The night was still.
The kind of stillness that made even the stars feel suspended—silent, breathless, waiting.
Sofia stood at the edge of the ridge, the desert yawning open before her like a wound. The sky had deepened into ink, but the first trace of sunrise clung low on the horizon, painting the edges of the world in ghost-light. The moon still hung above them, heavy and silver, casting their shadows long across the dust.
A warm wind stirred, carrying the scent of sage, earth, and something else. Something wilder. Something known.
She felt him before she saw him.
Xiuhcoatl emerged from the darkness without sound—bare-chested, no headdress, no armor. Just a man. But he moved like the desert was his spine, like silence was a second skin. The fire of command was still in his bones, bu
