Page 33 of Zenith Tower

We took the stairs without running. At the top, Hale stood beside the records attendant, still holding Kieran’s medication order. They were arguing over whether it superseded the infirmary instructions. Her attention remained on him while Caspian and I passed the junction.

Hale joined us near our corridor.

“Did you find it?” he asked.

“Sadie’s file, yes.”

His gaze sharpened. “And your mother’s?”

“Missing.”

Kieran was awake when we returned. He had moved from the bed to the chair and wrapped himself in a blanket rather than admit the room was cold. His gaze went first to my empty hands.

“You left it there,” he said.

“I couldn’t risk taking it.”

“Good.”

Caspian closed the door behind us. Hale took the other chair, leaving me the edge of the bed.

I told them how Sadie’s language changed from a name tosubject. I told them there was no outcome, only review left pending without a date. Then I repeated the cross-reference exactly as it had appeared.

Partial correlation with prior case S. Verita.

Kieran pulled the blanket tighter around his shoulders. Hale had gone completely still.

“They had a file on your mother,” Caspian said.

“They had one.”

“And now?” Kieran asked.

I looked at the three of them.

“Now there’s an empty space where it should be.”

Jonah

The second review of the week began with questions the panel had already asked.

They wanted the date of Astra and Caspian’s bond, the first appearance of Kieran’s line, and every change in his condition since the collapse. They asked Astra whether the third line at her wrist had altered. They asked me when I had last allowed my Mark to surface without suppression.

I gave them the same answer I had given before.

“At Zenith Hall, when the Tower summons appeared.”

The reader at the center of the table turned to a fresh page.

The chamber was arranged differently this time. Kieran sat nearest Marrow, with Astra and Caspian beyond him. My chair had been placed apart from theirs, close to the door.

“Your private record describes an accelerating decline,” the reader said to Kieran. “Do you dispute the independent measurements?”

Kieran sat with his right arm supported against his body. He had recovered enough color to make the effort of being there less obvious, though not enough to hide it from me.

“I dispute your use of the word independent,” he said. “Marrow chose the readers, took the copy, and decided which older case mine should be compared with.”

Marrow stood against the wall behind the panel. His face did not change.