The walk to the rehearsal hall stretched out before us like some ceremonial march, silent but for the faint echo of our footsteps on polished stone. Ingrid strolled ahead with the practiced nonchalance of someone born to halls like these, her braid swaying with each step. Callum trailed at my side, shoulders hunched slightly inward, as though he hoped the architecture might somehow swallow him whole. I kept my gaze low, focusing on the ridges of the stone, the imperfections in the grout lines—anything but what was ahead.
The rehearsal hall was nothing short of a spectacle. Double doors opened to reveal a space so vast it seemed to distort scale, swallowing sound and light alike. The floor was gleaming marble—veined and bone-white—while the walls were a sweeping parade of mirrors, each one
