Side Story 4.90 - Touch of Chaos

Johanis' POV

The screaming didn’t stop.

At first, I thought it was just in my head again. Another echo from the dreams. A cry laced into the wind, a leftover from whatever Hollowroot thing we had named last.

But then Lily stood.

Her face had gone pale. Not the way you go pale from fear—but like something inside her had been pulled thin. Like her name was being spoken somewhere else, dragged across stone.

"Do you hear that?" she whispered.

Aya jerked upright. She and the others were here on the pretense (although it is also true) of a sleepover. Her hand reached for the bone chalk she always kept looped on a string around her wrist. 

Brinn's eyes snapped to mine, and I didn’t need words to understand—this wasn’t one