They came for her at dawn, two Stonewardens in polished grav-steel armor, their faces impassive behind enchanted visors. They found her in her sparse cell in the Novitiate quarters, not packing, but waiting. She had nothing she wanted to take from her old life.
The walk through the waking city was a procession of shame. Whispers trailed her like ghosts. "Expunged." "Saboteur." "Rust-touch." The gleaming streets, the floating gardens, the spires that caught the morning sun—all of it was no longer hers.
They took her not to a prison, but to the Edge. The lowest commercial docking platform of Skyreach, where trade skiffs from ground-bound settlements unloaded ore and fungal matter. Here, the air was thick with the smell of soil, rain, and industry. The great, mist-shrouded expanse of the world below stretched out, a rumpled green and gray blanket—the Rotting World, her teachers had called it. A place of forgotten ruin and danger.
Master Arcturus was there, his robes pristine amidst the grime. He held a simple, lead-lined case.
"Your core remains," he said, his voice devoid of its former pedagogical warmth. It was merely administrative now. "To leave an Expunged with active magic is a risk. But the Convocation is not without mercy. A Suppressor." He opened the case. Inside, on velvet, lay a bracelet of dull, grey alloy. It looked dead. "It will dampen your affinity, contain your… proclivities. You will be a null-signature. You will wear it, or you will be rendered inert by force."
The finality of it stole her breath. To be cut off from magic entirely, even her flawed, dangerous magic? It was a living death. But the alternative—being magically neutered, her core shattered—was worse.
With fingers that trembled only slightly, she took the bracelet. The metal was cold, corpse-cold. As she clasped it around her wrist, a terrible numbness washed through her. It was like going deaf and blind in a sense she'd always possessed. The vibrant, if chaotic, hum of her own power was silenced. The distant pulse of the city's ley-lines vanished. She was locked in a shell of quiet flesh.
Arcturus nodded, a transaction complete. "A skiff will take you down to Fallow's Reach, a groundling settlement. They have been informed. You will be their problem now."
He turned and left, without another word.
Lyra stood at the precipice, the wind plucking at her plain clothes. The Suppressor was a cage around her soul.
"Don't look so defeated, Songbird. It's an ugly accessory."
Elara emerged from behind a stack of cargo crates, dressed in rugged travel leathers, a heavy pack on her back. In her hands, she carried two things: Lyra's own small satchel, packed, and a curious, multi-tooled implement of brass and black iron.
"Elara? What are you—?"
"Resigning," Elara said cheerfully, tossing Lyra her satchel. "Turns out constantly saving this crumbling city from its own arrogant architects gets tiresome. Also, I borrowed some things from the Deep Archives. Maps. Stories about where the old God-Engine might have been entombed." She grinned, a flash of white in her smudged face. "Thought you might want a guide to the Rotting World. Since you've got a booking on the next descent."
Lyra stared, hope a fragile, dangerous bird in her chest. "The Suppressor… I can't even light a spark."
Elara held up the brass-and-iron tool. It had prongs, clasps, and a series of tiny, intricate dials. "This, my magically stifled friend, is a Keeper's Key. For tuning regulators, bypassing failed mana-conduits… and sometimes, for picking very complicated, very magical locks." She winked. "Your Convocation uses first-principle magic. All will and crystal. Keepers know everything has a physical component. Even a Suppressor. It's a puzzle. And I love puzzles."
The skiff pilot called out, impatient.
Elara's expression softened. "The choice is yours, Lyra. You can go to Fallow's Reach and live a small, quiet, safe life. Or you can come with me, into the ruins of the past, and try to find a song the world has forgotten. A song that might not need a pure voice to sing it, but just… the right key."
Lyra looked at the dead bracelet on her wrist. Then at the vast, unknown world below, veiled in mist and mystery. She thought of the God-Engine's Core, a myth that felt more real than the failing crystal above. She thought of being a problem for the rest of her life.
She took a deep breath of the free, wild air from below.
"How do we start?" she asked.
Elara's grin was brilliant. "First, we take a ride down. Then, we find a quiet spot and see if this old key fits your new lock."
Together, they walked towards the waiting skiff, leaving the fading song of Skyreach behind them, descending into the symphony of rust and rain