No one slept the first night after victory.
They lay down. Some closed their eyes. They dreamed — if pain and smoke and screaming sky count as dreaming. A few woke gasping, hands reaching for weapons that were not there. A few did not wake at all, too deep in exhausted darkness to hear the crying in the streets.
But no one in Aru Temb truly slept. The city had learned too much in one night to trust silence again.
Along the lower terraces, mothers washed soot from children who hadn't been near the battle. Fishers did not untie their boats. Even the dogs barked at the river, as though the dark water might rise again if no one insulted it. Old men sat on doorsteps with spears across their knees — spears they could no longer lift, but holding them felt better than praying. A woman on the third terrace kept a single lamp burning in her window, waiting for a husband who would not return.
Above them all, the palace remained awake.
The wounded filled every covered chamber. Priests and river-keepers moved among them, but no one believed prayers would be enough tonight. A boy of fifteen with a crushed leg kept asking for his mother. A woman with burns across her hands sang an old river song in a whisper, over and over, until her voice gave out. In the corner of the grain loft, a man with no visible wound sat staring at the wall, rocking slightly, saying nothing to anyone.
In the lower royal court, the dead were being counted. Again. Then again. As if the number might change if grief and discipline argued long enough. The scribe's hand had begun to cramp, but he did not stop. Names mattered tonight more than handwriting.
Eren stood in the middle, half wrapped in fresh bandages, armor stripped away, a dark robe thrown over wounds that still bled through in places. He looked less like a prince than like a man war had not finished with. His left hand trembled slightly when he thought no one was watching. His right hand rested on the hilt of his sword, though he had no reason to draw it here.
A healer caught him by the wrist.
"You tear that side open again, and I will bind you to a bed with public help."
Eren pulled free. "If I tear it open, bind me after the count."
She stared at him. "Do men of your line ever listen?"
"Only to alarming things."
"Then I'll find something more alarming."
He moved on before she could, though he heard her mutter something about stubborn princes and the stupid cost of duty.
---
At the counting table, Captain Letho stood with one arm in a sling, reading names off bark-strips. His voice was hoarse. He had been reading for hours. A scribe scratched marks beside the dead, the living, the missing.
"River stair, second ring," Letho said. "Five dead. Two missing. One body unrecoverable."
The scribe asked quietly, "Name for the unrecoverable?"
Letho's jaw tightened. "Still spoken. Write it."
That was the rule now. Still spoken. Even if nothing whole remained. Even if the river had taken them or the enemy fire had left only ash.
Eren came to the table and put both hands on the wood. His knuckles were white.
"How many fit to fight by sunrise?"
Letho did not answer immediately. That was answer enough.
"Twenty-three," he said. "If your definition is ungenerous."
"And by honest definition?"
Letho looked up. "Nine."
Eren exhaled once through his nose. Nine. From a defense line that had numbered over two hundred the night before.
Behind him, a soldier collapsed mid-step — not dead, but too tired to stand. No one helped. There was no help left for that tonight. The man lay where he fell, breathing shallowly, and no one had the strength to carry him to a mat.
---
A palace runner entered at speed, mud still on his calves.
"My lord. The old king asks for the lower terrace sealed before dawn. No priest, keeper, or councilor enters without written authority."
Eren nodded. "Good."
The runner hesitated. "And the woman from the sky?"
The room changed around that question. The scribe stopped scratching. Letho looked up from his bark-strips.
Eren looked at the boy. "She is under crown protection."
"Yes, my lord. But… where?"
Letho answered. "Where no fool wanders and no coward reaches first."
The boy swallowed and bowed quickly. "Yes."
When he left, the scribe murmured, "The city is already asking."
"The city can ask," Eren said. "It does not yet get answers."
---
Outside, hammers had already begun. Not rebuilding. Reinforcing. Engineers drove temporary supports into damaged walls. Here and there, blue-white light flickered under cracks in the lower terrace path, making laborers mutter prayers before returning to work. The stones themselves seemed uneasy, as if the ground remembered the fire and had not yet decided to trust the weight of footsteps.
A little before midnight, Eren went down to the landing terrace.
It looked worse in torchlight than during the battle. Then, it had been chaos. Now it was only ruin. Broken obelisks lay across blood-black stone. The center ring had collapsed inward around the awakened seal, which still pulsed beneath the rubble — faint, breathing, blue-white. Ash clung to everything. The river moved beside it in heavy silence, dark and broad and strange.
Three priests of Ru argued with two river-keepers and a squad of guards.
"It must be purified before dawn!" said a priest.
"It must be left untouched," said a keeper.
Eren's voice cut across. "It is guarded."
The eldest priest bowed stiffly. The eldest keeper did not bow at all.
"My lord," said the priest, "if the lower ring remains active through the night without rites—"
"Then it remains active under armed watch."
"And if what lies beneath rises further?"
Eren looked at the seal. It pulsed once, as if hearing its own mention.
"Then waking men with swords are still more useful than sleeping men with doctrine."
That ended the argument. Mostly. The priests retreated to the edge of the terrace, still whispering. The river-keepers stayed where they were, silent and watchful.
---
A young guard came from the terrace edge, face pale.
"My lord. We found another one."
Letho went still. "Enemy?"
The guard nodded. "Caught in the lower spill-channel. Dead. Mostly."
Eren looked toward the river-dark. "Mostly."
The guard swallowed. "The body's dead. The weapon isn't
Eren and Letho exchanged one look. Not surprise. Recognition. They had seen this twice already tonight.
"Show me."
They moved toward the spill-channel. A cold wind came off Nam Lapi, carrying water scent, ash, and something metallic underneath — a smell like hot iron and old blood mixed together.
Behind them, the broken seal pulsed once.
Ahead of them, something in the dark clicked against stone.
Letho whispered, "It's not alone."
The clicking stopped.
Then it started again — closer. Two clicks. Then three. Then a wet dragging sound.
Eren drew his blade.
Behind him, the seal pulsed a second time. The light under the rubble flickered — blue-white, then red, then blue-white again. The red stayed longer this time.
The clicking stopped for good.
Then something — low, wet, wrong — began to crawl out of the spill-channel. It moved like a broken thing held together by will alone, and yet it moved toward them.
The guards behind Eren took one step back. He did not.