Silence convulsed through the ring like a held breath. Men and women who had been counting on victory now counted the cost, and their faces told me everything I needed to know: fear, exhaustion, the brittle edge of hope.
Yomi’s words, the blood of your children has awakened what sleeps moved through the crowd and lodged like a splinter under skin. Eyes flicked to the twins. Mothers shuddered. Even the hardest men softened in the presence of the small, vulnerable bodies cradled in Elista’s arms.
Elista’s jaw tightened. Her fingers flexed once around the boys, white-knuckled, then relaxed as though she could not afford the tremor. Dimitri did not so much as blink; he looked like a statue carved from midnight and grief, every inch of him straining for a verdict.
I let the silence stretch u
