The ravens of the elders vanished, each black wingbeat dissolving into ash that fell like slow snow. Their voices were gone—cut from the air, ripped from the marrow of the world.
The silence they left behind was not the quiet of peace but of exile. Their verdict was final. They had renounced their prophet without even knowing it, their faith breaking without a ceremony, without even the dignity of a curse.
No one here knew the truth. No one except Azezal.
Azezal, and the demon now standing beside Aurora.
The last of the ravens faded from the red sky, and with them, the faint glow of the mark on Aurora's elbow guttered out. It didn't fade gently—it died like a candle snuffed by fingers that hated it.
Skin that had borne the weight of divine claim was bare again, the symbol's phantom heat gone, leaving her elbow strangely cold, as if stripped not just of power but of something personal. She stared at the spot for a fraction too long before her jaw tensed.
