They moved the sanctum.
Not stone by stone, but meaning by meaning.
Mara stood at the center of the ritual circle as Cael and the glyph-reader reconfigured the anchoring symbols, rewriting what the Hidden Sanctum was rather than where it stood. Around them, the web pulsed, its threads taut as harp strings stretched to breaking.
"The Marked Ones are advancing from three directions," the scholar reported, eyes unfocused as he read the Memory Shard's projections. "They're not marching openly. They're collapsing history behind them. Entire paths are being erased."
"They're pruning reality," Cael muttered. "Cutting off retreat."
Mara nodded. "Which means they believe they already know the ending."
The relocation completed with a shudder. The sanctum slid—not through space, but through reference—anchoring itself in the narrow margin between remembrance and silence. A place that could not be erased without contradiction.
For a moment, they breathed.
Then the web screamed.
Mara doubled over as one thread twisted violently, turning in on itself. Not cut. Reversed.
"Someone's pulling from inside," she gasped.
The silent Vestige turned sharply. "That's not fear. That's intent."
The scholar suddenly cried out, clutching his head. "I—I remember something I shouldn't. A future. A version of this where we lose."
Cael's eyes narrowed. "The Marked Ones promised him survival."
The words hung heavy.
The scholar looked up, tears streaking his face. "They showed me a world where memory stabilizes—without gods, without you. A clean solution. No sacrifice. No loss."
Mara met his gaze gently. "And did they show you what it costs?"
He hesitated.
That was answer enough.
"They're using you as a relay," Cael said grimly. "If they invert your thread, they can trace us—collapse the margin."
"I didn't mean to," the scholar whispered. "I just wanted it to stop hurting."
Mara stepped forward, placing a hand over his. "I know."
The web shuddered again.
"They're close," the Vestige warned. "Minutes."
Cael raised his staff. "We sever the thread. Now."
The scholar went pale. "That will kill me."
Mara shook her head. "Not if I carry it."
Cael froze. "Mara—"
"If they're tracing through him," she said, "then I become the path. I'll take the inversion into myself."
"That could fracture your continuity," the Vestige said softly. "You might not come back."
Mara smiled faintly. "I already don't fully exist."
She closed her eyes and opened herself to the web.
The inversion struck like ice—memories folding backward, intent curdling into doubt. She saw the promised future: a world quiet, efficient, empty of wonder. No gods. No echoes. No loss—because nothing mattered enough to lose.
She rejected it.
With a cry that echoed across silence itself, Mara absorbed the inversion, severing the Marked Ones' trace. The scholar collapsed, unconscious but alive.
The margin stabilized.
But something inside Mara cracked.
The Vestige caught her as she fell. "What did you lose?"
Mara stared at her trembling hands. "My name," she whispered.
Cael went still. "You remember who you are."
"I remember my role," Mara said. "But the sound of my name… it's gone."
The web quieted, uneasy.
Far away, the Marked Ones reeled as their path vanished.
"She broke the trace," one snarled. "How?"
Another answered coldly, "Because she's no longer anchored to herself."
Mara forced herself upright, voice steady despite the hollowness inside. "This won't be the last betrayal," she said. "Fear makes traitors of us all."
She looked at each of them in turn. "But the web survives only if we do."
Outside the margin, the Marked Ones began to turn on one another—accusations flaring, unity fracturing under failure.
The hunt had begun.
And Mara, nameless now, stood at its center—more bridge than human, more story than self.