the city, the turning accelerated.
Sermons grew sharper. Not condemning—concerned. Faith leaders spoke of false hopes and untested wonders. Guild notices warned of "unregistered anomalies" and urged citizens to report irregularities for their own safety.
People argued in the streets.
"Miracles saved us!"
"Miracles caused this mess!"
"Magic is regulated for a reason!"
"So was faith!"
Posters appeared overnight—some hand-painted, some professionally printed.
TRUST STRUCTURE.
QUESTION THE UNSEEN.
ORDER PRECEDES SAFETY.
Someone crossed one out and scrawled beneath it:
ORDER FAILED US.
That poster was gone by morning.
---
Seris felt it tightening like a noose.
She walked with purpose now, not to hide but to observe. The guards watched her openly. Not hostile—yet—but alert, as if waiting for permission to decide she was a problem.
"They're splitting," she told Inkaris later. "Not cleanly. Belief against belief."
"Good," Inkaris replied mildly. "Uniform opinion is brittle."
"That's not comforting."
"It wasn't meant to be."
---
Liora noticed it in smaller ways.
A child tugged at her sleeve and asked if she was an angel.
A priest flinched when she passed.
A group of women stopped talking when she entered a shop—not afraid, but uncertain, as if she belonged to a category they hadn't agreed upon yet.
She touched her chest absently, remembering the cathedral. The shielding. The way corruption had recoiled from her.
"I don't like this," she murmured.
Aiden nodded beside her. "Me neither."
He tried again later—to help carry crates for an old man whose cart had broken.
The cart fixed itself.
Not dramatically. Not magically. Just… the axle slid back into place as if it had never been broken at all.
The old man stared.
Aiden stepped back. "I didn't—"
The man grabbed his hands. "Bless you."
Aiden pulled free, heart racing.
"I don't want this," he whispered.
But the city didn't hear him.
It heard want.
---
By evening, the streets were loud with opinion.
Arguments flared and died. A scuffle broke out near a chapel. Someone threw a stone at a guild office window. Someone else knelt in the square, praying loudly for a sign.
Nothing answered.
That made it worse.
High above, Caelum watched with a thoughtful frown.
"Oh," he murmured. "This is the dangerous part."
Not belief.
Not disbelief.
Expectation.
---
Aiden sat on the rooftop again, head in his hands.
"I didn't do anything," he said quietly.
Seris sat beside him. "That's the problem."
He looked up. "What do you mean?"
"You exist," she said. "In a city that's desperate for meaning. People don't need you to act. They need you to be possible."
Aiden swallowed. "I just wanted to buy fruit."
She smiled sadly. "Welcome to politics."
Below them, voices rose—chanting now, from two different directions.
One calling for miracles.
One calling for control.
Neither cared who got hurt in between.
Aiden closed his eyes.
Normal, he realized, wasn't about what you did.
It was about what the world allowed you to be.
And the city had decided he was no longer allowed to be ordinary.
Not after everything.
Not now.
---
Far away, in a place where velvet curtains muffled the noise of the streets, Varros lifted a glass and listened to the distant unrest like music.
"Ah," he said pleasantly. "There it is."
The city had turned.
And everyone, whether they knew it or not, was already choosing sides.
---