(Apollo & Adelaide)
Adelaide felt the bench beneath her vibrate as if it were a living thing. Not sentient, not aware—but responsive all the same. The obsidian carried memory the way skin carried scars, holding the echo of every body that had ever been bent here, every vow broken, every plea whispered into heat.
The obsidian didn’t just hold heat—it breathed it. Slow waves of warmth pulsed through the sloped surface, radiating into her ribs and belly as she lay draped over it, her bare chest pressed to the padded incline. Her wrists remained bound by glowing chains of smoke. Her palms were flat on the floor, and every faint movement caused the runes beneath her hands to flare brighter. Each flare arrived with a sound—soft, metallic, like distant bells ringing under stone—marking her m
