The sun dipped low as Novara's skyline rose in the distance, its towers jagged and golden beneath the late afternoon haze. Skyrails hummed quietly overhead, weaving through the city like threads of light, while thick city air clung to the streets below. The noise and the motion should have comforted Kazi after two weeks in the wilderness.
But it didn't.
Everything felt thinner now, dimmer. Like something had scraped the shine off the city she once called home.
She hadn't realized how long two weeks could stretch until she came back and saw the shift with her own eyes. Time outside the city had moved differently, bending around the weight of her mark, the resonance, and Azibo's memory. Here, time had continued on without her… but it hadn't healed anything.
Kazi led the way through the crowded streets of the Kwenra District, her hoodie pulled low over her curls, eyes flicking to every alley and rooftop. She hadn't said much since they reentered the city. Her jaw was tight, her fingers twitching with the tension of someone ready to burn through the pavement if she had to.
Rhazir followed close, his shadow stretching long in the evening light. Dakarai brought up the rear, his Volt Line mark hidden beneath a sleeve, but his eyes were alive with sparks, scanning their surroundings with quiet intensity.
"We're getting close," Kazi muttered.
The familiar graffiti of her neighborhood had changed. Murals were defaced. Windows shuttered. Shops she once passed on the way to class were now closed early, some boarded up entirely. The city hadn't just moved on while she was gone, it had contracted, recoiling from something invisible but deeply felt.
When they reached her building, her stomach turned. The front gate, once kept closed with a rusty padlock, was hanging open. No neighbors sat on the stoop. No music drifted through the walls. Just silence.
They climbed the stairs, every footstep echoing louder than it should have. Apartment 3A stood ahead. The door was cracked open just enough to send a chill down her spine. It hadn't been left that way by accident.
She hesitated for half a second, then pushed it open.
The apartment was darker than she remembered. Furniture had been tossed or broken. A lamp lay shattered by the window. Her books, her favorite ones, the ones she and Luma had traded back and forth, were scattered across the floor, some of them torn, others with burnt edges as if someone had tried to destroy them and stopped halfway.
Dakarai stepped in behind her. "They didn't even try to hide it."
"No," Kazi said softly. "They wanted me to see it."
She wandered slowly through the apartment, her hand trailing across the edges of the chaos. Everything had been touched, turned over, left open. Drawers gaped like wounds. Luma's favorite throw blanket was crumpled on the floor, dirt-streaked and half-burned.
She walked toward Luma's room. The bed was overturned, dresser drawers dumped, closet door hanging crooked. But near the window, something caught her eye, a jagged, soot-colored mark along the floor, like a scorch. It wasn't fire. Not hers. It had an unnatural twist to it.
Rhazir crouched beside it, fingers brushing the edge. "This wasn't an accident. They opened something here. Could've been a portal. Could've been an exit point."
Kazi swallowed hard. "You think she's still alive?"
"I think she's useful to them," Rhazir replied. "For now."
Kazi clenched her fists. Her mark flared beneath her sleeve, sending warmth crawling up her arm. She walked back into the hallway, where the mirror on the wall still hung crooked.
She stared at her reflection. Her eyes looked different now. Brighter. Angrier.
"Where would they take her?" Dakarai asked.
"Somewhere hidden," Rhazir said. "Somewhere outside the resonance network. They won't risk keeping her close."
"We need a lead," Kazi muttered. "Anything."
Rhazir stepped toward the door. "There's someone in the city who might know."
"Who?"
He glanced at her over his shoulder.
"Someone who used to hunt people like us."