They say time slows in moments of fear.
They lie.
It didn’t slow. It fractured.
Time didn’t stretch; it snapped, into shards that sliced through every step I took.
Each breath was jagged.
Each heartbeat, deafening.
Each footfall on the stone floor, a violent reminder that something was very, very wrong.
Selene was at my left, her fingers clutching my arm like a tether. Lena ran on my right, face pale, her mouth moving in silent prayers that never left her throat. We turned down the final corridor that led to the healer’s wing, the usually familiar walls suddenly foreign. The smell hit first, sharper than usual.
Antiseptic.
Burning sage.
Something metallic, something like… blood.
And something softer. Lavender. My father’s favorite.
The silence was wrong. Too clean. Too still. L
