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My blade connects with a sound like breaking ice. Crystal shards explode outward as I carve a path through its skeletal chest. For a brief, triumphant moment, I think I’ve struck true.

Then the shards freeze in mid-air, suspended as if time itself has stopped. They reverse direction, flowing back together with the fluidity of molten glass, reforming the wound as if it never existed. The glasscrawler had healed the same way, shards reversing to rebuild what we’d broken. But this thing⁠—

“It heals too fast!” I shout, leaping back as antlers slash through the air where my head was a heartbeat before.

Kelaros attacks from the side, his knife finding the joint where leg meets body. The limb shatters under his strike, but even as the stag staggers, crystal dust swirls upward, coalescing into a new leg in seconds.

“I told you, we can’t kill it.” He retreats to my side. “We need to find another way out.”

“Everything alive can be killed.” My hand drops to my wounded side. “Some things just take more effort.”

The sithean stone flares with sudden, violent heat. It burns my skin, pulse quickening to match the rhythm of the stag’s glowing heart. The connection between them sends waves of pain up my arm, and I gasp as magic surges through me.

“What’s happening?” Kelaros grabs my arm as another pulse of heat tears through me.

“I don’t know.” The pull intensifies, tugging me toward the stag rather than away from it. “The stone is reacting to it.”

The stag’s empty eye sockets fix on my wrist, the pale fire within them brightening with recognition.

Kelaros tightens his grip on my arm. “We need to retreat and find another path.”

He pulls me toward the wall where the crystal turns more translucent. “There might be a passage beyond this.”

We shove at the surface, trying to find a weak point or crack we might exploit. The wall yields under pressure, suggesting space beyond.

“Help me break through.” I raise my knife to strike the crystal.

Before the blade connects, the floor shudders. A groan emanates from the walls themselves, stone and crystal shifting. The wall we were about to breach solidifies, growing opaque and thick.

“The court is reshaping itself to keep us trapped,” Kelaros breathes in horror.

We turn to find another exit as the walls inch closer with each heartbeat. The only opening remains where the stag stands watching, antlers gleaming in the light of its own heart.

“It’s herding us.” Dread settles in my stomach. “Back toward the stag.”

Kelaros’s jaw hardens. “Then we go through it.”

We dash toward the remaining exit, knives ready. The stag lowers its head, antlers forming a barrier of crystalline spears across the opening.

I feint left, drawing its attention, while Kelaros dives right. The stag turns toward him, leaving an opening.

I seize the chance, lunging for the gap, but the floor suddenly tilts, sending me sliding back toward the center of the chamber. Kelaros suffers the same fate, the architecture itself becoming our enemy.

The walls continue to narrow, the ceiling dropping, pushing us toward the waiting predator.

“We need a new plan,” I gasp, searching the shrinking space for any advantage.

Kelaros scans the chamber, panic breaking through his careful composure for the first time. “There!”

He points to a narrow fissure forming in the corner where two walls meet, where the Court’s reshaping has created an unintended crack just wide enough for a person to squeeze through.

“Go,” he urges, pushing me toward it. “I’ll hold it off.”

I hesitate, knowing what that means. “You go. I’m the one it’s after.”

And without him watching, I can unleash on this stag with everything I have.

The stag advances, its patience over. Sparks fly beneath its hooves as its antlers lower for a charge.