Chapter 69

The group enters the Ditch, a mist-choked, looted quarter of Gore. Clode flits through torn posters while Raeve and Kaan note the city’s emptiness and the Moltenmaw moon looming. They glimpse a skittish white creature and a terrified null boy flees with stolen preserves. Then they discover bodies hanging from a skybridge—nulls, stripped of elemental beads—evidence of a soldier-led purge before forcing citizens underground.

Raeve leads them to The Curly Quill. Ahvi senses it’s empty; inside, the shop is ransacked, Ruse and Uno gone, and the armory only partly looted. Upstairs, Raeve finds Sereme’s space stripped and discovers parchment-lark messages: a curt “plans have changed” to Raeve, and a note from the Elding to Sereme sanctioning resources to aid wounded nulls, hinting at hidden agendas. Raeve’s anger flares.

Ahvi begins wheezing from spilled powder below. Raeve improvises a veil mask from the Book of Voyd’s wrappings and weighs the risk of a long, dusty trek to the collapsed shaft. She pushes to abort, but Ahvi insists a “song inside” assures success. Kaan urges trusting Ahvi despite uncertainty.

They decide Pyrok will safeguard Gruffin. Pyrok reveals he knows Gore’s hunting grounds and can feed the hatchling. Raeve guides him to a secret back entrance via a trash chute to her hidden living quarters, warning of predators and ordering him never to open the ceiling hatch.

Haunted by memories of Essi and the fragile silver moon, Raeve steels herself. With Pyrok and Gruffin secured, Raeve, Kaan, and Ahvi leave the safe route behind and continue their perilous mission beneath Gore, trusting Ahvi’s intuition despite growing stakes and mounting losses.