Miri's Pov
The semester was crawling to an end, and I couldn't decide if I was relieved or just exhausted. So much had happened these past months—too much. Sometimes I felt like I had been absent for most of it, a ghost haunting the academy hallways instead of a student living in them. But here I was. I had my mates. I was alive. And in the quiet moments, when I forced myself to breathe and remember that truth, gratitude bloomed in my chest like something fragile but real.
And maybe that was why, when the announcement for the annual Halloween costume party came around, I decided I wasn't going to half-ass it. No way. This time, I was going all out.
