The air on the other side of the arch felt wrong in a quieter way.
Rhaen took three steps into the new corridor and waited for her body to tell her what the dungeon had attached to her. The pressure behind her heart was still there, a thin prickling like a needle pushed under the skin and left to remind her it existed.
She reached for the mana-compass and held it flat in her palm.
The needle didn't just point.
It tugged.
Like a leash.
Rhaen breathed in through her nose and tried to think of retreat. Not moving—just the idea. Going back to the switching hall, back to the shaft, back to daylight. Back to a table where someone else would read what she bled for.
The compass needle quivered and pulled a finger's width to the right.
The corridor ahead of her brightened in faint, hair-thin lines that weren't carved into the stone. For a moment, it looked like the air itself had been traced.
