The tower door stood open like a mouth that had already decided to swallow them. Firelight spilled across the threshold, real fire this time, crackling from oil drums and casting long shadows that danced like they had opinions. Jax stepped inside first, leash coiled tight around his wrist, the new weight from the tower shard making every link feel like it carried a secret. The cold math ran automatic. *Small room. Six Cursed visible. One-eyed man at the back table. Weapons within reach. Exit behind us still clear. Calculate every word before it leaves your mouth.*
The one-eyed man looked up from a crate he was using as a table. Scar tissue pulled tight across the left socket, the lid sewn shut with crude black thread. His remaining eye was sharp, the color of old rust. A short, wiry woman with burn scars across her forearms sat beside him, sharpening a blade that already looked sharp enough to split hair. Two others lingered near the far wall, watching with the flat stare of people who had learned not to trust new arrivals.
"Fresh blood," the one-eyed man said. His voice was low, amused, like he'd seen this play before and knew how it ended. "You three smell like the Trial just spat you out. Name's Riven. This is our patch of the isle. You pay the toll or you swim back."
Mira moved up beside Jax, left shoulder dipping every third step. Her lightning was banked low, but the air around her knuckles still hummed. "Toll," she repeated, the word flat. "We just broke a wall of voices that sounded like people we lost. Not in the mood for tolls."
Lira stayed half a pace behind, fingers tracing slow compulsive circles on her thigh. Blood had dried in tracks down her chin, but fresh drops were already forming again. "The futures here are thin," she murmured, too quiet for the others to hear. "In one of them this man trades us information for a shadow. In the others he tries to take one by force."
Jax kept his face blank. The leash pulsed once against his wrist, warm and almost affectionate, as if it liked the smell of potential bargains. Kael stayed silent for now, but Jax could feel him listening, patient as rust. *Calculate the price,* he thought. *Riven wants something specific. Give him the wrong echo and we lose strength we can't afford. Give him the right one and we might buy a faster path back to Lena.*
Riven leaned back, the crate creaking under him. "Smart girl with the blindfold. Most new meat don't bring a prophet. Saves time." He tapped the table with a scarred knuckle. "Here's the deal. The bleed's spreading faster than usual. Last night we lost two of our own to things with too many fingers crawling out of the drains. They weren't from the Expanse. They came from your side. Cascade Spire, right?"
Jax felt the words like a hook behind the ribs. Lena's face flashed again; water at her shoulders now, real time, the three useless vials still broken on the floor beside her cot. The bleed was showing him more clearly with every hour. He kept his voice flat. "You know the real world."
"Used to live there," Riven said. "Tower enforcer before the Shroud took me. Still get glimpses when the bleed opens wide enough. Saw a girl coughing blood in the underlevels yesterday. Thin, stubborn, calling for someone named Jax." He smiled without warmth. "That you?"
The leash tightened on its own. Jax's hand twitched toward his throat before he caught it. The cold math fractured for half a second. *He's testing. Wants to see if I'll pay more to know. Don't let him see the hook.* "Names are cheap," he said. "What's the toll for real information?"
Riven's good eye narrowed. "One shadow. Fresh. From whatever you just dragged out of the Trial. I bind it to our outpost wards and it keeps the finger-things away for another week. You walk out with a map to the nearest god-corpse and a warning about the cult that's already hunting leashes like yours."
Mira's lightning crackled louder. "You want him to weaken the only thing keeping us alive so you can hide longer? Nice try."
Lira's finger-circling sped up. "Two futures now. In one we give him the shadow and the map is real. In the other he takes it by force and the cult arrives before we leave the isle."
Jax rolled the leash across his palm. The links bit skin, the small pain helping him focus. *Calculate the cost. Lose one echo and the voices quiet for a while. Keep them all and the bleed keeps showing me Lena drowning in real time. One shadow buys time.* The math felt cleaner than it had in the tower. He chose.
"Deal," he said. "But I pick which shadow. And you show me the glimpse of the girl first."
Riven studied him for a long moment, then nodded once. He pulled a cracked shard from his coat; the same black glass as the one from the temple, but smaller, worn. He pressed it to his forehead. The air between them shimmered.
Jax saw it clear as day: Lena in the underlevels, water at her collarbones now, coughing weakly. Her eyes were open, staring at the alley entrance like she still believed he would come. The three vials lay shattered beside her. She whispered his name once, then went still, chest barely moving.
The vision cut off.
Riven lowered the shard. "She's got hours, maybe a day. The bleed is speeding everything up on your side."
Jax felt the cold math lock back into place, sharper than ever. *Hours.* He uncoiled the leash and released the weakest new echo; the braided voice from the tower that had first spoken with Lena's tone. Dark mist flowed from his links and into Riven's waiting shard. The one-eyed man shuddered as the shadow settled into the ward stone at the center of the table. The outpost lights flickered brighter for a heartbeat.
"Map," Jax said.
Riven slid a scrap of cured hide across the crate. Crude lines showed the next chained isle and a massive god-corpse half-sunken three bridges away. "Cult's already moving on it. They call themselves the Hollow Choir. They want leashes like yours. Say the echoes are gods waiting to wear new skin."
Mira stepped closer, shoulder tic kicking hard. "And you just sold us to them for a week of safety?"
"Survival's expensive," Riven said with a shrug. "You'll learn."
Lira suddenly grabbed Jax's arm. Her fingers stopped circling. "The futures just shifted. The cult isn't coming later. They're already here. Outside."
The tower door behind them slammed shut on its own. Firelight dimmed as shadows moved across the windows; figures with pale masks and chains wrapped around their arms like jewelry. The air filled with low chanting, dozens of voices speaking in perfect unison.
"The leash remembers. The leash chooses. The leash becomes."
Jax felt his own leash pulse with dark hunger, almost eager. Kael's voice slid in, dry and close. *They want me, meat. And they know how to make you give me up.*
Riven stood slowly, knife already in his hand. "Looks like the toll just went up."
Mira's lightning flared bright. Lira's finger-circling started again, frantic. Jax stared at the door, the map still clenched in his fist, Lena's final weak whisper still echoing in his skull.
*Three moves ahead,* he thought. *Break the cult. Reach the god-corpse. Use whatever we find there to push the bleed back or force a path home.*
He smiled, small, ugly, and mean.
"Then we make them pay double," he said.
The chanting outside rose to a scream as the first masked figure slammed against the door, and the leash around Jax's wrist tightened like it was ready for action.