The silence after his fall is heavy. Not peace—just the absence of screaming.
I stand in the center of the broken plaza, dust swirling around my feet. The others gather slowly, some limping, some holding wounds, none of them speaking.
Branvel is the first to move. He kneels beside Fenn, checking his pulse, then nods. Alive.
Kett steps forward, looking at me. "Is it over?"
"No," I say. "It's quieter. That's all."
The Vault is still awake. I can feel it beneath my boots—watching, breathing, *deciding.*
Sov's gaze is sharp. "That thing wasn't just one man."
"No. It was a thousand stolen faces stitched into one body. And someone had to do the stitching."
"Then we still have a war," he says quietly.
I nod.
Wren appears from the edge of the ruins, her eyes wide. "I saw them—souls, like light, rising from him. So many. And some… some didn't go up. They *sank.*"
"They weren't innocent," Sov mutters.
"No," I say. "And not all of them are gone."
The others turn to me. I raise the ring. It pulses once—soft, but sharp.
"He was the blade," I say. "But someone else forged him. Someone deeper in the city. Deeper in the silence."
Lira grips her sword tighter. "Then we hunt again."
"No," I say. "We *rebuild.* Then we hunt."
I turn to the seal-holders. "Your duty doesn't end with binding threats. You're architects now. Keepers. Find the cracks. Seal what matters. Burn what doesn't."
Voul nods first. Then Jeral. The rest follow.
"Threadless movements will grow bolder," Kett warns. "They think we're weak."
"Then let them try," I say. "We don't hide anymore."
Branvel looks up at the sky. "What about the Vault?"
"It's not done testing me."
"And you?" Wren asks. "Are *you* done?"
I don't answer right away.
Because I'm not.
Not until the city remembers what it tried to forget.
Not until silence is no longer safe for them.
I look at the ring. At the shattered stone. At the echoes that still cling to the walls.
Then I walk forward. Not to escape.
But to *start something.*
Let them watch.
Let them listen.
The Masked One is no longer a shadow.
Now I speak. And the city *answers.*