The doors didn’t just close.
They _sealed_.
Stone ground against stone with a sound like bones breaking. Red light bled through the cracks, sealing the edges shut, stitching the courtyard closed like a wound that didn’t want to heal.
We were locked inside with it.
Darius was on his feet in a second, ignoring the way his wrist hung wrong, bone grinding against bone. His eyes were pure wolf, gold and furious, and his jaw was set like he’d bite through the Citadel itself to get out. He shoved me and Aria behind him, a wall of muscle and fury.
“Stay back,” he growled.
The thing didn’t move. It didn’t need to. It just stood in the broken doorway, seven feet of cracked obsidian and molten red veins, fire pits for eyes locked onto Aria like she was the only thing in the world.
_You
