The room fell into a silence so profound it felt as though the very air had turned to stone. No one moved.
No one breathed. The tension was a physical cord stretched to the point of snapping, leaving them all suspended in the terrifying moment before the first blow was struck.
"He is right," Morwenna said.
The words were a soft, heavy thud in the center of the room, like a stone dropped into a deep, still well.
Every head turned toward her. The collective gaze of the council was a physical weight, a suffocating pressure that seemed to demand an explanation for her sudden, uncharacteristic surrender.
Morwenna didn't look up. She remained anchored to the table, her eyes fixed on the dark, polished obsidian as if she were reading the very grain of the stone.
