



























Silence. The crack in the sky trembled.
The Loom pulsed. The second entity—the one that looked like a spiral staircase made of teeth—unfurled a question into her lungs: WHAT WOULD YOU HAVE US DO? amirah adara higher entities
And the higher entities wept.
"Look," she commanded. "Look at a mortal who loves you anyway. Not because you're powerful. Because you're lonely. I can feel it—the silence you live in. No one to argue with. No one to surprise you. You're not gods. You're prisoners." Silence
"I know you're listening," she said, not with her mouth but with the calcium in her bones. "You, who orbit the corpse of a star that never existed. You, whose second toe is a black hole. You, who dream gravity into being." The second entity—the one that looked like a