Velrosa stood at the balcony, the pale moonlight dancing across her bronze skin like a lover's touch.
Esgard sprawled beneath her in glittering shadows—its spires, its whispers, its blood-soaked stones all gleaming under the gaze of a sleepless night.
"You know," she said softly, her voice edged with something like fondness, something like grief, "I hate how much I love this city. The blood. The power play. The politics."
"I don't fancy it much," came Ian's voice from just above her, where he sat crouched on the sloped edge of the roof, legs dangling.
He looked like something the night itself had birthed—dark, quiet, coiled.
"You smell of blood," Velrosa said, her lips curling in amusement.
"When have I not?" he answered.
They stayed that way for a while.
No words.
Just silence.
Just the wind drifting through Esgard's bones, just the echoes of a thousand screams buried beneath a thousand stones.
