|Gryphon's POV|
She doesn't speak.
Her eyes, those eyes that have burned me alive too many times to count, look down at our joined hands like they don't recognize them—like she doesn't know how mine got there or why she hasn't pulled hers away yet. And I stay crouched in front of her, knees aching, breath held in the tightest part of my chest, because I think if I move, even an inch, I'll lose her again.
The silence is suffocating.
Not loud, not angry—just... thick. Dense with things unsaid, with the weight of too many nights like this. The kind of silence that feels like screaming from underwater, like you know they're right in front of you but they can't hear you. Or maybe they don't want to.
She's not trembling anymore, but her body is stiff beneath the towel, her spine straight a
