She exhaled once, a single, steady breath of relief that struck him harder than any blow.
“Marcus,” she whispered.
His name left her lips before she realized she had spoken.
And behind her, a shadow moved.
Fenwick.
The trap had sprung, both ways.
Marcus surged forward just as Fenwick drew steel, the blade catching lamplight.
“Don’t take another step,” Fenwick snarled. “Or she dies.”
Marcus froze.
But only for a breath.
Fenwick’s mouth curved, sensing advantage. “You always did underestimate what people leave behind.”
He flicked his wrist.
Something small and metallic skittered across the stone floor, spinning once before coming to rest near Marcus’s boot.
Marcus did not look down at first.
Then he did.
The air went thin.
Not memory. Not grief. Recognition. Immediate and absolute. The piece had once been seated deep in iron, worn smooth by motion and strain. A carriage part. Ordinary. Indistinguishable to anyone who did not know.
Fenwick watched his face, sharp and intent.
“Axles fail,” he said lightly. “Wheels loosen. A single piece gives way, and everything after becomes inevitable.”
Marcus’s hand tightened at his side. No tremor. No sound.
Behind Fenwick, Lila saw the shift, not in Marcus’s posture, but in the way the room narrowed around him.
Fenwick smiled, certain he had struck true.
He was wrong.
Because Lila shifted her weight in that same instant, sending the shard of glass skittering under Fenwick’s boot.
He slipped.
Marcus moved.
Not to strike.
To intercept the danger meant for her.
To place himself between her and the blade.
To save her.