The meeting room Margaret had prepared looked nothing like the cave chambers where training occurred. This space was almost aggressively normalâ€"comfortable chairs arranged in a circle, soft lighting that didn't pulse with ancient magic, refreshments on a side table like this was a PTA meeting instead of a council deciding whether two children should continue training that would probably kill them.Elena sat between Damon and Isabella, their three chairs forming a united front against whatever arguments were coming. Across the circle, Claire looked like she hadn't slept in days, designer clothes hanging on a frame that had lost too much weight. Beside her, Iris maintained professional composure that didn't quite hide the concern in her eyes.Senator Williams occupied the chair to Damon's left, tablet displaying legislation she'd been drafting to protect god-touched minors from exactly the kind of exploitation the Covenant had attempted. Dr. Chen sat opposite, monitoring equipment

Dawn found Elena and Isabella in a chamber that shouldn't exist within normal spacetime.The walls here didn't just pulse with light they moved through time itself, showing past, present, and future simultaneously. A tapestry of moments that made linear existence feel like arbitrary constraint rather than fundamental law.Margaret stood at the center, her form flickering through ages. Young, old, infant, ancient, all of them existing at once in ways that made Elena's enhanced vision blur with incomprehension."Stage Four addresses temporal anchoring." Margaret's voice came from multiple points in time past Margaret explaining what would happen, present Margaret experiencing current instruction, future Margaret already knowing the outcome. "Human consciousness experiences time linearly. Past, present, future in orderly sequence. Divine consciousness doesn't."She gestured, and the chamber walls exploded with visions. Elena saw h