Ironhand felt the surge like a knife in his spine.
He staggered mid-stride, gauntleted hand slamming into the rock wall to keep himself upright. Snow slid loose from above, cascading down around him.
The Spark had flared.
No—
The ritual had moved.
His teeth clenched. He tasted copper.
"They found him," he growled.
The pull twisted inside his chest, yanking hard enough that his vision blurred. The chain, an old, invisible presence that burned into his soul tightened.
Ashen.
Damn him.
Ironhand had spent years outrunning that pull. Breaking cities. Burning contracts. Killing anyone who tried to put a leash back on him.
But this—
This was different.
This wasn't the Baron.
This wasn't the House.
This was the Book reaching through Ashen to finish what it had started.
Ironhand tore forward, ignoring the pain screaming through his joints. The mountains blurred as he ran. He leapt ravines that should've broken his legs. He punched through drifts that buried lesser men alive.
The pull sharpened with every step.
A memory surfaced unbidden.
---
He had been sixteen when the Baron first chained him.
The ritual chamber smelled of iron and ink. The Book lay open, whispering promises that crawled under his skin. He remembered screaming as something cold and deliberate sank into his chest not metal, but command.
"You are my guardian now," the Baron had said. "You will protect what I choose."
Ironhand had learned what obedience really meant that night.
Pain when he resisted.
Silence when he complied.
He'd broken free years later, tearing the Baron's work apart piece by piece.
Or so he'd thought.
---
The ground shook again.
Ironhand skidded to a halt at the edge of a clearing and saw it.
The ritual circle.
Fresh.
Crude.
Incomplete but active.
Ashen stood inside it.
For a heartbeat, Ironhand forgot how to breathe.
"You idiot," he muttered. "You stepped in."
Shadows writhed above the circle, half-formed tendrils clawing at the air like blind serpents. The Book's influence leaked through them, thick and hungry.
Ashen stood rigid, blades lowered, face locked in focus.
He wasn't fighting.
He was choosing.
Ironhand's jaw clenched so hard his teeth creaked.
The House of Masks ringed the clearing five, maybe six survivors. Mirelle stood back, watching like this was theater.
Ironhand moved.
The first assassin never saw him.
Ironhand hit the edge of the circle at full speed, shoulder-checking one hunter hard enough to cave in their chest. Another lunged, Ironhand caught the blade bare-handed and headbutted the masked face until it stopped moving.
Mirelle shouted something. An order, maybe.
Ironhand didn't care.
He charged straight toward Ashen.
The moment he crossed the circle's boundary—
Pain exploded.
Not physical.
Absolute.
The chain inside him screamed, yanking him sideways, trying to drag him to his knees.
Ironhand roared and forced himself upright.
"I broke you," he snarled into the empty air. "You don't own me anymore!"
The shadows recoiled.
Good.
He grabbed Ashen by the collar and slammed his forehead against Ashen's.
"Listen to me," Ironhand growled. "The ritual doesn't want you dead. It wants you bound."
Ashen's eyes flickered. "I know."
"Then get out!"
Ashen shook his head once. "It'll take her instead."
Ironhand froze.
The child.
He felt her then, Lira's presence like a distant ember, flickering, fragile. The Spark reacted violently to the ritual's pull.
Ironhand's hands tightened.
"No," he said quietly. "Not again."
A scream tore through the air.
The shadows surged, lashing out at Ironhand like whips. He raised his gauntlet, bracing as ink-black tendrils slammed into him, cracking stone beneath his feet.
The chain burned.
He laughed.
A harsh, broken sound. "Is that all you have left?"
He planted his feet and pulled back.
Not with strength.
With memory.
With refusal.
He remembered the boy he had been before the Baron. The anger. The defiance. The moment he chose to tear the chain apart rather than live with it.
The ritual faltered.
Ashen stared at him. "Ironhand w..what are you doing?"
"Ending it," Ironhand said.
He reached inward and grabbed the chain. It didn't matter whether it was metaphor or not, it was there and he yanked.
With all his might.
Something tore.
The shadows shrieked.
The ritual circle cracked, runes flaring wildly. The pull on Ashen snapped back like a broken leash.
Mirelle screamed. "Stop him!"
Too late.
Ironhand drove his gauntlet into the center of the circle.
The ground split.
Light erupted upward, not dark, not cold, but burning gold, raw and furious.
The Book's presence recoiled, howling soundlessly as its projection shattered.
The clearing went dead silent.
Ironhand collapsed to one knee, breathing hard.
The chain was gone.
He could feel it.
Ashen stared at him like he was seeing a ghost. "You… broke it."
Ironhand wiped blood from his mouth. "No," he said. "I broke my part of it."
He looked toward where Lira lay unconscious in Elyra's arms at the edge of the clearing.
"The Spark still remembers," he said. "And now it knows it can choose."
The ground rumbled faintly in retreat, not approach.
The Book was not defeated.
But it was wounded.
Ironhand pushed himself to his feet, towering and unsteady.
"This isn't over," he said. "But for the first time… it's not inevitable."
Ashen fainted before he could respond and he turned away.
Because if he stayed...
If he looked too long at the child he'd almost become a jailer to...
He didn't want to think about it.
He might remember what hope felt like.
And hope was dangerous.