The hidden sanctuary

**Kelly Thompson's POV**

The void isn’t empty—it’s *judging*.

Eden stands before us, haloed by a light that doesn’t cast shadows. His scars are gone, his eyes the stormlit blue they were before the crown, before the Silence carved him hollow. But the air around him thrums with a tension that makes the static in my veins recoil. The Hunter’s gun stays leveled, his finger taut on the trigger.

“Wait,” I say, but the word tastes like ash.

Eden’s smile wavers. “You don’t trust me.”

The Hunter snorts. “Give us one reason to.”

A flicker of pain crosses Eden’s face—too human, too *familiar*—before he lifts his hand. The void shudders, peeling back to reveal a landscape of shattered glass mountains and rivers of liquid mercury. At the center, a spire pierces the sky, its surface etched with runes that bleed black smoke.

“The Clocktower,” Eden says. “Where the Silence stores what’s left of the timelines it’s eaten. If you want answers, they’re there.”