The screaming stopped too suddenly.
Not fading. Not weakening.
Cut off.
Emily stood frozen in the center of the room, the silence that followed somehow worse than the noise. Her fire guttered along her fingertips, thin threads of heat leaking out no matter how hard she tried to suppress it.
“Okay,” she whispered to no one. “Not great. Definitely not great.”
Another impact shuddered through the castle — closer this time. The floor rippled beneath her boots as if the stone itself were flexing under pressure.
Dust drifted from the ceiling in pale streams.
Something heavy slammed into the other side of the door.
Emily jumped back, heart leaping into her throat.
The door held.
For now.
A deep scraping sound followed, slow and deliberate, like claws testing the surface. Not frantic. N
