The note suddenly started to disintegrate in her hands.
No fire.
No spark.
Just a sudden crumbling, as if the paper had aged a century in seconds…turning to ash, then smoke.
Not like paper turning to dust…no, it dissolved, edges curling inward as if eaten by invisible flames. Smoke coiled between her fingertips before vanishing into the cold air.
Ivy flinched back with a gasp, stumbling against the wild undergrowth behind her. Her hands reached instinctively to brace her fall…but the moment her fingers touched the brush, something shifted.
The ground whispered death.
Leaves blackened at her touch. The tangled bushes shriveled with an audible crackle. Vines curled away from her palms as if recoiling in horror. That strange rot spread in slow motion, like invisible flames crawling ba
