The bleeding had stopped, but Kael's head still rang with echoes.
He sat on the tailgate of Tessa's supply wagon, a cloth pressed to his nose, watching the southern horizon where the distortion had been. It was gone now—faded like morning mist—but the resonance hadn't returned to normal. The bones still hummed wrong, a frequency that set his teeth on edge and made his skull ache.
Around him, the caravan was a controlled chaos of frightened people trying to pretend they weren't.
"Drink this." Joren pressed a tin cup into his hand. Water, blessedly cold.
Kael drank, tasting salt and metal. "How many others?"
"Bled? Seven. Old Meris passed out but he's awake now. The Sohm sisters are fine—they never worked the deep mines, so less dust in their blood." Joren sat beside him, moving carefully. "Petran's having a panic attack. Cors is talking him down."
"He shouldn't be out here. Too young."
"We were all too young once." Joren's voice was flat, distant. He was staring at his hands, at the tremor that had started in his fingers. The corruption made him shake sometimes, usually when he was stressed or tired. Right now he looked both.
"You need to rest," Kael said.
"I need answers more." Joren finally looked at him. "What was that? Really?"
Kael didn't answer immediately. How could he explain something he barely understood himself? The distortion had felt purposeful not random, like something reaching across distance, searching for a specific target.
The vessel approaches. The singer draws near.
"I don't know," he lied. "Maybe a storm we didn't detect."
"That wasn't a storm and you know it." Joren's jaw tightened. "I've seen godstorms, Kael. Been caught in two of them. They don't bend air like that. They don't make shapes."
"Then what do you think it was?"
"I think something's waking up. And I think whatever it is, it's connected to you."
Kael's hand clenched around the cup. "Why would you think that?"
"Because you heard voices. I saw your face—you weren't just sensing resonance, you were listening to something. Understanding it." Joren leaned closer, voice dropping. "I'm not judging. I'm just asking: what did it say?"
Kael met his eyes. Saw genuine concern there, beneath the cynicism and the fear. Joren had secrets too—the corruption wasn't something you got by accident. Whatever had happened in his imperial service, it had marked him as surely as the dust had marked Kael.
Maybe that was why Kael trusted him. Both of them were carrying wounds that wouldn't heal.
"It said someone's coming," Kael finally admitted. "Someone important. A singer."
"Singer? Like a bard?"
"No. Something else. Something that can..." He struggled for words. "Command the resonance, control it with their voice."
Joren's expression darkened. "Voice resonance. Gods, those are rare. Empire keeps a registry of anyone with even a hint of the ability." He was quiet for a moment. "If something out there is calling to a voice resonant, and the empire finds out..."
"They'll come," Kael finished. "In force."
"Which means we need to move. Now. Before—"
"Tessa! Riders incoming!"
The shout came from the western perimeter. Kael was on his feet before his conscious mind processed the words, cup forgotten, hand already reaching for the knife at his belt. Joren moved with him, military reflexes kicking in despite his condition.
They ran toward the wagon circle's edge where a young scout named Relle stood pointing west, arm steady despite the fear in her voice. "Eight riders. Maybe nine. Moving fast."
Kael followed her gesture. There—dust plumes rising against the bone-white ribs, still distant but closing. The morning sun glinted off something metallic. Armor, maybe, or weapons.
"Imperial?" Tessa appeared beside them, crossbow already loaded.
Kael squinted, trying to make out details. The riders were in formation—too disciplined to be bandits, too purposeful to be traders. "Probably."
Tessa turned, voice rising to carry. "Everyone stay calm! Keep the circle! Do not—I repeat—do not point weapons at them unless I give the word!"
"Why would imperial riders be out here?" Cors asked, joining them. Her single eye was narrowed with suspicion.
"Could be routine patrol," Davos offered weakly.
"Nothing's routine in the Expanse," Joren muttered. He'd drawn his knife—a long fighting blade with a god-bone handle that probably cost more than everything Kael owned.
"They're coming from the wrong direction anyway. Patrols run north-south, not east-west."
Which meant they weren't patrol. They were escorting something, or someone.
Kael's stomach tightened. The timing was too perfect. The distortion, the voices, and now imperial riders appearing within hours? That wasn't coincidence.
The vessel approaches.