Cattleya turned away from the alley, her boots crunching on a layer of frost and broken glass. The silence of the city was absolute, a heavy shroud that stifled the distant, rhythmic creaking of a wind-whipped sign. She walked toward the main thoroughfare, her eyes darting between the shadows.
The scene with the scavenger had stripped away the last veneer of her manufactured divinity. She was no longer a weapon of the Church or a prototype of the Council; she was merely a heartbeat in a ghost town.
As she reached the intersection of High Street, the moon broke through the thick, toxic clouds, illuminating a sight that chilled her deeper than the sub-zero air.
The street was littered with the bodies of the nobility.
They weren't ash. They were desiccated, their skin stretched tight over
