The old city narrowed again, folding around them like a throat swallowing light. Zoya moved quickly, her steps sharp and purposeful, but every few meters she paused—checking shadows, listening to vibrations in the ground, recalculating the path.
Manraj followed close behind, his breath shallow.
25 throbbed against his ribs.
A number no longer tied to time.
A number tied to distance.
"Zoya," he whispered, "slow down—"
She didn't.
"Can't," she said. "If the Under-Root felt the Root pull you, it's already adjusting its route."
"By… how much?"
Zoya finally turned to look at him.
"Enough that we're on borrowed seconds, not days."
The street tilted downward ahead, the stones older, cracked with root-lines that weren't plant roots at all—just scars left behind when something ancient retreated or died.
Manraj rubbed his sternum.
"I keep… feeling echoes. Like something brushing me from inside."
Zoya nodded grimly.
"That's because both sides touched you today. You're not neutral anymore."
He stiffened.
"What does that mean?"
Zoya stopped walking.
Turned fully toward him.
And said the one sentence he didn't want to hear:
"It means every step you take leaves a trace."
His mouth went dry.
"A trace for both sides?"
She nodded.
"And they will follow the stronger one."
Manraj looked down at his hands as if they belonged to someone else.
"I feel like a walking signal tower."
"You are," she said honestly. "But we're heading to the last place where Azhar severed every signal he had."
He blinked hard.
"Why there?"
"Because if he left anything behind that can sever yours… even for a moment… we need it."
She didn't add:
If it still exists.
She didn't have to.
He felt it.
---
THE PATH AZHAR WALKED
They turned into a steep staircase carved between two buildings so old they looked like they were melting.
Halfway down, Manraj hissed and pressed a hand to his ribs.
Zoya spun. "What is it?"
He inhaled sharply.
"It shifted again."
25 → 25 → 24.
Zoya grabbed his wrist immediately.
"Don't react. Just breathe."
He did.
Slowly.
Unsteadily.
"Is it closer?" he whispered.
"No," she said. "Just more certain."
He looked up. "Certain of what?"
"Where you are."
The number steadied at 24.
Manraj's pulse quickened.
"Zoya… what if I'm pulling it toward you?"
Zoya shook her head.
"No. The Under-Root isn't following me. It's following the void in you."
"Void?"
"Yes," she said. "The vacancy the Root carved. The space you told me about. The place Azhar used to fill."
Manraj's chest tightened painfully.
"I don't want to be a void."
"You're not," she said. "You're someone the void was shaped around."
"And that makes it worse," he whispered.
Zoya didn't deny it.
She just kept moving.
---
THE COORDINATES
They reached the end of the staircase.
The alley opened into a forgotten courtyard swallowed by banyan roots and old scaffolding. A rusted metal board lay crooked against the wall, half hiding a faded sign:
MUNICIPAL PUMPING STATION — CLOSED
Manraj frowned.
"A pumping station?"
Zoya stepped past the sign and ran her fingers along the wall.
"No," she said.
"This used to be a Root-entry point."
His breath hitched.
"For Azhar?"
"For every guardian before him," Zoya said. "But Azhar was the last one to use it before the Root cut this entire branch."
She pressed her hand to a rusted metal panel.
The metal rippled.
Softly.
Like remembering a shape it hadn't touched in years.
Manraj's heart skipped.
"You know how to open this?"
"No," Zoya said.
The metal peeled away on its own.
"But Azhar does."
A gust of cold air swept out of the opening — not natural cold.
Root-cold.
The kind that felt like standing at the edge of a memory you weren't allowed to remember.
Manraj shivered uncontrollably.
"Zoya… if we go in—"
"I know."
"If this is the Root's territory—"
"I know."
"What if it tries to pull me again?"
Zoya stepped closer.
"If it tries," she said, "I'll pull you back."
He looked at her.
"You couldn't last time."
She didn't deny it.
She only said:
"I wasn't ready last time."
Manraj swallowed.
"Zoya…"
"Yes?"
"Why are you doing all this for me? Even before you knew me?"
She looked at him carefully.
And her voice dropped to something quiet.
Unarmored.
"You weren't built to replace Azhar, Manraj. You were built so the Root could erase him without collapsing. But Azhar…"
She paused, breath trembling.
"…Azhar chose you over the Root the moment he realized what you were."
Manraj's lips parted.
"And you?" he whispered.
Zoya stepped closer.
"I chose you before I even knew your name."
The air shifted.
A tremor ran beneath their feet.
24 → 23.
Manraj stiffened.
"It's moving again."
Zoya's eyes hardened.
"Then we move faster."
She held out her hand.
"Come with me, Manraj."
He took it.
The metal doorway pulsed once.
Twice.
Then opened wider like a throat swallowing light.
Zoya whispered:
"Azhar left something in there for you."
The number throbbed.
23.
And the shadows inside the Root-entry whispered to him like a memory returning:
Come through.
They stepped inside.
Together.
And the hunt tightened behind them.