Clara woke to the sound of steel scraping against stone.
Her eyes flicked open to find Damien sharpening his blade by the fire. Each drag of metal against rock echoed like thunder in her ears. Evelyn sat across from him, arms crossed tightly, her gaze burning holes into the flames. Zeke lingered at the edge of camp, writing sigils into the dirt with a stick, his expression unreadable.
No one looked at her.
The air was heavy, not with silence but with restraint. It was the kind of tension where words had been spoken, sharp and ugly, and no one wanted to repeat them with her conscious to hear.
Clara pushed herself up, her body trembling, every muscle rebelling. Evelyn was at her side instantly, slipping an arm behind her to steady her.
"Slowly," Evelyn murmured. "You're still weak."
Clara wanted to nod, to thank her, but her gaze kept drifting to Damien's sword. His strokes were too hard, too deliberate. Not sharpening—testing. The kind of rhythm a soldier found when he was deciding if the blade was fit for what came next.
She couldn't stop herself. "You don't trust me."
The words were barely above a whisper, but they silenced the camp. Damien's arm stilled. Zeke's stick paused mid-sigil. Evelyn froze beside her, her grip tightening protectively.
Damien was the first to speak, voice low but unflinching. "Trust is earned. And right now, Clara, you're not the one holding the pen."
Her chest ached, breath catching. "I didn't ask for this tether. I didn't want him inside me."
"No one wants to be a weapon," Damien replied, standing now, looming over her. His sword gleamed faintly in the firelight. "But a weapon doesn't care who it hurts when it's in someone else's hands."
"Enough." Evelyn was on her feet, stepping between them. Her chains rattled faintly at her hip as if echoing her rising anger. "She's not a weapon. She's Clara. And if you can't see that—"
"She's a liability," Damien snapped, his frustration finally breaking through. "I'm not saying we kill her, but we need to prepare for what happens when she breaks again."
Clara's breath hitched. When. Not if.
Her eyes darted to Zeke, desperate for something softer, but his expression was cool, detached. "Damien's not wrong. The Architect's voice won't just fade. The longer she carries it, the more it grows. The question is not whether she'll break—it's whether she'll break when we can afford it."
Clara's stomach twisted, bile rising in her throat. Evelyn turned on them both, her voice sharp. "You speak like she isn't sitting right here. Like she's already gone. She hasn't given up. I won't let her."
Evelyn's words hit her like a lifeline, but Clara couldn't shake the weight of the others' stares. Damien's suspicion. Zeke's calculation. Both were true in their own ways. Evelyn's voice was the only warmth left—and even that felt fragile.
Because in the hollow of her mind, Yurin's whisper still lingered.
They will never see you the same way again. You are my battlefield.
Her fingers clenched the blanket around her shoulders. She wanted to scream, to prove them wrong, but fear lodged itself deep in her chest. What if they were right? What if Evelyn's loyalty was the only thread keeping her tethered, and the moment it frayed, she was nothing but an open door for him?
She stared into the fire, her reflection flickering in the flames. And for a split second, she swore the reflection smiled back.