Dust clung to Mikhailis's hair like ash, dulling the shimmer of silver threads woven into his cloak. A faint, sour taste lingered at the back of his throat. He sat hunched against a jagged slab of root-veined stone, ribs aching as though a giant's fist lingered around his chest.
"Ugh… well, that was a gentle fall," he muttered, pressing the back of his glove against a fresh gash on his brow. The cavern swallowed his words in its vast hush, and for a moment all he heard was the echo of dripping sap.
Across the chamber, Thalatha drew a slow, controlled breath, her shoulders rising in a quiet exhale. Her right arm trembled as she tore a strip from her own tunic and wrapped the wound at her shoulder. Crimson soaked the cloth faster than she could bind it, but she tied the knot with deliberate care. Her bow, miraculously intact, rested beside her, and her sharp eyes scanned the cathedral's shadowed corners as if expecting skeletons to leer from behind the pillars at any second.
