It's been two days since the Sanctum boy stumbled into Esgard's inner square.
Spoke his message.
They found him dead three hours later—heart exploded from the inside, eyes turned to glass.
No one buried him.
---
Now, in the highest tower of the capital, with cold sunlight slicing through the stained glass, the Hollow Council gathered.
Ten thrones circled the obsidian table, though only eight were filled. The seat marked Diplomacy remained untouched. The Sanctum seat remained cloaked in white cloth, veiled in the same silence they had left behind.
And at the head of it all, half-shadowed by the dying light, sat Ian.
Coat draped over his throne like smoke. Pale knuckles resting on the carved bone armrest.
Eyes half-lidded, watching. Calculating.
"Two days," Thalia Virex said, placing a parchment scroll onto the table.
Her voice rasped like a hinge too long un-oiled.
