Chapter 8: A World Apart

The silence that followed my failed proposal was colder and heavier than any that had come before. It was the silence of a door slamming shut, of bridges burning. Kaine’s rejection had been a clear message: I was on my own. Any hope of a negotiated peace had evaporated, leaving behind the bitter residue of defiance. I expected our grim routine to continue indefinitely—tense patrols, silent meals, the slow suffocation of hope. But the outside world, in the form of Marcus, had other plans. Two...