Above the high edge of the royal platform, where the three thrones met, stood the three monarchs Yaram, Elyria, and Tarell watching the combat arena as it prepared to host the remaining hundred.
The sky was blue, of a colder hue than usual, as if something invisible had passed through it and caused it to shrink slightly, hesitant to remain.
Even the air itself… felt different.
It did not catch the attention of the guards or the priests lined up on either side of the platform, but something about the silence between the three monarchs…
Tarell was the first to speak.
"Did… either of you feel that?"
He looked to the side, where Elyria stood motionless, her arms crossed over her chest.
"Dead air. Nothing more."
Then she added after a brief moment of silence, in a calm yet faintly apprehensive tone,
"But I haven't felt this before, not in the arena, not even during the war days."
Yaram was the slowest to respond.
