diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 8602bf02..1b89e4df 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -2,6 +2,20 @@
 
 All notable changes to this project will be documented in this file. See [standard-version](https://github.com/conventional-changelog/standard-version) for commit guidelines.
 
+### [8.2.6](https://github.com/soulcraftlabs/brainy/compare/v8.2.5...v8.2.6) (2026-07-13)
+
+- docs: RELEASES.md entry for 8.2.6 (write/index-spine hardening) (a873852)
+- chore: hold loadBinaryBlob fault-propagation for the cortex column-store lockstep (36c10c1)
+- fix: aggregation surfaces materialize/state-load failures loudly (02eff64)
+- fix: surface a degraded derived index on reads instead of serving it silently (ba958d9)
+- fix: saveBinaryBlob never acks a durable write that stored nothing (7feba49)
+- fix: refuse writes when single-op history cannot be made durable (54c1836)
+- fix: clear() wipes the full native/derived footprint, not a subset (d8301f8)
+- fix: surface segment/entity read faults loudly instead of masking as absent (af5d2f3)
+- fix: spine hardening pass 1 (part) — count symmetry, honest partial-load, flush durability, read-fault propagation (119087a)
+- test: pin the read-your-writes contract under the single writer (eb9c4eb)
+
+
 ### [8.2.5](https://github.com/soulcraftlabs/brainy/compare/v8.2.4...v8.2.5) (2026-07-12)
 
 - docs: RELEASES.md entry for 8.2.5 (honest rollback-failure response) (a7c7aa5)
diff --git a/package-lock.json b/package-lock.json
index 7968654e..84693b23 100644
--- a/package-lock.json
+++ b/package-lock.json
@@ -1,12 +1,12 @@
 {
   "name": "@soulcraft/brainy",
-  "version": "8.2.5",
+  "version": "8.2.6",
   "lockfileVersion": 3,
   "requires": true,
   "packages": {
     "": {
       "name": "@soulcraft/brainy",
-      "version": "8.2.5",
+      "version": "8.2.6",
       "license": "MIT",
       "dependencies": {
         "@msgpack/msgpack": "^3.1.2",
diff --git a/package.json b/package.json
index d5c4e740..3206fc73 100644
--- a/package.json
+++ b/package.json
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 {
   "name": "@soulcraft/brainy",
-  "version": "8.2.5",
+  "version": "8.2.6",
   "description": "Universal Knowledge Protocol™ - World's first Triple Intelligence database unifying vector, graph, and document search in one API. Stage 3 CANONICAL: 42 nouns × 127 verbs covering 96-97% of all human knowledge.",
   "main": "dist/index.js",
   "module": "dist/index.js",