You coughed, your palms scraped raw against the broken asphalt. Your ears rang.

Around you, people were screaming.

Then, the sound stopped.

Not the screaming—that still echoed somewhere distant—but the fighting. The ground-shaking impacts. The air-tearing roars.

Silence fell, heavy and wrong.

You managed to push yourself up onto your hands and knees, head swimming. A shadow fell over you.

Not a building’s shadow. Something else. Something big.

A man stood above you. Tall. Too tall. Broad-shouldered in a way that seemed wrong for the human frame, clad in black from neck to boot. A crimson cape hung still behind him, untouched by the smoke-laden wind.

His face was sharp. Angled. Beautiful in a way that felt dangerous.

His eyes were blue. Bright, burning blue, fixed on you with an intensity that made your chest tighten.

He didn’t move. Didn’t blink.

He just stared at you like you were a ghost.