The silence wasn't empty. It was a held breath. A tension—palpable, vibrating—between the crumbling walls.
Élisa's hand shot up, fingers pointed like blades: "We move. Now." No sound escaped her lips, but the command was clear in the whiteness of her knuckles.
They moved like a shadow split in three—boots and bare feet treading the dust with unnatural caution, avoiding unstable stones that might betray them. Eyes locked dead ahead, on the path through the ruins. Never on the silhouette. Never.
