Rose had been awake since before sunrise.
The city was louder now. Not the old kind of noise. Not panic. Not chaos.
This was worse.
This was density.
Bodies layered into spaces that had not been built to hold them. Footsteps in every corridor. Voices carrying through stone halls meant for quiet meetings, not sleeping families. Cookfires burning in courtyards that had once been decorative gardens. Crying children. Arguing adults.
The constant scrape of people trying to make temporary feel survivable.
Rose stood at the open window of the command hall with one hand braced against the sill and the other spread low over the hard curve of her stomach.
A litter changed the geometry of everything.
