The moonlight over Veynar was not the pale, distant glow Sol remembered from Earth. Here, the Great Heartwood's canopy acted as a secondary sky, filtering the celestial light through silver leaves and iridescent moss until the entire world was bathed in a haunting, underwater emerald. But tonight, that beauty was destined to be stained.
Sol sat on the edge of the soft, mossy bed in the Feline Spire, his hands buried in his hair, listening to the silence of the room. It was a silence that felt heavy, almost suffocating, pressing against his eardrums until he could hear the frantic rhythm of his own pulse.
The weight of the vision he had just experienced… the staggering history of Orphos, the bitter irony of Isylia's imprisonment, and the cold reality of his own months-long exile… clung to him like a damp shroud.
