The lighthouse settled into a quiet that felt earned rather than empty.

Noel stood near the narrow window, hands resting on the cold stone, watching the sea stretch between broken silhouettes of islands. Now that the shock had passed, the weight of everything Theo had revealed pressed in more heavily. Not panic—something worse. Options. Too many of them, all carrying consequences.

Behind him, Theo sat wrapped in a blanket Noel had pulled from his pouch, both hands around a cup of water. Noir lingered close to Noel's boots, ears twitching, eyes never fully at rest.

Noel broke the silence first.

"I'm not going straight for the center," he said, voice low and steady. "Not yet. If they're scattered the way you described, then my priority is getting everyone back together. Selene, Elyra, Charlotte—Marcus especially. I won't gamble their lives on speed."

Theo nodded slowly, as if he'd expected that answer.

"That's how it should be," he said. "The center isn't meant to be rushed. At least as it is now."

Noel turned from the window. "Then help me understand the layout. Not guesses—how the islands were arranged before everything went to hell."

Theo leaned back, eyes lifting toward the ceiling as if mapping memory onto stone. "There are layers," he said after a moment. "Always were. Outer islands first—small, unstable ones. Then inner rings with clearer paths. The central island sits like a knot everything else tightens around."

"How many?" Noel asked.

"Enough that no single route was ever safe," Theo replied. "But also enough that movement depended on reference points. The lighthouse was one of them. Not just light—position. Even in storms, people knew where they were in relation to it."

Noel absorbed that, nodding faintly. "So even now… you can still orient things."

"I can," Theo said. "I can't move ships anymore. But I can watch. Track shifts. Tell you which island drifts closer, which ones feel wrong to step on."

Noir glanced up at Noel. 'That makes him more useful than half the scouts we've worked with.'

Noel almost smiled.

"So this is how it works," Noel said aloud, more to himself than anyone. "I move. You stay here. You watch the board while I'm on it."

Theo met his gaze, something firm settling behind his tired eyes. "Then I'll be your fixed point," he said. "Someone has to stay still so the rest of you can move."

Noel exhaled, decision locking into place like a piece sliding home.

"Alright," he said. "That's our starting line."

Theo pushed himself up from the chair with a quiet grunt, joints protesting, and motioned for Noel to follow him deeper into the lighthouse.

"Give me a minute," he said. "There are things here I haven't touched in a long time."

He moved slowly but with purpose, like someone navigating a place mapped into muscle memory rather than sight. Behind a warped panel near the inner wall, he pressed his palm against a seam that didn't quite match the stone. The panel slid aside with a dull click, revealing a shallow compartment layered with dust and old tools.

Theo rummaged through it, pushing aside coils of wire, metal casings, and sealed boxes whose edges had softened with age. Finally, he straightened and turned, holding something small in his hand.

He placed it in Noel's palm.

It was a compact metal device, no larger than two fingers across. Smooth, worn at the edges. No mana signature that Noel could feel at all.

"What is this?" Noel asked, turning it over.

"A communicator," Theo replied simply. "Short-range. Frequency and resonance." He tapped the side with one finger. "You speak into it. If the matching piece is close enough, the sound carries."

Noel blinked, then let out a quiet, incredulous breath. "You're telling me you've been sitting on something like this the whole time?"

Theo shrugged. "It was useful before the islands broke. Less so after." A pause. "Until now."

Noir leaned closer, nose almost touching the device. 'It's clean,' she noted. 'No enchantment threads. That's… strange.'

"And impressive," Noel muttered. He turned the device over once in his hand, feeling its weight and balance. He let out a quiet breath, half disbelief, half respect. "People really underestimate what can be built without magic," he said. "Everyone's so focused on spells that they forget tools can do the same job—sometimes better."

Theo huffed softly, a hint of pride slipping through his exhaustion. "Magic is loud," he replied. "Craftsmanship isn't. That's why it survives longer."

Noel nodded at that, gaze returning to the mechanism. Whatever enano had helped design this hadn't been chasing power—they'd been solving a problem. And it showed. "Alright," Noel said at last, carefully securing the device. "This changes things."

They left the lighthouse behind as the light dimmed back into its steady, watchful rhythm.

The path downward opened onto the island's outer edge, where stone gave way to open sea. Noel stopped there, boots planted firmly as he took in the view ahead.

Water stretched between the islands—dark, glassy, and far too calm for the distance it covered. The nearest landmass hovered more than five kilometers away, its outline warped by haze and distance. Smaller islands drifted beyond it, staggered like broken steps that never quite touched.

Open ocean, swallowing the space between.

Noir padded forward beside him, paws stopping at the shoreline. She sniffed the air, ears angling toward the distant island, shadow rippling faintly along her fur as if the gap itself unsettled her.

Noel didn't speak at first.

He measured it. Distance. Mana cost. Margin for error. Before, even attempting something like this would've been reckless.

Now… it was uncertain.

He finally broke the silence, voice low.

"Be honest with me," Noel said. "If I try to cross that distance in one Shadow Step… does it hold?"

Noir didn't answer immediately. She closed her eyes, shadow gathering tighter around her small frame, the bond between them stretching outward like an invisible line.

Then she looked up at him.

'Yes,' she said, without hesitation. 'Not because it's easy. Because you can now.'

Noel raised an eyebrow slightly, inviting more.

'Before, we were forcing space to fold,' Noir continued. 'Pulling it open and hoping it wouldn't tear back. Now… it listens to you. You can be a shadow just like me dad.'

A pause.

'And we're not light anymore,' she added. 'We won't scatter.'

Noel let that settle.

The sea below remained indifferent. Patient. Ready to claim anything that misjudged it.

He nodded once.

"Alright," he said simply.

Noel stepped closer to the shoreline, the hem of his coat stirring in the wind. Shadows began to gather beneath his feet, spreading outward over the water.

Then he spoke the words clearly.

"Shadow Step."

The shadows tightened.

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