Long chapter
—-
When Matriarch Whitmore finally spoke, she did not simply add her opinion to the discussion. Her words crushed the entire hall into silence.
Every whisper died instantly.
Those elderly council members who had been shouting just moments earlier now trembled where they stood.
Being Silverwood elders meant they knew exactly what the Caelum family was. They had not merely heard the name in passing either. They remembered what the Caelums had once been.
And the accusation Matriarch Whitmore had just spoken, disruptors of morale, was a charge that could justify killing them ten times over.
The old men who had been clinging to a faint thread of hope collapsed where they stood, their bodies shaking uncontrollably.
Ethan watched them quietly.
A faint psychic pressure leaked from him, subtle enough that it could almost be mistaken for imagination, yet heavy enough to suffocate the room.
Everyone present felt it. Even the powerful cult masters shifted uncomfortably.
