Chapter 152

• Marcel’s POV
• The night had settled into one of those strange, heavy silences—the kind that didn't feel peaceful but weighty, as though the air itself was aware of something I couldn’t yet name. I had just finished telling Evelyn her bedtime story, something soft and silly about a dragon who loved sunflowers, and I tucked her in like I always did. Her tiny hand clutched mine just before she drifted off, and for a moment, everything in the world felt still. Safe.
• But the other half of my world—Ella—was missing from our usual routine.