They didn't stop moving until three streets separated them from the harbor square, ducking into the shadow of a shuttered warehouse where the noise finally thinned to something manageable.
Zelene doubled over, hands braced on her knees, breath tearing ragged out of her.
Corvin stared at her, sword still half-drawn.
"...Zelene."
"..."
"That man had a sword pointed at half his own patience and you ran toward a dead end." Corvin's voice cracked with disbelief, adrenaline still burning through it. "Explain. Now."
She didn't look up. "..."
"You bowed to him," Nym said, quieter, watching the alley mouth for pursuit even as his attention stayed fixed on her. "I heard it. From all the way down the street. You bowed."
Silence.
"Zelene."
"..."
Corvin dropped down in front of her, forcing her to finally meet his eyes. "You've never once bowed to anyone since I've known you. Not the elder in that cavern village. Not the Council of Fen Aldric's own guild master. Not once." His jaw tightened. "So who was that."
She straightened slowly, breath still uneven, and for a long moment said nothing at all.
"...Kael."
"Kael," Corvin repeated, testing the shape of the name like it might mean something if he said it slower.
"Dravenhart," she added, so quiet it nearly didn't survive the distance between them.
Nym went very still. "The Dravenhart. The one they were shouting about in the square."
"..."
"Zelene." Corvin's voice had gone dangerously calm now, the kind of calm that came right before something broke. "Why does the Commander of the eastern defense chase you through an alley and call you by a name I've never once heard you use."
She squeezed her eyes shut.
"He's my fiancé."
The silence that followed had weight to it, physical, pressing.
"...What."
"Betrothed," she said, faster now, like speed might soften it. "Before the fire. Before any of you."
"You have a fiancé." Nym's voice cracked on the word, disbelief written plain across his face. "This whole time. Nym found out he's Cerulean. Corvin nearly collapsed learning he's Aureate. Silas fell out of a tree over recognition. And you — you just — never mentioned you're engaged?!"
"It never felt like it mattered."
"It clearly matters," Corvin said, gesturing sharply back toward the harbor. "He recognized your voice, Zelene. He ran after a hooded stranger through a crowded square because some part of him refused to let you go. That is not a man who has forgotten an arrangement."
"..."
"You wanted to take the hood off," Nym said slowly, watching her face rather than the alley now. "Didn't you."
She didn't answer.
"Zelene."
"...Yes," she admitted, so small it barely qualified as sound. "I wanted to. For one second, standing there, I wanted to just — let him see me. Stop running from everything for one second."
Corvin exhaled hard, dragging a hand through his hair, some of the sharp edge in his voice finally softening into something closer to worry. "And if you had?"
"..."
"If he'd seen your face," Corvin pressed. "What then?"
"I don't know," Zelene said, and for the first time since the alley, her voice cracked properly. "I don't know, Corvin. I've spent two years telling myself it didn't matter whether he ever found out I was alive. And then I heard his voice again, and every single thing I told myself just — stopped mattering. But, I don't think I'm ready."
Nym crouched slowly in front of her, some of his usual careful gentleness returning. "We need to leave the harbor. Tonight, if we can."
"Right..."
"And if he's already searching?"
Zelene looked back toward the noise still drifting faint from the square — a search she was certain, by now, had already begun.
"..."
She didn't have an answer for that one either.