The city did not notice when Aerin changed.
Cities never did.
They noticed fires, riots, collapsing towers, blood in the streets—but not the quiet rearrangement of a single person's awareness.
Dawn crept over Caereth's eastern rooftops in the same dull gold it always had, touching cracked tiles and sagging chimneys, illuminating laundry lines and the steam rising from bakeries. Life continued with stubborn indifference.
Aerin stood at the narrow window of the rented room, watching the street below with an attention that felt… heavier than before.
Not sharper. Not faster.
Heavier.
A fishmonger argued with a customer over the weight of a silver-scaled carp. A cart rattled past, one wheel wobbling dangerously.
Somewhere, a woman laughed too loudly, the sound cutting through the morning air before dissolving into noise. All of it felt normal. Excessively so.
Aerin's fingers rested against the windowsill. He didn't touch the glass. He didn't need to.
Something tugged at him—not a sensation, not a voice. A recognition.
The cart wheel should have snapped.
The thought came unbidden, complete and certain.
The axle was cracked. The weight uneven. The road stones misaligned. A dozen small factors leaned toward failure, stacking neatly atop one another.
But the wheel held.
The cart passed.
The moment slid on.
Aerin frowned, a shallow crease forming between his brows.
He wasn't predicting anymore.
He was noticing the absence of outcomes.
Behind him, the room smelled faintly of old wood and iron.
The innkeeper had called it a "room," but it was closer to a storage space with a bed forced into it. Aerin had chosen it deliberately. Cheap. Forgettable.
Overlooked.
He turned away from the window and sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, staring at his hands.
They looked the same.
Long fingers. Callused palms.
A thin scar across the knuckle of his right index finger from a childhood accident he barely remembered.
There was no glow, no distortion, no visible mark of anything unusual.
And yet, when he closed his eyes, the world did not go dark.
It never truly did anymore.
He could feel the city—not emotionally, not spiritually, but structurally. As if Caereth were a machine whose parts he had not been meant to see, but now could not unsee.
Events lined up in his mind like loose threads, each tugging against the next, each insisting on sequence.
Cause. Effect. Cause. Effect.
And in between them—gaps.
Empty spaces where something else wanted to exist.
Aerin exhaled slowly and stood. He dressed without ceremony, pulling on worn boots and a plain coat, the fabric rough against his skin. He checked the knife at his side more out of habit than need. Steel still mattered.
He wasn't arrogant enough to forget that.
Downstairs, the inn was already alive
. The common room buzzed with low conversation, the scrape of chairs, the clink of cups.
Aerin moved through it without drawing attention, nodding once at the innkeeper, who barely glanced up.
Outside, Caereth unfolded around him in layers.
The city was old. Not ancient, but old enough to have learned how to rot without collapsing. Buildings leaned into each other like conspirators.
Streets curved in ways that made no sense to newcomers but felt inevitable to those born here. Stone, wood, iron—patched, repurposed, reused.
Aerin walked without destination, letting his feet choose the path.
That was new, too.
Normally, he planned. He calculated. He moved with intent, even if that intent was simply survival.
Now, something else guided him—not instinct, not intuition.
A pressure, subtle but persistent, nudging him toward intersections, toward crowds, toward places where outcomes multiplied.
He passed a shrine wedged between two warehouses, its stone face worn smooth by time and neglect.
A cracked bell hung above it, unmoving. Aerin slowed, eyes lingering on the metal.
The bell did not ring.
It should have.
He didn't know how he knew that. He only knew the certainty settled in his bones like an old memory. A group of dockworkers brushed past him, their shoulders jostling his coat.
One of them laughed, loud and rough, and the sound echoed strangely off the stone.
Aerin stepped away from the shrine, heart beating a fraction faster.
Someone was watching.
The realization didn't come with fear. It came with irritation.
He turned down a narrower street, one that smelled of salt and tar, the docks bleeding into the city's veins.
Crates were stacked high along the walls, marked with faded sigils and merchant brands.
Sailcloth flapped overhead, strung between buildings to block the sun.
Halfway down the street, a man leaned against the wall.
He was unremarkable in the way that felt intentional.
Average height. Average build.
Brown hair pulled back at the nape of his neck. His clothes were clean but plain, the cut practical, the colors muted. He could have been a clerk. A sailor. A courier.
He watched Aerin approach with open curiosity, no attempt at concealment.
When Aerin drew level, the man spoke.
"You walk like someone who's listening for something," he said.
Aerin stopped.
The street behind him was empty now. Ahead, it curved out of sight.
"People say that to sound clever," Aerin replied evenly. "Usually they're wrong."
The man smiled faintly. "Usually."
They stood there, measuring each other.
The man's gaze was sharp, not predatory but analytical, like someone examining a flawed mechanism.
"You're new to this part of the city," the man continued. "But the city already knows you."
"That's not how cities work."
The man shrugged. "Depends on the city."
Aerin shifted his weight, fingers brushing the hilt of his knife without drawing it. "If you have a point, make it."
"I do," the man said. "I'm curious."
"That's not a point."
"It is when curiosity gets people killed."
Aerin met his eyes fully now. For a brief moment, the world… hesitated.
Not visibly. Not dramatically. But Aerin felt it, like a breath held too long.
The man blinked, just once, and something in his expression tightened.
"Interesting," he murmured.
Aerin's jaw set.
"Who are you?"
"Someone who notices patterns," the man replied. "And anomalies."
Silence stretched between them.
Somewhere in the distance, a gull cried.
Aerin felt the pressure again—the sense of multiple outcomes crowding close, each one eager. He could step forward. He could turn away. He could speak.
He could strike.
Each choice existed.
Too many of them.
The man's gaze flicked, just briefly, to Aerin's right hand.
Aerin relaxed his fingers.
"I'm not interested in trouble," Aerin said.
"Neither am I," the man replied. "But trouble doesn't require interest."
A moment passed. Then the man straightened, pushing off the wall.
"My name is Corin," he said casually.
"If you're smart, you'll forget this conversation."
"And if I'm not?"
Corin's smile returned, thinner this time. "Then we'll talk again."
He stepped past Aerin, close enough that their shoulders nearly brushed.
As he passed, Aerin felt something tug—a faint, sharp sensation, like a hook testing the edge of his awareness.
He let it slide.
Corin paused a few steps away. "One more thing."
Aerin didn't turn.
"You should stop standing near shrines," Corin said. "They attract attention."
"From whom?"
Corin hesitated. Just long enough.
"From things that don't like being reminded they're not in control."
Then he walked away, footsteps fading into the city's noise.
Aerin stood alone in the narrow street, pulse steady but mind racing.
Corin had felt it.
Not fully. Not clearly. But enough.
Aerin exhaled slowly and continued on, emerging into a broader avenue that opened toward the docks.
The sea stretched beyond, gray and restless, ships bobbing against their moorings. The smell of salt grew stronger, mixing with oil and fish and sweat.
He leaned against a railing overlooking the water, eyes scanning the horizon.
Ships came and went.
Cargo moved.
Lives intersected and separated.
The world functioned.
But underneath it all, something strained.
Aerin closed his eyes.
For a moment—just a moment—he stopped trying to choose.
He let the pressure build.
Outcomes crowded in, overlapping, contradictory.
A ship's rope snapping. A sailor slipping.
A crate falling.
None of them inevitable. All of them possible.
Aerin did not push.
He did not pull.
He simply… didn't resolve.
The world shuddered.
Not outwardly. No one screamed. No alarms rang. But Aerin felt it—a subtle lurch, like a gear skipping a tooth.
Somewhere on the docks, a sailor stumbled, catching himself on the railing with a curse.
The rope held. The crate stayed put. The ship remained moored.
Everything continued.
Aerin opened his eyes, breath shallow.
Sweat dampened his palms.
That had been a mistake.
Not because anything had gone wrong—but because something had almost gone right.
He pushed himself away from the railing and walked, faster now, needing distance.
The city pressed in, noise rising, people brushing past him. Faces blurred together.
He was not alone in this anymore.
Someone had noticed.
Maybe more than one.
As the sun climbed higher over Caereth, casting hard shadows across stone and sea, Aerin felt the shape of an unanswered question settle over him like a weight.
Not what he was.
But how long the world would tolerate it.
And whether, when it finally answered, anything would be left standing.