The air in the training hall didn't just feel still after Aurelia's intervention; it felt vacuum-sealed, as if the very oxygen had been sucked out by the sheer force of the humiliation that had just transpired.
The metallic tang of blood—Theo's blood—hung heavy in the nostrils of every noble present, mixing with the sharp, acrid sting of spent magical energy.
Theo leaned into Aurelia, his body a ruined marionette of shattered cartilage and torn muscle. His ribs felt like jagged glass grinding against his lungs with every shallow gasp, and his vision was a kaleidoscopic smear of crimson and gray.
Inside his mind, there was no screaming. There was no weeping. There was only a terrifying, glacial quiet, the sound of a furnace cooling after a catastrophic meltdown.
The rage had burned itself out, leaving behind something harder, something colder, and something infinitely more dangerous than mere anger.
