Nwadiebube closed his eyes.
"Leave," he repeated.
That was all it took.
The doors shut behind her with a muted finality, and for the first time that night, the room felt truly silent.
Nwadiebube exhaled, the breath leaving him slower than it had entered. His hand clenched at his side, then relaxed. The fire crackled, indifferent to the weight of revelation it had borne witness to.
A god.
The word no longer felt abstract. It pressed against his thoughts, invasive and dangerous. Empire, conquest, influence, those had once felt like the summit of ambition. Now they seemed like scaffolding around something far greater, something far more terrifying.
He turned sharply and strode from the room, robes whispering against the stone floor.
There was only one person he trusted to anchor him when his mind threatened to spiral. One voice that could cut through illusion without feeding it.
"My sister," he murmured to himself.
Tonight, he would not face these thoughts alone.
