'...Dead?'
Soren stood utterly still, the dark chamber tilting on its axis as the revelation crashed over him.
His mind stopped working, his heart frozen mid-beat as if it had forgotten how to function. The world around him blurred into meaningless shapes. Bowing Malakor, watchful Elenaria, worried Ethea behind him - all of them faded into the background, drowned out by the single word constantly echoing in his chest.
...Dead.
She was dead.
The one who waited by the door every evening, the one who had curled up on his chest every night, the companion who had been his only warmth during the loneliest years of his life...
Gone.
'...
You have to wake up, Soren.
You have someone else to save now.
...
We will meet again.
...'
Those words, which he had clung to as a promise, now revealed themselves for what they truly were.
'She... She knew.'
