The substation smelled like burnt coffee and bodies that had learned to postpone rest. Arden sat at the table with her left hand in a basin of ice water. The frostbite was minor—skin pale, sensation muted, nothing that wouldn't heal if she let it. She wouldn't let it. There was no time for letting.
Olli set the shard on the table between them like evidence at a trial neither side would win. The metal was dull now. No warmth. No cold. Just weight. He tapped it with a screwdriver. No hum. No resonance. Dead.
"Entity killed it remotely," he said. "Soon as it realized we'd exposed it publicly, it severed the connection. Shard's just metal now. Expensive paperweight."
Kael leaned against the counter, arms folded, watching Arden's hand in the water turn colors that shouldn't happen to living flesh. "You lost north," he said. Not a question. A catalog.
"Yeah."
"How are you navigating?"
