Solas P.O.V.
The wrongness wakes me before dawn.
Not a surge. Not a tear.
Just a thin metallic thread humming against the edges of my senses, like something tapping the world from the wrong side.
I lie still and reach outward.
Moonshadow sleeps.
Wards hold.
But out past the northern ridge, something presses. Testing.
Growing bolder.
We don’t have the luxury of pretending not to feel it.
I rise, dress, and send a sharp mind-link.
Amelia. Rayven. Lira. Strategy Hall. Now.
Then I pull my phone from my pocket and fire off a message to Lucian.
TEXT TO LUCIAN:
Need you. Bring Thane, Kieran, and Caelan to the Strategy Hall. Urgent.
No explanation. He’ll understand the weight behind it.
By the time I reach the long strategy hall, lamps are already lit, and Rayven is pacing. Her arm
