Day 6: Lyra’s Journal

The river’s edge still smells like rain when I wake up, even though the sky’s clear now. I didn’t sleep well—my mind kept circling back to Vex’s words last night, the way he said my name like it was a secret he’d been holding for years. His voice was quiet, but it cut through everything: *‘You’re not alone in the dark, Lyra.’* I kept thinking about how he didn’t even look at me when he said it, just stared into the water like he was trying to find something beneath the surface. My stomach’s still a little tight from the hunger pangs last night, but the real thing is—why do I keep going back to those ruins? I don’t know why, but I did. I stood there by the crumbling walls, and for a moment, I thought I heard the wind whispering my name too. Not like a promise, but like a question. Like it was waiting for an answer I didn’t even know I needed yet. Now, I just want to sit in the grass and let it go. Maybe tomorrow, I’ll find out what it means to be truly at peace.