The first morning Aurelia forgot to listen for disaster, she didn’t realize it had happened until noon.
She was sitting on an overturned crate outside a small waystation, sleeves rolled, hands dusted with flour from helping a woman shape flatbread over a stone pan. The air smelled of smoke and yeast. Someone nearby argued cheerfully about the correct way to mend a cart axle.
It was Kane who noticed.
“You didn’t pause once,” he said, handing her a cup of water.
“Pause for what?” she asked.
He tilted his head, looking deliberate.
Aurelia blinked.
Then she laughed quietly, surprised, almost disbelieving.
“Oh,” she said. “That.”
The reflex to scan for imbalance, for rupture, for the invisible tension before a break is gone. Not suppressed. Not resisted.
Absent.
The fracture inside h
