POV: Clara

The world smelled like blood and rain when I woke.

The storm had passed, but the world had not returned to normal. It was nothing like the world I knew before. There was no freshness or stillness to it. The sky was heavy and pale, slashed with dull gold that was not morning, and every shadow moved.

The house creaked around me softly, wood groaning, pipes thrumming, like it remembered how to be alive. The floor pulsed gently beneath my palms, a gentle vibration. ...