Luna Viana's POV
It was evening by the time I went to him.
Not late. Not quiet enough to sleep. But something had shifted.
The kind of quiet that didn’t settle—it pressed.
The sky hung low and heavy, a dull stretch of grey and blue swallowed with thick clouds. No stars. No moon. Just a weight that seemed to sit over everything unmoving.
I felt it as I walked.
The absence of sound where they should have been some. Doors closed too early today. Voices lowered, or gone entirely. Even the air carried it—the bitter scent of crushed herbs clinging to everything, mixed with something sharper underneath.
Something wrong and I could feel it at the back of my throat.
My steps slowed for a moment, long enough for the thought to catch up with me.
The ridge rose ahead, familiar and distant at
