Dawn crawled over the hills like a reluctant thing, pale and tentative. It spilled first over the jagged rocks and splintered trees, then onto the broken stone of the city below. Smoke still drifted from the wards that hadn't held through the collapse; faint fires glimmered in alleys like wounded eyes. The world smelled of wet stone and ash, of blood and earth, of things torn apart and somehow surviving.
I stayed crouched on the hill's edge, knees drawn up, watching the city. My shoulder burned every time I shifted, and my ribs protested each shallow breath. The debris of last night's collapse still littered the outskirts—chunks of masonry scattered across the lower wards, watermarks tracing the paths the black tide had clawed through. For the first time in hours, the world felt silent—but it was the kind of silence that pressed at the ears, that carried a warning.
