Chapter 14: Protocol

Chapter 14: Protocol

Forten woke to the sound of something crashing.

A tray, maybe. Metal skittering across stone.

His eyes snapped open, then immediately regretted it. Light stabbed him. His ribs burned. His head felt packed with frost.

He wasn’t in the trial chamber. Not anymore.

The room smelled too clean. Whitewashed stone walls, seams etched with faint glyphlight that pulsed like the slow beat of a dying heart. The air carried the sour tang of boiled herbs, mixed with the metallic stink of old blood. A blanket covered him - thin and scratchy, barely functional. It felt rationed, not given.

There was a painful silence in the air.

Until the cough. Not his. Someone else’s. Followed by a muttered curse, sharp, annoyed.

Forten turned his head, slow as rust. Pain cracked across his ribs for the effort.

Thorne was crouched at the far side of the cot, one knee braced against the floor. A flask, half-shattered, spilled the last of its contents across the tiles. His cloak hung in weary folds, the colour long since drained by frost and smoke. One of his discs leaned against the wall, edge catching a sliver of glyphlight, as if it were keeping watch on its own.

Thorne didn’t apologise. Didn’t even look at him at first. He just set the flask upright, shook the dregs out of his sleeve, then finally glanced over.

“About time,” Thorne said.

Forten’s lips cracked as he tried to speak. His throat was a desert. “How… long-?”

“Two days. Three, if you count the hours you spent mumbling before you blacked out again.”

Forten blinked hard. “Mum-”

“She’s been asking,” Thorne cut in. “They didn’t tell her. Protocol.”

The word landed like a weight. Protocol. The Guild’s favourite excuse for cruelty.

Forten tried to push himself upright. Pain lit his ribs like coals. He gritted his teeth. Walter was beside the cot, half-slumped, seams torn, stuffing blackened. His button eye dim. Not moving.

“Walter-”

“Still alive,” Thorne said. “If you can call it that. Your bear’s tougher than it looks.”

Forten stared at him, jaw tight. “You let her think I was dead?”

“I don’t let anything,” Thorne said. He leaned back on the stool, arms folding. “The Guild does what it does. You’re lucky you woke up here at all.”

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Silence pressed in. Forten’s hands curled into fists beneath the blanket.

Thorne studied him. Measuring.

"So did I-"

"No."

The word landed like a blade. No hesitation. No room for air.

Forten’s mouth closed. His question - the one he hadn’t even finished - withered before it could reach breath.

Thorne leaned back, arms folded. “You were never going to pass. Not after that stunt. You know why they rejected you?”

Forten’s chest tightened. He didn’t answer.

Thorne didn’t wait. “Because you wouldn’t listen. Integrity means obedience. You refused a direct order.”

“I stopped a slaughter.”

Thorne’s eyes narrowed, voice as even as stone. “And that’s the point. You don’t get to decide. The Guild does.”

Forten’s teeth ground together. “Then maybe the Guild’s wrong.”

The words hung there, raw and reckless.

Thorne’s mouth twitched. Not a smile. Not quite. “Say that louder, and you’ll find out how wrong you are.”

Forten didn’t look away this time. His chest still burned, but the fire climbed his throat. “So I was supposed to butcher a chained runt and call that integrity? If that’s your Guild, then I want no part in it.”

The silence that followed felt colder than the infirmary walls.

Thorne stepped closer, shadow cutting the light across Forten’s cot. His voice stayed level, but the edge was iron. “That runt was calling. Every squeal carried numen. That’s why four came. In the Tower, that call brings a herd. You die. Your teammates die.”

Forten bit down the retort burning his tongue. The words scraped at him, but he didn’t give Thorne the satisfaction of flinching.

“You know, there were supposed to be five,” Thorne said quietly.

“One never made it back to its cage.”

He let the words hang, heavy as iron.

Forten’s throat tightened. His eyes darted to Walter’s sagging frame, stitches still gaping, breath a faint wheeze of cloth.

“Don’t bother denying. I saw the remains.” His voice dropped, flat and cold. “Nothing leaves a rattleboar split this clean.”

The silence between them thickened.

“I don’t know what you did,” Thorne went on, eyes narrowing, “but I know it wasn’t you. And that thing beside you-” He gestured faintly at Walter. “-whatever it is, it can’t keep doing that. Not without a cost. Look at it.”

Thorne’s gaze flicked past Forten, toward the bear slouched against the cot. Walter didn't move.

“You think you saved something,” Thorne said. “All you did was survive it. Barely. One rattleboar would have torn you in half - and you brought four onto the floor at once. If it hadn’t stepped in-”

"If he-"

Thorne ignored Forten. He leaned closer, voice dropping to a low rasp. “-you’d have been just another name scrubbed from the board. And do you know what that means?”

Forten said nothing.

“It means I had to step in,” Thorne said, voice sharpening for the first time. “Because no candidate dies under my watch. Not even stubborn ones like you. You nearly made me break my own rule.”

For a heartbeat, Thorne’s anger filled the room heavier than the glyphlight. Then it cooled again, settling back into the weight of old duty.

Forten swallowed what he wanted to say. He would not give Thorne the last word. He looked away, chest heaving. Walter’s dim form filled his vision again. His throat tightened.

“You think I failed.”

“No,” Thorne said. “I think you survived.” He stood, cloak falling heavy at his side. “That’s different. Sometimes more useful.”

He moved toward the door. Then stopped. Reached into his cloak.

Something thin and sealed hit Forten’s chest. He caught it clumsily. A folded envelope, wax stamped with a glyph he didn’t recognise.

“Read it,” Thorne said. “Not here. Not where there are eyes.”

Forten stared down at the seal, the weight of it heavier than coin.

“Why give this to me?” His voice was hoarse.

Thorne’s back was already to him. “Why not?”

The door opened. Draft poured in.

Then Thorne was gone.

Forten sat in the silence, envelope trembling in his grip, Walter unmoving at his side. His ribs burned, his eyes stung, and in his chest something beat harder than pain.

The wax seal pressed into his palm, cold as iron.

He didn’t know what the letter meant.