Furia stepped through the door and into a darkness so complete that she could not see her own hand in front of her face, and her heart slammed against her ribs while she stumbled forward on unsteady feet. The air around her was cool and still, and it smelled of old wood and candle wax and something metallic that she could not name, and she heard the door close behind her with a soft thud that sounded far too final.
Her eyes slowly adjusted to the dim light, and she found herself standing in a grand hallway with walls of dark polished wood and floors of black marble. A chandelier hung overhead with candles that flickered despite there being no breeze to move them, and the ceilings were so high that the shadows up there seemed to swallow the light before it could reach them. The hallway str
