Please add 500 words here
[Jake's POV]
For a few seconds, I did not move.
The black car carrying Margot Delacroix disappeared into the line of traffic, swallowed by headlights and wet asphalt, but my mind stayed fixed on the sentence Claire had read into my ear.
**Find Sofia before she becomes one.**
Not dies.
Not disappears.
Becomes one.
A table. A piece of furniture. A useful object placed inside a room and mistaken for decoration until someone needed leverage. It was a cruel phrase. Too cruel to be accidental. Whoever had written it understood the Winter Table, understood Sofia, and understood me well enough to know which word would cut deepest.
Claire's voice returned, quieter now. "Jake?"
"I heard you."
"You stopped breathing."
"I'm fine."
"No, you're not."
