The palace fell silent after the guard's departure.
Only the slow tick of the antique clock filled the space — a rhythm too loud in the quiet.
Helios walked through the vast hall, her heels echoing like whispers of command. The portraits on the walls stared back at her — emperors, generals, ancestors of power — all dead, all watching. Their eyes followed her, judgment carved in oil and gold.
Her steps faltered when she reached the last painting — not a ruler, not a soldier.
A man.
He was painted in light tones, unlike the others — dark hair, eyes soft and unreadable, his smile small but devastatingly alive.
Eform.
The artist had captured him perfectly, almost too perfectly. The faint tilt of his lips, the way his gaze seemed to see through the canvas, right into her.
Helios reached out, fingers hovering over the surface but never touching. The glass felt colder tonight.
> "You shouldn't be here," she whispered. "You're a distraction… you always were."
But the air was heavy, and his painted eyes refused to look away.
A memory flickered — a fleeting image of laughter in a rain-soaked alley, his hand dragging hers as they fled a storm of bullets and betrayal.
The way he'd looked back at her then, not with fear, but with faith.
That memory hurt more than any wound she'd ever endured.
She turned away sharply, her cloak flaring behind her, but the faint reflection of him in the glass still burned in the corners of her vision.
Outside, thunder rolled again — closer this time.
> "Fine," she murmured under her breath. "Stay in my mind a little longer, Eform. But don't expect me to break."
She walked away, the hall lights dimming as she passed — as if the palace itself bowed in mourning.
When the last door closed, a gust of wind slipped through the crack of the balcony. The flame in the chandelier flickered, and for a heartbeat, the shadow of Eform's smile shimmered on the wall.