[Following: Fire And Flame]
The storm had swallowed the enclave. Wind howled across the cliffs like a wounded thing, dragging veils of snow in furious spirals that battered against the windows of Eve's office. The scent of old wood and incense lingered faintly in the air, mixing with the dry, metallic tang of the heater struggling in the corner. A single lamp cast its amber glow across the desk — paper stacks, datapads, and a cup of cooling tea sitting untouched.
Eve sat in stillness behind it, her shoulders draped in a shawl of deep grey wool, hands folded loosely before her. She had been writing — or trying to — but the pen had slipped from her grasp some time ago. Her mind had wandered elsewhere.
Then... something stirred.
It came like a shiver in the Force — distant, yet painfully clear. The sharp, spiralling pang of hurt, of something once bound now coming undone. Colette's strength colliding against Reina's pride, both reverberating through the quiet fabric of the enclave like thunder muffled beneath the snow.
Eve closed her eye, and for a moment the storm outside and the turmoil within were the same. She didn't see what happened, but she didn't need to.
Her breath trembled out. The ache that followed wasn't just empathy, but reflection too. It found the raw place left behind from her own recent words with Reina, the sharp tone she still regretted. The memory of it now was like salt on a wound.
Beyond the the walls of the enclave, there was movement, a flicker of a presence she knew instinctively. Colette, stepping out into the white expanse, her essence thinning into distance as she walked away. Eve's chest tightened. The Force between them stretched like a thread pulled too far, until it hurt to feel.
She wanted to rise. To call out. To do something. But she stayed seated, silent in the golden pool of lamplight. Some things couldn't be healed by words or will, only by the long, cold process of living through them.
Isari stirred by her feet, the creature's ears twitching before a soft, mournful whine broke the silence. Eve looked down. The fox's eyes gleamed up at her, dark and glistening, reflecting the lamplight and her own sorrow back at her.
"I know..." she whispered, reaching to stroke the silvery fur between her ears. "I know, my love."
The storm screamed outside, louder now. The sound filled the office, pressing in through the walls until it was all there was — the wind, the snow, and the slow thud of her heart.
Eve's gaze returned to the window. The outer lights of the enclave glowed faintly through the blizzard, halos of gold smothered by white. Somewhere beyond them were her sisters, both lost in different ways. Both searching for who they were meant to become.
And beneath that, unspoken, came the same quiet question that had haunted Eve for longer than she wished to admit:
If all things are change, if all paths shift beneath our feet — then where do I stand?
The Force did not answer her. It only breathed softly through the room, cold and alive, like the whisper of snowflakes against glass.
Eve sat back in her chair, her reflection faintly visible in the darkened window — a lone figure surrounded by stormlight. A keeper of peace who could not mend every fracture. A teacher who still doubted her own path.
Outside, the storm raged on. Inside, silence reigned — vast and aching.
