Rezor trailed off as silence took over. The storm stopped.
Not gradually. Not a slow fade of wind and rain. One moment, the building was shaking with the force of nature trying to tear us apart. The next, silence. Complete, absolute silence.
Everyone froze.
“Is it over?” someone whispered.
Rezor moved to the window, and I followed. Through the cracked glass, I could see the plaza. The ground was soaked, debris scattered everywhere. But the rain had stopped. The wind had died.
And above us, the clouds were moving.
“Look,” I breathed, pressing closer to the window. “The clouds. They’re retreating.”
It was the most surreal thing I’d ever seen. The dark, churning storm clouds that had been pressing down on the valley, invading our sanctuary, were pulling back. Not just to the mountain peaks, but past them. Rolling away like a tide retreating from shore.
Rezor grabbed my hand and pulled me toward the door. “Come on.”
We burst out into the plaza, and I immediately looked up.
The clouds continued their impossible retreat, moving faster now, streaming away from the valley in every direction. And where they pulled back, I saw something I hadn’t seen since before we’d crashed here.
Blue sky.
Clear, brilliant blue sky.
And through it, shining down on the planet for the first time in who knew how long, was the sun. Not the dim, filtered light we’d grown accustomed to. Not the gray haze that passed for daylight most of the day. Pure, golden afternoon sunlight that painted everything in colors so vivid they almost hurt to look at.
I stood there, shaking, staring up at the impossible sky, and felt something crack in my chest.
“What the hell just happened?” I whispered.
Around us, people were emerging from buildings. Cautious at first, then with growing confidence as they realized the storm was truly gone. I heard gasps of wonder, saw people pointing at the sky with expressions of awe.
Someone started to laugh. Then someone else. Soon the plaza was filling with people, all of them staring up at the clear sky with something like religious fervor.
“The storms,” an elderly female said, her voice trembling. “They’re gone. The storms are gone.”
“How?” I turned to Rezor. “How is this possible? Storms don’t just…leave. Not like that.”
“I don’t know.” He looked as stunned as I felt. “But whatever caused it—”
“Cleo!”
I turned to see Zelana running toward us. Actually running, her normally dignified composure completely abandoned. Before I could react, she grabbed my face and kissed both my cheeks.
“You did it,” she said, her eyes bright with tears. “The prophecy. Your people brought renewal.”
“I didn’t—” I started, but she’d already turned away, her arms raised to the growing crowd.
“Listen!” Her voice rang out across the plaza. “The signs are clear. The sky people have brought renewal to our world. The storms that have plagued us for generations, that have imprisoned us in this valley, they are gone because of the sky people. They came to save us.”
A cheer went up from the crowd. Not everyone, but enough that the sound echoed off the surrounding mountains.
“No, wait,” I said, trying to pull away from Rezor’s grip. “That’s not—we didn’t do anything. This is—”
But Zelana was on a roll. “For cycles, we have lived in fear. Fear of the storms, fear of the world beyond our walls. But the prophecy told us that three would fall from the sky, and through them, balance would be restored.”
The crowd was growing now, people streaming into the plaza from all directions. I saw Baleck and Mierva pushing through, their expressions stunned.
