The Marquis did not raise his voice.
He didn't need to.
"An anomaly," Dorian Veyrn repeated, tasting the word like a vintage he might purchase or poison. He sat behind a lacquered desk that belonged to three dead men and one living empire. The room around him was warm, expensive, and quiet—quiet the way a knife was quiet before it entered flesh.
Across from him, a crestwright in grey robes kept his hands folded to hide their tremor.
"She saw—" the crestwright began.
Dorian's fingers tapped once on the desk. Not impatient. Exact.
"She perceived," Dorian corrected, as if language was law. "Systems do not tolerate perception from subjects. That is reserved for administrators."
The crestwright swallowed. "Her soul-signature—something misaligned. The brand accepted, but the interface… surfaced."
Dorian's smile was thin as thread. "And my Hound?"
The crestwright hesitated just long enough to be guilty.
"Hound Raithe intervened," he admitted. "He removed the guard. He spoke to her privately."
Dorian leaned back, relaxed in a way that made fear feel childish. "Kael is trained. He knows what he is allowed to feel."
"Still," the crestwright murmured, "if she's a glitch—"
"If she's a glitch," Dorian cut in, "she's a door."
He stood and crossed to the window. Lantern District burned below, a sea of silk and sin. People laughed. People bought each other. People pretended the Dominion wasn't built on crests and quiet screaming.
Dorian placed his palm on the glass as if blessing the city.
"Send a retrieval order," he said softly. "Not public. Not loud. I want her intact."
"Yes, my lord."
Dorian's eyes narrowed. "And send an observer to Hound Raithe."
The crestwright frowned. "To monitor him?"
Dorian's voice warmed. "To understand him."
He turned back toward the room, and his smile finally showed teeth.
"Mercy is not a flaw," Dorian said. "It's a handle."
Kael didn't take Astra out through the front door.
He took her through the back of the building, down a service corridor that stank of spilled perfume and old fear. He moved like a man who'd lived his whole life under invisible crosshairs—fast, quiet, refusing to look over his shoulder because he didn't believe in comfort.
Astra followed half a step behind him.
Her throat still burned from the crest's punishment. Each pulse reminded her that the Dominion wasn't a place you stood in. It was a machine you survived by learning where the gears bit.
Kael glanced back once, catching the way her hand hovered near her neck.
"Don't touch it," he said.
Astra's laugh came out rough. "Is that advice… or an order?"
His jaw tightened. "Advice."
"Then I'll consider it." She lowered her hand anyway, because the pain was loud and she needed quiet.
They emerged into the Lantern District's underside—narrow alleys threaded between grand brothels and velvet clubs, where the lanterns were dimmer and the smiles had fewer teeth. Above them, music drifted from balconies. Below them, drains carried secrets away.
Kael kept them in shadow.
Astra forced her breathing calm and let her eyes do what her body could not.
The interface hovered faintly in her vision, like a second world layered over this one. It didn't feel magical. It felt bureaucratic—cold, certain, hungry.
At the edge of her sight:
STATUS
A thin line underneath crawled forward.
TRACE: 1.1%
Astra's stomach twisted.
It rose when she looked.
It rose when she resisted.
It rose when she survived.
Kael slowed at a corner and pressed his palm to the stone wall. The motion looked casual. It wasn't. He was listening through the city like it was a living thing.
Then he turned sharply, guiding her into a recessed doorway.
Astra's shoulder brushed his chest.
Heat sparked, uninvited—danger mixing with the simple fact that he was warm and she was not. His coat smelled of leather, steel, and something clean that didn't belong in Lantern District.
Kael's eyes flicked to her mouth and away again, like looking was a sin he refused to indulge twice.
"You're bleeding," he said.
Astra swallowed. "I'm branded."
"Yes," Kael replied flatly. "And you're bleeding."
His hand lifted—slow, controlled—hovered near her throat without touching. Waiting.
Permission offered, like before.
Astra's pulse jumped hard enough to hurt. She tilted her chin up a fraction.
"That's not an order," she whispered.
His gaze locked on hers. "No."
Astra exhaled once, then nodded—small, deliberate. Consent made sharp.
Kael touched the edge of the sigil with two fingers, barely grazing skin. The contact sent a shock through her, not sexual—intimate. The kind of closeness that made you want to either bite or beg.
His fingers were careful. Too careful for a man trained to break people.
"I need to get you somewhere quiet," he murmured. "Somewhere with wards."
"So you can hide me," Astra said.
"So they can't find you," Kael corrected.
Astra's smile turned bitter. "Who's 'they' today? The Marquis? The Church? The Guild? Or just anyone who wants to see if I scream prettily?"
Kael's fingers paused for half a heartbeat.
Then he withdrew, fists curling as if he'd touched something dangerous and liked it too much.
"Keep moving," he said.
Astra followed—because she had no better plan, and because the look in his eyes said he was already counting how many bodies he'd have to leave behind.
They crossed a small square where lanternlight spilled like honey. Courtesans watched from a balcony, draped in silk and boredom. A pair of men in expensive coats argued over a contract like it was romance. A child ran past with a tray of sweet buns, and Astra's hunger flared—physical, humiliating.
Kael didn't look at the child.
But when the child passed, Kael's hand flicked, and a coin landed in the tray with a soft clink.
Astra saw it.
He saw her see it.
The moment hung between them—proof that he wasn't only what the Dominion had trained him to be.
Astra's throat sigil pulsed, as if offended by tenderness.
Her vision flickered.
A pane slid open like a blade drawn quietly from a sheath.
RULESET (VIEW ONLY)— Subject must obey authorized commands.— Unauthorized resistance increases TRACE.— Anomaly behaviors trigger audit.
Audit.
Astra's skin went cold.
"Kael," she said softly.
He didn't answer, but his shoulders tightened, acknowledging the tone—the way she said his name like a lever being tested.
"I'm being audited," she murmured.
Kael's eyes sharpened. "How do you know that."
Astra almost smiled. Not because it was funny—because it was useful.
"You said I shouldn't be able to see things," she replied. "Yet here we are."
Kael's gaze flicked over the square, scanning faces, doorways, reflections. His voice dropped low.
"Then stop looking."
Astra's breath caught. "You think it watches when I watch."
"I know it does," Kael said.
His certainty sent a chill through her that pain couldn't touch.
They turned into a side street lined with velvet curtains and discreet guards. Kael headed toward a plain door set into stone—too plain for the district. Too quiet.
He reached for the handle—
—and the street behind them changed.
It wasn't a sound. It was the way air moved when predators arrived.
Kael froze.
Astra felt it too, that instinctive tightening in the chest when the world tilts toward violence.
Footsteps. Measured. Not drunk. Not rushed. Coordinated.
Kael's hand slid to his belt—no dramatic draw, just readiness.
"Stay behind me," he said.
Astra's mouth curved. "That sounds like an order."
"It is," Kael answered.
Astra didn't argue. Not because she liked obedience—because the tone in his voice promised consequences for anyone who tried to reach her first.
Three men emerged from the lantern haze. Not district guards. Not buyers.
Crestwright Guild.
Their robes were grey, but their crests gleamed too brightly—freshly tuned. Their eyes were clinical in a way lust never was.
One stepped forward, hands open to appear harmless. "Hound Raithe."
Kael didn't move. "Guild."
"We're here for the branded subject," the man said calmly. "A transfer. Official audit."
Astra's throat sigil flared, hot as warning.
Her interface pulsed.
TRACE: 1.6%
Kael's gaze stayed on the Guild men. "Show me the seal."
The man smiled and produced a wax tag stamped with a crest. Not House Veyrn. Not Church. Something else—an emblem Astra didn't recognize, but her gut hated anyway.
Kael's eyes narrowed. "That seal isn't yours."
"It's an emergency authorization," the man replied. "Given the anomaly report. You understand."
Kael's voice went flat. "I understand you're lying."
The Guild man's smile thinned. "We don't need your permission, Hound. The subject is property of the Dominion."
Astra's stomach flipped at the word property. Heat and rage braided together. Her body wanted to move. Her throat crest wanted her still.
Kael stepped forward—one pace, just enough to become a wall.
"She's under my custody," he said.
The Guild man sighed, like disappointed professionalism. "Then you'll come with her."
The other two men shifted slightly, spreading. A net being cast.
Kael's hand rose—not to draw a weapon, but to adjust his cuff.
His military crest variant glimmered.
Astra felt it more than saw it. Authority pressing outward. A scent of command in the air.
"Back away," Kael said.
The Guild men did not move.
Astra's throat crest pulsed like a heartbeat speeding up.
Her interface flared and, for a split second, she saw something new:
GHOST COMMAND: EMPTY SLOTCONDITION: AUTHORIZED VOICE / REGISTERED ORDER
Astra's breath stuttered.
Authorized voice.
Registered order.
Kael's voice could qualify.
Astra's mind raced, fast and cruel. If the system could store a command—
A Guild man stepped closer, hand lifting as if to grab Astra's chain.
Kael moved like a blade freed from sheath.
His elbow smashed into the man's throat. The Guild man choked, stumbling back. Kael pivoted and drove a knee into the second man's ribs before the man could even raise his hands.
Violence didn't look like anger in Kael.
It looked like efficiency.
The third Guild man lunged for Astra.
Astra's throat sigil burned, trying to clamp her in place. Her body locked—half a second of forced stillness.
The man's fingers brushed her chain—
—and Kael's voice snapped through the alley like a whip.
"Stop."
Astra's interface flashed so bright it almost hurt.
GHOST COMMAND: CAPTUREDSTORED ORDER: STOPSOURCE: KAEL RAITHE (AUTHORIZED)
The Guild man froze mid-reach.
Not because he chose to.
Because his own crest recognized authority and obeyed.
His eyes widened with shock and fury as his muscles locked. His mouth opened, trying to speak around the compulsion.
Astra stared at him, pulse roaring. The system had listened. The system had saved the word.
Kael didn't waste the opening. He slammed the man's head into the stone wall—hard enough to drop him without killing.
Two Guild men lay groaning. The third sagged, stunned, eyes unfocused.
Kael grabbed Astra's wrist—not painful, just unbreakable—and yanked her toward the plain door.
"Inside," he said.
Astra moved.
Because for the first time since the chain touched her throat, she'd seen a crack that wasn't just hope.
It was function.
They slipped into the building. Kael slammed the door and threw a bar across it. Then his palm pressed against a sigil etched into the stone.
A ward flared faintly, a whisper of light.
Outside, the Guild men cursed.
Inside, the air changed. Cleaner. Quieter. Like a room that didn't want to be found.
Kael turned to Astra, breathing hard but controlled. His eyes dropped to her wrist where he'd grabbed her, then released as if touch might contaminate him.
"You did something," he said.
Astra's throat still burned, but now thrill laced the pain.
"I listened," she replied.
Kael's gaze sharpened. "No. You—" He stopped, jaw flexing, choosing words like a man picking a lock without tools. "When I said stop… he froze."
Astra swallowed. The interface hovered, faint again, but she could still feel the stored command sitting somewhere in her system like a hidden blade.
Kael stepped closer.
The space between them narrowed until Astra felt the heat of him again. The room was small. The silence was thick.
"You're not just seeing," Kael said quietly. "You're interacting."
Astra tilted her chin. "I didn't write anything."
"Still," Kael murmured. "The system responded to you."
He lifted his hand again, hovering near her throat like earlier. Waiting.
Astra's heart thudded hard against her ribs. She wanted him to touch. She wanted him to not touch. Both feelings were power, and she hated that he could pull them out of her with nothing but restraint.
"You keep asking like a gentleman," Astra whispered. "Does that make it easier to live with yourself?"
Kael's eyes flashed—annoyance, hunger, something darker.
"Does it make it easier for you to survive me?" he shot back.
Astra's breath caught. The question landed like an intimate threat.
She lifted her hands slowly—palms up, close to his chest without contact.
"It makes it easier to choose," she said.
Kael went still.
Then, carefully, he touched her throat again—two fingers, gentle as a lie. He traced the edge of the fresh sigil, and Astra shivered despite herself.
"Tell me what you saw," he said.
Astra's voice dropped low. "A Ghost Command slot. Empty. It wanted an authorized voice."
Kael's fingers paused. "And it took mine."
Astra smiled, slow. "It did."
Kael's gaze lifted to hers, and the air between them tightened until it felt like a wire. A bargain waiting to be spoken.
"You understand what that means," he murmured.
Astra's smile turned sharp. "It means the collar obeys you."
Kael's eyes darkened. "It means the collar can impersonate me."
Astra's pulse jumped.
Impersonate.
Not just store.
Not just delay punishment.
It could replicate authority—once.
Astra's interface flickered again, as if pleased by their realization.
GHOST COMMAND: ARMED (1)RELEASE CONDITION: TARGET CREST RECEIVES MATCHING ORDER