Silence woke her first.

Not the silence of death or peace, but the kind that presses down so thickly it bends the air — the silence that follows an explosion too vast for sound to survive.

Elaria opened her eyes to light.

Not sunlight, not firelight — but a pale, breathing radiance that shimmered like water even though no source of it existed. The ground beneath her was glass-smooth, reflecting a sky that wasn’t there. Every breath she took tasted like memory: smoke, rain, the warmth of ...