Marked

The tram rattled through Ravendon like a stubborn old machine. Elias held the cold metal bar beside the window, trying not to look at his wrist again. The mark had faded from glowing red to a clean dark line, as if drawn by ink directly into his skin.

A broken circle.
Three short rays at the top.
A straight line down the center.

He had tried rubbing it, scratching it, even pressing his sleeve over it until the fabric hurt his arm. Nothing changed. In fact, the mark felt as if it had always been there.

He pulled his sleeve down quickly.

The lights above flickered in the exact same pattern he had seen in the Bureau, but no one else paid attention. Ravendon trams flickered all the time. To everyone else it was normal noise in a noisy city. To Elias, it felt like the lamps were watching him.

He got off the tram earlier than usual and walked home through steady rain. The streets were quiet. Shops had pulled their metal shades low. Water dripped from every corner of every roof. A thin dog slept under a closed stall with its tail curled over its nose.

By the time Elias reached his apartment building, he was shaking and not just from the cold. The stairwell smelled of rust and cement. He climbed to the third floor, unlocked his door, and stepped inside. The small room felt too small tonight. His cot, his table, his books, his kettle. Everything looked normal. That made it worse.

He closed the curtains, dropped his bag, and took out the scrap of paper he had torn from the ledger. He had done it on instinct, with no real plan. Now he wasn’t sure if that decision would save him or ruin him.

The moment he touched the paper with both hands, the ink on it began to move. This time it didn’t ripple. It shifted, slowly, as if gathering itself. Elias froze and watched thin black lines pull themselves into place.

The sigil formed again.
A broken circle.
Three short rays.
One straight line.

It glowed for a heartbeat, then settled into solid black.

Elias stepped back until the backs of his knees hit the bed. He sat down hard, trying to breathe normally. People told stories about Marked Ones sometimes, but those stories were quiet things, meant for late nights or whispered warnings. Most of Ravendon didn’t believe any of it. Even the Bureau never mentioned such ideas.

The paper lay on the table, still and harmless. Elias forced himself to stand and pick it up.

The scrap vanished from his hand.

A second later it lay on the floor near his foot.

He hadn’t dropped it. It hadn’t even slipped. It was simply gone from his fingers and waiting for him on the ground. The room was silent except for the sound of rain outside.

Elias crouched and reached for it again. The paper felt warm. The ink on it quivered, once, like something breathing.

A soft humming sound drifted through his apartment. Not loud. Not sharp. More like someone whispering behind a closed door. The lamps dimmed the way they had in the Bureau. Elias pressed himself against the wall, staring at the scrap.

For a moment he thought he saw a second shape forming under the sigil, something faint and unfamiliar. It disappeared before he could be sure.

Then someone knocked on his door.

Elias flinched so hard he hit his elbow against the shelf. The knock came again, slow and steady, the kind of knock that belonged to someone who expected an answer.

“Elias Rook,” a calm voice said.

Elias looked around the apartment as if there might be some other exit. There wasn’t. He forced himself to the door and opened it a little.

A man in a dark coat stood outside. Rain slid off the brim of his hat. His clothes were too neat for this weather and his posture was too steady for someone who had climbed these creaking stairs. He looked like he belonged to a part of Ravendon Elias had never seen.

The man’s eyes dropped to Elias’s wrist. Elias pulled his sleeve down without meaning to.

The stranger did not push inside. He waited.

“My name is Officer Kellon,” he said, holding up a badge unlike any police badge Elias had seen. “I work in a division that handles unusual incidents.”

Elias felt something tighten in his stomach.

Kellon continued, “We monitor disturbances. Strange activity. Events that do not match the city’s expected patterns. Your block triggered several alerts this evening. Not hours apart. Minutes apart.”

That made more sense. Elias had barely been home long enough for an hour to pass, let alone two. The earlier wording had been wrong. Kellon spoke plainly now.

“Something in this building behaved in a way it should not,” he said. “And whenever that happens, we check the source.”

Elias didn’t answer.

Kellon took a calmer tone. “I am going to ask you a question. Tell me the truth. Did you bring anything home from the Bureau today?”

Elias thought of the moving ink. The glowing mark. The page that refused to stay still.

He nodded.

“May I see it?” Kellon asked.

“No.” The word escaped Elias before he could stop it.

Kellon studied him, thoughtful but not angry.

“You have been Marked, haven’t you?”

“I don’t know what that means.”

“It means the quiet life you had is gone,” Kellon said. “You touched something that reacted to you. Something that does not behave like ink or paper should.”

Elias felt a burning pulse through his wrist.

Kellon stepped closer. “If the wrong people find you first, they won’t give you the chance to understand what the mark really is.”

Elias felt his legs shake.

Kellon held his gaze. “You need to come with me.”

Before Elias could move, every lamp in the hallway flickered, then steadied, then flickered again with the same strange rhythm he had seen all day.

A scraping sound slid across the floorboards.

The torn scrap of ledger paper slid out from under Elias’s door and stopped between his feet, as if it had walked there.

Kellon saw it. His expression changed. Not fear. Something like recognition.

He whispered a single word.

“Ledger.”

Then the lamps went dark.