Eamon sat at the long, wooden table in the rectory, the dim candlelight casting shadows across the worn stone walls. Around him, the other deacon assistants quietly chewed their meals, the silence almost oppressive.
He stared down at his own plate—a piece of bland, tasteless bread that was beginning to crumble in his fingers. Each bite was dry and flavorless, as though it had absorbed the atmosphere of the room itself: cold, indifferent, and suffocating.
His stomach growled faintly, but Eamon hardly cared. Hunger had become a background noise, a minor inconvenience overshadowed by the hollow weight of dread that had taken up residence inside him.
He could hear the low murmur of conversation from the priests at the far end of the hall, but they felt like distant echoes, reverberating in a world Eamon didn't truly belong to.
He glanced at the other assistants seated near him. Their faces were blank, expressionless—mirror images of his own despair.
