Traces in the Ash

The cold luminescence faded with the dawn, leaving behind a brittle crust of silver ash on the slate shard. I knelt beside the canal's damp edge, carefully scraping the residue with the flat of a discarded rusted nail. Beneath the charred resin, a faint indentation had etched directly into the stone: an inverted sigil shaped like three intertwined crescents. It had burned through the surface without heat. Wrapping the marked shard securely in a scrap of oily rag, I wedged it into my jacket pocket, noting how the shadows in this vaulted undercroft still seem to lean toward the canal water, reluctant to disperse even under morning light.