Page 67 of Ashen Souls

“I didn’t make any decisions,” I said.

“That’s the problem.”

I peeled open the packet, the scent of eucalyptus rising as I spread the mask over my face. Harper collapsed beside me on the bed, scrolling through her phone like the conversation had never happened.

Harper and I walked to campus together, her arm hooked through mine, her running commentary filling the quiet whenever my thoughts tried to wander. Classes passed in a blur of lectures. I answered questions on autopilot, nodding whenever someone spoke directly to me, letting the daylight carry me.

By late afternoon, Harper veered off toward the arts district. She had a closing shift at a loud bistro where she dealt with demanding tourists in exchange for decent tips and free pasta.

“Try not to vanish into the ether while I’m slinging overpriced wine.” She pulled her hair up with a claw clip.

I adjusted the strap of my bag. “I’m just going home.”

She squeezed my arm. “Text me when you get there. Or if you need me to leave mid-shift to fight someone.”

“I will.”

Walking home alone, my pace slowed along the emptier streets, passing shop windows and cafés that were just beginning to spill golden light onto the sidewalk.

Halfway down Alder Street, the Old City Archives caught my attention.

It wasn’t anything remarkable, just a stone building squeezed between two larger storefronts, its gothic windows caged in wrought iron. I’d walked past it countless times, but today, my feet stopped.

I stared at the weathered oak doors, my gaze drifting to the tangled ironwork arched above the frame. As I watched, the metal began to… warp? The rigid iron seemed to soften, bleeding and shifting until the chaotic scrollwork snapped into a deliberate, structured pattern.

The mark on my wrist pulsed against my sleeve.

When I pushed the cuff back, the sight of my marred skin rooted me to the spot.

It had mutated again. The lines were sharper, darker. What had once been a vague brand had grown into a spear-like symbol stretching across my veins, its branching strokes curling outward like roots or thin tongues of flame. At its center, a small circle glowed softly.

Tiny sparks of heat flickered along the edges, breathing beneath my skin.

It was a sigil.

A shoulder clipped mine, sending me stumbling a half-step.

“Watch it,” a passerby muttered, not even glancing back as he hurried down the pavement.

I jerked my head up, staring back at the iron archway. The metal was still now, ordinary and undisturbed. But the shape it had taken a second ago was already burned into my mind.

The sigil was guiding me to this place. To the Archive. It wanted me to discover something.

Vesbridge had always felt old. The streets, the names, the way certain corners seemed to swallow sound. I’d grown up here surrounded by stories my parents never quite finished telling, half-remembered fragments of history that never made it into the guidebooks.

What if the answers weren’t hidden somewhere in my mind? What if they were already here?

I pictured the Archive’s interior: rows of shelves sagging under the weight of records, old maps, and parish registers. A place where truths didn’t scream, they waited.

If there was a beginning to whatever was happening to me, some name for it, some record of it happening before, this might be the place to start.

I stood there as the wind picked up, carrying the river’s damp chill through my coat.

Not today, I decided. I wasn’t ready. I needed time to decide whether I wanted answers badly enough to pay whatever they might cost. What waited inside those walls wasn’t going anywhere.

Tomorrow.

Turning away, I headed down the street.