C77 THE NEW DAWN OF FLAME AND ASH

The first thing Elara noticed was the silence.

Not the heavy silence of death she had known in the Shadow Realm, but the kind that comes just before life takes its first breath — a fragile, expectant calm.

She lay quiet, half-buried in dew-damp grass, the scent of dirt clinging to her skin. The dawn sky spread above her in ribbons of silver and gold, clouds gleaming as if lighted from within