Aurelia POV
The small silver pendant remained clutched tightly within my palm long after Rowan had settled into his own uneasy rest nearby, his breathing gradually evening into the steady rhythm of exhausted sleep despite our continued vulnerability to potential pursuit.
I stared up at the scattered stars visible through the sheltering canopy overhead, my mind racing through fragmented, distant memories I hadn't consciously revisited in years.
My mother.
I'd been so young when she'd died, barely old enough to form lasting, coherent memories beyond scattered impressions and half-remembered sensations. I'd grown up within Silver Crest believing myself an orphan with no meaningful connection to whatever life had existed before my earliest memories of servitude and quiet suffering.
Nobody
