"The scent of truth is subtly masked by power, hidden by fear, but never truly gone."
3RD POV
The moonlight crept in thin, silver beams across the royal chambers, casting ghostly patterns along the polished floorboards. Each gleam of light fractured the shadows, illuminating just enough to give the night its hush but not enough to mask the tension rising beneath it.
Selene Duskbane's eyes snapped open long before the dawn bell could toll. She lay motionless in the large four-poster bed, her limbs still, but her senses wide awake. Her breathing remained slow, deliberate, but her mind was already racing, sharp, honed, and alert. She was not listening to the sounds. No creak of footsteps or echoes of voices would stir her this way.
