Void Before the Light
The wind changed before anyone noticed.
Soft at first, almost tender. Then sharp—cutting through the valley like glass.
Kimberly felt it before it came. The air grew heavy, the kind of silence that presses against the skin and makes the soul whisper run.
She stood at the edge of the temple ruins, staring up at the Eclipse Moon. It was steady—too steady. The light no longer pulsed with life; it held, rigid, as though straining against something unseen.
“Elion,” she called quietly.
He appeared beside her, cloak whipping in the strange wind. “I feel it too. The Heart’s pulse—something’s muffling it.”
Kimberly closed her eyes. Within her chest, the rhythm that once connected her to the Heart felt faint, distorted, like a voice speaking underwater.
And beneath it,
