The wind had changed.
It no longer carried the clean chill of the mountains, but a metallic taste—like rain before lightning. Even the air seemed to hum, thin and restless, as if the sky itself were about to split.
For two days they traveled south, following the veins of old trade roads half-buried under frost and ash. The land grew stranger the farther they went. Trees twisted toward the heavens as though trying to escape the ground; rivers ran backward, their currents pulled toward the mountains they’d left behind.
Luna said little. Her thoughts were heavy with the dream, and with the voice that had called to her from within it. Every so often, the mark on her wrist pulsed—not in pain, but in rhythm. A heartbeat not her own.
Valois watched her carefully but didn’t press. He had seen
