We are broken. We are scarred. We are fragile.
But we are here. And we are whole.
The next morning, the sun rises over a changed world.
I am in the kitchen, brewing coffee, when the heavy oak door of the suite clicks open. Asher and Elara step in. They are dressed in simple pajamas, their hair messy, their faces pale but entirely, beautifully human.
Asher is holding a small, injured sparrow in his cupped hands. The bird’s wing is bent at an awkward angle, its feathers ruffled and dull.
Elara is holding her sketchbook, her charcoal pencil flying across the paper. She isn't looking at the bird. She is looking at the air, her silver eyes swirling with complex, non-Euclidean shapes.
"Mama," Asher says, his voice quiet, carrying the deep, grounded resonance of the Mortar. "I found him in
