The moment stretched between us, the Shroud frozen in the wake of those two words, my own phantom breath caught in disbelief.
Did he just—?
Can he actually—?
The questions collided in the space where our consciousnesses intertwined.
Had I possessed this ability all along? Or was I really experiencing a false awakening since my childhood?
I clawed for an answer, but the past remained as opaque as the blizzard around us.
The Shroud, meanwhile, trembled with something dangerously close to hope, its form rippling toward the boy's retreating back. I felt its impulse like a physical pull, to manifest another illusion, to ask, to finally be known—
—and then, just as sharply, its recoil.
Memories surged through our bond: a woman screaming at its whispered voice, hunters firing arrows into spectral faces, the endless, hollow weight of being called a monster.
The Shroud stilled.
No.
