The path was new.
Angela had walked this stretch of Hollow Bastion a dozen times — and yet, the cobblestones beneath her boots had changed. Not in placement. In memory. She could no longer recall who had laid them, or if they had ever needed laying at all.
To her left, a shrine had appeared overnight — not built, not blessed. Just there. A basin of bone-white stone, filled with ashwater and knotted threads. Villagers passed it in reverent silence, touching their fingers to the edge and whispering fragments of verses she did not recognize.
"The Hollow does not ask," one woman murmured, "it remembers."
Angela stopped.
The woman bowed her head, then moved on without looking up. She bore no mark of priesthood — no rank, no robes. Just a cracked mirror around her neck, swinging like a pendulum.
