The room felt smaller than it was, bookshelves pressing in from the side walls. A desk stood at the center, guarded by a massive chair that loomed like an abandoned throne. Near the door, five thick candles rested on a stand, their wicks unlit.
Tina slammed the door behind them. The lock screamed in protest as she twisted it.
Outside the hags groaned. They were no longer searching—they had found them.
"They're going to break in," Olivia whispered, her voice trembling.
Tina backed away from the door. "Quiet."
A heavy, relentless pounding struck the door. Each blow echoed through the small room, rattling the shelves lined with books and scattered trinkets.
"Theo," Tina tightened her fist around her dagger. "Give us a little light."
In the darkness, Theo searched blindly for anything that might catch flame—a scrap of paper, a strip of cloth. At last, his fingers snagged a piece of parchment, but as he pulled it free, several objects tumbled to the floor with a clatter.
There was no point in hiding anymore.
"Theo, anytime now!" Tina shouted.
Theo lifted the parchment and snapped his fingers. Flame burst to life at his fingertip, scorching his skin. He bit back the pain and pressed the fire into the parchment. "Here!"
Tina snatched the paper and hurried to light the candle stand, lighting each wick. Their weak glow pushed back the darkness, revealing the cramped room. When she finished, she dropped the parchment.
"Olivia, behind the chair!" she shouted.
Olivia moved swiftly, ducking low behind the massive chair.
Tina lifted her arms, venom dripping from her blade, her blood already primed with poison by her Aspect Ability. If the hags were Dormant rank, she could take down a few before she fell.
Then the scream came.
It tore through the hall like a consuming fire. Tina flinched, her stomach dropping as if the sound had punched through her chest and seized her heart. Her legs buckled. She hit her knees with a heavy thud, her fingers trembling until the dagger skittered across the floor.
Her lungs wrenched for air, her chest tight. She had held her breath so long that every inhale ached, every shudder was a reminder of months trapped in darkness.
And then—silence.
For a heartbeat, she thought the door would break, that this was the end.
But it never came. Instead, the hags' screams faded down the hall, their footsteps rumbling over stone, until only the weak flames remained and the sound of her ragged breathing.
Tina fell back, lying flat on the stone, trembling as though she'd run a marathon. "I thought we were goners…" she whispered. The cool floor grounded her.
Reading Tina's collapse, Theo moved quietly behind the chair and crouched beside Olivia. His hand hovered for a moment before brushing a damp, tear-streaked strand of hair from her face, gently, as if she might shatter at his touch.
"It's okay," he murmured. "We're okay."
Olivia's eyes flicked up, uncertain. "Theo… we're not okay. We don't even know how to get out, and we shouldn't have left her—"
"S—she's okay," he interrupted, forcing the confident tilt of his mouth he had spent months perfecting. "I'm certain of it."
"How… how can you be so certain?" Her voice wavered, thin as paper.
"Most of them followed us," he said, searching her eyes. "Ecludia's smart. And if she's who you say she is… she's well capable."
He tucked a damp strand of hair behind her ear, letting the small gesture carry reassurance he couldn't quite feel himself.
Olivia's eyes brightened, fragile hope breaking through fear. She leaned forward, wrapping her arms around his neck. He felt the tremor running through her body as she held on.
He hated lying to her.
That was the last one.
He pulled back, brushing his thumb over her cheeks and wiping away the last of her tears. "Want to check out some of these books? I thought you liked reading…" He offered a gentle smile.
Olivia eclipsed it with one of her own, letting out a soft, teary laugh. "I told you I liked reading—what do you mean, 'I thought you liked reading?'" she tilted her head, mock suspicion in her gaze.
"Caught me…" He slipped out of her arms and turned toward the bookshelf.
Olivia joined him, running her fingers along the spines before pulling one free and angling it toward him. "Does this look like a good read, or a waste of time?"
Theo read the cover. "The Eternal Battle Between the Beast and the Heavens." He tilted his head, pretending to weigh its depths.
"Sounds terrible. What would the plot even be?" A grin tugged at his lips as he teased her.
***
The corridor was one of hunger. Crooked limbs and torn gowns surged like a tide. Bodies knotted together, mouths gaping wide.
Ahead, the tunnel turned cold—a haven for the denizens of Repose.
Its walls bore centuries of scars, and narrow windows along the left side spilled slivers of gray light onto the floor.
Zerin stood at the bend, watching a group of hags: a shivering, ravenous mass bound by shared madness. Their bodies collided, arms flailing as they tried to batter their way into a room.
To his right, the hallway stretched back the way he had come—quiet, empty.
Zerin's irises burned deep red as he scanned the chaos. He had thought most of them dead. Yet there were more than he'd anticipated.
He gripped his blade in reverse, drove it into the stone wall, and wrenched it down. The screech of midnight steel cut through the air.
Screech—
Again, and again, he struck the stone, each strike a piercing note. Sparks flew, catching on the sleeve and the right side of his jacket. At last, it worked: one of the hags' gaunt faces snapped toward him. Their vacant focus ignited into rage, a wildfire spreading across the mass.
At last, the hags turned as one, drawn irresistibly forward. The shuffling swarm accelerated, collapsing into itself as stronger, faster bodies trampled the weaker, slower ones.
Good, he thought.
Zerin rounded the corner, quickening his pace. His jacket whipped behind him as he took rapid strides. Their howls erupted in a chorus, multiplying off stone, until it felt as though the entire labyrinth was in pursuit.
The corridor ended in a door that would funnel them exactly where he needed.
For a second, there was only the pounding of feet behind him. Then, once Zerin crossed the threshold—the Wraith moved.
A dozen crimson shapes peeled themselves from the walls—figures wrought from liquid blood, tall and thin, their forms unfinished. They erupted forward in perfect silence, meeting the hags the moment they spilled into the doorway.
The first hag split apart before she could even react, her body cleaved by a sword of liquid blood, each strike as sharp and forceful as iron. Another clone drove its arm through two torsos at once, lifting them straight up like broken dolls, allowing their decrepit bodies to slide down its arm to the shoulder.
The corridor quickly became one of slaughter—quick, efficient, precise and inevitable.
And, when all was finished, the blood clones melted into a puddle that mixed with the azure—that flowed back across the floor like a receding tide. The mulberry mixture gathered near Zerin, rising upward until it shaped itself into the Wraith.
"Thank you," Zerin said. He scooped up a severed arm and took a bite from the flesh as he advanced.
In any other circumstance he would have wasted his time to gather their cores, but knowing they were only Dormant rank, felt useless—their blood would serve him better for his Aspect.
The Wraith and Zerin walked together down the corridor, Zerin offering no other instruction after stepping over and passing the remains that seemed to age far quicker than what they were moments before.
Returning to the hall the hags had once filled, Zerin paused beside one of the narrow windows and peered inside, dropping the severed arm at his side.
Beyond it lay a chamber—a large atrium forged for ritual. A towering painting of their god dominated the far wall: the woman he had seen before. The Mother of Preservation, that oversized hat and that skin cast in that icy blue hue.
But something else drew his eye.
Centered beneath the painting stood a massive crystal mounted upon a raised stage. Something rested inside of it.
An unmoving silhouette.
Zerin's eyes narrowed. He shifted his blade to his left hand and moved on, attention fixed on the door the hags had been trying to break through.
He crossed the chamber and seized the handle. Yet, it refused to budge.
It was locked.
He glanced over his shoulder at the Wraith.
"Get me through this door. I need to see what's on the other side."