The first time Elira saw the blueprint, it whispered to her. She couldn’t explain it—not in any way that made sense. It wasn’t a voice, exactly, more like a sensation. A vibration beneath her fingertips. A pulse in the ink itself. But that was impossible. Ink didn’t move. Ink didn’t breathe. Ink didn’t call to her like something alive. And yet, as she stared down at the parchment spread across the