Lyanna found him near the market on the ninth day, exactly as promised.She wore travel clothes instead of sect robes, plain gray fabric that did nothing to disguise the way she carried herself, spine straight, eyes constantly tracking the crowd around her out of habit rather than suspicion. Her arm was still bound though the wound had clearly begun closing beneath the wrapping, and she fell into step beside him without preamble, the way someone does when they’ve already decided the conversation is happening whether the other person agrees or not.“You’re harder to track than you should be for someone who claims to just gather herbs,” she said, matching his pace easily despite his shorter stride. “I checked with three different guilds. Nobody’s ever heard of a Hadrian Vex doing trade of any kind.”“I’m new to it.”“New people don’t move like you did in that clearing.” She studied his face, sharp and unhurried, the same evaluating look she’d worn while bleeding against a rock wall thre

A day before the new moon, the reconstruction reached a milestone Aethros had been quietly working toward for two weeks.Both arms fully restored, the primary channels running clean from shoulder to fingertip without so much as a flicker of resistance when he cycled qi through them. Chest meridians nearly a third complete, the phoenix fire behaving now more like a tool than a wound, responsive to his will in ways it hadn’t been even a week earlier. Body Refinement, sixth stage, further than he’d expected to reach this quickly given the state he’d started from.He tested the progress alone in his room that morning, cycling a full breath of qi from his right shoulder down through his fingertips and back, feeling the pathway hold steady under the strain. A month ago the same test would have left him gasping, doubled over with his hand braced against the wall. Now it barely registered as effort, a smooth current instead of a desperate trickle.He flexed both hands slowly, watching the fai

The hall was packed by the time they reached the front benches, banners from a dozen merchant families hanging from the rafters, murmured speculation thick enough to taste in the air. Word had clearly spread.Nobody wanted to miss watching the Vex family’s collapse play out in public, and the benches along both walls were filled well past what Aethros remembered from Roran’s descriptions of previous sessions, latecomers standing in clusters near the back doors.Theron arrived precisely at midday, Rurik trailing a step behind him, already smirking at the crowd like a man who’d come to watch a show he already knew the ending to.Theron’s robes were immaculate, black silk embroidered with the Blacksteel crest, every stitch of it announcing wealth the way Cassian’s plainer, older robes could not. He moved through the parting crowd with the unhurried confidence of someone who had never once doubted his own victory, nodding to acquaintances as he passed, accepting a few murmured congratulat

Murmurs spread through the crowd, disbelief mixing openly with something that sounded almost like admiration. Another merchant near the front leaned toward his neighbor, voice carrying further than he probably intended. “The trash son. Paid off Blacksteel. Someone explain that to me, because I’ve done business in this city for thirty years and I’ve never seen anything like it.”“Neither have I,” his companion muttered back. “And I don’t think Lord Blacksteel has either, judging by his face.”Roran, standing close enough to hear everything, turned to Aethros with open shock written across his face. “How,” he said quietly, leaning in. “How did you even manage this. Where does a crippled young master find that kind of money in two weeks? You told me nothing about any of this, and I’ve been standing right beside you the entire time.”“It’s a long story.”“That’s not an answer.”“It’s the one I have right now.” Aethros kept his eyes on Theron, watching the man’s fury build without a releas

The hall erupted.Guild elders rose fully from their seats along the dais, voices overlapping as they called for order, the gray-bearded elder’s raised hand doing little to quiet the chaos spreading through the benches. Family heads whispered urgently to one another, some already reassessing the boy they’d spent weeks dismissing as harmless. Near the back, someone let out a low whistle that cut through the noise before an elder’s sharp glance silenced it.“Who taught you that,” one of the elders demanded, leaning forward over the rail, his eyes narrowed with genuine suspicion now rather than mere curiosity. “No cripple learns pressure point mastery. That technique requires years of formal instruction most sect disciples never receive, let alone perfect well enough to use it that precisely under pressure. I’ve overseen this guild for thirty years, and I’ve never seen anyone your age move like that.”“I read,” Aethros said simply. “The family library has more in it than anyone bothers t