Asha's workshop filled with the perfume of brass dust and lemon oil, the scent of patience and careful hands. Morning had sharpened into a clean, cold light that settled on the palace like a silent verdict. Every tick of the clocks she had brought from home seemed louder here, as if the stones themselves wanted to listen.
She tested a newly cut gear between her fingers, the edge catching just enough to remind her that precision is a kind of faith. Across the room, Kairon watched from the doorway, his coat unbuttoned, the scar on his palm pale as old parchment.
"You're early," she said without looking up.
"You work better before the palace wakes," he answered. He stepped inside, the sound of his boots soft against the polished floor. "And I wanted to see what silence feels like with you in it."
The words slid through the room like a secret. Asha tightened a screw, refusing to give him the smile that threatened. "Silence doesn't need witnesses."
"Maybe not," he said, closer now. "But it remembers."
The door creaked again—this time a thin man in council livery bowed low, his voice a nervous tremor. "Regent, the east corridor has flooded from last night's storm. The engineers request your presence."
Kairon's shoulders stiffened. Asha caught it in the corner of her eye: the smallest inhale that belonged more to memory than to duty.
"I'll come," he said, clipped and cool. "Tell them to hold the perimeter."
When the messenger left, Asha turned to him fully. "What is in that corridor?"
His gaze met hers, dark and deliberate. "A history we can't afford to repeat."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I have while keeping you safe." His voice softened on the last word, as if he'd meant to say something else.
She wiped a line of brass dust from her wrist. "You think I need protection from the past?"
"I think the past still believes it owns you," he said.
Later, she followed the sound of distant water through stone halls that smelled of rain and candle wax. Guards let her pass only after a long, silent glance at the Regent's seal on her sleeve.
The east corridor breathed a damp chill. Moonlight from broken panes painted silver scars on the floor. Water lapped at the edges like a patient animal. At the far end, a heavy door stood locked with three bars of different metals—iron, brass, and a darker alloy she didn't recognize.
Asha reached out. The air before the door pulsed faintly, as if it had a heartbeat.
"You shouldn't be here."
Kairon's voice came from the shadows behind her. He had followed without a sound. His eyes held not anger but a careful fear.
"Tell me why," she said.
"Because once a door like this knows your name," he said quietly, "it never forgets."
She traced the cold brass of the lock, feeling the faint hum inside. A clockmaker knows when something mechanical is more than steel. This door was listening.
Kairon stepped close enough that the warmth of his coat brushed the back of her sleeve. "Asha. Leave it for now."
She turned, the distance between them a breath. "For now," she agreed, though her mind was already sketching the lock's design.
That night the palace windows glowed like low stars. Asha lay awake in her chamber, the ring warm against her skin. Somewhere in the east wing, water dripped with a rhythm too precise to be accident. She counted each drop until it became a second heartbeat.
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