Dawn broke pale over the city, brushing the cobblestones with gray light that seemed to carry the weight of yesterday's terror. Elira moved at the front, the ash thread coiled around her wrist, warm against her skin like a heartbeat. Behind her, Maelin, Thyra, Rosa, Luthien, and Old Senna followed, their eyes wide at the silence that had swallowed the streets. Normally, the morning would hum with life—vendors calling out wares, children running through the alleys, looms clattering from open windows. Now, everything was muted, as though the city itself was holding its breath.
The Weaver's Quarter lay before them, deserted and broken. Once, the district had overflowed with the colors and chaos of craft: bolts of silk draped over balconies, spools of thread stacked in dizzying towers, looms working day and night in symphony. Now it was a graveyard of abandoned work. Threads curled across the streets like snakes, half-buried in dust and debris. Fabric scraps clung to walls, fused into the stone as if the city itself were trying to remember what it had lost.
"It passed through here," Maelin said softly, kneeling to inspect a strip of silk melted into the pavement. "And it learned again."
Elira pressed a finger to the cloth. The ash thread pulsed warmly, a reminder that she was not powerless. "It doesn't just move anymore," she murmured. "It experiments. It remembers. And it waits."
From a nearby doorway, an old woman emerged, leaning heavily on a carved cane. Her eyes were sharp and alert, despite trembling hands. "You shouldn't be here," she whispered. "It wears familiar faces now. Faces you know. Faces you trust."
Varrek stepped forward. "Who?"
"My son," the woman said, voice shaking. "He returned home smiling. Then he spoke in voices not his own, with eyes that didn't belong to him. I can feel it in the streets. It lingers."
A tremor ran through the ground. The city itself seemed to shiver.
Footsteps echoed from the mist ahead, measured and deliberate. A figure emerged wearing a baker's apron, the fabric darkened with stains. Its face shifted with every step, features stretching, rearranging, failing to settle.
"Elira," it said softly, her name carried in a familiar voice—the voice of her mother.
Thyra gasped. Rosa pressed a hand to her mouth. Maelin's eyes narrowed.
"You taught me to break patterns," the figure said, voice shifting like wind through cloth. "Now teach me mercy."
Elira took a steadying breath. Her heart pounded, but her voice did not falter. "You are not him," she said firmly.
"I remember being him," the cursed figure replied. "I remember fear. Hunger. Obedience."
It stepped closer. The stones cracked beneath its bare feet.
Old Senna moved beside Elira. "Then remember choice," she said, voice sharp.
The ash thread flared. Elira lifted her hand and spoke the breaking words, measured, precise. The air thickened, vibrating with energy as hidden threads within walls, garments, and even flesh stirred in resistance.
The curse recoiled, hissing. "You would undo a city to save a few," it spat.
Elira met its shifting gaze, unflinching. "No. I would save a city by refusing silence."
She pulled the ash thread taut.
Light spread outward like molten silver, steady and controlled. The cursed figure screamed as pieces of it tore away, unraveling into smoke and thread fragments that vanished into the early morning air. The baker collapsed to the ground, breathing hard, fully human again.
Silence fell.
The old woman wept openly, clutching the empty doorway for support.
Varrek exhaled, lowering his sword. "It's not finished," he murmured.
"No," Elira said quietly, scanning the empty streets. "But now it knows we will hunt it."
Maelin smiled grimly.
The sun finally broke through the clouds, weak but tangible. Light touched the buildings and the cobblestones, revealing the scars left behind by the curse. The ash thread hummed faintly against Elira's wrist. The curse had learned to walk among them.
Now, it would learn fear.
And Elira knew that this was only the beginning. The city had remembered. And so had she.