The light lasted approximately three seconds.
Then it went inward, which was worse in a way, because the sensation of it traveling back through me was like swallowing a star, enormous and brief and followed by a silence so complete I thought for a moment I had gone deaf.
Then I heard the city.
Every sound of it, the market vendors, the early morning conversations in upstairs rooms, children somewhere in a courtyard, a dog, water running in a pipe under the street. I heard the silver forest and the movement of things in it that were not wind. I heard the pulse of the castle on the hill, Vaelthorn breathing in its ancient stones, the blood locks cycling their patient rhythms.
I heard, faintly and from the direction of the street, three heartbeats I recognized.
I stood up.
My legs worke
