The first night of isolation is quiet.
Too quiet.
No caravan bells in the distance.
No trade glyphs flaring along the roads.
No shrine-hum in the bones of the earth.
Only the sound of wolves breathing beyond the walls… and stomachs remembering they are empty.
By dawn, Blackthorne learns what Heaven’s silence truly weighs.
The bread lines form early. Short at first. Polite. People murmuring reassurances they don’t quite believe yet.
“We still have stores.”
“We’ve survived worse.”
“They’ll blink before we starve.”
No one says how long the stores will last out loud.
Healers ration salves down to half-doses. Hunters return with more bone than meat. Children are fed first, their bowls filled while adults pretend they aren’t shaking from hunger.
The wolves do not eat at all.
They s
