The sentence kept glowing on the parchment long after the light of the copied line should have faded, and no one in the ruin managed to pretend that this apparition was only one more oddity among many. The voice returns when the name is lost. Eve had repeated the words in her mind so many times by now that she was no longer sure whether she was thinking them or whether they were being spoken to her from somewhere else. Morning had long since become a pale forenoon, yet the fog at the northern edge of the ruins had not withdrawn. It lay there in a flat, motionless layer between the trees, beyond the ditch they had crossed, and no longer felt like weather, but like a boundary that allowed them to look at it without allowing them to forget. Garrick had spread the parchment across a flat stone slab and placed several small measuring rods around it, all connected by copper wires. The wires led to his damaged resonance device, whose glass was cracked and whose needle moved only in short, reluctant jerks. Still, he worked on it with a stubbornness that both calmed and unsettled Eve. Whenever Garrick did not understand something, he built a device, and when that device was not enough, he built a better one, and when the better device triggered something dangerous, he still kept building, because for him, standing still was the ugliest form of surrender. Finn sat beside him and held a spool of copper wire that Garrick had pressed into his hand without much explanation. He did it with visible concentration, his tongue pressed lightly against the inside of his cheek, while Clara stood a few steps away and did not take her eyes off him. Mira sat on a blanket near the fire pit, her back against a stone, her knees drawn to her chest, and outwardly she seemed calmer than all the others. That was exactly what made Eve suspicious, because a child who had just returned from an encounter with an ancient boundary stone, a foreign voice and a language she could not possibly know should have trembled, cried or slept. Mira did none of that, but watched the adults with a stillness that gave Eve the feeling that she was slowly learning to distinguish their fear for her from the sense of ownership that sometimes hid inside it. Lyra knelt beside Garrick and had filled several pages of her notebook with tiny signs, while Kael stood apart and looked toward the northern forest. His posture was calm, but his shoulders were too hard, his fingers too close to the hilt of his weapon, and Eve knew enough about him by now to recognize that it was not only the fog that troubled him. Garren and his people no longer kept entirely to the shadows, but they did not stand in the middle of the group either. Nara sat on a fallen piece of wall and sharpened her knife with slow, controlled movements. Marek paced in a tight circle, as though mistrust might run out of his body if he only kept moving long enough. Tara stood at the edge of the ruin and had placed one hand against the broken wall. She did not listen with her ears. Eve understood that by now, because Tara listened with her skin, with her fingers and with that part of a person that, in a world like this, either grew numb or became too finely tuned to ever find peace again. “Hold the wire still,” Garrick murmured without looking up, and Finn immediately looked down at his hand. “I am holding it still.” Garrick’s expression did not change. “You are moving it.” Finn breathed out audibly. “I am breathing.” Garrick drew the wire a little closer to the device. “Then breathe more calmly.” Finn threw Eve a quick glance in which exhaustion and offended patience wrestled with each other. “I did not know that one had to stop being alive before beginning a technical apprenticeship.” Garrick grunted. “That would be helpful in many cases, but impractical.” Clara stepped a little closer. “Perhaps you could find someone else to take out your bad mood on, someone who has not just spent half the night walking through the fog.” Garrick lifted his head, studied her for a moment, then looked at Finn. “Your sister is right. Give me the spool before I forget that young hands are useful for something other than destroying delicate work.” Finn handed him the spool, but instead of withdrawing, he remained seated. “I can still help, if you tell me what you are actually doing.” Clara opened her mouth, but Finn looked at her before she could say anything. “I want to know.” Those three words were not loud, but they were firm enough that Clara did not immediately contradict him. Eve saw how difficult that was for her. Clara was used to pulling Finn out of things, not letting him talk his way into them. Garrick studied the young man with new attention. “I am trying to find out whether this line on the parchment glows only because Mira spoke it, or whether the runes themselves have retained some kind of stored resonance.” Finn furrowed his brow. “So whether the words still carry something inside them, even though they are only copied?” Garrick paused. “Yes, that is surprisingly useful phrasing.” Finn’s mouth shifted a little. “I can think when no one declares me too young beforehand.” Clara exhaled audibly, but said nothing. Eve stored that small moment away, because Finn could not only be someone Clara protected. He was attentive, curious and braver than he believed, and that was precisely what made Mira’s sentence about the bright sound in his name more dangerous. Lyra placed her hand flat beside the parchment. “They are not only words. In the oldest records, a name was not understood as a label, but as a point of connection. Whoever carried a name was anchored in memory, place and body. Whoever lost his name could continue to breathe and still begin to slip out of the world.” Marek stopped and twisted his face. “That is the kind of scholar’s talk that eventually makes people throw one another into pits and call it ritual.” Lyra did not look at him with reproach, only with weariness. “Unfortunately, that is not wrong.” That answer took the mockery from Marek for a moment. Eve turned to Mira, who had lowered her head at Lyra’s words. “Does something hurt?” Mira shook her head. “Not now.” Eve remained careful. “But earlier?” Mira pressed her lips together, then nodded almost invisibly, and Clara was at her side at once. “Where?” Mira placed one hand on her chest, then on her forehead. “Not in one place. It pulls when a name is missing.” Garrick and Lyra exchanged a glance. Clara saw that glance and immediately hardened. “No.” Garrick drew his brows together. “I have not said anything yet.” Clara was not reassured by that. “You were about to say something, and that is enough for me.” Lyra raised one hand calmly. “Clara, if Mira reacts to missing names, she might be able to help us find the second half of the inscription.” Clara repeated the word bitterly. “Help. That is a very beautiful word for the things all of you want from her.” Mira looked up. Eve noticed it, and a knot formed in her stomach. The girl had heard, not only the words, but the core beneath them. She was not simply the one they worried about, but the one they needed, and with every new clue that difference became more dangerous. Finn sat down beside Mira, leaving enough distance not to set Clara on alert again. “No one is forcing you to do anything, and if someone tries, Clara will probably tear off their ears before I even have time to be helpful.” Mira looked at him. “Would you help?” Finn seemed surprised by the question. “With the ear tearing?” Mira shook her head. “No. If I have to do something.” Clara went rigid. Finn’s gaze moved to his sister, then back to Mira. “I think that depends on what that something is. But I would not want you to have to do it alone.” Mira nodded slowly, as though the answer was not pleasant, but serious enough to keep. Eve looked at Clara and recognized the pain in her face. Clara hated that answer because it brought Finn closer to Mira’s danger, and at the same time she could not hate him for being kind. That made it worse. Kael had been silent long enough. When he spoke now, his voice sounded more sober than the situation deserved. “We should return to the boundary stone.” Clara spun around. “No.” Kael held her gaze without sharpening his own. “The stone reacted. The parchment is still reacting. If something lies beneath it, we have to find it before the fog does.” Tara took her hand from the wall at the edge of the ruin. “The fog already knows about it.” They all looked at her. “Since Mira answered, it has been moving differently. Not faster. More purposefully.” Garren nodded grimly. “Then Kael is right. We have a window of time, and I do not trust any window of time the fog leaves us voluntarily.” Clara shook her head. “You are already talking as if Mira were a tool again.” Eve answered before Garren could say anything, and her voice was calmer than she felt. “We go back, but Mira decides how close she wants to get to the stone. No one touches her, no one asks her questions if she does not want to answer, and if she says we stop, we stop.” Garrick looked as though he wanted to protest, but Eve gave him a look that silenced him. Lyra nodded. Garren as well. Kael said nothing, which with him could mean agreement or an even greater problem. Clara looked at Eve for a long time. “And if the stone only reacts to her?” Eve felt how heavy the answer was because she did not want to lie. “Then we find out whether there is another way.” Clara did not laugh, but her face showed that she had heard the gap in that sentence exactly. “And if there is none?” Eve thought of the Nexus, of the figure of light, of the choice that had not been a real choice. She thought of the orb beneath her hand and of how easy it could feel to make a decision as long as one did not yet know who would suffer for it later. “Then we still do not decide over her,” she finally said. Mira looked at her. That gaze struck Eve more deeply than she had expected, because there was gratitude in it, but also doubt. Perhaps Mira believed her. Perhaps she had already learned that adults made their promises with full conviction and later still found ways to break them. They did not set out at once. Garrick insisted on stabilizing his resonance device as best he could, and this time Finn did not let himself be sent away. The old craftmaster explained to him how copper wire reacted to rune resonance, how a human body could disturb or amplify a signal, and why one must never trust only a single measurement when using devices near the fog. Finn listened attentively and asked questions that were not all clever, but some were cleverer than Garrick had expected. From the corner of her eye, Eve saw Clara following every sentence with growing unease. She also saw Finn sitting straighter since Garrick had begun taking him seriously. That was good, and it was dangerous, but it was good. A person who was only ever protected remained where others placed him. Finn was beginning to look for a place of his own. Eve hoped that place would not lie too close to the fog. When they finally set out, the sky above the ruins had the color of old ash. The way to the ditch was shorter than last time, or perhaps it only felt shorter to Eve because she knew by now what waited there. Kael led, but this time Garren walked beside him, and between the two men lay a silent tension made of too many unspoken judgments. Nara and Marek covered the sides, Tara stayed near Mira without crowding her. Lyra carried her books and copies in a leather bag close to her body. Garrick had strapped the resonance device to his chest with a broad belt so he could watch the needle without having his hands completely free. Finn walked with him, officially to carry the wire spool, but in truth because Garrick had allowed him to learn something. Clara stayed with Mira, and Eve walked close enough behind them to intervene, yet far enough away not to strain Clara’s nerves even further. Just before the drainage ditch, Eve stopped. The fog above the water was no longer flat. It layered itself in fine lines, and when one looked at it too long, those lines began almost to form signs that withdrew as soon as the mind tried to grasp them. Garrick lifted a hand. “Wait.” He turned a small wheel on his device, and the needle jerked so violently that the casing cracked. Finn gripped the wire spool more tightly. “Is that bad?” Garrick looked at him. “If you are asking whether I am delighted, the answer is no.” Finn nodded solemnly. “I have learned to translate that by now.” Garrick looked back at the device. “Good. Then you learn quickly.” Clara gave them an irritated look, but Finn smiled briefly, and that small moment of normality was almost painful. Kael went to the edge of the ditch and studied the water. “Yesterday it let us through.” Garren leaned beside him. “Yesterday it may not have known we would return.” Mira looked at the water. “It knew.” Everyone fell silent. Clara stroked her shoulder. “What do you mean?” Mira kept looking at the motionless surface. “The stone waited. Some things wait so long that they no longer know whether they are calling or remembering.” Lyra whispered, “That is the structure again.” Garrick looked at her. “Binding speech?” She nodded. “Or something very close to it.” Eve stepped to Mira. “Do you want to go on?” Clara lifted her head at once, but said nothing. Mira looked across the ditch into the woodland. “I do not want to.” Eve nodded slowly. “Then we go back.” Mira looked at her in shock, and that very shock hurt Eve. The girl clearly had not expected her answer to be enough. “But I have to.” Clara knelt in front of her. “No, Mira. Have to is a word other people give you when they want you not to resist.” Mira looked at her. “But if I do not do it, others will be hurt.” Clara swallowed hard. “You do not know that.” Mira held to her answer. “I do.” Clara’s voice grew more brittle. “No. You believe it because this fog puts things into your head. That is not the same.” Finn stepped carefully closer. “Maybe we can find a middle way. Mira does not have to go directly to the stone, but she can tell us when it gets worse. Garrick can measure, Lyra can read, and I can…” He stopped because he apparently could not think of what he could contribute. Garrick glanced at him from the side. “You can guide the wire and pay attention to whether the tension changes. If the thread pulls before the device reacts, you tell us at once.” Finn nodded, surprised by the concrete task. Clara looked at Garrick, this time not only angry, but also uncertain, because he was not merely drawing Finn into danger, but giving him responsibility. Eve saw Clara’s hand settle around Mira’s shoulder and at the same time twitch toward Finn. Two people she wanted to protect, and the path demanded that she could not hold both at once. They crossed the ditch with a new copper thread, which Garrick anchored to a stone. The beams still lay there, but the wood had become damp and darker. When Eve crossed, she heard a faint creak this time. That could have been reassuring, but it was not. The forest had not fully taken back its silence, but now chose what could be heard. On the other side waited the dead stretch between the trees. Mira stopped before she had taken even one step into it. She placed one hand on Clara’s arm. “There is a room beneath the stone.” Lyra drew in a sharp breath. Garrick looked at his device. “That explains the vertical resonance.” Marek snorted. “Of course it explains that. I was already wondering when the ground would finally decide to become suspicious as well.” Nara gave him a look. “If you are afraid, you may say so instead of disguising it so uglily.” Marek glared at her. “I have been afraid for years. I simply refuse to be told how it has to sound.” Garren lifted a hand, and both fell silent. Eve crouched and looked at Mira. “Can you show us where?” Mira nodded, but she did not move. “If I come closer, it gets louder.” Clara immediately stood beside her. “Then you are not going closer.” Lyra stepped forward. “Perhaps it is enough if she guides us from a distance.” Garrick took the wire spool from Finn, fastened one end to a narrow measuring rod and handed him the other end back. “If the runes beneath the stone react to names, we may be able to find the outer line without bringing Mira directly to it.” Finn held the wire carefully. “What should I do?” Garrick pointed toward the half overgrown area around the stone. “You walk slowly in a semicircle around the stone, but not too close. If the wire warms or pulls, you stop.” Clara looked as though she would like to knock the spool out of Garrick’s hand. “Why Finn?” Garrick did not answer at once, and that moment was almost worse than a quick excuse. Finally he said, “Because Mira reacted to him, and the device also showed a slight deviation yesterday when he stood close to her.” Clara’s voice became so cold that Finn flinched. “No.” Finn began carefully, “Clara.” She turned to him. “No, Finn. Not this time.” Finn held the spool tightly. “I am only standing a few steps away.” Clara looked at him with painful sharpness. “You heard what she said about your name.” Finn nodded. “Yes.” Clara grew quieter, which did not make her fear any smaller. “And you still want to go closer to a stone that stores names?” Finn’s face reddened, not from anger alone, but from the old pain of not being seen as his own person. “I want to help.” Clara answered at once. “You help by staying alive.” Finn held her gaze. “That is not a task, Clara. That is a condition you want to manage for me.” Those words struck her. Eve saw it. Clara did not become louder, but quieter. “You do not know what you are talking about.” Finn’s voice stayed firm, though his face was tense. “Maybe not. But I know I cannot stand behind you forever while everyone else makes decisions.” Clara looked at him, and for a moment the whole story between them became visible, even without Finn knowing all of it. The healer’s house. The night. The lie. The years afterward. The way Clara had saved him by closing herself off. Eve knew that Finn was speaking against a wall built out of love and covered in horror. For that very reason, Clara would not yield easily. Mira touched Clara’s hand. “He is not gone when he takes a few steps.” Clara looked down at her. “You cannot know that.” Mira said nothing, then looked toward the stone. “But I know the room beneath it is sleeping. If we are too loud, it will wake wrongly.” Garrick rubbed his face. “That is a very bad way to give a technical instruction.” Lyra, however, nodded slowly. “Not loud. No calling names. No unnecessary words.” Garren looked at his people. “You heard her. Quiet and slow.” Clara did not take her eyes off Finn. “If the wire pulls, you come back.” Finn nodded. “Yes.” Clara remained hard. “Do not be heroic.” Finn tried a small smile. “That was never my great strength.” Clara only said his name. “Finn.” He answered gently. “I will come back.” Clara audibly hated that she wanted to believe him. Finn moved carefully through the undergrowth with the copper wire. Garrick held the device, Lyra took notes, Eve watched Mira, Kael watched the fog, and Clara watched Finn with a concentration that almost hurt physically. At first the wire hung loosely between Finn’s hands and Garrick’s measuring rod. Then, when Finn passed the eastern side of the half hidden boundary stone, it tightened slightly. Finn stopped at once. “Here.” Garrick’s needle struck out. “Do not move.” Finn went stock still. “I am not moving.” Garrick did not look up. “Not even out of defiance.” Finn’s mouth twitched. “I am especially not moving out of defiance.” Garrick knelt and pushed leaves and soil aside. Beneath the moss, a narrow stone line emerged, cleanly worked and almost completely overgrown. Nara helped him without asking, and soon a circular rim appeared, running around the boundary stone. Lyra did not place her hand on it, but bent down deeply enough to recognize the tiny signs cut into the rim. “This is not a single stone.” Garrick carefully scraped soil from a groove with a tool. “It is a cover.” Marek stepped back. “Of course it is a cover. Why should an ominous boundary stone also simply be an ominous boundary stone?” Garren looked at Kael. “Can the fog be beneath it?” Kael answered after a moment. “The fog can be anywhere something has been forgotten.” Garren twisted his face. “That is not a reassuring answer.” Kael did not look at him. “I have no reassuring ones.” Eve went back to Mira. The girl had turned pale and pressed both hands against her stomach. “Mira?” Clara immediately knelt beside her. “What is it?” Mira squeezed her eyes shut. “There are many down there.” Eve remained calm, though her stomach tightened. “Many what?” Mira did not answer right away, and when she spoke, her voice was thin. “Names.” Lyra lifted her head. “Stored names?” Mira shuddered as though the word had poured something cold across her skin. “Not stored. Held.” Clara wrapped both arms around her. “Then we stop.” Mira clutched Clara’s sleeve. “No. One hurts.” Eve felt the air grow heavier. “One of the names?” Mira nodded. “It is not fully there. It is torn.” Kael slowly turned toward her. Every color had drained from his face. “What did you say?” Mira opened her eyes and looked at him. “Torn.” Kael’s hand closed around the hilt of his weapon so tightly that his knuckles stood out. Eve stepped closer. “Kael?” He did not answer. Garrick and Nara had meanwhile uncovered the edges of the cover. The stone was larger than Eve had expected, a round slab with the boundary stone set into its center. Several shallow grooves ran from the rim to the middle, and in each lay tiny rows of runes, so dense that they almost became grain. Garrick set a tool against it, hesitated, looked at Mira and then at Eve. “If we open this, it will react.” Clara said at once, “Then we do not open it.” Lyra shook her head. “Clara, if names are being held down there, this could be the foundation of the entire system.” Clara looked at her bitterly. “I understand that you desperately want to know that.” For the first time, Lyra did not sound gentle, but shaken. “No, you do not understand. If names were held, then perhaps the fog was never only a rift between worlds. Perhaps it is also an archive. Or a prison.” Finn slowly returned to Clara, the wire spool still in his hand. “And if someone loses their name, the voice comes back?” Lyra looked at him. “Perhaps.” Finn kept thinking. “Back where?” That question remained unanswered too long. Finn looked from one face to another. “That is the question, is it not? If a voice returns, it has to return somewhere. Into the fog? Into the body? Into the name? Or into the place where the name was held?” Garrick stared at him. “That is… uncomfortably well asked.” Finn did not look pleased. “Thank you, I think.” Clara looked at him, and Eve could almost hear what she was thinking. Do not ask further. Do not go closer. Do not make yourself useful to something that eats you. But Finn had already asked the question, and now it stood between them, as unavoidable as the stone. Mira suddenly curled inward, and Clara caught her. “Mira!” The girl gasped, and her face twisted in pain. “Do not say it.” Eve knelt in front of her. “Do not say what?” Mira shook her head, tears in her eyes. “The name does not want it.” Kael took a step back. “Do not open it.” Everyone looked at him. His voice had grown rough, almost foreign. Garrick straightened. “What do you know?” Kael swallowed, but he seemed to be struggling with something deeper than mistrust. “There is something down there that should not be found.” Garren narrowed his eyes. “That sounds like knowledge, not a guess.” Kael looked briefly at him, then at Mira. “I know this pain.” Eve felt her heart beat faster. “Have you ever seen a place like this?” Kael closed his eyes. “No.” Eve did not let go. “Kael.” His voice became quieter. “Not seen. Heard.” Mira whimpered softly. Clara held her tightly, but this time she did not say that they should leave. Perhaps she understood that the pain would not end simply because they turned away. Garrick looked at Eve. “We can lift the slab, but only a little. I can set a stop so it does not open completely.” Finn looked doubtfully at the stone slab. “That does not sound very safe.” Garrick looked at him. “It is not very safe.” Finn nodded slowly. “I appreciate the honesty.” Clara glared at both of them. “I do not.” Eve looked at Mira. “Can you endure it?” Mira breathed shallowly. “If the name does not fully come.” Eve nodded. “Then it does not fully come.” She looked at Garrick. “Only a little. No experiments.” Garrick made a face as if she had subjected him to a personal attack. “What do you think I consider experiments?” Eve answered dryly. “Air to breathe.” Finn murmured, “That explains a lot.” Garrick gave him a look that was almost paternally annoyed, then went to work. Nara and Garren helped him drive two narrow iron wedges beneath the rim of the slab. Kael stayed back at first, but when the stone did not move, he finally stepped forward and placed both hands on one of the grooves. Eve noticed that his fingers were trembling. Together they lifted the slab a little. A current of air rose from the opening, cold and dry, not musty. The smell beneath reminded Eve of old books, stone and something metallic she could not name. Mira did not scream, but her body tensed, and Clara whispered soothing words into her hair, words meant more for Clara herself than for the child. Garrick pushed a small rune rod into the opening, its tip glowing faintly. “There is a hollow space.” Lyra lay down on her stomach and looked inside. “Stairs.” Marek stepped even farther back. “I hate stairs that lead beneath boundary stones.” Nara looked at him dryly. “You hate many things.” Marek folded his arms. “And I am constantly proven right.” Garrick fixed the slab with two wedges. “It stays open as long as no one bumps into it or the stone decides to personally insult my work.” Eve intervened at once. “We are not all going down.” Clara nodded fiercely. “Mira stays above.” Mira shook her head, weakly but firmly. “If I stay above, I hear everything without walls between us.” Clara closed her eyes. Finn touched her shoulder. “I will stay with her above if you have to go down.” Clara answered at once. “I am not going anywhere she is not.” Finn remained calm. “Then I am staying too.” Eve looked between them. “No one stays alone. Garren, Nara, you hold watch up here. Marek, Tara, you secure the ditch. Lyra, Garrick, Kael and I go down. Clara, you decide for yourself, but not for Mira.” Clara looked at her, hurt and angry at once. Eve knew this sentence was hard, and precisely because of that it had to be said. Mira slowly lifted her head. “I am going.” For a moment, Clara seemed unable to breathe. “Mira, please.” Mira held to it. “Otherwise I hear him anyway.” Finn said softly, “Then I will hear with you.” Clara turned to him. “What?” Finn did not look away. “I am going with you. Not at the front, not bravely, not stupidly. But if she hears it, she should not be the only one who is afraid.” Mira looked at him, and something in her face softened. Clara looked as though someone had taken a decision from her hands that she should never have been allowed to hold. Eve stepped closer. “Then we go down together, but slowly. At the first sign that Mira cannot bear it, we turn back.” Garren nodded. “We will hold the slab. But if the fog comes, I am not pulling you one by one out of a hole while everyone up here dies.” Eve nodded briefly. “No one is asking that.” Marek muttered, “Not yet.” They descended. The stairs were narrow and so low that Garrick cursed several times because he struck his head on roots and stone. The rune rod cast a pale light that revealed the walls only in pieces. Signs were everywhere, not the large runes of the boundary stone, but tiny markings set close together, running in long rows across the stone. Eve had the feeling that she was not descending a stairway, but walking between the pages of a book that had not been written for living eyes. Mira held Clara’s hand and Finn’s sleeve, as though she needed both of them to keep from being pulled apart. Kael walked behind Eve, quieter than usual. Lyra did not touch the walls, but her gaze moved quickly, hungry and frightened at the same time. Garrick’s device began to hum softly, and this time it seemed to follow Finn’s breathing. Eve noticed it, and Garrick did too. Clara did not, and Eve was grateful for that moment. At the end of the stairs, a small chamber opened. It was not large, barely more than a round room beneath the stone, but its walls were completely covered in names. Some were cut deep and clear into the stone, others seemed lighter, almost fresh, and still others were only shadows of lines, places where a name must have been before something scraped it out. In the center of the chamber stood no altar, but a low circle of stone, its surface filled with countless small recesses. Some held dust, others small splinters of metal, bone or glass. Eve stopped, and her hand moved unconsciously to the red cloth at her throat. Suddenly she no longer saw only the chamber. She saw a small hand that had once held that cloth. She saw her sister, younger, laughing, far too alive for a memory buried under guilt for so long. She had not spoken her name aloud in years, not because she had forgotten it, but because it lay inside her in a place that bled whenever touched. Lysa. The name rose inside her without her speaking it. The red cloth seemed to grow warmer beneath her fingers. Mira turned her head toward her. “You are holding someone.” Eve froze. Clara looked at her at once. Finn too. Eve took her hand from the cloth, but the name remained inside her. “That is none of your business.” The sharpness in her own voice surprised her. Mira flinched back. Regret struck Eve immediately. “Forgive me,” she said more softly. “That was not fair.” Mira nodded, though her gaze remained on the red cloth. “She is not in the stone.” Eve could not answer. Something inside her wanted to cry, but the tears did not come. Perhaps she had kept them back for too long. Lyra slowly stepped to the wall. “These are not grave inscriptions.” Garrick knelt before the stone circle. “No. This is a register.” Finn asked quietly, “A register for what?” Lyra’s gaze moved across the names. “For bindings.” Clara shuddered. “I hate that word.” Kael answered unexpectedly, and his voice sounded rough. “You should.” Eve looked at him. He stood before a place on the wall where no name was legible anymore. Not weathered. Removed. The marks in the stone looked furious, deep and irregular, as if someone had worked against their own memory with violence. Mira began to tremble. “Not there.” Kael did not move. Eve stepped closer. “Mira?” But Mira pressed both hands over her ears. “Not there. Not there. He is broken.” The air in the chamber grew colder. Garrick’s device struck out, and the needle slammed so hard against the edge that the glass cracked further. Finn reached reflexively for the casing to steady it. Garrick caught his hand. “Do not touch it directly.” Finn pulled his fingers back. “Sorry.” Garrick shook his head shortly. “No. Good reaction. Wrong execution, but good reaction.” Under other circumstances, Finn might have smiled. Now he only looked at Mira. Clara knelt before her. “We are leaving.” Mira gasped. “The name is not gone.” Lyra now stood beside Kael and looked at the scraped out place. “It was removed.” Mira whispered through tears, “No. It was broken.” Kael stepped back as though the sentence had struck him physically. Eve looked sharply at him. “Do you know it?” Kael’s jaw worked. “No.” Mira suddenly cried out, not loudly enough to fill the chamber, but sharply enough that Clara pulled her close. “Do not lie,” Mira whispered. Kael went deathly still. Finn looked at him with a mixture of fear and curiosity. “What do you mean?” Mira was crying now, but her eyes remained on the ruined place. “He knows the edge. Not the name. The edge of it.” Lyra whispered, “That could be the name of the Broken One.” The words made the chamber feel narrower. Eve thought of her vision at the black lake, of the long limbs, the blue eyes and the disfigured humanity of that figure. Kael closed his eyes, and for a moment he did not look like a man who could lead them through the fog, but like someone recognizing himself at the edge of an abyss. “I heard that sound,” he finally said. “Years ago. Not the name. Only what remained when someone called it.” Garrick looked up from his device. “Who called it?” Kael opened his eyes. “I no longer know.” Clara laughed bitterly. “Convenient.” Kael looked at her. “No. Cruel.” That silenced her. Mira loosened herself a little from Clara’s grip and stretched a trembling hand toward the ruined place. Clara held her back at once. “No.” Mira sobbed. “He hurts.” Eve crouched in front of her. “Mira, you do not have to touch him.” Mira pressed her lips together. “But he does not stop.” Finn sat down on the cold floor beside her. “Then listen to me.” Clara looked at him in alarm. “Finn, what are you doing?” Finn’s face was pale, but his voice remained calm. “I am only talking.” He looked at Mira. “You do not have to listen to the broken name. You listen to me now. My name is Finn, and I am here, and Clara is about to yell at me because I am doing something she did not approve beforehand.” Mira breathed in shakily. “Finn.” The needle on Garrick’s device moved a little. Garrick saw it. Eve saw it too. Kael did not look, but his hand tightened on the hilt of his weapon. Finn continued, slower and warmer. “Exactly. Finn. Not especially old, not especially clever, only occasionally useful with copper wire. And I think you should stay with my name until the other one stops being so loud.” Mira looked at him through tears. “Your name is warm.” Clara placed a hand on Finn’s shoulder as though she wanted to pull him back, but she did not. Finn stayed with Mira. “Then take it for a moment. Only for a moment. Do not keep it, that would be rude.” Garrick’s device hummed more strongly. Eve held her breath. Mira relaxed a little. The pain in her face eased, not fully, but enough for her to breathe again. Clara looked at Finn, and in her gaze lay horror that was not directed at him. He had helped. That was the problem. He had helped, and by doing so he had moved one step closer to the thing Clara wanted to keep him away from. Lyra whispered, “Names can support.” Garrick answered quietly, “Or guide.” Eve heard both, and both frightened her. The stone circle in the center began to glow. Not everywhere, only in the recesses closest to the ruined place on the wall. Kael stepped back. “We should go.” Garrick lifted his device. “Not yet. The system is reacting to Finn’s name.” Clara spun toward him. “One more word in that direction and I will smash that thing against your chest.” Garrick looked at her, and this time there was no scientific defiance in his face. “Clara, I am not saying we should use him.” Clara remained hard. “But you are thinking it.” Garrick held her gaze. “I think everything that might keep us alive. That is not the same as doing it.” Clara was close to tears, but her voice remained hard. “For people like you, eventually it is the same.” Eve stepped between them. “Enough.” Mira looked at the stone circle. “It heard Finn.” Clara turned chalk white. Finn whispered, “The broken name?” Mira shook her head. “The room.” Garrick swallowed. “What does the room want?” Mira looked to the walls, to the names, to the scraped out places, then to Eve. “It wants to know who is still remembered.” Eve felt the red cloth beneath her fingers again. Lysa. The name burned inside her. She did not want to say it. She wanted to protect it, but perhaps silence was another form of loss. Lyra had said names were connection points between person, memory and world. What did it mean, then, if Eve carried her sister’s name only inside herself, never in the room, never before others, never where the world could hear it? Was that protection or cowardice? Was memory still memory if it was entrusted to no one? She only realized that Mira was looking at her when Finn softly said her name. “Eve?” She shook her head. “Not now.” Clara looked at the red cloth, but she did not ask. Eve was grateful to her for that. Kael stepped back to the ruined place on the wall, though every part of his body seemed to work against it. He lifted his hand, but did not touch the stone. “If this is the name of the Broken One, why was it removed?” Lyra answered softly. “Perhaps to banish him.” Garrick looked at the stone circle. “Or to keep him incomplete.” Finn furrowed his brow. “Would an incomplete name not be worse?” Everyone looked at him. He gave an uncertain shrug. “I mean, if names bind people to the world, then a broken name does not make a person harmless. It makes him lost.” Those words struck the chamber harder than any measurement. Mira began to cry again, but this time without the cramped pain from before. Kael looked at Finn, and in his gaze there was something that almost resembled respect. “Yes,” he said. “It does.” Clara looked as though she did not know whether to embrace Finn or drag him out of the chamber. Eve understood that feeling too well. Finn kept thinking, and every good thought made him more valuable. Every valuable person in this story was noticed eventually. Garrick knelt at the stone circle and examined the recesses. “These small fittings may have held carriers. Metal plates perhaps. Pieces of bone. Glass. Things connected to the names.” Lyra nodded. “Name anchors.” Clara shuddered. “You have just found a new word I hate.” Mira whispered, “Some are empty.” Eve looked at her. “Because the anchors were removed?” Mira nodded. “Or taken.” A scraping ran through the chamber. It did not come from the stairs. It came from the walls. The names began to glow faintly, row by row, first clear, then flickering. Lyra looked around breathlessly. “The system is waking.” Garrick reached for his device. “No. It is responding to too many living names at once.” Marek called something from above that came only muffled through the opening. Nara answered sharply. Garren ordered silence. Then a cold breath moved down the stairs. Kael raised his weapon. “The fog is above.” Clara grabbed Mira. “We are leaving.” This time no one objected. Garrick wanted one more look at the stone circle, but Eve yanked him back by the sleeve. “You have seen enough.” Garrick looked at her indignantly. “I usually decide that myself.” Eve pulled him on. “Not today.” Finn helped Mira to her feet, and for a moment she held onto his arm. The names on the wall glowed more strongly. Garrick’s device gave off a high tone. Clara looked at Mira’s hand on Finn’s sleeve and grew even paler. “Mira.” The girl let him go at once. “Sorry.” Finn shook his head. “You do not have to apologize.” Mira looked at the ground. “I do. If something finds me because I am holding onto you, then I do.” Finn wanted to answer, but Eve saw that he had no light sentence left. They climbed the stairs, faster this time. Muffled voices drifted down from above. When Eve reached the final steps, she saw Garren and Nara standing by the opened slab with weapons drawn. The fog had reached the forest, but it did not simply emerge between the trees. It gathered in long strands above the ground, crawled around roots, felt across stones and withdrew again and again as though testing the boundary the old stone still formed. Marek stood a few steps away, his face twisted with tension, while Tara held a small sign made of bone and wire in both hands. “We have company,” Marek said. “In case anyone down there was hoping the situation might become friendlier.” Garrick and Kael pushed the cover slab back, not completely, but enough to narrow the gap. The stone sank with a dull sound that was audible this time. The glow at the rim faded. Mira sagged against Clara, and Finn instinctively reached for her, but drew his hand back before touching her. Eve saw it. Clara saw it too. That unfinished gesture was worse than a touch, because it showed that Finn had already begun to censor himself so Clara would have less reason to fear. The fog at the forest edge moved. No voice came from it, but the impression of a voice did. A distant searching. Mira lifted her head. “It is asking.” Eve stepped in front of her. “Who?” Mira did not look at the fog, but at the closed stone. “The room. The fog. I do not know. It is tangled.” Lyra knelt beside her. “What is it asking?” Mira swallowed. “Which names are still warm.” Clara closed her eyes. “No.” Finn whispered, “Warm.” Garrick looked at his device. The needle pointed at Finn, then at Mira, then at Eve, then began to turn restlessly. “The system distinguishes not only living and dead,” he murmured. “It distinguishes remembered names, spoken names, broken names.” Lyra nodded slowly. “And lost names.” Kael looked into the fog. “Then we cannot stay here.” Garren looked at him. “Retreat?” Kael nodded. “Immediately.” Clara drew Mira closer to herself. “Finally something sensible.” They moved away from the boundary stone without running, because running in the fog rarely meant escape and often only invitation. Garren and Nara went last, while Kael and Eve secured the sides. Garrick held his device pressed against his chest, and Finn carried the wire spool though no one had asked him to. Lyra walked close to Mira, but asked no more questions. That was perhaps the only form of kindness she could manage in that moment. When they reached the ditch, the water was smooth. Too smooth. Eve looked into it and regretted it immediately. For a moment she did not see her reflection, but a little girl with dark brown hair, clutching a red cloth. Lysa did not smile. She only looked at Eve, and her mouth formed a question that needed no sound. Do you remember me if you never say my name? Eve staggered back. Kael was instantly beside her. “What did you see?” Eve shook her head. “Nothing.” He looked at the red cloth. “Eve.” She tore her gaze away. “Not now.” Kael said nothing more. That was wise of him. Or kind. With him, that was difficult to tell. When they crossed the ditch, Finn stopped in the middle of the beam. Clara was already on the other side and turned around immediately. “Finn?” He looked into the water. “There is something.” Mira lifted her head. “Do not listen.” Clara reached out her hand. “Finn, come to me.” He blinked as though he had to free himself from a thought, then walked on. When he took Clara’s hand and stepped onto the bank, the water behind him moved in a circle. No sign appeared. No voice spoke. Yet Eve felt a brief pressure in her ears, and Garrick’s device gave off a soft tone, one tone exactly, clear and warm. Clara pulled Finn toward her so forcefully that he almost lost his balance. “What did you hear?” He looked confused. “I do not know.” Clara did not let go. “Finn.” He searched for words. “I truly did not understand anything. It was only… It was as if someone almost said my name, but did not know how it began.” Mira began to cry quietly. Clara looked as though she would set everything around her on fire if fire helped against fog. Eve turned to Kael. “We need to get farther away from this place.” He nodded. “Yes.” Eve looked toward the fog. “And after that?” Kael answered without turning his gaze away. “After that, we have to find out what the Broken One was before his name was removed.” Lyra, standing close behind them, said softly, “And why someone believed the world would be safer if no one could remember him anymore.” They only reached the ruin when the afternoon had already turned gray. No one spoke much on the way back. The parchment with the copied line lay in Lyra’s bag, but Garrick had made several new sketches and noted down some of the names from the chamber, not the ruined ones, not the painful ones, but those clear enough to transfer without risk. Clara had watched him do it, and Eve knew something had formed between them that might later break again. Finn walked more quietly than before, but he was not broken. After a while, he stepped beside Eve while Clara walked a few paces ahead with Mira. “Can I ask you something?” Eve looked at him. “You ask anyway.” He smiled weakly. “That is probably true. What did it feel like to become brave?” The question surprised her. “I do not know whether I ever did.” Finn looked at her skeptically. “You stand in the way of things other people do not even want to look at.” Eve looked ahead. “That is not always courage. Sometimes it is guilt. Sometimes anger. Sometimes the lack of better ideas.” Finn was silent for a moment. “But you go anyway.” Eve looked at Mira, at Clara, at the fog behind them. “Yes.” Finn’s voice became quieter. “I do not always want to be the one Clara has to save.” Eve did not answer immediately. She thought of the way Clara had looked at him, of how every one of his questions to the old stone had been a knife to her. “You should tell her that.” Finn looked ahead. “She does not hear that.” Eve let her gaze rest on Clara as well. “Then say it often enough that she has to hear it.” Finn nodded slowly. “And what if she is right?” Eve looked at him. “About what?” He hesitated. “That I should keep my distance. That I should stay out of things that are not about me.” Eve wanted to tell him that it would be safer. She truly did. But the lie stuck in her throat. “Perhaps these things have long since become about all of us.” Finn looked ahead, where Mira walked holding Clara’s hand. “Mira called my name warm.” Eve nodded. “Yes.” Finn swallowed. “Is that bad?” Eve thought of the tone from Garrick’s device, of the water beneath the beam, of the stone circle full of names. “I do not know.” Finn exhaled slowly. “That is at least an answer I believe.” When they reached the fire pit, Mira sat down at once. Clara sat beside her, but her eyes kept searching for Finn. Garrick did not vanish into work as he usually did, but remained standing for a while, looking thoughtfully at the young man. Then he took the wire spool from Finn’s hands. “You held yourself well.” Finn looked surprised. “Thank you.” Garrick raised a warning finger. “That does not mean you are coming with us again tomorrow if it gets more dangerous.” Clara looked up triumphantly, but Garrick added, “It only means you learn better what you are doing before then.” Clara stared at him. Finn did too. Then Finn smiled, small, exhausted and almost proud. Clara saw that smile and closed her eyes for a moment, as though it hurt her. Mira watched them all. Eve noticed it. The girl saw how people spoke about danger, use, protection and responsibility. She saw how her own pain delivered information. She saw how Finn became helpful through his closeness and thereby immediately became part of a larger plan. Eve wondered what Mira was learning from that, perhaps not today, but a little more with every day. Was she learning that her life was valuable, or was she learning that her value lay in being able to do something others needed? The difference was not large enough when one was afraid. Later, while Garrick and Lyra compared the copies and Kael kept watch at the edge of the ruin, Eve sat apart and took the red cloth in both hands. She had worn it for years. Mended it, washed it, hidden it, defended it. It was the only thing left of Lysa, apart from a name Eve never spoke aloud. The chamber had contained no gravestones. No corpses. Only names, and yet it had felt full of the dead. Perhaps that was the cruelest truth. Perhaps no death was needed to become lost. Perhaps it was enough if no one dared to give your name back to the world. Eve closed her fingers around the fabric and whispered so quietly that not even the fog should have heard it. “Lysa.” Nothing happened. No runes glowed. No water rippled. No shadow moved. And still, for one moment, the world was not quite the same. On the other side of the fire pit, Mira lifted her head. She said nothing. She only looked at Eve, and this time there was no foreign knowledge in her gaze, but a quiet understanding that shook Eve almost more than any prophecy. Kael stood at the edge of the ruin and looked into the darkness. Eve wondered which name he could no longer say. Clara kept Finn in her sight while he talked with Garrick about copper wire and resonance. Mira sat between them, small, pale and far too awake. Lyra wrote the first sentences about what they had found, and Garren quietly consulted with Nara and Tara about the next path. Marek sat alone on a piece of wall and pretended none of it interested him. Evening lowered itself over them. The fog remained outside, but not far away. In Lyra’s bag, the parchment began to glow again. This time it was not only the copied line from the boundary stone that shone. Beside it, where the parchment had been empty, a second sentence formed for a brief moment out of pale light. No one saw it completely before it vanished again. Lyra tore the bag open and pulled out the parchment, but there was only a faint afterglow, an almost lost trace. Garrick bent over it. “Did you recognize anything?” Lyra nodded slowly, and her voice was barely more than a breath. “Not everything.” Eve stepped to her. “What did it say?” Lyra looked to Mira, then to Finn, then to Eve. “Only a fragment. Beneath the names sleeps the guilt.” The fog at the edge of the ruin did not answer, and that made it worse. It did not need to answer. By now, all of them had understood that silence too could be a form of voice.