The world, for Cædmon, had dissolved into a maelstrom of desperate, frantic motion. The vibrant chaos of the Dunholm Central Market—a riot of colour, smell, and sound—was no longer a backdrop, but a treacherous, shifting obstacle course. His every sense was screaming, focused on a single point: the dark, fleeing robes of Master Aldred, a serpent disappearing into a sea of humanity.
He vaulted over a cooper's display of barrels, the wood clattering loudly on the stones, earning him a string of curses. He shoved past a portly merchant haggling over spices, the exotic scents of cinnamon and clove a strange, jarring note in the symphony of his panic. His breath was a ragged fire in his lungs, his heart a frantic war drum against his ribs. He could not lose him. Aldred was the living thread, the only direct link to the heart of the conspiracy.
But even as he ran, another, more terrifying awareness rode alongside his desperation. Behind him, keeping pace with a surprising, light-footed grace, was Leofwynn. He could feel her presence not as an echo, but as a point of pure, agonizing reality in a world gone mad. She was a beacon of quiet in the noise, and her presence in this chase was a desecration. He had led the wolf to her, and now, in his madness to catch it, he was dragging her into its path.
Aldred was clever. He did not run in a straight line but weaved through the thickest parts of the crowd, using the press of bodies as both a shield and a weapon. He toppled a fishmonger's stall, sending a shower of slick, silver-scaled fish across the cobblestones, forcing Cædmon to leap over the treacherous mess. The tutor, for all his scholarly appearance, moved with the ruthless efficiency of a trained agent.
Cædmon pushed himself harder, the phantom ache in his knee—Tomin Fenn's ghost—flaring in protest. He ignored it. He was closing the distance. He could see the back of Aldred's head, the man's dark hair plastered to his scalp with sweat. Another ten paces, a clear stretch of ground by the fountain in the center of the square, and he would have him.
Then, Aldred did something that confirmed his absolute monstrosity. He risked a glance over his shoulder, his cold eyes locking not on Cædmon, but on the pursuing figure of Leofwynn behind him. A flicker of cruel, tactical understanding crossed his features. He saw her not as a person, but as a tool.
With a sudden, sharp pivot, Aldred threw his entire weight against the side of a massive, heavily-laden cart stacked high with bolts of wool and dyed cloth. The cart, precariously balanced, groaned in protest. Its great wooden wheels shrieked as it began to topple, slowly at first, then with a terrible, gathering momentum, directly into the path of Leofwynn.
Time seemed to warp, to stretch and thin like heated glass. Cædmon saw it all in a moment of horrific clarity. He saw Aldred using the diversion to slip into a narrow alleyway, disappearing from sight. He saw the great cart, a juggernaut of wood and wool, crashing down. And he saw Leofwynn, her eyes wide with shock, frozen in its path.
A choice had to be made. The serpent or the girl. The mission or the soul.
For Cædmon, it was no choice at all.
He abandoned the pursuit without a second thought, his entire being focused on a single, desperate objective. He launched himself forward, his body a projectile of pure, protective instinct. "Leofwynn!" he roared, the name torn from his throat.
He reached her a heartbeat before the cart did. He didn't have time to pull her clear. Instead, he slammed into her, wrapping his arms around her slight form, twisting his own body to take the brunt of the impact. They crashed to the stone floor together, a tangle of limbs and terror. The cart came down with a splintering, earth-shaking boom, its heavy contents—bolts of crimson and sapphire cloth—spilling over and around them, burying them in a soft, suffocating avalanche of colour.
For a moment, there was only darkness, the muffled screams of the crowd, and the scent of lanolin and dye. He was lying half on top of her, his body shielding hers from the weight of the fallen goods. He could feel the frantic, bird-like beating of her heart against his chest.
"Are you hurt?" he gasped, his voice tight with a fear he had not felt in years.
"No," she whispered, her voice a small, shaken sound from somewhere beneath him. "I… I think not. Cædmon?"
He pushed a heavy bolt of crimson wool away and managed to sit up, pulling her with him. They were in a small cave of fallen cloth, dust motes dancing in the slivers of light. Her simple archivist's tunic was smudged with dirt, her perfect braid had come partly undone, and her pale blue eyes were wide with a mixture of shock, fear, and a dawning, profound confusion as she looked at him.
At that moment, new figures appeared, their presence cutting through the surrounding chaos. Three men in immaculate grey robes embroidered with a silver, sunburst-like sigil. Their faces were calm, authoritative, and they moved with a disciplined grace that separated them from the panicked crowd. The Scir-Lēoht Covenant. The Light-Wardens.
Their leader, a man with a sharp, intelligent face and hair prematurely touched with silver at the temples, knelt beside them. "By the Covenant," he said, his voice calm but carrying an immediate authority. "What dark art caused this?"
Cædmon saw his chance. He could not explain the Serpent Circle, but he could point the city's other hounds in the right direction. "A man," Cædmon said, his voice regaining its composure. "A sorcerer of some kind. He attacked us. He fled into that alley." He pointed. "His magic is subtle, a thing of shadow and influence."
The lead mage, whom Cædmon recognized as Magister Leofstan, looked at him, his eyes seeming to peer into Cædmon's very soul. "We felt the disturbance. A spike of fear and psychic violence. Your own energy is… chaotic, Walker."
"He was the cause," Cædmon insisted, a lie of omission. "He is the threat."
Leofstan considered this, then looked to his acolytes. "Brothers, attend to the scene. Follow the trail. His residual energy will be a shadow on the stones. Find where it leads." The two other mages nodded and moved toward the alley, their hands glowing with a soft, analytical light.
Leofstan turned back to Cædmon and Leofwynn. "You are both unharmed?"
"We are," Cædmon said, helping Leofwynn to her feet. "Your swift arrival is appreciated, Magister."
Leofstan gave a curt nod. "Our duty is to the city's peace. And your presence, Echo-Walker, is rarely a harbinger of it." With that, he turned to direct the city guardsmen who were now arriving, leaving Cædmon and Leofwynn standing alone in the heart of the chaos they had survived.
The wreckage of the market stall was a testament to the violence of the last few minutes. Onlookers still stared, whispering amongst themselves, pointing at the strange, grim man and the quiet girl from the archives. Cædmon felt a surge of guilt so powerful it was a physical nausea. He had brought this upon her. His darkness had spilled out and stained her quiet, orderly world.
"I am sorry," he said, the words feeling utterly inadequate. "You should never have been a part of this."
Leofwynn looked at him, her initial shock giving way to a deep, searching curiosity. She tucked a stray piece of flaxen hair behind her ear, a small, human gesture that seemed impossibly grounding in the madness. "Who was that man, Cædmon? Why was he running from you?"
"He is… an evil that the city does not yet know it has," he said, the truth a bitter thing. "And I am the only one who hunts him."
She saw the profound exhaustion in his eyes, the haunted look that went far beyond the chase. She saw the man she had only ever known in the sacred silence of the Rūn-hord, now standing here, breathing hard, his knuckles white, looking like a soldier who had just walked off a battlefield.
"You are hurt," she said, her voice soft. It was not a question. She was looking at his hand, the one that had been trembling earlier in the tavern. A faint tremor had returned.
"It is an old wound," he lied.
He knew he should leave, should let her return to her life and distance himself from her for her own safety. But he couldn't. He felt a desperate, selfish need to ensure she was truly alright, to spend a few more moments in the quiet sanctuary of her presence before returning to his own personal hell.
"Allow me to see you home," he began, but the words felt wrong. He changed course, an uncharacteristic social impulse taking hold. "Or… allow me to repay the distress I have caused. There is a quiet inn near the archive, The Scholar's Mug. A cup of tea. A moment of peace. Please."
The request was so unexpected, so contrary to the grim, silent man she knew, that it startled her. She looked at his face, at the raw vulnerability that had cracked through his iron composure, and she saw not a fearsome Echo-Walker, but a man in desperate need of a moment's peace.
She gave a small, almost imperceptible nod. "I would like that."
The Scholar's Mug was everything The Oaken Shield was not. It was small, quiet, and smelled of old books and brewing tea. The patrons were mostly university scholars and elderly scribes, speaking in low, thoughtful tones. It was a world away from the chaos of the market. They found a small, secluded table by a window overlooking a quiet garden.
For a long time, they sat in a silence that was both comfortable and awkward. Cædmon, a man who conversed with the dead, found himself utterly at a loss for how to speak to the living. He was acutely aware of every detail about her. She was younger than he was, perhaps twenty-two or twenty-three to his own late twenties. Her features were fine and delicate, but it was her eyes that held him—a pale, clear blue that seemed to hold a deep and ancient stillness. In the soft light of the inn, he saw a faint, almost imperceptible point to the tip of her ear, a detail usually hidden by her hair. It was a strange, captivating imperfection.
"You are very beautiful," he said, the words leaving his mouth before he had a chance to stop them. They were unadorned, spoken with the simple, direct finality of a truth he had just discovered.
Leofwynn's pale cheeks flushed with a soft pink. She looked down at her hands, a small, genuine smile gracing her lips. "You are… not what I expected, Cædmon."
"And what did you expect?" he asked, a hint of his usual dry irony creeping back into his voice.
"I do not know," she admitted, looking up at him again. "A man of ghosts and shadows. The stories they tell… they speak of a grim, cold man."
"Sometimes the stories are true," he said quietly.
As he spoke, a sudden, vicious wave of nausea rolled through him. The phantom taste of Aelfric's cheap, sour ale filled his mouth, and a disorienting flash of the dockworker's drunken rage pulsed behind his eyes. He squeezed his eyes shut, his hand clenching into a fist on the table, fighting for control. The soul-stains, agitated by the day's violence and his own frayed nerves, were rebelling.
"Cædmon?" Leofwynn's voice was filled with alarm. She saw the sweat bead on his forehead, the tightening of the muscles in his jaw. She saw the flicker of a stranger's fury in his eyes.
Acting on an instinct she did not understand, she reached her hand across the table. She did not touch him. Instead, she let her fingers hover an inch from his temple, her eyes closing as she focused her will.
The effect was instantaneous and profound. It was not like the passive aura of peace he felt when near her. This was an active, intentional act. He felt a wave of cool, clean silence wash through his mind, not drowning the echoes, but… ordering them. It was as if the chaotic, screaming voices in his head were gently but firmly told to stand in a single, silent line. The rage receded. The phantom taste vanished. The pain subsided. He was left in a state of quiet, absolute clarity.
He opened his eyes and stared at her, his breath caught in his throat. He could see the effort it took her; her face was pale, a fine sheen of perspiration on her brow.
"How did you do that?" he whispered, his voice filled with a raw, wondering awe.
She drew her hand back, looking as surprised as he felt. "I… I do not know," she confessed. "When I am near a text that is damaged, or a thought that is tangled, I can sometimes… soothe it. Straighten the threads. The noise inside you… it felt like that. Like a book of stories all being shouted at once. I just… quieted them."
He looked at this quiet, unassuming girl from the archives, and saw something ancient and powerful hiding behind her gentle eyes. He knew, in that moment, that he had to give her a piece of the truth. It was a debt he owed her for the miracle she had just performed.
"I carry them with me," he said, the confession a physical weight leaving his chest. "The echoes. It is not just a memory I see. It is a stain. A piece of their final moments, their final feelings, lodges within me. I carry a library of last breaths." He looked at his own hands. "Sometimes… some of the books shout louder than the others."
It was the most he had ever told another living soul about his curse.
Leofwynn listened, her expression not one of fear or revulsion, but of deep, compassionate understanding. She did not recoil. She leaned closer. "Then you must have a very quiet library of your own, to keep them all in order," she said softly.
He looked at her, at her earnest, clear eyes, and felt the cracking of a wall around his heart that had been fortified for a decade. He felt a fragile, terrifying flicker of hope. Perhaps he was not as alone as he had thought.
Later that night, the city settled into its uneasy slumber. Cædmon stood by the window of his chamber, looking out at the moonlit rooftops. His conversation with Leofwynn had left him in a state he did not recognize. The psychic noise was still there, but it was muted, the memory of her calming touch a shield against its worst ravages. He had found his sanctuary. And the thought terrified him more than any ghost, because now he had something to lose.
His purpose, however, remained. Aldred had escaped, but the trap for Seraphine Morgenstern was still being set. He had to continue his hunt.
A sharp, official rap on his door startled him from his reverie. It was late for a visitor. He opened it to find not a common guardsman, but a man dressed in the severe, black-and-silver livery of the Lord Regent's personal retinue. The man's face was impassive, his eyes holding the cold certainty of absolute authority.
"Cædmon, the Echo-Walker?" the man stated, his voice devoid of emotion.
"I am he."
The man held out a heavy parchment scroll, sealed not with the simple wax of the Stǣl-witan, but with the Regent's own intricate, silver-and-black sigil. "A summons from the Lord Regent himself. Your presence is commanded. At once."
Cædmon's blood ran cold. The Regent never involved himself in the city's common crimes. This was something else. He broke the seal, his fingers numb. The script within was elegant, precise, and chilling.
It commanded him, by order of the Regent, to present himself at the Morgenstern estate on the morrow at first light. Sir Dagobert, a knight of the Regent's own household guard and a close confidant, had been found dead within the estate's walls under circumstances most mysterious. The Morgensterns, in their reclusiveness, had requested the Regent's direct intervention. And the Regent was sending his most reliable tool.
Cædmon stared at the scroll, the words blurring before his eyes. It was a trap. A perfect, inescapable trap. The Serpent Circle had not fled from him. They had anticipated him. They had committed a new murder, a murder so high-profile he could not possibly refuse the case, and they had done it in their own lair.
They were not running. They were inviting him in. And they were using the highest power in the city to hold the door open for him.
A Discarded, Crumpled Note
(Found in a wastebasket in a small room at The Scholar's Mug inn. The script is fine and elegant, but hurried, with several words crossed out.)
Cædmon,
I hope this message finds you well. I found myself thinking of our conversation. The things you spoke of… the burdens you carry. I cannot pretend to understand them, but I saw the pain in your eyes. It was not the look of a cold, grim man, as the stories say. It was the look of a man carrying a weight too great for any one soul to bear.
You called the echoes a library. I think perhaps you are the librarian, and you have simply been reading in the dark for too long. If there is ever a time when the silence in your own library becomes too loud, know that there is another, quieter one where you are always welcome.
I… I hope to see you again.
Yours in quiet, L.
(The note is crumpled, as if the author was too shy or thought it too forward to send.)