Maélor did not immediately respond to Elystria's words.
His gaze remained riveted on Mordred, but the storm that rumbled within him seemed to gradually subside. The tension that contracted his muscles like steel cables relaxed millimeter by millimeter. His shoulders, broad as ramparts, imperceptibly sagged. His jaw, clenched to the point where one could hear his fangs grinding, loosened in a silent breath. His claws, which had furrowed the air with invisible grooves, slowly opened, revealing palms marked by the pressure of his own nails.
In a movement of calculated slowness, almost ceremonial, he lowered his right arm—that arm which seconds earlier had held death in suspension.
His voice, when it finally rose, carried the weight of centuries. Calm as the eye of a cyclone. Heavy as the marble of a royal tomb.
- "How did you awaken?"
