Primrose POV
The morning after the Dinner from Hell, I woke up early. I needed fresh ingredients for Vali's Two-Wolf Stew and something colorful to distract Jasper from his brooding.
I locked the Little Whiskers Daycare and stepped out into the pre-dawn mist of the common district.
I made it exactly three steps.
A shadow moved. Not a person—a literal shadow. It peeled itself off the cobblestones and rose up in front of me.
Before I could even reach for my emergency pocket-pepper, a figure materialized. It was a Crow-kin with black wings (Vesper).
"Lady Primrose Thistle," he rasped. "My master requests your presence."
"I'm busy," I snapped, trying to step around him. "Tell your master to make an appointment. The waitlist is two weeks."
"My master," the Crow-kin said, "does not wait."
The world suddenly tilted.
I didn't faint. I was engulfed. The shadows around me surged upwards like black water. It was a spatial magic I'd only read about in the Hard Mode lore—Shadow-Walking.
