For several seconds after Sienna entered, no one welcomed her.
Not because they did not want to.
Because the room had forgotten how.
The silence stretched beneath the glass ceiling, thin and tense, while morning poured through the walls in golden sheets that suddenly felt much less sovereign than they had a moment ago and Maya still stood near the glass with one hand half-raised from where she had pointed out her hidden home, but every eye had moved to Sienna.
Even Maddie, who had previously cursed at Maya's house with the fearless vulgarity like she were born to offend both heaven and grammar, said nothing.
Sienna stood near the entrance as if she had walked into an ordinary living room and not caused sunlight to reconsider its career. She wore simplicity like insult, just a slender girl with composed posture, dark elegance, and eyes so completely violet that Phei still felt the echo of those two steps backward in his bones.
The girls reacted first in pieces.
