It had been a week. Just seven days, yet it felt like an eternity—no, like a thousand decades had passed since I last saw Hugo. Every second stretched endlessly, especially in the quiet moments at night when I laid down in the bedroom Mother and Father Draven had prepared for me. The soft sheets, the laughter of Maxen and Mireya echoing in the halls, and the gentle warmth of Mother's presence all tried to soothe me, but a piece of me ached—an emptiness shaped exactly like Hugo.
And then, that night, the emptiness shattered.
It was around eight in the evening when the Draven household was winding down from dinner. Father Kael had retreated to his study, Mother Marina was carefully sewing new uniforms for the twins, and Maxen and Mireya were still bickering over who got to hold the new puzzle set first. I was half-amused, half-tired, sitting cross-legged on the carpet, when the front doors suddenly opened with a sharp, determined swing.
