Eighteen months after Pek’s betrayal, Aira was fourteen and a half years old, and she'd become exactly what the Under-City demanded: a ghost.
She operated alone now, taking jobs from Cray's network but answering to no one. She had three different hideouts that she rotated between, never sleeping in the same place twice in a row. She trusted Kess and Nell enough to meet them occasionally, but even that trust had limits. She never told them where she lived, never let them see her come or go from her safe spaces.
The bounty was still active. Five hundred gold marks for information leading to her capture. But in eighteen months, no one had come close. She'd become too careful, too paranoid, too isolated to catch.
Her Mental Canvas had expanded to thirty-two square centimeters. She'd memorized twelve working glyphs and tattooed seven of them on her body. She was faster, stronger, more skilled than she'd been at thirteen.
She was also lonelier than she'd ever been in her life.
But loneliness was safe. Loneliness couldn't betray her.
The message came through the usual dead-drop: a chalk mark on a water pipe in the eastern tunnels. Nell's mark, not Kess's. That was unusual, Kess was typically the one who made contact.
The mark meant: Need to see you. Important. Not urgent. Your choice.
Aira stood in front of the chalk mark for a long time, debating.
She hadn't seen Nell in three months. Their last meeting had been brief and professional, a handoff of stolen goods, a split of profits, nothing personal. That was how Aira preferred it now. Business only. No emotional entanglements. No vulnerability.
But this mark was different. Your choice meant Nell wouldn't be offended if Aira ignored it. Which meant it was personal, not business.
And personal meant dangerous.
Aira almost walked away. Almost erased the mark and pretended she'd never seen it.
But something stopped her. Some small, stubborn part of herself that hadn't died yet. The part that remembered Nell wrapping a blanket around her shoulders on her first night with the Dippers. The part that remembered Nell teaching her to negotiate, to read people, to survive.
Like a mother, Cray had said.
Aira erased the mark and drew her own response beneath it: Tomorrow. Noon. Echo Point.
Echo Point was a chamber in the deep tunnels where sound bounced strangely off the walls, making it nearly impossible to approach without being heard. Safe meeting ground.
She'd go. She'd listen to whatever Nell wanted to say.
But she wouldn't let her guard down.
Nell was already there when Aira arrived, sitting on a flat stone with a small pack beside her. She looked older than Aira remembered, dark circles around her eyes that hadn't been there before.
The Under-City aged people fast. But even so, Nell looked tired in a way that had nothing to do with physical exhaustion.
"You came," Nell said. Not surprised, exactly. Just... relieved.
"You said it was important." Aira stayed near the entrance, keeping her exit route clear. Old habits. Good habits.
"It is." Nell gestured to the stone beside her. "Sit. Please. I'm not here to ambush you or lecture you. I just... I need to talk to you. And give you something."
Aira didn't sit. But she moved closer, within conversation distance.
Nell sighed. "You look good. Healthy. A little thin. I was worried you weren't eating enough, living alone."
"I eat fine."
"That's good." Nell was quiet for a moment. "Kess says you've been taking riskier jobs. Solo infiltration work. Long cons in the above-ground districts."
"The pay is better."
"The danger is higher."
"I can handle it."
"I know you can." Nell's voice was soft. "That's not what worries me."
Aira's shoulders tensed. "If you're here to tell me I should come back to the crew—"
"I'm not." Nell held up a hand. "You made the right choice, going independent. After what Pek did... I understand. I do." She paused. "But I'm worried about why you made that choice. About what you're becoming."
"I'm becoming a survivor."
"You're becoming isolated." Nell's eyes were sad. "And isolation is its own kind of death, Aira. Slower than a knife. But just as certain."
"I'm fine, Nell."
"Are you?" Nell leaned forward. "When's the last time you laughed? When's the last time you let yourself care about anything other than the next job, the next score, the next safe house?"
Aira didn't answer. Couldn't answer. Because she didn't remember.
"I've been where you are," Nell said quietly. "After I lost my father. After his partners stole everything and I ended up down here. I thought the only way to survive was to close myself off. To trust no one. To need nothing." She smiled faintly. "I was good at it, too. Lasted almost two years before I realized I was surviving but not living. There's a difference."
"The difference gets you killed."
"Sometimes. But dying inside while your body keeps walking around, that's not better." Nell reached for her pack. "I asked you here because I'm leaving. Not the Under-City. Not the crew. Just... taking a break. There's a job above-ground. Long-term. Months, maybe a year. And I wanted to see you before I left."
Something twisted in Aira's chest. "Cray approved this?"
"Cray understands that even the best of us need to come up for air sometimes." Nell pulled something from her pack, a small leather journal, worn and water-stained. "This is for you. I've been keeping it since you joined the Dippers. Thought you might want it someday."
She held it out.
Aira took it carefully, like it might explode. Opened it to a random page.
Nell's handwriting, neat and precise.
Aira led her first negotiation with Crow today. She was terrified but didn't show it. Got us an extra twelve silver on the deal. Cray was impressed. So was I.
Found her crying in the tunnels. She won't say why but I think it's about her mother. Gave her space. Sometimes that's all you can give.
She's getting harder. I see it happening and I don't know how to stop it. Or if I should even try. Down here, hard keeps you alive. But at what cost?
Aira flipped through pages. Years of observations. Small moments. Victories and failures and everything in between.
A record of someone who'd been paying attention. Who'd cared enough to write it down.
"Why?" Her voice came out rougher than she intended.
"Because someone should remember who you were before the Under-City tried to grind you down into nothing." Nell stood up, shouldering her pack. "And because I wanted you to have something to look back on. When you're older. When you've gotten out of here, because you will get out, Aira. You're too smart and too stubborn not to."
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She stepped closer, and Aira didn't step back.
"The Under-City teaches you to survive by not caring," Nell said softly. "But that's a lie. You survive by caring about the right things. By choosing what matters and protecting it. Not by pretending nothing matters at all."
She pulled something else from her pocket, a small vial of ink. Not Church-sanctioned. The color was wrong, too dark, with hints of deep red in the blue.
"Eastern ink," Nell said. "Real Eastern ink, not Church knockoffs. Took me eight months and most of my savings to get it. It's yours."
Aira stared at the vial. "I can't—"
"You can. You will." Nell pressed it into her hands. "Your mother tried to teach you Eastern techniques. Died before she could finish. This ink... it works differently than Western formulas. More intuitive. More dangerous. But maybe it's what you need to understand what she was trying to show you."
"Nell—"
"Use it or don't. Keep it or sell it. I don't care." Nell's smile was sad. "But don't throw it away just because it came from someone who cares about you. That's not survival, Aira. That's just fear."
She moved toward the exit, then paused.
"One more thing. Kess asked me to tell you something. He was too scared to say it himself, thought you'd take it wrong." She looked back. "He's in love with you. Has been for a year. Won't do anything about it because he knows you're not ready. Maybe never will be. But he wanted you to know. In case it mattered."
Aira's chest constricted. "Why are you telling me this?"
"Because you need to know that someone sees you. Not Aira the thief. Not Aira the ghost. Not Aira the survivor." Nell's eyes were bright. "Just you. The girl who tried to save a kitten. The girl who still has nightmares about the choices she's made. The girl who's still human underneath all that armor."
She walked to the tunnel entrance.
"Take care of yourself, Aira. And when you're ready, when you finally get out of this place and go find what you're looking for, don't forget that there are people down here who loved you. Even when you didn't love yourself."
And then she was gone, her footsteps fading into the echo of the tunnels.
Aira stood alone in Echo Point, holding a journal full of memories and a vial of Eastern ink that shouldn't exist.
Her hands were shaking.
She sat on the stone where Nell had been and opened the journal again.
The entries went back to her first week with the Dippers. Small observations. Nell tracking her progress like a teacher tracking a student. Or a mother tracking a daughter.
She flinches when Cray raises his voice. Not at him. At the volume. Someone hurt her badly before she came here. The Church, probably. Or the orphanage. Maybe both.
She's smart. Scary smart. Picks up new skills faster than anyone I've seen. But she doesn't trust it. Doesn't trust herself. Keeps waiting for someone to tell her she's not good enough.
The kitten broke something in her. I saw it happen. Saw the moment she decided not to try anymore. I should have said something. Should have told her that failing doesn't mean you stop trying. But I didn't. And now it's too late.
Pek betrayed her. She's going independent. I understand why, but it hurts. Feels like watching her build a wall around herself brick by brick, and every brick is another piece of her she's losing.
She came to today's meeting but wouldn't sit down. Wouldn't meet my eyes. Stayed near the exit the whole time. Like a wild animal that's forgotten how to be tame. Or forgotten why it would want to be.
I'm leaving for a while. Need to. But I'm scared for her. Scared she'll disappear so far into the isolation that she won't find her way back. So I'm writing this. Hoping she reads it. Hoping it matters.
The last entry was dated yesterday:
Aira - If you're reading this, it means I gave you the journal. It means you came to meet me even though you didn't want to. That's good. That means you're not completely lost yet.
I know you think trust is weakness. I know you think caring is dangerous. I know you think the only way to survive is to stop feeling anything at all.
You're wrong.
The Under-City wants you to believe that. Wants you to become another empty thing that moves through the dark without purpose or connection. But that's not survival. That's just existing. And you deserve more than that.
Your mother died from a botched healing glyph. You've spent five years running from that legacy, scared you'll fail the same way she did. But she didn't fail because she tried. She failed because the system was rigged against her. Because the Church hoards knowledge and charges too much for healing and lets people die rather than admit their monopoly kills people.
Don't let them kill you too. Not by capturing you. But by convincing you that being human is weakness.
Go to Kaelia someday. Learn the storm script your mother only knew fragments of. Become the healer she wanted to be. Come back and show the Church that their way isn't the only way.
But don't lose yourself doing it. Don't become so hard and so cold that when you finally have the power to help people, you don't care enough to use it.
You were eight years old when you escaped the orphanage. Tiny and terrified and desperate. But you had so much fight in you. So much hope. So much determination to be more than what they called you.
Don't let the Under-City take that away.
I love you. Kess loves you. Cray respects you more than he'll ever say. You have people who care. Even if you don't let yourself care back.
Stay alive. Stay human. And when you make it out, because you will, remember that we believed in you.
- Nell
Aira closed the journal, her throat tight.
She looked at the vial of Eastern ink. Held it up to the dim light filtering through a grate far above. The deep blue-red swirled like storm clouds. Like blood in water. Like possibility and danger mixed together.
She could sell it. It was probably worth fifty gold marks or more. Enough to live on for months.
Or she could use it. Try to understand what her mother had been attempting. Risk failure and corruption and all the dangers that came with Eastern techniques.
Or she could keep it. A reminder. A choice not yet made.
She tucked the vial into her inner pocket, next to her heart.
The journal went into her pack.
And then she sat there for a long time, alone in Echo Point, trying to remember what it felt like to hope.
Aira was halfway back to her hideout when she heard footsteps behind her. Not trying to be quiet. Not trying to sneak.
She turned, knife already in hand.
Kess stood ten feet away, hands raised. "It's me. Just me."
She didn't lower the knife. "You followed me?"
"Nell asked me to check on you. After." He gestured at the knife. "You gonna use that, or can we talk?"
Aira studied him. Kess was nineteen, tall and lanky, with dark hair that always looked like he'd just woken up. He had kind eyes. That was the problem. Too kind for the Under-City.
She lowered the knife but didn't sheath it. "There's nothing to check on. I'm fine."
"Yeah. You look fine." He moved closer, careful, like approaching a wounded animal. "Nell gave you the journal, didn't she?"
"Not your business."
"Fair." He stopped a few feet away. "She also told you... the other thing. About me."
Aira held his gaze, her face carefully blank. "She shouldn't have."
"I asked her to." Kess shrugged, but there was tension in his shoulders. "Figured you should know. In case it mattered."
"It doesn't."
"Okay." He said it simply. Not hurt. Just accepting. "I figured. But I wanted you to know anyway."
"Why?" The word came out sharper than she intended. "Why would you tell me that? What do you want from me?"
"Nothing." Kess's voice was steady. "I don't want anything from you, Aira. I just... I wanted you to know that someone sees you. Really sees you. Not the thief. Not the survivor. Just you."
"There is no 'just me.' There's only what I need to be to stay alive."
"I don't believe that." He smiled, sad but genuine. "I've seen you give your last copper to a kid who needed food. I've seen you let targets go because they were too desperate. I've seen you care even when you pretend you don't."
"Then you haven't been paying attention."
"I've been paying attention for three years." He took one step closer. "And I know you're scared. I know trusting people nearly got you killed. I know Pek's betrayal messed you up. I get it."
"You don't—"
"I do." His voice was gentle. "My mother betrayed me. She said she couldn't take care of me any longer. Dumped me in the orphanage when I was four. I ran away. That's why I'm here."
Aira hadn't known that. She'd never asked.
"I'm not asking you to trust me," Kess said. "I'm not asking you to let me in. I'm just asking you to remember that when you decide you're done being alone, I'll still be here. That's all."
He turned to leave, then paused.
"The journal Nell gave you? She made me read parts of it. The parts about how you're closing yourself off more every day. How scared she is that you'll lose yourself completely." He looked back at her. "For what it's worth, I'm scared of that too."
"I don't need you to be scared for me."
"I know." He smiled again, that same sad, genuine smile. "But I am anyway."
He walked away, his footsteps fading into the tunnel echoes.
Aira stood there, knife still in hand, Nell's journal heavy in her pack.
Two people loved her. Cared about her. Wanted her to be more than what she was becoming.
It should have felt like a gift.
Instead, it felt like a weight.
Because caring about them back meant giving them the power to hurt her. And she'd already been hurt enough.
She sheathed her knife and kept walking, alone by choice.
But the weight in her chest didn't go away.
She would keep operating solo. Would stay cautious. Would maintain her safety protocols.
But she would also remember that Nell had cared enough to write everything down. That Kess loved her even knowing she might never love him back. That even Cray, in his cold, calculating way, respected her.
She wasn't alone because no one wanted her.
She was alone because she'd chosen it.
And choices could be unmade. Eventually. When she was ready.
But not today.
Today, she had work to do. A bounty to evade. Skills to master. A future in Kaelia that was still far off but getting closer every day.
And now she had a reason beyond survival to reach it.
She had a lot of people to prove wrong. Everyone who'd called her Zero, who'd said she was worthless, the monks who'd told her the ink's will was to let people like her mother die.
And she had people who believed in her, people like Nell, who'd filled a journal with proof that Aira was worth believing in.
Even when Aira didn't believe it herself. She couldn’t let them down.
She walked out of Echo Point and back into the tunnels, the journal's weight familiar against her back and the ink's weight pressing against her heart.
Still alone. Still hunted. Still surviving.
But not quite as hollow as before.
[STATUS UPDATE]
Name: Aira
Age: 14.5 years
Level: 0
Rank: Gold II (Independent Operator)
Mental Canvas: 32 cm2
Scripts Memorized: 12 (7 tattooed)
Skills: Street Sense (Lv. 7), Light Fingers (Lv. 6), Combat Awareness (Lv. 4), Infiltration (Lv. 3)
Humanity: 58 → 60
[Little spark, the journal is a mirror showing you who you were before the walls went up. The ink is a key to your mother's legacy. And the knowledge that someone loves you, that's the most dangerous gift of all.]
Dark steampunk fantasy webnovel
The world of Rohana exists beneath a barrier of luminous crosses. Here, the Rohana Federation bends to Rohai, whose staff bears seven crystals of immense power. His Church of Harmony has divided civilization: city dwellers harness crystal technology while villagers cling to simpler traditions beyond the Church's reach.
In Haugstad, a forgotten village, Haran Baratti and his son Heron knew fragile peace. Then, unknown assailants burn it to ash. Haran draws the attackers away, giving Heron a chance to survive. His final words: We will meet again in Tiwaz.
Star-cycles later, Heron must earn an adventurer's passport to cross borders closed to villagers. To reach his father, he'll navigate crystalline cities and brutal hierarchies where allies carry secrets as dangerous as the enemies.
What to expect:
- Dark steampunk-inspired power fantasy with extensive world-building
- Magic systems where power comes at a psychological cost
- Visceral, well-choreographed combat sequences
- Mysteries that unfold across multiple volumes
- Steampunk aesthetics merged with elemental magic
- Stories where the actors are often found in morally grey areas
This work will appeal to readers who enjoyed:Works of Dan Simmons (Hyperion, Drood, The Terror), The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, A Song of Ice and Fire, Fullmetal Alchemist, HunterxHunter.
More influences and details can be found on the novel's page.
Chapters (1200 - 1500 words) are released daily at 20:00 (8 PM) GMT+1