The room stayed quiet after David sank into the chair. Not the strained quiet from before, not the kind that waited for the next blow, just space.

  The shadows did not return.

  The light settled into something warm and ordinary. Lamps. Sun through glass. The low creak of the house breathing around them.

  David leaned forward, elbows on his knees, hands hanging loose. His chest still hitched now and then, breath catching and releasing without rhythm.

  Francis remained beside him. She hadn’t moved away. Her hand rested where it had all along, steady.

  Someone set a glass within reach. Another pulled a chair closer without asking.

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  No one tried to fix it.

  Chris crouched in front of him. “You stayed,” he said.

  David nodded once. That seemed to take what little he had left.

  Rowan knelt near his other side. “You told the truth.”

  David let out a breath that felt like it had been waiting a long time. “I don’t know what comes next,” he said. “I don’t know how to do this without losing more.”

  “That’s alright,” Francis said softly. “You don’t have to know tonight.”

  The people in the room shifted, closing the distance without crowding him. A shoulder brushing his own. A quiet presence at his back.

  “We don’t walk this alone,” someone said.

  David looked up then, really looked, meeting eyes instead of light.

  The raven was there, unseen by anyone, perched high along the curtain rod. Silent. Watching.

  The necklace at David’s chest lay still now. No glow. No pull. Just silver.

  He exhaled fully for the first time that night.

  The room held.

  The soft voice whispered in the silence.