"Careful, careful. You've been through quite the ordeal," Ivan said, his voice soft and gentle. "You need to rest."

"I need to get out of here," Hina said, but she lay back down on the bed. It was her bed, she realised. She'd never slept a full night in it, but—

She remembered Kai's broken body, his death—his promised resurrection.

"What—"

"You're safe. You've done very well, very well indeed. And you're safe here." Ivan smiled like a friendly grandfather, and the expression looked out of place on his face. That more than anything, shook some of the cobwebs from Hina's mind. He was sitting in the chair beside the bed, watching her. Light streamed in through the open window, and the room was warm.

Beyond it, she could see the trees of the grove, clear skies above. Hina was still in the House.

"What?" Hina said. "What happened?"

"Those of us who are bound to the House—those of us who are left, we've all got to stick together, don't we?"

"But what about..." Hina trailed off. What about all of the people that she'd killed?

"Ger? Ger and the wolves?" A look of sadness crossed his face for a moment, but only for a moment.

"Did I—did I—"

"You did, yes. Yes, you did." Ivan's voice was soft, but firm. "You did what you had to do. For all of us."

"How?"

"You were lucky. You had the support of the House, yes, that's for certain. And that bell—well. You did a fine job with the tools that were available to you. The timing was impeccable."

"You're not... mad?"

"No, no. Of course not. If they deserve it, the House will bring them back."

Hina looked at him for a moment. A small smile twisted the lines of Ivan's crinkled face. "Do you really believe that?" she asked.

"Oh yes. Yes, of course. They'll get what they deserve. They have. And in the mean time, I'll be taking care of things around here. I'll have to work on getting a few new people in. A change of management, as it were."

"But—"

"You just take your time, you can move along when you're ready. There's no rush." He made to stand, hands reaching down to the sides of the chair.

"Wait—what day is it? How long have I been here?"

"You've been asleep for... for nearly two weeks—plenty of time, plenty of time left to adjust."

"I've been here for two weeks?!"

"Ah. Most take a month or two to acclimate to the mark. Few are as quick as you. A sign of great things to come, I'm sure."

"I—I have to go. It's what, a week from here to the city? I have—two weeks until the admissions interviews?"

"Oh yes. Yes. You have time. We'll make sure you end up in the right place on time. If not, there's always next year, yes?"

"No, I—can you—can you get me there faster than walking?"

"Oh, if need be. But a good long walk will do you some good. It helps with the adjustment."

Two weeks. It was enough time, but barely. "Then." She sat up. "Then I have to go now."

"I'm sure that you have questions?"

"Oh." Hina realised that there was a lot that she didn't understand. "Yes, I have questions."

"Well, I have time. Please, ask away."

"Tell me about souls." The conversation with the House came back to her in a rush. That booming intangible voice. The deal. "What is a class-four soul?"

"That, that's a bit of a complicated question. I'll try to explain it as best I can." He paused for a moment, and then continued. "Souls grow throughout the course of a life—we discussed this at dinner, I think. Back before—" He looked down for a moment before looking back at her, grey eyes looking at her intently. "Soul-classes are how we describe that progression. Normal folk—babies are born with a class-zero soul, and progress oh, up to around class three over the course of a life. Some less, some more. Class-three is the average, I'd say."

"But practitioners—"

Practitioners are different. People who work with power of all kinds—power strengthens a soul. Common practitioners develop class-four souls over the course of a lifetime, many go beyond that. The truly powerful, well." His smile broadened. "You can see for yourself, if you activate the mark."

"How do I do that?"

"Can you feel it?"

Hina thought about it for a moment. It was a mark on her soul, on her ambit? She focused her mind like she would if she was doing ambit work, feeling for the edges of her being, the boundary between herself and the world beyond. And there it was—deep within her, a burning, glowing symbol. She could feel it without stretching her perception across the whole of her soul—which was a relief. She didn't have the focus for anything so involved right now. The weariness was like a heavy coat, weighing her down.

"I can feel it," she said.

"All you have to do is treat it like you would a sigil. Feed it some power, show it what you want."

"Is it a sigil?" It looked similar. A twisting burning pattern of lines and angles and shapes within the depth of her being—so complex that it was hard to look at, at least at first.

"No, no. It's a rather different beast."

"Is it—it's simpler than a sigil?"

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

"Very much so—and attached to you. You wouldn't be able to use it otherwise. If you taught some practitioner the shape of it, and they managed to reproduce it for a working, I don't expect that it would do anything."

"Huh." Hina watched the thing shimmer within her perception. "What can I do with it?"

"Primarily it forms your link with the House. But there's more, too. Some of it, some will become clearer in time, as your bond develops."

"What about the rest? What can I do with it now?"

"Try asking it to show you souls."

"What will that do?"

"Just try it, I'll wait."

Hina felt her well, which was completely empty—still completely empty since the fight with Gerda. Though it had been over in moments. Somehow, somehow she'd won. It scarcely felt real.

Support from the House, and the bell? And she got lucky? The timing?

The sigil had run wild, and it had been all she could do to keep it from taking over. From doing—whatever it was that it wanted to do. She didn't look forward to trying to use it again.

It was something to consider later, though. Maybe after more work with her ambit.

Hina drew power into herself. It spread through her, filling her with a sense of power and strength, and relief. Her body had missed it, she hadn't realised how wrong, how empty she'd been feeling until she started to cycle. Until the power rushed into her.

When Hina focused on the feeling of the mark, the shape of it sprang into her mind's eye fully formed, with a clarity that she hadn't expected.

It was almost a simple shape, a circle with a line through it, but underneath that was a hidden complexity. It was like looking at a fractal, a pattern that was infinitely complex, but that could be broken down into simpler patterns.

But on the whole, it was still infinitely simpler than The Sigil Of Lesser Guidance, which had only grown in complexity as she used it—as she killed with it.

Was that it? Did using the sigil to kill made it grow within her? Was that why it had grown harder and harder to use over time?

Would the mark grow too? As she fulfilled her bargain?

Forming a thread of power, Hina extended it towards the mark, moving the thread closer and closer until it made contact with a snap.

The mark didn't draw on her thread like the sigil had, but she could feel it light up, coming alive in a barely perceptable way, moving slightly around the edges. Like it was breathing.

She wanted to see souls, she projected the thought at it. And then again, more forcefully: show me souls.

The mark didn't respond, but Hina felt a sense of waiting, an expectation. Then, after a heartbeat, the mark pulsed.

The world changed.

Shimmering colours overlayed everything. The painted ceiling, the walls and the rest of the room glowed with white light and Hina's fingertips glowed with coppery light.

She turned to look at Ivan, and saw a figure glowing with green-blue light. "Oh," she said. His was a deep, rich colour, much more tangible than Hina's own glow.

"You figured it out?"

"What does it mean?"

"Tell me what you're seeing."

"Everything is glowing in colours. You're kind of greeny-blue, and I'm coppery-red, and the the room around us is all white. And outside the window—it's all white, I can't see anything out there."

"Marvellous. Colours are a common frame of reference."

"Some people see it differently?"

"Sometimes, sometimes. But that's not important. What's important is learning to understand what you're seeing. Now, questions?"

"The colours show strength, right?"

"Correct. They progress as a soul grows stronger."

"What does class-four look like?"

"Like you. You're class-four, a little over the baseline now."

"And class-three?"

"Redder. Less orange, more red. Class two is entirely red. And class-one souls are red, but faint, and zero are even less so. Wisps of red, barely there at all."

"And higher classes?"

"They progress through the colours, but they're rare. You shouldn't mess with anyone above class-four, if you can help it."

"What class is yours?"

"If you don't know." He smiled. "Then I won't tell you."

"More than ten?"

He smiled in response and changed the subject. "You can use this application of the mark to avoid people who are too strong for you. People who might interfere with your mission for the House, for example."

"I see." Hina cut off the thread of power, and the colours faded. The image of the mark disappeared from her mind, effortlessly drifting away. "I think I understand. Is there anything else I need to know?"

"In the city—and other places, perhaps, but mainly in the city—there are people who might be able to detect your mark. Keep your distance from them, if you don't want to be found out, hey?"

"Who are they?"

"Practitioners who specialise in workings pertaining to the soul. Usually they'll have to touch you to do their work." He shrugged. "Don't let them touch you."

They talked until Hina grew tired, and Ivan left her to sleep.

* * *

Hina walked out the front door of the The Grove into the wild, backpack slung over her shoulder. The sun was peeking over the horizon, and a bird squawked in the distance.

She had a long walk ahead of her, but she was ready for it. She had just enough time, so long as she didn't dawdle.

The world was quiet, but for the whisper of wind and the birds in the background. The grass under her feet crunched as she walked. It wasn't far to the road, and then on to the city.

She was almost there, after all this time.

Her belt was weighed down with heavy black stones, and she could feel the weight of them as she walked. Thirteen of them—a fortune. They'd been waiting for her beside the bed—reclaimed from where they'd fallen.

A gift from the House.

The silver bell was gone, though. She had dropped it somewhere in the grove, and the House hadn't returned it. Hina hadn't pushed her luck by asking for it.

So she'd need to sell something else in the city, when the money from Olivia ran out. But she had options. Plenty of unidentified trinkets, and her weapons hung heavy on her belt.

She'd be fine.

On to the city, and then—the academy. Hina didn't know what she was going to say to Olivia. She pondered as she walked.

It was a difficult one. If Olivia found out the truth, that would be bad. She'd go to her parents—she'd done it before—and that would be the end of Hina.

And if Hina let her think the obvious, that Hina had failed to save Kai, that would be a problem when Kai came back.

She didn't want to have to hide Kai when he came back.

Or maybe it didn't matter. If it took her five years to get him free of The Grove, maybe Olivia's opinion wouldn't be important anymore. And if she needed to hide Kai then, she could work something out.

A lot could happen in five years.

But Hina wanted to get him back sooner if she could.

Ten class-four souls.

Until what happened in the grove—Kai's bloodied body flashed into her mind—Hina had never killed anyone—her hand on the bloodied knife—not except in self-defence. Maybe that was still true, if defence of a loved-one counted. If accidents didn't count. She'd done what she had to. What she'd been forced to do.

Hina was at peace with that. Mostly. She was getting there.

But now—ten class-four souls. The thought of it made her stomach turn. The enormity of it. The horror of what she'd agreed to do. It wouldn't be like the other times, it would be deliberate. Intentional.

But. Maybe that didn't need to be so bad.

If it was people like Gerda, people like Bruce, people who were harming others. People who needed to be stopped. That was something else.

When she thought about killing Bruce, beyond the blinding terror and the overwhelming anger—knowing that here was a person who killed and ate people? And she'd stopped him from hurting anyone else. Hina felt a faint sense of pride. She could live with that.

If she could find more people like that? She could do it. She could even feel good about it. Were there ten people like that in the city? There must be. There were people like that everywhere.

People who need killing.

If Hina could find them, and if she could be sure that they were the right people, she thought that it was something she could bear. And she would have to bear it—but she didn't want to think about that part too hard.

Get Kai back. Find a way out of her bargain with the House. Get rid of the mark. And then she could get on with her life.

Wings beat in the distance, and Hina looked up. A black and red bird flapped down towards her.

She stopped, and held out an arm for a perch.

The bird landed on it, tilting his head to look at her with a beady eye.

"Hey, hey," she said. "Welcome back."

Bean whistled a cheerful greeting.

Hina smiled. "I missed you."

She stroked the bird's head, and he cawed, and then flew off. He flew in a wide circle around her, cawing, and came to rest on her shoulder as Hina walked on.

* * *

On the sixth day, Hina came around a bend in the road and saw it. High round walls and towers shining in the sun, capped with a splash of colour.

The City. Om Qalar.

She'd made it.

Somewhere behind those beautiful shining walls Hina would find everything she needed.

She'd find it, and she'd take it, no matter who tried to stop her.

And then she'd be free.