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My boots hammered against the slick stone, each footfall swallowed almost as quickly as it landed.
Thousands of whispers followed us, drawing closer with the putrid, acidic smell of rotting flesh. They were close enough that I could feel them brushing against the nape of my neck like cold breath.
“Faster!” Kaezlyn snapped from behind me.
The corridor seemed endless, every turn revealing another stretch of damp stone swallowed by darkness. My lungs burned, each breath scraping raw against my throat, while the whispers multiplied behind us until they no longer sounded like voices, but a tide surging through the halls.
We rounded another corner, and a large iron door blocked our path. Runes similar to the ones of Cerilla’s door pulsed with a power that felt like Astaroth.
Helion swore under his breath and turned to me. “This is going to hurt,” he said, almost apologetically. His eyes found mine for the briefest heartbeat before looking to Kaezlyn. “Hold her.”
Kaezlyn lunged at me.
I dodged, circling and landing a kick into her side. She hissed, dropping into a fighting stance.
Before I could strike, pain scraped across every nerve in my body.
My throat burnt from the scream that tore from me. Kaezlyn’s arms wrapped around me, becoming the only thing keeping my upright.
Helion roared, the sound folding into my own until the chamber echoed with nothing but pain. Fire poured from his hands in a relentless torrent, and the runes answered with a blinding white brilliance that seared itself into my vision.
My consciousness wavered, reality slipping through my grasp like water between desperate fingers.
The iron wailed, slowly melting away to reveal ash-covered trees behind it.
The pain ebbed as the runes died, the light fading like a life slipping from a fresh kill.
“Hurry,” Helion panted, sweat glistening against his forehead. His fire had spluttered out, sinking beneath his skin until only his veins pulsed with a molten glow.
Kaezlyn guided me through the ruined doorway, her hand firm beneath my elbow. Every instinct urged me to wrench free, but my legs were too unsteady to argue.
Ash fell in thick, silent drifts, ghosting over my skin before the wind carried it onward. The next breath I stole tasted of smoke and scorched earth, the heat scraping down my throat until my lungs protested.
“Which way?” Helion asked Selkie between ragged breaths.
Selkie closed her eyes, as if concentrating on something beyond my reach before they burst back open, filled with panic. “I-I can’t feel it. The souls… They are drowning out the pull of the tide.”
“Lyra.” He looked at me. “Can you sense the Dead Sea?”
I focused on the part that called to me—and sucked in a sharp breath when I only met a wall of coldness that felt as violating as being pulled through Rythos’ void.
“No,” I gasped, rubbing my arms against the onslaught of gooseflesh.
Edgar mumbled something in a language I didn’t recognise, yet somehow, I knew it was a curse.
I made the mistake of looking down the corridor, and my mouth dried, heart lurching against my ribs.
Souls spilled from the darkness in impossible numbers, translucent bodies folding over one another like a tide of broken limbs. Some crawled-on hands that bent backwards, joints cracking with every movement. Others floated inches above the stone, their necks hanging at impossible angles, heads lolling as though they had long forgotten how a body was meant to hold itself.
Their faces... I stumbled backwards.
Eyes were sunken so deep, they had become endless black hollows. Lips split to the corners of their cheeks, whispering without pause, their words layering over one another until they became a single, maddening hum.
I’d taken down monsters. I was a goddess, one who wouldn’t be taken down by something already dead.
I reached my hands out, the tide of my power surging against my skin as a melody flooded from me.
My song died on the first note.
