The house was quiet, but it wasn’t the kind of silence that brought me peace.
That had been left behind, in the room of symbols where something had named me without finishing the name. Since then, even the most ordinary sounds—a door closing, footsteps on the wood, leaves brushing against the windows—felt like echoes of something else. Of something I didn’t know how to face.
I was in my room, sitting by the window. The afternoon fell slowly, spilling amber tones across the walls. I had showered. Tried to sleep. Eaten. And yet, it felt as if none of it had truly happened. As if everything that made me who I was was still back there, on that backless chair, in that carved circle that still whispered from memory.
Skadi didn’t speak.
But she didn’t hide either.
She was awake. Watching. As
