Chapter 108

Aria's POV

The institute opened on the first Monday of September.

I wasn't there.

This was deliberate and had been agreed between Beth and me in August, in a brief conversation that required less negotiation than either of us had anticipated. The institute was hers. My presence at the opening would shift its center of gravity toward Shadow Peak's history rather than toward what it was building for itself. The first day needed to belong entirely to Beth and the cohort and Oskar and the river.

She sent a message that evening. Three sentences: *It began. The room felt right. Gorvan cried, briefly, which he would deny if...