Silence. Long enough for three of her tears to fall and hiss into steam against the hall's purity.
Then the Voice returned. Quieter now. The quiet of a general who has stopped inspiring and started confessing.
"We are losing."
Seraphiel's head lifted.
"The lower choirs have felt it first. Distant hymns faltering. Voices cracking mid-praise with sounds that have no place in holy song. The corruption spreads not as invasion but as warmth — slow, gentle, that makes the frozen forget why they chose the cold."
Her wings folded tighter. A shield.
"Lust finds its footing on the mortal sphere. It spreads upward. Into our realms. Through cracks we cannot see because they do not look like cracks — they look like open doors."
"How far?" Her voice. Hoarse. The first full sentence she'd spoken in eons.
"Far enough that I speak to you now not from strength but from fear."
