No one pretends it is noble.
That is the first lie the world refuses to tell itself.
The winter comes harder than expected.
Not because Heaven punishes the refusal.
Not because the sky is angry.
Because weather is still weather, and without intervention it does what it has always done.
Snow piles high in the northern valleys. Roads vanish. Supply lines fracture under weight and cold. The world does not end.
But it hurts.
Kael stands over the maps as reports arrive in uneven bursts, his jaw set, eyes shadowed. “They’re asking again,” he says quietly. “Not for Heaven.”
“For permission?” I ask.
“For relief,” he answers. “From us.”
The shadow coils, sober.
This is where belief becomes responsibility.
The first convoy does not make it through.
A bridge collapses under ice before d
