Days passed in the highlands, but for Elara, time had become a fluid, distorted thing. She spent her hours patrolling the perimeter of the ruins, her senses constantly brushed by the psychic static of the abyss. Every flicker in the sky was a needle prick against her consciousness. She was the gatekeeper, yet she felt like a prisoner staring through the bars of an infinite cage.
You are brooding again, Elara, Lyra said, her voice cutting through the heavy silence of the hall. You are trying to carry the sky alone. You must learn to distribute the weight.
How? Elara asked, gesturing to the empty stone around her. The throne is cold. There is no one to share this with. You are shadows, and I am the only pulse left in this mountain.
We are not shadows because we choose to be, Malphas inter
