VALERIE
The walls of the castle had begun to hum.
Not with music, not with life—but with something old and coiled and hungry. I heard it now in my sleep, in my waking hours, in the pause between breath and blink. The sound of waiting. The voice in the mirror hadn’t spoken since the explosion. But it didn’t need to because now, it was inside me.
Valerie stood before Rose like someone caught between tides. Her hands were clenched, knuckles pale. The sigil on her palm still bled sometimes—thin, red veins cracking through the once-whole mark of the mates’ bond. She wasn’t sleeping anymore. “I’m losing time,” Valerie whispered. I nodded slowly. She didn’t blink. “I found ash on my feet this morning. I woke standing in the old forge. I don’t remember walking there.” “What else?” “My voice.”
