I staggered upright, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. The blood was already drying into a tacky smear across my skin, but I could still taste it—metallic, sharp, wrong. My heart hammered, not from the fight, but from what came after.

  The axe clattered as I shoved it aside with my boot. There was no time to think about that now. No time to feel. I moved from body to body, looting fast, hands shaking slightly even though the danger had passed.

  The first Fireeater carried nothing special: a set of crude ignition tools—flint sticks bound with oily twine, and little glass ampoules filled with some viscous, noxious-smelling fluid. Miniature firebombs, amateur hour stuff. I shoved them into my pack without thinking.

  The second had something worse: a page fragment, half-charred, the ink still faintly visible. I didn’t recognize the language—twisting, spiked glyphs that seemed to squirm if I looked too long. Forbidden? Probably. That tracked with the Fireeaters’ usual brilliance: burn what you couldn’t read.

  The last held a coin, twisted and blackened from the heat of his own death. A flame devouring a book was still visible on one side, etched deep enough to survive, their little badge of honor. I pocketed it, fingers tingling where the metal touched skin.

  As I worked, System notifications blinked across my vision, cold and clinical: {Minor XP gained.} {+20 Death Boons} {Reputation: Librarians - Decreased.}

  Perfect. The weight of it all settled like ash across my shoulders. I had killed three intruders, saved a boy’s life, and lost points with the people who were supposed to matter. Story of my life.

  Speaking of the boy—he was already moving. Blood matted his hair where it spilled down from the gash at his temple, but somehow he still clutched his ruined satchel like it was the only thing keeping him upright. He looked at me once, wide eyes too big for his face, filled not with gratitude, but pure…

  Terror.

  He bolted then, broken boots skidding across marble, and vanished down the twisting aisles without a word. I didn't call after him. What would I even say? "You're welcome"? "Sorry for biting a guy in front of you"? "Hope you live long enough to need therapy"? I watched him go until the hunger inside me squirmed again—curling, unsatisfied. The Boon wasn't finished. It never was.

  [Charming,] Malice murmured. [Nothing says 'hero' like traumatizing minors.]

  The hunger inside me hadn't even finished twitching when the air changed. A pulse rolled through the Library—soft, golden, heavy enough that the hairs on my arms stood up. It was like someone had snapped their fingers inside the rules of the world itself, a ripple of authority.

  I turned, one hand instinctively reaching for the axe still slick on the floor. A tear in the air opened with a neat, almost lazy flick, and William Lazseryk stepped through, sealing the portal behind him like he was snapping shut a filing cabinet.

  If authority had a mascot, it would have been him. Small, sharp, and armored in stiff, meticulously embroidered robes. His scales gleamed under the Library’s strange light, a dusty gold somewhere between dragon and sun-bleached parchment. Tiny wings were tucked close to his back like he couldn’t be bothered to use them, and a pair of half-moon spectacles balanced precariously on his snout.

  He surveyed the scene—the broken bodies, the blackened shelves, the blood still fresh on my gauntlets—with an expression so flat it made my stomach twist harder than any blade could. No shock, no horror. Just a long-suffering sigh.

  William produced a floating quill with a snap of his clawed fingers. A piece of parchment unfolded itself midair and began scratching notes before he even spoke. I braced myself.

  [Ooooh, here we go,] Malice snickered inside my skull. [Pop quiz time. First question: How badly did you screw up?]

  William cleared his throat. "Miss Vezwincourt," he said, voice clipped and cold, like he was reciting a weather report. "While we at the Library appreciate your... enthusiasm for self-defense, I regret to inform you that unauthorized acts of violence remain firmly against regulation."

  I opened my mouth, but he raised a single claw. "Allow me to finish."

  He adjusted his spectacles with precise annoyance, eyes flicking to the scorched shelves, the cracked pillar, the scattered books still smoldering at the edges. "You are hereby cited for the following infractions: Damage to protected Library property. Unauthorized lethal force within a Penitent-access corridor. Endangerment of visiting scholars." He inhaled sharply, as if I were the one burning the place down. "And worst of all..." He jabbed the parchment floating beside him. "...creating a public disturbance."

  I swallowed back the thousand things I wanted to say. It wouldn’t matter, not to him. William Lazseryk wasn’t here to listen—he was here to document, to catalog the mess I'd made like another broken artifact shoved onto a forgotten shelf. The quill scratched furiously at the floating parchment, recording every word he spoke in neat, damning lines.

  "Unauthorized violence is a serious offense," William continued, pacing with short, clipped steps. "Especially when it compromises the Library’s neutrality. You are aware, I assume, that the Fireeaters, reprehensible as they were, remained an unaffiliated faction under current accords?"

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  I stared at him, blood still dripping from my gauntlet. "They were going to kill that boy," I said, voice low.

  He gave me a look usually reserved for particularly stupid paperwork. "Intent," he said sharply, "was irrelevant. Outcome is what matters here. And the outcome, Miss Vezwincourt, was a dead incursion team, several thousand gold worth of structural damage, and one traumatized minor who will almost certainly spread damaging rumors about the Library's ability to guarantee safety."

  He folded his arms behind his back, wings giving a faint, irritated twitch. "Public relations," he added dryly, "are fragile when your institution is known primarily for lethal architecture and legally binding regrets."

  [He likes you,] Malice whispered. [He's just playing hard to get.]

  I ignored him, clenching my fists until the Boon under my skin gave a warning pulse. William’s eyes sharpened, catching the flicker of movement—the way the blood on my armor didn’t dry like normal, the way the hunger still throbbed just beneath the surface. His nose wrinkled.

  "And that," he said, voice dropping half an octave, "brought me to the more pressing concern." He tapped the parchment once with a claw. Symbols shifted along its surface, rearranging into something sharper. Binding runes. I knew enough magic to recognize a sanction when I saw one.

  "Unauthorized use of divine-touched abilities within Library grounds without registration or restraint." He paused, letting it hang there. "You've not simply endangered yourself, Miss vezwincourt. You've endangered all of us."

  The parchment floating beside William shimmered again, sigils coiling tighter, angrier. I shifted my weight, pulse still too loud in my ears, the Boon clawing against my ribs like it didn’t appreciate being reprimanded. William didn't flinch or blink. He just kept talking, voice crisp and dry as old paper.

  "Given the severity of the incident," he said, "several corrective measures were available." He lifted one claw, ticking them off like he was listing dinner options. "First: revocation of your access ticket. Immediate loss of browsing and travel rights within the Library’s primary and secondary systems."

  He paused briefly before continuing. "Second: restricted floor access. You would be confined to Penitent-level stacks. No Archive of Worlds, no research wings, certainly no protected Vaults." My stomach twisted. I couldn’t afford that restriction, not if I had any hope of finding a way off this floor—or a way to survive what was coming.

  "Third," William said, voice sharpening, "if you wish to remain beyond a probationary period, you will be required to enter into a binding contract. One that ensures compliance with Library regulations." He let that sit there for a moment, staring at me over the rims of his tiny spectacles. "It would be magically enforced," he added, as if I were too stupid to figure it out. "Violation would result in penalties determined by the Registrar Council."

  [Penalties like spontaneous combustion, maybe,] Malice mused. [Or worse—mandatory paperwork.]

  William stepped closer, tail flicking once behind him. His voice dropped lower, quieter—but somehow heavier. "The Library is neutral ground," he said. "It exists because it must be above the petty wars of gods and monsters." His golden eyes pinned me in place. "If you drag divine corruption into these halls unchecked, you risk all of it. The books. The portals. The safety it barely still provides." He said it without rage or drama, just simple, brutal fact.

  I opened my mouth—no idea whether I was about to apologize, argue, or scream—and he cut me off again with a precise, brutal efficiency: "You will choose, Miss Vezwincourt. Order or exile."

  And with a flick of his fingers, the contract unrolled in the air between us, humming with golden light, waiting.

  The contract hovered there, humming like a beehive ready to explode. I stared at it, at the tight weave of runes, the dense knot of rules I could already feel trying to wrap themselves around my throat. Something ugly twisted in my gut.

  “No,” I said, voice low and shaking. “This wasn’t right.”

  William’s expression didn’t change, not even a twitch.

  “They were murdering him,” I snapped, jerking my chin toward the trail of blood the boy had left behind. “I didn’t start this.”

  "You finished it poorly," William replied, his tone utterly flat.

  I took a step toward him, armor creaking. "They would have burned him alive."

  "And you," William said calmly, "burned the Library’s neutrality in the process." His words hit like slaps—precise, measured, designed to sting without drawing blood. I hated how steady he was, how small and sharp and unshakeable he seemed compared to the storm rolling under my skin.

  "The rules exist for a reason," he continued. "Without them, we become no better than the Fireeaters you slaughtered."

  I flinched at the word. Slaughtered. The blood still slick on my gauntlets seemed heavier now.

  "You saved a boy," William said, softer now. "You endangered a thousand more." He lifted his quill again, tapping it once against the floating parchment. "You are not in a dungeon anymore, Miss Vezwincourt. You are in a sanctuary. A fragile one."

  [So fragile,] Malice whispered, [it can’t even survive you breathing too loud.]

  I clenched my fists, feeling the armor bite into my palms. "I didn’t ask for this," I said through gritted teeth.

  William nodded, almost sympathetically. Almost. "Most monsters never do."

  I froze. The words hung there between us—ugly and naked and real. Behind my ribs, the Boon twitched, hungry and vindicated all at once.

  Monster.

  [He’s not wrong,] Malice said, almost sweetly. [But hey. At least you’re our monster.]

  The contract pulsed again, closer now, demanding. William waited, patient, merciless. Order or exile. Something inside me broke. Not a crack this time—a shattering. A sharp, clean snap that left no seams to stitch back together.

  I stared at the floating contract, the neat little golden script spelling out my future in chains, the future he thought I deserved. The word monster hissed in my ears, not as accusation, but as invitation.

  The Boon surged behind my ribs, hot and greedy. The hunger I kept locked down, the violence I kept tamped tight, roared up like wildfire tasting dry brush. Maybe he was right. Maybe it was easier to stop pretending.

  I lifted my head. Smiled. Let him see it.

  William’s quill faltered mid-air. His nostrils flared, catching something sour and burning rising off me. His claws twitched toward a sigil I didn’t give him time to finish.

  The Golden Axe sang into my hand, called not by thought—but by hunger.