Page 81 of Her Orc Healer

Sylwen didn't touch it. He simply looked, his expression unchanging but something in his eyes shifting—like clouds passing across the moon. The silence stretched, broken only by the soft crackle of the blue flames.

When he finally spoke, his voice was different. Lower. Rougher at the edges. “Where did you find this?” His tone wasn’t accusatory, but it held weight. A question meant not to satisfy curiosity but to measure consequence.

"Does it matter?" Kazrek asked.

"This mark doesn't appear by accident," Sylwen interrupted. His gaze flicked up to mine, penetrating. "And you wouldn't be here if it weren't for someone you love."

My throat tightened. "My niece. She... something is wrong."

"You've seen changes," Sylwen said, filling in the blanks. "Shadows where there weren't any before. Moments when she seems... not quite herself."

I nodded, unable to speak.

Sylwen's fingers hovered over the pendant, not quite touching it. Then, with deliberate slowness, he rolled up the sleeve of his robe.

My breath caught.

Kazrek leaned forward, voice low. “It’s the same.”

The symbol was etched into Sylwen’s forearm—faded now, a silvery scar against his dark skin, but unmistakable.

"Yes," Sylwen agreed. "I've been taken. And—unlike most—I've been returned."

The word slammed into me like a punch.

Taken.

I saw it again—scrawled across the wall of my shop, red as blood, the ink still seeping into the grain of the wood when I found it. A warning. A threat.

"What does it mean?" I asked, not sure I even wanted to know. "Taken?"

"The Mark of the Taken," he said. "A relic of the Shadowfall War. A binding sigil, used to create vessels for corrupted magic." He traced the scar with one long finger. "Those who bore it typically vanished—either into shadow, or death. I was... an exception."

I leaned forward, pulse quickening. "What happened?"

"I was a scholar before the war," Sylwen said, his gaze unfocused now, looking somewhere beyond us. "When corruption spread through the Alder network, I offered myself as bait. A trap. I would allow myself to be marked, to infiltrate and learn their secrets."

He laughed, a hollow sound. "Pride. Always the most elegant weapon against the clever."

The blue light flickered, casting his features into sharper relief.

"The ritual worked exactly as intended—just not as I had understood it. I became a vessel. Perfect, they said. Elves last longer than humans before being consumed." His voice had grown distant. "I felt myself eroding. Bit by bit. Not my body—my will. My essence. Like watching yourself dissolve in a mirror while being unable to look away."

Kazrek's hand found mine under the table, warm and steady. I gripped it tight.

"How did you survive?" I whispered.

Sylwen's eyes refocused, landing on us with uncomfortable clarity. "I didn't," he said simply. "I was saved."

He pulled his sleeve back down, covering the mark. "Her name was Aylan. A human healer—one with an uncommon gift for cleansing magic. She was fearless. Stubborn. The kind of woman who never waited for permission to fix what was broken. Even me."

The implication hung in the air, heavy as winter fog.

"She tore the shadow out of me piece by piece," Sylwen continued. "She burned through her own magic to do it—lit herself up like a pyre and pulled the darkness into her so I wouldn’t drown in it. And it worked." His voice caught, just barely. "She died in my arms three days later."

Kazrek's grip on my hand tightened almost painfully.

"I'm sorry," I said, the words utterly inadequate.

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