---

I opened my eyes to the gleam of silver moonbeams slicing through the slit in the stone wall. The scents of damp rock, burning torches, and fear clung thick, but beneath them was something new — a fierce clarity. The chain‑links that had bound my wrists lay broken at my feet, the clatter echoing like the start of a thunderclap.

My sister, Lily, sat bound in the center of the chamber, her face pale with exhaustion, the weight of the child she carried evident even in the flickering torchlight. Surrounding her, I spotted ominous silhouettes — rogues arranged in a loose circle, five hundred or seven hundred at least,...