Isadora:
The night tasted of fog and static.
The storm had passed, leaving the world in a half-light that clung to the bones of the academy like rot. Every corridor hummed faintly with the aftershock of shattered wards, the stones themselves seeming to whisper as if remembering the screams of the monsters she’d slain hours before.
Now, the halls were still. Too still.
Inside my chamber, the boys lay scattered in exhausted disarray—fallen saints, warriors turned into sleeping ruins. Rhett collapsed in the chair near the fire, one arm slung across his chest, blood dried to rust down his temple. Kai slept on my bed, skin pale as wax, his light magic dimmed to a faint shimmer that pulsed with his heartbeat. Silas was sprawled at the foot of the bed like a fallen shadow, and Lucian leaned a
