The underways swallowed Astra like a mouth.
Cold air hit first—wet stone, old ash, and the metallic taste of drains that had carried too many secrets. Then gravity took her. The darkness rushed up, and for one heartbeat she felt weightless in a way that almost resembled freedom.
Her collar didn't allow that illusion to last.
A white flash tore across her vision.
FORCE-LOCK: 99% — COMMITTING.
Her throat clenched. Not pain—control. A clamp closing around her nervous system like a fist.
Astra's limbs seized mid-fall.
Her stomach dropped harder than her body. Frozen muscles meant she couldn't brace, couldn't twist, couldn't aim for water instead of stone.
She was going to hit wrong.
A shadow moved above her—fast, disciplined, impossible.
Kael.
He didn't dive like a hero.
He dove like a soldier calculating angles.
His hand caught her wrist, iron grip, and yanked her into his body midair. The impact drove the breath out of her. His other arm wrapped around her ribs, turning her into a controlled fall instead of a broken one.
They slammed into something slick—water, shallow and cold—then rolled, skidding over stone. Astra's spine lit with pain, but it didn't land cleanly because her system was still trying to lock her into obedience and failing to decide what obedience meant while falling.
Her vision stuttered.
LOCK STATUS: STUTTERINGERROR: ENVIRONMENTAL INTERFERENCEERROR: SIGNAL LOSSCOMPLIANCE MODE: PARTIAL
Partial.
That was worse than yes or no.
Astra's body twitched, caught between motion and restraint. Her hands jerked like marionette strings were being yanked by two different hands.
Kael kept her pinned against him, not crushing—anchoring. His breath was hot against her ear in the dark.
"Stay with me," he said.
It sounded like an order.
It sounded like a plea.
Astra hated that her body responded to both.
Above them, the grate slammed.
Boots thundered on iron. Voices echoed down the shaft—Rusk's clipped command, Seraphine's bright doctrine, men shouting over smoke.
Lanternlight bled through gaps in the metal.
Astra's collar pulsed RETURN—furious, distant, like a master shouting down a well.
Kael didn't look up. He looked at Astra's throat, then her eyes, reading her face for fracture.
"How bad," he murmured.
Astra tried to answer. Her jaw wouldn't cooperate for a beat. Her tongue felt thick. The force-lock was chewing at her fine motor control like a rat in a wall.
Kael's hand slid to her cheek—brief, grounding contact.
"Blink once if you can move," he said.
Astra blinked once.
"Blink twice if you're about to lock completely."
Astra forced a second blink.
Kael's expression tightened like a wire pulled too far.
He cursed under his breath—not theatrical, not loud. Private rage.
Then he shifted his stance, lifting Astra as if she weighed nothing, and moved into the tunnel without giving her body time to argue.
Astra's head lolled against his shoulder for half a second. She caught the scent of him—leather, steel, clean sweat. The intimacy of being carried made heat flare in her gut, sharp and unwanted, because her body refused to separate survival from closeness.
Kael's voice went low at her ear. "Don't drift."
Astra's laugh came out cracked. "I'm trying."
They ran.
Not far—the tunnel turned tight, low ceiling pressing. Kael ducked automatically, Astra held against him, his steps precise even in water.
Astra's interface flickered again, dimmer here.
TRACE: 26.1%WARNING: NERVOUS SYSTEM THRASHFORCE-LOCK: SEEKING STABLE COMMAND SOURCE
Stable command source.
Astra's stomach knotted.
The system wasn't locking because she was "bad." It was locking because it wanted a single voice to obey.
A single hand.
One master.
That was the collar's idea of safety.
Above, iron screamed as someone forced the grate. A splash of light. Then the metallic clatter of a chain dropping down.
They were coming.
Kael reached a junction where the tunnel split: one path sloped deeper into wet dark, the other rose toward a drier corridor lined with old bricks and faint, ugly sigils carved like scars.
Underchain marks.
Kael chose the scarred corridor without hesitation.
Astra's collar jittered as the signal changed. The pull of RETURN weakened by a hair, and that hair felt like oxygen.
Her interface stuttered.
ENVIRONMENT: UNDERCHAIN INTERFERENCEFORCE-LOCK: UNSTABLECOMPLIANCE MODE: DEGRADING
Degrading.
Good.
Dangerous, but good.
Kael set Astra down against a wall where the brickwork bulged—an alcove barely big enough for two bodies. He pressed himself between her and the tunnel mouth, listening.
Astra's legs tried to fold. Kael's hand caught her elbow.
"No," he said, voice sharp. "Stay upright."
Astra's eyes narrowed. "That's… an order?"
"Yes," Kael answered.
The collar liked that. It loved clear authority.
Astra felt the sick little relief of it—her muscles steadied when Kael spoke like a handler, because the lock wanted a voice it could recognize without conflict.
She hated herself for the relief. She hated the collar more.
Kael leaned close, mouth near her ear. "Don't touch your throat."
Astra's lips parted. "I won't."
Kael's gaze flicked to her mouth, then away. Even in panic, even in blood and smoke, he still looked like a man fighting the urge to look too long.
Astra filed that away.
A hinge.
Footsteps echoed in the deeper tunnel now—Hounds entering the underways. Their cadence was different than guards. Cleaner. More patient.
Kael's eyes narrowed. "They brought more."
Astra swallowed. "Rusk?"
"Maybe," Kael murmured. "Or Dorian's."
Astra's throat burned at the Marquis's name, a reminder that even here, under stone and interference, the collar still knew who had written its first line.
Kael pressed his palm to the Underchain sigils carved into the wall—testing. They didn't flare like Dominion wards. They didn't glow. They just… resisted, like stubborn stone refusing to be told what to do.
Kael's voice went low. "Lyra wasn't lying about these tunnels."
Astra's laugh was thin. "She lied about everything else."
Kael didn't answer, and the silence held something heavier than agreement. His mind was already doing what his body always did: turning betrayal into a map.
Astra's vision flickered. The interface steadied for a heartbeat, like the Underchain interference forced it into a simpler state.
PERMISSIONSREAD: ENABLEDWRITE (SELF): LOCKEDCOMPLIANCE MODE: LIMITEDNOTE: FORCE-LOCK FAILED TO COMMIT
Failed.
Astra sucked in a sharp breath.
Kael's eyes snapped to her face. "What."
Astra swallowed. "It failed."
Kael's jaw flexed. "Because of this place."
Astra nodded once, fighting the tremor in her hands. The collar still pulsed, still threatened, but the hard jaw of the force-lock had loosened into something more like a warning.
Kael's gaze sharpened with grim approval. "Then we keep moving."
Astra's mouth curled. "Now you listen."
Kael's eyebrow twitched. "I am listening."
Astra stepped closer, forcing her body to stay upright, forcing her voice to stay steady. "The lock wanted a stable command source."
Kael went still.
Astra lowered her voice, intimate and precise. "It tried to pick a master."
Kael's eyes darkened. "And it didn't."
"It didn't," Astra agreed. "Because it couldn't decide. Too many claims. Too much interference."
Kael's jaw tightened. "So we stay where it can't decide."
Astra smiled faintly. "Exactly."
Heat bloomed between them, not tender—strategic. The kind of closeness born from shared danger.
Kael's hand hovered near her throat, then stopped himself as if the movement burned. "If I touch you here—"
"It calms it," Astra finished softly.
Kael's eyes flicked to her mouth again. "It also makes me visible."
Astra swallowed. "To Dorian."
"And to the Church," Kael added.
Astra's pulse kicked. Seraphine's ward had pressed into the room like doctrine made tangible. She wasn't letting go.
Astra leaned closer until her breath warmed Kael's jaw. "Then don't touch," she murmured. "Teach."
Kael's eyes narrowed. "Teach what."
Astra's smile sharpened. "Teach me how you phrase commands so they don't spike trace."
Kael's mouth tightened. "You want to talk about wording while Hounds are above us."
Astra's gaze didn't blink. "Yes."
Kael stared at her for a long beat, then exhaled slowly—acceptance disguised as irritation.
"Short commands are louder," he said. "Clean. Absolute. The system loves them."
Astra nodded, filing it away.
Kael continued, voice low. "Conditional phrases slip under alarms. 'If—then.' 'Until.' 'Unless.' It reads like protocol, not rebellion."
Astra's mouth went dry. "That's why your claim almost worked."
Kael's eyes flashed. "Yes."
Astra felt a twist in her chest. He'd been trying to save her with language, not violence. That was its own kind of intimacy.
Astra's fingers brushed the edge of his sleeve—barely there. A touch that asked a question without forcing an answer.
"Kael," she whispered. "When you said earlier… you'd have to choose what this is."
His body went still.
The tunnel echoed with footsteps. Danger pressed close.
And still, Kael heard her.
His voice was rougher than before. "Not now."
Astra's smile turned wicked, soft. "I didn't ask you to choose."
Kael's eyes snapped to her mouth.
Astra kept her voice low enough to be a secret in stone. "I asked you to admit you'll think about it later."
Kael's throat worked. His restraint trembled—tiny, visible in the way his fingers flexed and unclenched.
Then he gave her the smallest nod.
Astra's breath hitched.
Consent-as-foreplay, not with bodies, with power. With the simple fact that he could deny her and chose not to deny her that much.
A distant clang echoed—metal striking metal.
They'd found the grate.
Kael's head snapped toward the tunnel mouth. "Move."
Astra moved.
This time Kael didn't carry her. He guided her by the wrist, fast and controlled, keeping her in motion so the collar had less time to argue with itself.
The corridor twisted through old brickwork. Underchain sigils appeared in clusters—marks like scars and warnings. Astra's interface dimmed in their presence, as if the system was embarrassed to be seen here.
They passed a narrow archway where the brick was broken and the dark beyond smelled like smoke and damp cloth. A hidden route.
Kael slowed, listening.
From ahead came a faint sound—soft, deliberate footsteps. Not pursuit. Not panicked.
Waiting.
Kael stopped, pulling Astra behind him.
Astra's collar pulsed RETURN, weak but persistent. She tasted the command like a sour note in her throat.
"Who's there," Kael called, voice low.