The summit ended at noon.
I knew it by the way the fortress exhaled.
Footsteps in the main hall fell too even, too careful, like men rewriting the morning in their heads before they even reached the gate.
Voices stayed low, clipped, the kind that meant they had come for more and were leaving with less.
I sat in the Aerie, turning the small stone over and over in my palm.
It was warmer than the room, warmer than my skin. The heat pulsed once, slow, like something breathing under my thumb. I stopped trying to explain it three days ago. Some things just are.
A knock came at the door.
Three short raps. The third one softer, like a question leaning at the end.
Not Evan.
Evan knocked like he was checking a perimeter.
“Come in.”
The door opened.
Old leather and wild
