Exhaustion necessitates sleep.

That night, Cerina lay in the narrow bed they had given her, staring at the low ceiling. The room was barely larger than a large closet, its walls and floors the same cold, grooved stone that seemed to crawl through the entire monastery. The single candle they had left her had burned down to a stump, leaving her in thick darkness broken only by a faint, watery glow from the high, barred window.

The bed smelled as old as it had looked in the candle light, and the mattress was hard and unyielding beneath her. She shifted, trying to find a comfortable position, but every movement made the straw inside the mattress creak like old bones. She pressed her hands to her sides, trying to still herself, but the unease of the day wouldn’t leave her. It sat heavy in her chest, and no amount of deep breathing could dislodge it.

Her thoughts drifted back to the figures in the courtyard, their slow, swaying movements. The grooves in the stone. The texture of the parchment. That strange pulse of the black stones beneath her fingertips. She told herself it was her imagination, or perhaps her nerves. This place was so far removed from anything she’d known. But the more she tried to rationalize it, the less convincing her explanations became.

And then there was the voice.

No, not a voice. Not exactly. It was more like a pressure in her mind, a feeling she couldn’t name. It had started when she first laid down, just a faint whisper of something that wasn’t quite hers. Now, it was growing louder—or, rather, heavier. It wasn’t a sound, but it felt like one. A low, vibrating hum pressing against the inside of her skull, urging her toward something.

Get up.