Page 86 - DivineSparkRising II-TheMirrorofSilenceFinal

Divine Spark Rising
vent as a cone of silence scoured past. Paint peeled
from the tin; the air tasted of old batteries.
Hafid kicked a laundry pole into a drone. It
stuttered, spun, went off like a dying cicada. Zhara
hurled a coil of copper that snapped against a
Redactor’s mirrored palm and sparked. The
woman flinched—first humanity Henry had seen
from one of them—then steadied, her mouth
reversing a lullaby’s line.
Sera turned and sang two syllables so soft
Henry only felt them on his teeth. The lullaby
unhooked. The Redactor looked very young for a
second, then fled into shadow as if ashamed of
something she remembered.
They dove through an open skylight into an
abandoned cinema that smelled of velvet and
mold. The screen at the far end blinked white.
Sofia’s face glided across it like a moon.
“You waste your breath on defiance,” she said.
“Rest. Heal.”
“Not on your terms,” Henry said, lungs
burning.
“On the only terms that keep you,” Sofia replied.
“You think I do not love you. I do. I just love the
quiet more.”
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