Haley paused at the restaurant's door, her fingers still laced with Sienna-Rose's as her gaze tilted upward. For a moment, she forgot to breathe. Above them, branches stretched and curled like strands of kelp drifting in a hidden current, their tips glowing with delicate crystals that swayed as if the air itself were water.
Each crystal caught the light and held it, suspended like droplets of rain frozen midfall. The polished floor reflected it all, bending and shimmering until it seemed they stood on the ocean floor, surrounded by ripples of living light.
"Wow," Sienna-Rose muttered under her breath.
She thought back to the one diving lesson she'd taken years ago in Bali, just once, long enough to glimpse coral reefs and endless blue. But that memory paled compared to the beauty unfolding above her now. This is no simulation of the sea; this is magic given shape, a dream made real.
