Chapter 43: The Naming
The cottage, in the aftermath, felt different. The salt-and-timber smell was still there, but now underscored by the sharp scent of fear-sweat and the ghost of the Harvester's ozone crackle. The cozy space felt too small, the walls too thin. Every creak of the driftwood pine outside was a footfall. Every gull's cry was a warning.
Lyra the name was a decision made in the silent walk home, a gift waiting for acceptance stood frozen in the center of the room. The frantic energy of her flight had solidified into a permanent, fine tremor that vibrated through her small frame. Her eyes, the color of the Stillwater's deepest trenches, darted from the reinforced door to the shuttered window, to Kaelen, to Elara, cataloging exits, threats, resources. She was a soldier in a five-year-old's body, standing at a defensive perimeter in unknown territory.
