The dream was louder this time.
Elian stood in a field of blue grass that swayed without wind. Above him, a sky made of glass fractured gently with every heartbeat, forming new constellations and breaking them apart again. The stars spelled out words he didn't know, or maybe knew once and had forgotten.
In front of him> The cocoon.
Tall. Crystal. Breathing.
Yrmeta stood inside it, eyes closed, mouth slightly parted. Her skin shimmered like layered storms. Her wings curled inward, tipped in black ash. Her hands reached out but never touched the surface. Her presence filled the dream like gravity.
"Elian."
Her voice echoed through him, not around him. It didn't come from her lips, it came from the wound in the world behind her.
"You are made of unspoken things," she whispered. "And they are beginning to speak."
He wanted to step closer. To ask her what that meant. To ask about the name the girl had called him.
But before he could move, blood leaked down the side of the cocoon.
Dark, slow. Not hers.
The world twisted.
And he woke up.
Elian sat bolt upright in bed, heart hammering.
The air was heavy. His blankets tangled like vines.
Then he saw the stain.
His pillow was soaked- Red. Wet. Fresh.
He touched his face.
No pain.
No wound.
But the blood was real. His fingers came away sticky.
He looked down.
A smear of it trailed from the center of the pillow toward the edge, like something had bled there beside him, or over him.
A soft knock on the door.
"Elian?" Willow's voice, quiet and unreadable.
He froze. "Yeah?"
"I felt her again," she said. "In your room. While you slept."
His voice cracked. "Was she… Angry?"
Willow hesitated. "No. But she wasn't alone."