The dawn was wrong.
Not gray, not gold. Copper. The kind of color that belonged not to the sky but to blood cooling in a bowl. The light didn't spread, it bled, leaking over the ruins of the clearing in slow, sticky sheets.
Aria stood at the center of it.
Kael's shallow breaths anchored her hands, but the world beyond him refused to wait.
The survivors had split. No middle ground remained.
On one side, the kneeling disciples pressed ash into their brows, rocking back and forth as they chanted her name. Some burned themselves with coals, others bowed until their foreheads split. A young girl cradled a dead man's severed hand as though it were a relic. Their faith was no longer quiet, it was a frenzy.
On the other side, the zealots gathered weapons. Their chant had sharpened into a battle-cry: "Burn the vessel before it burns the world!" Each word was a stone hurled at her chest.
