Chapter 5 Ivy's Silence

The corridor to the archives always felt colder than the rest of the compound. The lights flickered overhead, buzzing with fatigue, like everything else in Kaerinth.

Ivy moved through the rows of ancient war files like a shadow. She wasn't military. Not exactly. But she knew how to navigate systems of people, of information, of silence. She'd survived three regimes by saying less than necessary and seeing more than anyone realized.

At the end of the corridor, a sealed case waited. One no one touched. One Emily had marked CLASSIFIED – NO DUPLICATES.

Ivy stared at it for a long moment before kneeling, pulling a thin tool from her boot, and slipping it between the latch. The case clicked open with a whisper.

Inside: a single document. A prisoner transfer file dated two weeks before Raphael's official capture.

Her fingers tightened.

So the plan was already in motion before the fall.

She scanned the fine print. The signature at the bottom chilled her.

Elizabeth Arwen.

Of course.

Emily stared at her reflection in the cracked mirror above the basin. The woman who stared back looked tired. Not weak. Not broken. But tired in a way that came from carrying too many ghosts.

She touched the side of her face, where an old burn scar ran along her jaw. Raphael had never seen that scar. Not up close. Not until now.

And yet, he hadn't reacted. Not to the scar. Not to the damage. Just to her.

That was what unsettled her the most.

She didn't want to see the man he used to be. She wanted to remember the monster.

But monsters didn't smile like that. Monsters didn't hum burial hymns.

She closed her eyes and breathed in deep.

A knock rattled the door.

"Come," she said.

Ivy stepped in, her boots quiet. "We have a problem."

Emily straightened. "What kind of problem?"

Ivy walked to the desk, set the document down without a word. Emily read. Once. Then again.

Her voice came out low. "This says he was delivered. Not captured."

Ivy met her eyes. "And Elizabeth signed off on it."

Emily's mind raced.

If that was true, then Raphael had been planted. Surrendered. Not for defeat, but for something else.

A message. A bargain.

A trap.