Master.
The word was a cage, not a crown. It slammed down around Ravi, invisible bars of expectation and responsibility he was wholly unprepared for. He felt a desperate urge to deny it, to shout that he wasn't a master, he was a mistake, a cosmic glitch who just wanted to be left alone.
"I'm not the master of anything," he said, the words tumbling out in a rush. He pushed himself to his feet and backed away from Lyssara, his hands held up as if to ward her off. "It was an accident. The machine, it... it malfunctioned. It probably registered the door shutting and shorted out. That's all."
Lyssara didn't move. She just watched him, her head tilted, that unnervingly sharp intellect whirring behind her eyes. The awe was gone, replaced by a deep, unsettling scrutiny.
"An accident," she repeated, her voice flat and devoid of emotion. "The executioner's axe was an accident. The mugger's wrist was an accident. The guard's arm, his partner's helmet, the Dismissal Ward letting us through unharmed, and now a centuries-old Automaton Warden destroying itself on your skin... All accidents."
She took a slow, deliberate step toward him. "Accidents follow you like a loyal hound, Ravi. At some point, you have to admit you're the one holding the leash."
Her words disarmed his act. His feigned panic was met with cold logic, his denial with an itemized list of impossibilities. He was a terrible liar, and she was a brilliant detective. It was a losing battle.
He clamped his mouth shut. Anything he said would only dig his grave deeper.
Seeing his silence, Lyssara's focus shifted from him to their new surroundings. "If the system has accepted a master," she said, her voice turning crisp and professional, "it's no longer on a lockdown protocol. We should see what resources we have."
She turned and strode purposefully into one of the newly opened corridors. After a moment of terrified hesitation, Ravi followed. Being alone with his thoughts was suddenly more frightening than following the woman who was beginning to see right through him.
The corridors were lined with the same green-glowing crystals, bathing everything in a soft, ethereal light. They passed storerooms filled with sealed crates, a pristine armory stocked with weapons that gleamed as if forged yesterday, and a library whose shelves were filled with leather-bound codices. Lyssara walked through it all with a historian's reverence, her fingers ghosting over the artifacts of her ancestors.
"They were more than merchants and craftsmen," she murmured. "They were scholars, tacticians, king-breakers."
She finally led him into a large, circular chamber at the very heart of the vault. A round stone table dominated the center of the room, its surface a single, perfectly smooth slab of obsidian. As they entered, the emerald light in the room brightened, and the surface of the table flickered to life.
A map bloomed across the obsidian, rendered in glowing lines of silver light. It was a breathtakingly detailed layout of the entire city, showing not just streets and buildings, but underground tunnels, hidden passages, and the patrol routes of the Warden's Watch, marked by tiny, pulsing red sigils.
"A scrying table," Lyssara breathed, her eyes wide with wonder. "A living map. This alone is worth more than the entire city treasury." She pointed to a cluster of red sigils. "Look. The Warden's men are still surrounding the well, confused. They have no idea we're right beneath their feet."
Ravi stared at the map, at the glowing proof of their temporary safety. It should have been a relief. Instead, it felt like being handed the keys to a kingdom he was terrified to rule. All this information, this power… it demanded action. It invited conflict.
Lyssara ran her hand over the edge of the table, then her gaze fell on an inscription carved into the stone pedestal. Her expression sobered instantly.
"What is it?" Ravi asked.
"The Guild's First Law," she said, tracing the strange, angular runes. "'An Oath given in this place is an Oath that cannot be broken.' They were masters of Oathbinding. A promise made here… it's not a matter of honor. It's a matter of physics. Your words become your chains. To break such an Oath is to unmake yourself."
He felt a chill that had nothing to do with the underground air. Physical force was a joke to him. A swinging axe, a crushing fist—they were nothing. But a contract? A promise that could bind his very being? Here was a weapon that could truly harm him. Here was a lock his skeleton key couldn't pick.
Lyssara turned from the table to face him fully. Her expression was calm, her gaze level and direct. The balance of power between them had shifted again. He was the glitch in reality, but she was the one who understood the rules.
"We have sanctuary," she stated. "We have supplies, intelligence, security. Everything we need to survive."
"Good," Ravi said, grabbing onto the thought like a life raft. "We stay here. We wait them out. We disappear."
"No," Lyssara replied, her voice as hard and final as the obsidian table. "That's not what we're going to do. What you did wasn't a party trick, Ravi. It was a paradigm shift. Power like yours doesn't get to hide. It either rules, or it gets put in a cage." She took a breath, the words hanging in the silent room, a formal declaration. "I helped you survive. Now you're going to help me."
"Help you do what?" he asked, a knot of dread tightening in his stomach.
Her eyes bored into his, sharp, predatory, and alight with a terrifying new purpose.
"You're going to help me take back this city."