Reina materialized in her room in a quiet ripple of mana, the familiar air settling around her shoulders like a cool cloak. The lamps had not been lit, leaving the room submerged in darkness. Shadows draped over the furniture, pooling in corners, softening every edge. Reina did not bother summoning a light; she knew every line and contour of this space by memory alone. After the long, chaotic evening with Miri, she had expected the stillness of solitude to greet her.
But the silence was wrong.
It was too thick, too uneven—disturbed in a way silence never was when she was alone.
She didn't need to draw in mana or sharpen her senses.
The intruder had been sloppy. Painfully sloppy.
Someone was breathing too loudly, the faint hitch in their chest betraying drunken lungs.
Someone was shifting their weight—poorly—each movement causing the wooden frame beside them to creak with strain.
Someone had forgotten that shadows only hide those who know how to stand still.
