The day before the Consecration passed in the particular, suspended quiet that settles over a place bracing for something it can't yet name — guards moving through final drills with grim efficiency, Temple attendants rehearsing ceremonial movements one last time, the capital outside swelling louder by the hour with pilgrims and merchants and families arriving for a festival most of them believed would be nothing more than tradition and celebration.
I spent the morning with Miraya in the Temple's inner sanctum, reviewing the ceremony's structure one final time — not searching for new vulnerabilities, but simply making certain every substitution, every quiet adjustment, sat correctly in its place.
