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The Masquerade (2)
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2025-06-18 20:09:52Seraphina’s POV
My pulse spiked before I even saw what was inside.
The auctioneer—or rather, the host representative, a woman with a voice layered in magic—unfolded the cloth.
A pendant.
Moonshadow stone.
Raw-cut, encased in a frame of cold iron etched with archaic sigils.
I felt it before I saw it. That subtle drag in the air. The sense of wrongness. It wasn’t just Moonshadow stone. It was Moonbane-forged.
Ambrosius shifted slightly beside me.
“You recognize it,” I whispered.
“So do you.”
I didn’t need to see the back of the pendant to know the mark would be there. The tri-moon crest. Faint, nearly rubbed out. But still there.
And now it was here, in this place, being passed from one masked hand to another like some common bauble.
My teeth ached from how tightly I clenched my jaw.
“Do we bid?” I asked.
“No,” Ambrosius said. “Not yet.”
“Why not?”
“Because the moment we sho
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