Chapter 14. Two Marks, One Bond

At the first pale breath of dawn, just as the soft pink light began to leak through the high windows, the summons arrived with a quiet urgency. Two guards in pale, almost pearlescent armor stepped into Lora’s chamber as though they had emerged from the very walls themselves. Their spears caught the new daylight and winked reminders of the price of resistance; cold metal gleamed like silent sentinels. Without a word—only the firm tilt of a gauntleted hand—they guided her from the hush of her private rooms, across winding marble corridors that still held the lingering cool of night, and finally into the soaring expanse of the High Hall of Judgment.

Even before she set foot on the polished stone floor, Lora could feel the hall’s tone: somewhere between solemn ceremony and a gathering storm. Sunlight, refracted through tall, narrow stained-glass windows, draped the floor in shards of teal and amber. Above, the council of Elysor’s elders sat high in tiered seats carved from gleamin