The morning after the apprentice's capture felt thinner somehow. The air trembled with a quiet hum, too soft to hear yet impossible to ignore. Light bent strangely through the mist; even the lanterns swayed though no wind touched them.
Wenrel noticed it first when his tea rippled, concentric circles pulsing to a rhythm that wasn't his heartbeat.
Elaris entered, silent as always, and set a crystal case on the table. Inside, a single feather of pale quartz shivered with the same unseen pulse.
"It started an hour ago," she said. "Every instrument in Jorveth's tower began echoing this tone. The lattice is humming. It's not random."
Wenrel brushed a finger against the case. The feather chimed softly, a note so pure it felt alive. "Thread feedback?"
She shook her head. "No. It's answering something. Possibly… itself."
Outside, the Glass-Larks had gathered — crystalline birds with wings that fractured sunlight into moving rainbows. They sang in mirrored tones, each trill harmonizing with the hum. When they took flight, the whole terrace shimmered, the air flickering blue like water under moonlight.
Lysara approached from the parapet, cloak drawn close. "They're not just singing," she said. "They're mapping. Look east."
The horizon quivered. Bridges curved where they should have hung straight. Towers leaned in subtle arcs, drawn toward a point just beyond sight. Wenrel focused, and the world sharpened until he saw faint threads converging at impossible angles — a lattice folding over itself in defiance of logic.
Then the Glass-Larks dove as one. The hum deepened, pressing against the ribs.
"Containment," Lysara ordered. "Before it harmonizes with the foundations."
Wenrel closed his eyes. The threads lit up behind his lids — silver veins pulsing in perfect rhythm. He reached carefully, guiding the resonance instead of fighting it. The pattern pushed back, aware and deliberate.
Elaris whispered, "It's an answer."
"To what?"
"To the anchor you marked during the capture. Something's replying."
A sharp crack split the silence. One of the lanterns burst, scattering shards like rain. Wenrel raised his hand; the fragments froze midair, suspended in a thin veil of light.
Then a new voice called from the corridor. "Finally found you."
A woman stepped into view — lean, copper-haired, wearing a half-broken resonator slung over her shoulder. Sera Olyne, the Resonant Cartographer. Her boots still smoked from travel.
"I've been tracking this tone from the northern ridge," she said. "Whatever you anchored has become a node. The city's geometry is rewriting itself around it."
She unrolled a thin sheet of living glass. As she touched it, lines burned across its surface — rooftops twisting, bridges curling, the hum etched into shape. "See? The resonance forms a recursive spiral. That's not Kael's symbol."
Wenrel stared. The pattern was unmistakable — the spiral within a ring — but reversed.
Elaris's breath caught. "It's not his. It's the counter to his mark."
The hum climbed higher, every note threading through the marrow of the city. Even the Titan Trees moaned, deep and low, their roots vibrating like living strings.
Wenrel steadied his breath and pressed his palm to a wooden beam. The resonance met his pulse, merging for a single dangerous instant. He sent a single thought through the lattice: We see you.
The world held still.
Then — silence. The hum cut off. Bridges straightened. Light steadied. The Glass-Larks scattered, silent as glass dust in a breeze.
Sera broke the quiet first. "That wasn't an echo," she said softly. "It knew you were there."
Lysara's voice was low. "What knew?"
Elaris closed the crystal case around the trembling feather. "Whatever lives on the other side of thought."
Wenrel didn't answer. His eyes stayed on the horizon — where the air shimmered faintly, like a curtain waiting to be lifted.