"You're thinking like a Dreamer again, Elara. Stop it."
Jaxon's voice echoed off the damp stone walls of the "Blind Alley"—a dead-end tunnel deep in the Under-City where the Dream Veins were so thin the streetlights only flickered like dying fireflies.
He lunged at me, his wooden staff whistling through the air. I tried to skip back, my heart hammering against my ribs, but my foot caught on a jagged pipe. I tumbled backward into the sludge, the wind knocked out of me.
"Again," Jaxon said, not offering a hand to help me up. His broken Blue Mark sparked against his neck, casting rhythmic, jolting shadows against the rust-covered walls.
"I can't see what you're doing!" I gasped, wiping the foul-smelling water from my face. "Your Mark... it's too fast. It's a blur."
Jaxon stopped. He spun his staff and planted it firmly in the ground. He looked at me with a frustration that was tempered by something else—maybe pity, or maybe a strange kind of hope.
"That's the problem," he said, stepping into the dim circle of light. "You're trying to track the light. Everyone in Oakhaven does that. They watch the glow of a Mark to see what's coming. If a Red Mark flares, they know a strike is coming. If a Green Mark dims, they know the healer is tired."
He walked over to me and tapped the center of my chest with the end of his staff.
"But you're a Blank. You don't have a light to guide you, and you don't have a light to give you away. To a Hunter, you are a hole in the world. Use it."
He closed his eyes. "Try to hit me. Don't look at my Blue Mark. Look at my feet. Look at the way my weight shifts. Magic lies, Elara. Physics doesn't."
I stood up, my muscles aching. I felt the locket against my skin, still warm from the Scholar's memory I had absorbed in Maura's shop. It wasn't just a weight anymore; it felt like a part of me, a second heart beating in my pocket.
I lunged. It was a clumsy move, but I kept my eyes on his shoulders, not the blue sparks on his neck. I saw the slight dip in his left hip before he moved. I pivoted.
Whish.
His staff swung through the air exactly where my ribs had been a second ago. I didn't fall. I didn't stumble. I was standing right behind him.
Jaxon froze. He turned slowly, a wide, genuine grin breaking across his face.
"There it is," he whispered. "The Ghost Step. You moved before I even finished the swing because you weren't waiting for the magic to tell you where to go."
"I saw you," I said, my voice trembling with a sudden, electric excitement. "I didn't feel the 'Spark.' I just saw... you."
"Exactly," Jaxon said. He tossed me a short, heavy iron rod he'd found in the scrap heaps. "Now, let's talk about the Locket. You didn't just 'eat' that memory back at Maura's. You integrated it. The Scholar's memory gave you his 'Logic.' Use that logic to read the flow of the city."
I gripped the iron rod and closed my eyes, reaching out to the locket.
"Analyze," I whispered.
The world shifted. The "Lines" appeared again, but they were clearer now, labeled with the data from the Scholar's life. I saw the pressure in the steam pipes. I saw the structural integrity of the tunnel. I saw the exact frequency of the "Static" humming in the air.
"Jaxon," I said, my eyes snapping open. They were no longer just grey; for a split second, they reflected the silver light of the Archive. "The Hollows... they aren't just looking for me. They're setting a 'Filter' at the North Gate. They're going to flooded the Under-City with 'High-Frequency Pulse.'"
Jaxon's smile vanished. "A Pulse? That'll kill anyone with a broken Mark. It'll shatter us from the inside out."
"They don't care about the 'Broken,'" I said, the cold logic of the Scholar's memory making my voice sound distant, even to myself. "They only care about the Void. If they kill everyone else, the only thing left will be me. I'll be the only silent spot in a screaming city."
"We have to move," Jaxon said, grabbing his pack. "We can't stay in the warrens. We have to go to the 'Dead Zones'—the places where the city's power hasn't reached in a hundred years."
"No," I said, clutching the iron rod. I felt a surge of something that wasn't just fear. It was the "spite" I had felt in Kael's shop, but now it had a name. It had a purpose. "If we run, they'll just keep hunting us. We need to break the Filter."
"Elara, there are dozens of them," Jaxon argued. "The Hollows are half-machine. They don't feel pain."
I looked at the locket. I remembered the man in the white room. Subject 006. The Vessel.
"They don't feel pain," I agreed, my voice hardening. "But they run on the city's light. And I'm the girl who knows how to turn it off."
I started walking toward the North Gate, the sound of my boots on the stone no longer sounding like a fugitive's flight. They sounded like a drum.
Jaxon watched me for a moment, his broken Mark sparking in a frantic, panicked rhythm. Then, he let out a short, sharp laugh and followed.
"I knew you were a big stone, Elara," he muttered, catching up to me. "I just didn't realize you were an avalanche."
As we approached the edge of the district, the air began to hum with a high-pitched, painful vibration. The 'Pulse' was starting. In the distance, I saw the first of the Hollows—tall, silent figures in black armor, their masks glowing with a cold, artificial white light.
I didn't hide. I didn't use the Concealment.
I gripped the iron rod, let the locket draw the energy from the air around me, and prepared to show the city what a girl without a dream could do with a nightmare.