Scarlett begins in a borrowed room, young enough to believe invisibility is safety. She moves through others-rooms of stories, of mirrors, of silence, of letters unsent-each one asking her a different question about voice and ownership.In the hall where an archive burns, she learns how fragile words can be. In the ledger where stolen lines are returned, she learns repair. In the room of mirrors, she learns what breaking can free. And at last, she chooses to build a room with her own name on the plaque.Afterlight is a novel told in rooms-each one a metaphor, each one a stage in the long, trembling work of becoming visible. Tender, fierce, and luminous, it asks what it means to inherit silence, and what it costs to turn silence into speech.