## Chapter 46: A Bridge of Song
Alex emerged from the Council chambers, the Lumina sun, a giant crimson disc, bleeding onto the horizon. Tears, glistening like scattered diamonds, traced paths down his cheeks. Relief, a wave that had crashed over him the previous night, had receded, leaving behind a tremor of nervous anticipation.
The celebration had been cathartic, a release of the pent-up emotions that had threatened to consume them. But the weight of responsibility settled on his shoulders once more. The reply from the unseen realm, a fragile melody echoing their own, was a spark, a flicker of hope in the vast unknown.
Doubt, the serpent that had coiled around him for weeks, wasn't entirely vanquished. Its presence lingered, a cold whisper in the back of his mind. What if the response was a fluke? What if their tentative connection sputtered and died, leaving them back in the suffocating silence they'd endured for so long?
