The morning sun filtered through the stained glass windows of what had once been Hearthome's grandest ballroom, casting fractured rainbows across marble floors still stained with glittering dust. Lord Torval Flameheart stood alone among the wreckage, his hands clasped behind his back, studying the transformation of his domain.
Where Duke Haverford had fallen, servants had swept the crystalline remains into neat piles, though they refused to dispose of them entirely. The maids whispered that the dust sang lullabies when the wind caught it just right, and that touching it left your fingers cold for hours afterward. Torval had ordered the piles covered with silk cloth, but even shrouded, they seemed to pulse with their own inner light.
