Serenity's POV
Silence never feels empty after violence. It feels crowded, as if the air itself has become thick with the ghosts of the things we didn't say and the blows we didn't land.
The gates have closed again, the heavy thud of the reinforced steel echoing like a lid being hammered onto a coffin. The alarm is gone, but the silence it leaves behind is worse—it is the silence of an audience waiting for the next act. Darian is no longer in sight, driven back into the darkness from which he came, but his presence lingers like a wound left open too long, raw and pulsing. Every eye in the courtyard remains trained on me, sharp and measuring. They are looking for the fracture. They are waiting for me to spill the secrets I’ve tucked into the seams of my dress.
I do not rush to speak.
In
