Chapter 15. Marked Again

After the council’s doors finally clanged shut behind them, she discovered that her temporary freedom had evaporated like mist at dawn, and once again she found herself confined within the tower’s narrow chamber. The door before her was a slab of cold iron, locked solidly from the outside, and the single, narrow window high above was barred with steel so finely carved it gleamed as if it still held a sliver of sunlight in its metal veins.

A faint whisper of dust and the distant drip of water were the only sounds in the room, and she set off pacing in restless arcs until the soft pads of her bare feet ached against the worn stone floor. Every step reminded her of the runes beneath her skin, those delicate lines of power that had cracked and fanned her pulse into a furious beat.

“Two marks,” she murmured to herself, the phrase settling in her mind like a persistent echo.

There it was again, the whispered mantra in every quiet moment, a haunting reminder of the magic