Page 125 of Zenith Tower

“My father was persuasive.”

That explained the older grief I had felt move through him earlier, tangled with anger and something warmer he had not yet been ready to name.

The stewards followed us to his door. One remained outside while the other inspected the room, looked beneath the bed, and checked the narrow false window before leaving.

“One hour,” he said.

The door closed.

Caspian waited until the steward’s shadow settled across the gap beneath it.

“The Council is sending an enforcer to take command of our review,” he said quietly. “Walkin can override the administrator, authorize containment, and petition for emergency severance.”

My wrist burned beneath his hand.

“When?”

“Less than a week. The east rooms are already being prepared.”

“Marrow knew.”

“He filed the report that gave them cause.” Caspian’s mouth hardened. “The rescue. Kieran’s restored Mark. Hale’s bond. Walkin is coming because the third line closed.”

I looked down at my wrist.

Three completed lines crossed the inside of it: silver, green-gold, and rain-dark. The new reach ended in my hands. I still did not know how to use it.

“They told your father all of that?”

“The administrator told both of us. She said Walkin will treat the four of us as one mechanism.”

“Meaning they’ll hurt you to control me.”

“Yes.”

He did not soften it. I loved him for that and hated the truth anyway.

I crossed to the false window. Silver light climbed the wall without ever becoming daylight. Through the stone came the low rush of water and, beneath it, the faint scrape of a steward shifting outside the door.

“My mother must have known,” I said. “Not Walkin. This part. Why the Council was afraid of three bonds.”

“She may have.”

“And she still never told me I had a Mark.”

Caspian came to stand behind me, close but not touching.

“She kept you outside their reach for nineteen years.”

“She also left me helpless when Linden arrived.”

“She may have believed hiding it was the only way to keep you safe. That doesn’t mean she was right.”

I turned.

His father’s visit still showed in him. Not in his posture; that had returned to its usual control. The bond carried what his face did not: anger worn thin by relief, affection complicated by an older hurt.

“What happened with Magnus?”