The Unspoken Truth

Pre-dawn chill seeped through the floorboards of Malacor’s bedroom long before the village began to stir.

He hadn’t caught a single hour of rest. The shadows on his ceiling offered no distraction from Othella’s expression the previous evening. Beneath the heavy guilt swimming in her gaze, it was the steel that truly unsettled him.

It was the quiet, immovable look of someone who had already cemen