The corridor did not slope upward.
It moved sideways.
Not along the curvature of the chamber, but through it — a clean incision in stone that had not existed moments before. Its walls were pale and unmarked, yet faint veins of gold threaded through them in slow pulses, matching the engine's rhythm behind.
Kaelen stepped into it first.
Not because he doubted her strength.
Because he did not yet trust what the system had become.
The girl followed.
The golden frame around her body no longer flared or strained. It hovered close now — a precise geometry of light outlining bone and breath. When she crossed the threshold into the corridor, the gold veins in the walls brightened.
Recognition.
The Scribe hesitated only once before following. Behind them, the chamber remained open, the engine humming in flawless rotation.
Whole.
For now.
The corridor narrowed after twenty paces.
The air shifted.
Not dense as before.
Taut.
Like a string drawn tight across a vast distance.
Kaelen felt it through the soles of his boots — a current traveling laterally through the earth, not downward.
He slowed.
"This is not an exit," he said quietly.
"It's a conduit."
The girl's eyes closed briefly as she walked.
"Yes," she whispered.
"It's connecting."
The walls began to change.
Faint inscriptions emerged from smooth stone — not diagrams like the Arc chamber above, not structural matrices like the engine rings.
These were names.
Not in modern High Court script.
Older.
Each carved along the corridor's length in deliberate spacing, twelve repeating clusters of sigils marking lineage and territory.
Kaelen's breath stilled.
The outer houses.
The twelve anchor lines were not abstract geography.
They were bound to blood.
The corridor widened abruptly into a smaller chamber.
Circular.
Unadorned.
At its center stood a low pedestal of white stone.
Above it hovered a sphere of faint silver light — unstable, flickering.
Not as massive as the engine.
Not as complex.
But familiar.
An anchor node.
This one trembled.
Its surface rippled irregularly, threads of resonance slipping in uneven spirals around its circumference.
The golden frame around the girl brightened in response.
Not aggressively.
Concerned.
Kaelen approached the pedestal slowly.
"This anchor was compensating," he murmured.
"For centuries."
The Scribe circled cautiously. "Compensating for what?"
"For absence."
Kaelen extended his resonance toward the sphere.
Immediately, resistance met him.
Not from the node itself.
From beyond it.
A distant pressure pushing against its alignment.
He withdrew slightly.
The girl stepped closer to the sphere.
The golden frame extended a fraction outward, lines adjusting as though measuring strain points.
The sphere's flicker steadied when she neared.
But only slightly.
"It's being pulled," she said.
"From where?" the Scribe asked.
She turned her head faintly toward the northwest wall of the chamber.
Not looking through it.
Feeling through it.
"Not here."
Kaelen felt it then.
A countercurrent.
Subtle.
Threading backward along this conduit from a distant anchor line.
A pulse not in harmony with the engine's rhythm.
The restoration below had not gone unnoticed.
Somewhere along one of the twelve anchor territories—
Someone was resisting synchronization.
The silver sphere at the pedestal dimmed suddenly.
The corridor walls trembled.
Kaelen dropped his resonance into the floor at once.
The stone answered, but unevenly.
The engine's rhythm remained perfect behind them.
This distortion originated elsewhere.
The girl's golden frame flared brighter.
She inhaled sharply.
"It's pushing harder."
The silver sphere elongated vertically for a heartbeat — nearly tearing open like the seams above had done — before snapping back into shape.
The Scribe staggered against the wall. "Another tear?"
"No," Kaelen said.
"This is will."
He felt it clearly now.
Not wildborn distortion.
Not structural imbalance.
Intent.
A distant anchor house refusing recalibration.
For generations, imbalance had benefited some.
Trade routes.
Territorial shifts.
Magical anomalies leveraged for power.
Restoration threatened that.
The silver sphere pulsed erratically again.
The golden frame extended further from her body, angular beams locking into invisible geometry around the node.
She did not touch it.
She aligned with it.
The sphere steadied.
For a breath.
Then—
A shockwave surged backward along the conduit.
The chamber lights flickered.
Kaelen braced.
The girl cried out softly as the countercurrent struck her golden frame directly.
Not shattering it.
Testing it.
The beams of gold around her spine and ribs sharpened, reinforcing.
The silver sphere flared blindingly bright.
Then dimmed to near extinction.
The Scribe's voice trembled. "It's collapsing."
Kaelen stepped beside her and placed his hand against the air just before the node.
He did not project force.
He widened his lattice again — but this time not into earth.
Into the conduit.
He followed the resisting current backward.
Far.
Through stone.
Through root.
Through distance.
He felt the second anchor.
Not failing.
Straining.
And beyond it—
A stabilizing presence.
Not like the engine.
Not like the girl.
Human.
Focused.
Deliberate.
Someone was anchoring against recalibration.
Kaelen withdrew sharply.
The girl's breath came uneven.
The golden frame flickered but did not fracture.
"It's not breaking," she whispered.
"It's fighting."
The silver sphere pulsed again.
This time the light did not flicker randomly.
It began to match the engine's rhythm faintly.
The countercurrent pressed harder.
The walls groaned.
Kaelen's jaw tightened.
If the node fractured, the recalibration would cascade unpredictably across adjacent anchors.
This was the first test of restoration.
Not mechanical.
Political.
The Queen remained unaware.
But somewhere—
One of the outer houses had already begun to choose.
The girl steadied her stance.
Her shoulders squared.
The golden frame contracted closer to her skin, lines sharpening with structural precision.
"Let it push," she said.
Kaelen looked at her sharply.
"It will strain you."
"It's not pushing me," she said quietly.
"It's pushing the rhythm."
Understanding settled over him.
She was not the engine.
She was the convergence.
She did not force compliance.
She harmonized imbalance until resistance exhausted itself.
The silver sphere brightened.
The engine's rhythm deepened faintly in the distance.
The countercurrent surged once more—
Harder.
The chamber shook.
A crack formed along the pedestal's base.
The Scribe cried out.
Kaelen planted both feet and anchored fully into the conduit, reinforcing the chamber's structural geometry.
The golden frame around her flared brilliantly—
Then locked.
The sphere emitted a single, pure tone.
Not loud.
Absolute.
The countercurrent faltered.
Wavered.
Broke.
The silver sphere stabilized.
Its surface smoothed.
Its rotation matched the engine's rhythm perfectly.
Silence fell.
Not tense.
Settled.
The golden frame dimmed slightly.
The girl exhaled slowly.
The crack along the pedestal sealed.
The conduit walls stopped trembling.
Kaelen released his anchor gradually.
Far along the second anchor line, the resisting presence withdrew.
Not defeated.
Retreated.
The Scribe leaned heavily against the wall. "They felt it."
"Yes."
"They will know someone answered."
"Yes."
The silver sphere hovered now in steady, balanced light.
The first external anchor had aligned.
Eleven remained.
The corridor behind them glowed faintly, as if acknowledging completion.
The girl swayed once.
Kaelen caught her.
The golden frame flickered but remained intact.
"You cannot do that twelve times," the Scribe said hoarsely.
Kaelen looked toward the conduit stretching further into stone.
"We may not have a choice."
Far above, beyond stone and forest and sky—
Twelve houses were beginning to feel the shift.
Some would submit.
Some would resist.
And the civil fracture that had once simmered in whispers—
Had just found its fault line.
The corridor ahead pulsed again.
Leading onward.
Toward the second anchor.
And this time—
The resistance would be waiting.