Roland, now alone with the sleeping Lyra, worked quickly and silently. He had pulled three massive, brittle scrolls from a hidden compartment, each page illuminated by the faint, pulsating runes on the slate diagram. The Archivist's Text was proving difficult; the language was esoteric, and the complexity of the Seven-Point Containment Lock was staggering.
He was focusing on the outermost rune, the Rune of Obfuscation, when he noticed a terrible inconsistency.
He carefully placed his fingertips over Lyra's temples, running a low-level diagnostic sweep of her neural pathways—a standard test to ensure she hadn't suffered memory trauma from the shift. The results were startling. The Healer frowned, running the scan again.
"Impossible," he muttered.
Her short-term memory was intact, but everything prior to her re-securement was a fog—not a trauma-induced block, but a literal void. He compared the results to the magical diagram, a cold realization settling in his gut.
The Seal's Purpose
He traced the connection between the neural scan and the seal. The Rune of Obfuscation wasn't just hiding her Lycan nature from external scrutiny; it was operating internally. It wasn't just a cloak—it was a comprehensive, self-enforcing filter.
The Healer's eyes widened as he put the pieces together.
"The lie," he whispered, staring at the scroll. "It's built into the magic itself."
The seal's complexity was not just for raw power, but for discretion. It was designed to suppress and hide the Lycan identity on every level:
Physical Suppression: It fought the shift, ensuring no feral strength or heightened senses could be detected in her human form. This is why she appeared to be a baseline human until the disastrous, forced shift.
Magical Suppression: It contained her Lycan mana core so tightly that any routine scan would only detect the small, disorganized magical signature of a curse-turned werewolf, thus perfectly aligning with the "Werewolf Subject" designation in the General Staff's files.
Cognitive Suppression (The Amnesia): The outermost rune, the Rune of Obfuscation, was not just hiding her identity from them, it was hiding her identity from herself. It didn't just suppress the wolf; it suppressed the Lycan's self-awareness. Her memories—of her past, her family, and the power that necessitated such a seal—were not destroyed, but actively quarantined and cloaked by the magic. She literally could not remember who she was because the seal was ensuring she remained a blank slate.
The amnesia wasn't a side effect of the trauma; it was an intentional, core function of the ancient containment magic.
The Danger of Discovery.
Roland's hand trembled as he finished his diagnosis. Ryker's report to the Lord Commander—calling her a "Werewolf Subject"—was not a lie they created. It was the identity given to her by the seal itself.
If the seal ever failed, or was intentionally broken, two things would happen simultaneously:
Her true Lycan power would be unleashed, likely uncontrolled, as it had been suppressed for years.
All her quarantined memories would flood back, along with the knowledge of her captor and the person who cast the seal.
He quickly scribbled a note on the slate for Ryker:
Commander:
The seal is the cause of her amnesia. It is a cognitive, magical, and physical mask—it hides the Lycan from everyone, including Lyra herself. Our 'Werewolf Subject' lie is what the seal wants us to believe. The seal is not a simple cage. It is an identity regulator.
If we break it, we unlock her memories and her full, uncontrolled power. We are not just trying to save her life; we are trying to keep a lid on a secret the world forgot.
Ryker had already left the sanctuary, Roland's grim warning about time and treason echoing in his ears. The morning light filtering through the stained glass of the East Wing hall felt too bright, too indifferent to the catastrophic secret he carried. He couldn't risk the Citadel's messenger corps, who logged every dispatch.
His steps took him to the lower market wards, a twisting maze of shops and back alleys that smelled of damp stone and stale incense. He found the familiar, unmarked storefront—a place that sold antique maps but dealt in much darker geographical secrets.
Inside, the proprietor, a nervous man named Pip, barely met Ryker's eye. Pip was one of a handful of contacts Ryker used for untraceable exchanges, a low-level cog in the vast, unofficial network managed by Vara the Broker.
"I need to send a query to the Broker," Ryker said, his voice flat and authoritative.
Pip fumbled under the counter, retrieving a small, cylindrical lead canister with a weighted bottom. "The usual route? The eastern sea lanes?"
"The eastern sea lanes," Ryker confirmed. It was the only secure route, using independent vessels that ran outside the jurisdiction of the Imperial Fleet, but it meant a significant delay. "Estimate on delivery?"
Pip consulted a smeared, coded chart hanging near the back. "Vara is currently operating near the Free City of Othmar. If the current holds, it will be twenty-eight days until the courier reaches her anchorage. She'll need time to research. A return message... at least two months, Commander."
Two months. Lyra was a ticking time bomb—a Lycan sealed by ancient magic and now a source of volatile amnesia—and he wouldn't get answers for sixty days. Ryker suppressed a surge of frustration. He had to accept the risk. The information Vara held was simply unavailable within the Citadel's censored libraries.
He took the small container and withdrew a piece of treated parchment and a slender stylus. He didn't use ink; he used a concentrated essence that vanished once it dried, leaving the parchment blank, only to reappear when treated with a specific counter-agent—a security measure only Vara knew.
He wrote quickly, coding the vital terms:
To Vara—Urgent and Discreet. Requires full history on Subject-Designate 'Lycans' (pre-Dynastic designation). Specifically requesting data on Astralite susceptibility and the Seven-Point Containment Lock (ancient sorcery, suspected of creating cognitive interference).
Payment is triple the standard rate, pending successful and safe return of documentation.
—R.T.
He sealed the message and handed the canister to Pip, along with a heavy pouch of gold. "This is Priority-One. If anything interrupts the courier, you will be held accountable."
Ryker left the shop, feeling the immediate relief of having initiated the search, but also the crushing weight of the coming month of blindness.
The Message Arrives.
He returned to his office, exhausted, and immediately found a small, rolled parchment tucked beneath the lid of his inkwell—a common, coded signal from the healer.
" This came faster than I expected." He grumbled to himself.Ryker broke the wax seal, his eyes scanning the Captain's hurried script:
Commander:
'The seal is the cause of her amnesia. It is a cognitive, magical, and physical mask—it hides the Lycan from everyone, including Lyra herself. Our 'Werewolf Subject' lie is what the seal wants us to believe. The seal is not a simple cage. It is an identity regulator.
If we break it, we unlock her memories and her full, uncontrolled power. We are not just trying to save her life; we are trying to keep a lid on a secret the world forgot.'
Ryker crumpled the note in his fist.
An identity regulator. Not only was he sheltering a Lycan, but he was actively maintaining a prison built by a mage of god-like power—and he had just sent a slow, traceable letter asking an illegal Broker how to break it. If his request fell into the wrong hands, the true scope of his treason would be revealed, and both he and Lyra would be instantly condemned.
He looked toward the Citadel, the sun now fully cresting the towers. He had two months until Vara's answer, and he was now holding an eleven-year-old child whose very existence was a lie fabricated by ancient magic.
"Just what I need."