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T he baby hiccupped once against my chest, then went still. I tightened the wrap over my shoulder and stepped into the Hearth Office.

Inside, the quiet was its own kind of heavy. Not silence exactly—just the scratch of a quill, a chair creaking, the faint clink of a teapot.

The clerk looked up from a pile of half-sorted forms. She was younger than I’d expected, maybe twenty-five. Human. Ink smudged on the edge of her hand, and there was a berry-colored stain on the collar of her tunic.

"Name?" she asked.

"Issy Fairbairn." The name fit awkwardly around my mouth, one I hadn’t used since before my marriage.

The clerk nodded and slid a parchment toward me. “Sovereign Separation Intent?”

I gave a single nod, tight and mechanical. It felt surreal—after years of enduring a life that was all wrong, I was finally doing something about it. Something official. On paper. Like that made it real. Like a piece of paper could keep him away.

She retrieved a clean quill from the rack. No flourish. No ceremony. The motion had the weight of practice. She’d done this a hundred times. A thousand, maybe.

My hand shook when I reached for it. I hated that. Resented the tremor as if it betrayed me.

Ellie stirred as I dipped the quill, then stilled again when I adjusted my hold, careful not to jar her. The paper bore six lines to fill—Name, Arrival Date, Declared Occupation, Dependents, Magical Affiliation (if any), Reason. That last field was optional. I left it blank.

The final act came with no warning. The clerk turned the page over, revealing the soulbinding plate—no larger than my palm, etched with circular sigils that glinted faintly in the lamplight.

“You’ll need to press your thumb here,” the clerk said.

But I hesitated; Gavriel might be able to trace me. But the protections here were supposed to be different. Cleaner. Older, maybe. Soulbound magic didn’t bow to titles or houses. That was what I’d been told.

Still, my stomach knotted as I looked down at the plate. That was the danger of surviving too long: you stopped trusting even the things built to protect you.

The surface shimmered faintly. I shifted Ellie higher on my chest and pressed my right thumb to the circle's center. The metal was warm, and a pulse thrummed once beneath my skin. Pressure, then release. A quiet click, like a door shutting somewhere far away.

“All set,” the clerk said, placing the parchment into an envelope and sealing it with a quick sigil stamp. “You’re authorized for a transitional board and placement. One dependent registered.”

Her eyes flicked toward a ledger off to the side. “You’ll be assigned to Tinderpost House, Oakroot Quarter. Meals are communal. Curfew's at dusk. You’ll get placement notice by tomorrow—usually start with cleaning or inventory.”

I nodded, lips pressed tight. I used to have a cook, a laundress, a woman who pressed my gloves flat and folded my letters by hand. Now, I was waiting to hear which broom closet I'd be assigned to. It wasn’t shameful, exactly. Just a long way to fall for the sake of freedom.

The clerk tucked the ledger aside, reached under the counter, and slid across a folded scrap of paper with simple directions printed in an even hand. Then, softer: “Try to rest, Miss Fairbairn. That first night, sometimes that’s the hardest. But it gets better.”

I murmured thanks and turned to leave, one hand still bracing Ellie, the other curling around the directions.

Out on the worn stone walk, the city stretched in front of me: rooftops flickering with early light, smoke curling skyward in calm spirals. The air smelled of wet stone, chimney soot, and something faintly herbal. Not like Elarion. Nothing about this place was.

It had taken me six days to get here. Two carts, one grain wagon, and a lot of walking.

My boots were splitting. My back hurt from carrying Ellie the whole way.

We’d slept in a barn, under a bridge, once behind a broken shrine.

Woken up more than once sure we were being followed.

They called Everwood a sanctuary. A place for people starting over.

I didn’t know if that was true. But we’d made it.

And for the first time since Ellie was born, I could breathe.

Tinderpost House was a half-mile east, through winding side streets and past the edge of a district called Oakroot. The directions were clear enough: right on Crescent Lane, down two blocks, follow the ridge until the third stairwell. A city of turns and ridges instead of towers and columns. Good.

As I moved through the streets, the evening bustle of Everwood stirred around me.

Shopkeepers sweeping stoops. A pair of orc children chasing each other with wooden swords near a laundry line.

A dwarven man hammering something into shape just outside a storefront shutter.

I passed a bakery with its doors cracked open, warmth streaming out with the scent of yeast and cardamom.

The Oakroot District grew quieter as I crossed under an arch of climbing vine and moss-covered brick. Older buildings here, soft at the edges. Low walls caught the morning sun in slanted patches, and I noticed a pale cat winding through a garden fence.

Eventually, I found the stairwell. Three stone steps, cracked at the corners, sloped toward a squat building with smoke trailing out of a lopsided chimney.

I hesitated—not because I doubted the directions, but because crossing the threshold made it real.

Filing the parchment had been one thing.

Walking into the place where I would sleep, where I would eat from a communal pot, guarded by curfew and soft-voiced rules… that was another step entirely.

The hinges groaned a little when I pushed the door open, but the warmth that breathed out to meet me was immediate. Dry heat, touched with the sharp scent of rosemary and something more earthen. Damp wool, maybe. Old pine smoke woven into the very walls.

Inside, the hearth dominated the far wall—wide, open-faced, its stones dark with age and use. A banked fire glowed low in the grate, coals tucked beneath split logs that crackled and hissed. Above it hung an iron kettle.

The main room was long, maybe once a taproom before the house changed hands.

Mismatched cots and bedrolls lined the walls in uneven intervals, thin dividers of canvas hanging from ropes to offer some illusion of privacy.

Blankets hung over the shutters to keep the cold out.

The floor was sweep-clean but uneven, bowing slightly toward the middle, stubborn with age.

Two people looked up as I stepped in.

A halfling woman in a saffron shawl paused mid-stitch, needles frozen above a ripple of green yarn. Her eyes were sharper than her smile, though she offered one anyway. Across from her, a silver-haired teen stirred a pot slowly with a long-handled spoon, her other hand tucked into a woolen sleeve.

“Hello?” a voice called from my left.

The dwarven woman who emerged from a side door had a linen towel slung over her shoulder, and her sleeves were rolled to her elbows, revealing forearms crisscrossed with faded scars. Steel-gray hair braided into a crown. A knit cap clung to the back of her head.

Her gaze swept down to Ellie, then back up again. "You the Hearth Office one with the babe?" she asked.

I nodded. "Yes, ma’am."

“Name?”

“Issy,” I answered. Not Isolde. That name didn’t belong to me anymore. Isolde was married, watched, spoken for. Issy might still have a chance.

She grunted acknowledgment, already moving toward one of the cots nearer the fire. The canvas divider was pulled halfway across.

"Fire’ll hold till morning. Draft by the east wall cuts through bone when it’s wet like this, so you’ll want to sleep her close."

I followed, boots scuffing against knotty boards. Ellie stirred again, a soft, unconscious sound that landed in the room like a bell chime.

The dwarf paused beside the cot. The frame had a slight wobble, but the blanket folded on top looked clean, at least.

“I’m Mrs. Gruha.” She nodded toward the cot. “You hungry?”

“I—” I didn’t trust whatever would come out if I said more. So I nodded instead.

Mrs. Gruha sniffed once like she was sizing up a batch of dough, then rolled her shoulders and nodded back. “Toes off, sit down. That girl will start fussing if you don’t rest your arms soon.” She turned to the teen by the stew pot. “Leilan, a cup of broth.”

The girl—Leilan—moved without a word, sliding a ladle through the broth with practiced ease. Across the room, the halfling woman kept knitting, her needles clicking rhythmically again.

Mrs. Gruha handed me a chipped mug with both hands. “Warm enough,” she said. “Not much, but it holds the stomach steady.”

I took it. It smelled of parsnip and something bitter, like dockleaf. The heat seeped into my fingers through the cracks in the glaze.

“You need anything, you ask me. We keep quiet here, but we keep each other warm.”

She didn’t wait for a reply—just turned back toward the side room she came from, the towel now folded over her forearm.

I sat slowly. The cot creaked under my weight, but it held. Ellie barely shifted when I adjusted the wrap, easing her free and settling myself back onto the cot. Her little hand stayed curled near her cheek, open and soft.

The others had gone back to their own rhythm. The halfling hummed again, under her breath, some tune that felt older than the walls. Leilan rinsed the ladle and hung it on a nail above the counter. The kettle in the hearth gave a soft, hollow knock as the steam shifted within it.

I sipped the broth slowly, watching the fire’s light flicker gently across the rafters. My eyes burned, but I refused the tears that tried to settle there. Instead, I counted.

Fifteen coppers in the inside pouch, three silver bits stitched into the hem. That should stretch if I kept it close. Bread was coinlight if I bartered, meat less likely. I’d walk to avoid cart-fare. Wash linens on rest days. Hope no diapers tore.

Twenty-nine days left on the filing clock.

That was the real number that stuck, beat inside my head like a second pulse.

Ellie stirred, and I tucked the blanket tighter around her, my fingers lingering on the curve of her back.

Outside, the city was settling into its evening hush.

I could hear it, barely—a distant cart rolling over stone, the clatter of horseshoes on cobblestone, soft and rhythmic like breath.

Somewhere not far off, someone laughed—a sharp, momentary burst that faded into the hush again.

I drank the last of the broth and set the mug down beside the cot.

Then lay back, slow and careful. I didn’t undress; I just curled onto the edge of the cot around Ellie, cloak still drawn close, my boots half-loosened but still on my feet.

The practical part of me insisted it was warmer that way.

The truth settled somewhere lower in my ribs—if I had to run, shoes mattered.

The ceiling beams above were marked with old smoke trails—soft streaks of black and brown. It almost looked like a map. Roads I didn’t know, lines that led nowhere but across one dark ceiling in one dark room in a city that didn’t know my name.