The silence in the indigo-inscribed chamber was no longer the profound stillness of a tomb. It was the suffocating quiet after a scream, thick with the metallic tang of blood and the acrid scent of voided bowels. Tarek's body lay near the second Gate, shrouded not in silk – such luxury was a world away – but in the remnants of Kaela's spare cloak, a rough, grey wool stained dark at the chest. The shroud couldn't hide the terrible concavity beneath it, the void where a heart, warm and fiercely beating moments before, had been ripped away. Garrel sat propped against the wall nearby, knees drawn up, his head lolling. He wasn't unconscious, but catatonic, his blind eyes wide and unseeing, mouth slightly open, a thin line of drool tracing his chin. The scholar's mind had finally shattered under the weight of the Eater's presence.
Ren lay beside Kaela, unconscious, his breathing shallow and ragged. Bruises mottled his face and neck from the clown's grip, and the Vorath mark pulsed erratically beneath his torn tunic, a feverish ember in the gloom. Kaela had cleaned the worst of the grime and blood from his face with a scrap of damp cloth, her movements stiff, mechanical. Lira huddled against the cold obsidian of the Gate itself, her wings wrapped tightly around her like a shroud. Silent tears carved paths through the dust on her cheeks, her small frame wracked by tremors that never ceased. Mirak stood sentinel a few paces away, her back to them, facing the direction the clown had vanished, utterly still. The air hummed with unspeakable tension, the memory of the painted grin and the crunch of bone etched onto every mind.
No one spoke. Words were dust. The horror was too vast, the loss too immediate. Tarek wasn't just dead; he had been unmade, consumed as a grotesque punchline by something beyond comprehension. His sacrifice felt meaningless against the entity's casual, cosmic cruelty. The only sounds were Ren's labored breathing, the faint drip of condensation somewhere in the dark, and the almost inaudible whimper that escaped Lira whenever the image of the dripping heart flashed behind her eyelids.
Hours bled into each other, marked only by the flicker of Ren's shadow-ice light, which Kaela kept dimly burning. The fear was palpable, a living thing coiling around them. Every shift in the faint indigo glow on the walls, every imagined whisper of cloth, made Lira flinch and Kaela's hand tighten on her sword hilt. They weren't just mourning; they were waiting. Waiting for the music to start again. Waiting for the grin to reappear from the shadows. Sleep was impossible. Rest was a forgotten concept.
Finally, as the oppressive silence threatened to crush them completely, Lira's voice emerged, a raw scrape in the dark. "Wh… what do we do?" She didn't look up from her knees. "He's… Tarek's…" She couldn't finish.
Kaela didn't answer immediately. Her single amber eye, fixed on Ren's unconscious face, held a terrifying emptiness. Then, slowly, it hardened into something brittle, sharp. Duty. The only thing left. "We move," she said, her voice flat, devoid of inflection. "We carry them." She gestured vaguely at Ren and Garrel. "We leave this tomb."
Lira's head snapped up, her eyes wide with fresh terror. "Move? Now? But Ren… he's… and it… it could come back!"
"And if we stay, it will come back," Kaela stated, the certainty in her tone chilling. "It fed. It got its… crescendo. But it's an Eater of Echoes, Lira. It craves the next note. The silence won't satisfy it forever. We are prey sitting in the open." She shifted her gaze to Tarek's shrouded form, a flicker of pain breaking through the ice before it refroze. "We carry him too. We don't leave him here… for it."
"Carry them?" Lira whispered, looking from Ren's limp form to Garrel's vacant stare to Tarek's covered body. "How? Where? That door?" She pointed a trembling finger at the colossal second Gate.
"Through it," Kaela said, her gaze fixed on the obsidian barrier. "It's the only path. The clown came from beyond it. Maybe it leads out. Maybe it leads deeper into hell. But staying here is death. Slow or fast, it's death."
Mirak turned slightly, her veiled face inclining towards Kaela. "The seal is weakened. The entity's passage… it strained it further. It may be possible to force it. But the cost…"
"Cost?" Kaela's laugh was a dry, bitter sound. "Look around you, Mirak. What cost is left to pay?" She gestured at Tarek, at Garrel, at Ren. "We pay in blood and broken minds. We pay because we have nothing else."
Lira buried her face back in her knees. "I can't… I can't carry Tarek…"
"You won't have to," Kaela said, surprising them. "You carry Garrel. He's light. Mirak, you take point. I'll carry Ren. Tarek…" She looked at the shrouded form, her jaw tightening. "I'll carry Tarek." The statement was impossible. Tarek was a big man, solid muscle even in death. Kaela was strong, but carrying him and Ren? Madness.
"Kaela, you can't–" Lira started.
"I can," Kaela interrupted, her voice cracking with a sudden, fierce intensity. "Because we have to. Because if we stop, if we wait for Ren to wake up or for dawn that never comes down here, we die. We die like Tarek. Or worse." She pushed herself stiffly to her feet, ignoring the protests of her own battered body. "We rest for what remains of the night. Try to gather strength. At first light… we move."
There was no light down here. Only the perpetual gloom. But they understood. They would rest until the crushing fear or exhaustion forced a semblance of stillness. Kaela didn't sit. She stood guard over Ren and Tarek, her sword resting point-down on the stone, her gaze scanning the shifting indigo patterns on the walls, the deep shadows beyond their meager light. Lira eventually slumped sideways, exhaustion overwhelming terror, falling into a shallow, nightmare-ridden doze, her hand still clutching Garrel's limp arm. Mirak remained standing, a silent statue facing the void. Garrel breathed. Ren breathed. Tarek did not. The chamber waited.
A thousand miles away, under a sky stained the colour of dried blood by the setting sun, the Drylands lived up to their name. Dust devils danced across cracked, ochre plains stretching to the horizon, where the skeletal outlines of long-dead forests clawed at the sky. The air shimmered with heat and tension.
On a ridge overlooking a vast, shallow basin, General Gorath of the Ascendancy's Ironjaw Battalion lowered his brass spyglass. His face, already a brutal landscape of scars beneath his horned helmet, twisted into a feral grin. Below, like a stain spreading across the basin floor, was the Vyrnese host. Not just longships, but an army. Thousands strong. Sea Wolves in scaled armor stood beside hulking warriors clad in the hides of deep-sea leviathans. Banners depicting storm-wracked waves and jagged teeth snapped in the dusty wind. And among them, moving with unnatural fluidity, were figures that seemed woven from shadow and brine – the Deep Speakers.
"Savages and squid," Gorath spat, the words thick with contempt. "They think dust is the same as seawater." He turned to his lieutenant, a hulking brute missing an ear. "Signal the artillery batteries. Let's give them a welcome worthy of the Emperor's… hospitality." His grin widened, revealing filed teeth. "Fire at will. Grind them into the dirt they love so much."
As the order echoed, the first barrage of Ascendancy siege engines roared. Massive stones, glowing faintly with embedded runes, arced through the crimson sky, plummeting towards the Vyrnese ranks. Explosions of dirt and rock erupted, mingled with the screams of the unprepared. The Drylands erupted into chaos.
In the gilded cage of Ebonspire's highest tower, Emperor Kyril Voss stood on his balcony, ignoring the distant, thunderous rumble that vibrated through the stone beneath his feet. He held the obsidian shard amulet in his palm, its surface warm, almost vibrating. A crack, hairline thin, marred its surface, leaking a wisp of chilling darkness that dissipated instantly. Before him, Lady Elyra knelt, her head bowed.
"...initial contact at the Drylands basin, Sire," she reported, her voice calm despite the distant thunder. "Gorath engages. Vyrnese forces are numerous, bolstered by… Deep Magic. Their advance is slowed, but not stopped. Our coastal scouts report fog banks moving against the wind towards Bleakcliff and Storm's End."
Kyril didn't look at her. His eyes were fixed on the amulet, on the crack. A slow, unnerving smile touched his lips. "Let the fleas bite, Elyra. Let them expend their fury on the dust." He closed his fist around the shard, feeling its power thrum against his skin. "The real feast is being prepared elsewhere. The Devourer stirs. Its hunger resonates… beautifully." He looked up, his eyes holding a fanatical gleam. "The distractions are welcome. Ensure Gorath makes them pay for every inch. Bleed them white on the plains. The Tower's shadow grows longer."
Elyra bowed lower, hiding her own unease. "As you command, Sire." She rose and retreated, leaving the Emperor alone with his crackling shard and the symphony of distant war.
Deep in the undercity clinic, the air was thick with the smell of cheap lamp oil, blood, and conspiracy. Scourge paced, her movements still stiff, but fueled by a terrifying, focused energy. The tonic Sira provided honed her pain into a razor's edge. Before her, spread on a stained operating table, was a rough map of Ebonspire, marked with red ink.
"The main assault hits the River Gate," Sira said, her finger tapping the map. "Vyrn's heaviest troops, backed by their Deep-Spawn magic. Gorath's legions will be drawn there like moths to flame." She moved her finger to a smaller, less fortified gate near the Merchant's Quarter. "The Postern of Whispers. Old. Neglected. Guarded by a skeleton crew… half of whom wear the Sigil." She tapped another point inside the walls. "The granaries adjacent. Packed to the rafters. Dry tinder."
Scourge stopped pacing, her single amber eye fixed on the Postern. "How do we open it?"
"An alchemical charge," Sira replied, producing a small, dark clay sphere from her apron. "Placed here," she indicated a point on the map near the gate's inner mechanism. "It burns hot and fast, silent until it's not. Triggers the lock's failure. The Sigil inside drops the inner portcullis as a 'malfunction', trapping the few loyal guards in the gatehouse. Then…" She drew a line from the Postern to the granaries. "We light the spark. The fires spread fast, fueled by panic and grain dust. Chaos. Perfect cover for the Vyrnese vanguard to flood in."
Scourge picked up the clay sphere. It felt cold, inert. "And Muryong? Your promise, Sira. When does that part happen?"
Sira's gaze was steady. "When the city burns, Scourge. When the Emperor flees his crumbling Tower. He will run towards the Devourer's prison, towards the source of his power. And Muryong… he is drawn there too. Vorath calls him. We have watchers in the wastes, near the Maw's ruins. They report movement towards Lorathis. When the Tower falls here, we converge there." She leaned closer, her voice dropping. "The chaos of the sack, the fall of the Empire… no one will notice a few figures slipping into the deep. We find him. We take him. In the ruins of his world, you claim your due."
Scourge's hand closed tightly around the alchemical sphere. The image bloomed in her mind: Ebonspire in flames, the Black Tower collapsing, and Jim Muryong, broken and helpless, bound before her in the desolate wastes. His eyes wide with terror as she raised her dagger towards the pulsing Vorath mark. The promise of his screams was the only thing that made the phantom pain in her wrist bearable. The only thing that mattered.
"When?" Scourge hissed, the word thick with anticipation.
"The Deep Speakers' fog reaches the coast at dawn tomorrow," Sira said, a grim smile touching her lips. "The storm breaks then. Be ready at the Postern. The signal is black smoke over the granaries. Then… we open the door."
Scourge nodded, tucking the sphere into a hidden pocket in her modified armor. Dawn. A new dawn drenched in blood and fire. The Emperor's reckoning. And hers.
Back in the indigo chamber, the "night" passed in a torturous limbo. Kaela didn't sleep. She watched the shadows, listened for the scrape of unnatural joints, the sigh of the void. Lira jerked awake repeatedly from nightmares, her cries muffled by her wings. Garrel remained lost. Ren's breathing grew steadier, but he didn't stir. The Vorath mark glowed faintly, a sullen ember.
As the oppressive silence stretched towards its breaking point, Kaela finally moved. "Enough," she rasped, her voice rough. "We go. Now." She knelt beside Ren, checking his pulse. Stronger. But still unconscious. She slipped her arms under his shoulders and knees, lifting him with a grunt of effort. He was dead weight. She staggered slightly but held firm. "Mirak. The door. Find a way."
Mirak glided towards the colossal second Gate, her hands tracing the seamless obsidian near the hairline crack the clown had used. She murmured something under her breath, a sound like stones shifting. The indigo symbols on the surrounding walls pulsed brighter.
Lira whimpered, looking at Garrel. "H-how…?"
"Support him," Kaela ordered, nodding towards the scholar. "Get him walking. Drag him if you have to."
Lira, tears welling again but jaw set in terrified determination, hauled Garrel upright. He moaned softly, his legs buckling. She wrapped his arm over her slender shoulders, bearing most of his weight, her wings drooping with the strain. "Come on, Garrel," she whispered, her voice trembling. "Just… walk. Please."
Kaela turned to Tarek's shrouded form. The hardest part. She took a deep, shuddering breath, the image of the dripping heart flashing before her eyes. With immense effort, she bent, got one arm under his shoulders, the other under his knees, and lifted. He was immensely heavy. She staggered, muscles screaming in protest, the wound on her thigh from the Labyrinth throbbing viciously. She gritted her teeth, a low groan escaping her, and straightened, holding the shrouded body against her chest. The wool cloak felt damp.
Mirak pressed her palms against the Gate near the crack. The indigo light flared intensely around her hands, flowing into the obsidian. A deep, resonant thrum vibrated through the chamber floor, setting their teeth on edge. The hairline crack widened with a groan of protesting reality, not stone. Darkness, absolute and cold, beckoned.
"It is open," Mirak stated, stepping back. "But the path is unknown. And fragile."
Kaela adjusted her grip on Tarek, shifting Ren higher in her other arm. Her muscles trembled with the strain. Sweat beaded on her forehead. "Doesn't matter. Lead the way." She looked at Lira struggling with Garrel. "Stay close. Don't look back."
Lira nodded, her face pale but resolute, half-dragging the unresponsive scholar towards the widening crack. Mirak stepped through the darkness first, vanishing instantly. Lira followed, pulling Garrel after her, swallowed by the void.
Kaela stood before the opening, the weight of the dead and the nearly dead crushing her. The darkness beyond felt alive. Hungry. She took a step forward, into the threshold.
Behind her, from the center of the chamber where Tarek's heart had lain, a dry, rasping chuckle echoed. It was faint, almost imagined.
Kaela froze. Her blood turned to ice. Slowly, agonizingly, she began to turn her head, the impossible weights in her arms making the movement torturous.
Before she could complete the turn, a cold, knobby finger tapped her shoulder from behind, coming from within the darkness she was about to enter.
"Leaving so soon?" the high-pitched, grinding voice sighed, dripping with mock disappointment, directly into her ear. "But the next movement... it requires an audience."
The painted grin filled her peripheral vision. The void where a heart should be pulsed with chilling darkness. Kaela's breath hitched, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird. The Eater of Echoes had returned. And it stood between her and the only way out.