The Gembound: The Price of Keeping Chapter 21: Chapter 20 — The Ash Market

Read chapter 21 of The Gembound: The Price of Keeping by Taliorn on NovelPedia.

Chapter 20 — The Ash Market They left the mansion at noon, Eliza leading with brisk efficiency that made Yara feel protected but unpracticed. They took the long route toward the high market near the Regent’s castle. The streets appeared as a row of gray teeth: empty shops, leaning signboards, and torn banners snapped in an ashen wind. By the time they arrived at the square, the sun was a red smear behind smoke, and the air reeked of blood and fire. Where stalls used to overflow with goods, now survivors huddled under a burned warehouse at the street’s end. When the Scion’s shadow fell, everyone went still. Heads turned to the silhouette—heat and scale, claws clicking on stone. Its eyes glowed like twin embers. The crowd pulled back; hushed whispers followed: witch, monster, savior. Eliza said nothing. She simply watched, folding and unfolding her hands in a steady rhythm that made her look both careful and prepared to act. Her silence seemed like consent. Yara’s pulse matched the Gem ’s low thrum. It no longer spoke in sentences; its pleasure spread through her like heat in a forge full and curious, ready to be used. “There,” Eliza murmured, pointing. A maimed soldier slumped against a cart, his leg missing below the knee. Both his armor and his skin were so blackened that it was hard to distinguish one from the other. A woman tried to comfort him, clutching a torn gray shawl to her shoulders. Near the wall, a builder hammered at a broken plank as he tried to brace a cracking beam. “Start with them,” Eliza said. “They still believe in things.” The Soldier Yara approached the soldier. Up close, she could see his eyes were open, staring at nothing. Fever-bright. "Hey," she said. He blinked. Focused on her with effort. "Water?" "I can do better than that. I can try to fix you." He looked at his missing leg. At his blackened skin. Laughed—bitter, wet. "No one can fix this." "I have power. I've healed someone before. Made them whole." His eyes sharpened. Suspicious. "What's the cost?" "No cost. I just—" Yara's voice cracked. "I'm trying to help. But I have to warn you. It might go wrong. Might kill you faster. Or—" She thought of the boy, the crawling skin, the screaming. "Or worse." "Worse than this?" He gestured at his ruined body. "I'm dying anyway. Slow. Can already smell the rot setting in." "I need something," Yara said. "An object. Something that matters to you. It helps me... guide the power. Make it work right." He reached for his sword with a shaking hand. "This. My father's. Carried it seventeen years." He looked at it, then at her. "If you can make me walk again—use it. It's all I got left worth a damn." Yara took the sword. Felt the weight of meaning in it. "I'll try," she said. "Just—hold still." She pressed the blade to his chest. The metal dissolved. Flowed into him like liquid fire. He screamed—raw and animal—as it spread through his body. Into the stump of his leg. Along his arms. Across his chest. Living steel grew where flesh had burned away. His leg reformed—not flesh, but metal fused with what remained of muscle and bone. Gold veins traced through the steel, pulsing with light. When it finished, he gasped. Stared at his new leg. Flexed it. The metal moved like living tissue. "What—" He looked at Yara. "What am I now?" "Whole. Bound. Mine." He stood. Tested his weight on the metal leg. It held. He picked up what remained of his sword—just the hilt now, the blade consumed. Set it aside carefully. "What do you need me to do?" he asked. Not "what do you want." Need . Like the question came from somewhere deeper than choice. "Protect these people," Yara said. "Keep them safe. Keep them fed. That's your purpose now." The gold veins in his arms flared brighter. He straightened, shoulders back. Guard posture. "Yes, my Lady." Just like that. No hesitation. The binding had taken. Eliza stepped closer, watching. "He feels it," she said quietly. "The emptiness until you give him direction. I feel it too. Like a hunger tha