Sol sat cross-legged on the smooth wooden floorboards of the eastern balcony. The cool night air brushed against his skin, carrying the lingering scent of damp earth.
Behind him, the heavy timber doors of his quarters remained firmly shut, Zeyra's intoxicating presence and her desperate, aggressive proposition completely excised from his mind.
He had no time to dwell on the possessive obsessions of a Flame Core warrior, nor the intricate, suffocating web of tribal politics. He had literal wars to prepare for, and two starving Sovereign spirits resting heavily in his chest.
He fixed his silver-crimson eyes on the dark, jagged line of the distant horizon. The sky was just beginning its transition, bleeding from a deep, bruised indigo into a pale, slate gray.
The dense canopy of the Great Orrath, usually a chaotic mess of overlapping shadows, started to take defined, terrifying shapes against the lightening backdrop.
He was waiting for the exact moment of dawn.
