The hollow reeked of smoke, blood, and damp stone. The battle’s echoes had faded hours ago, but the air still trembled as though it remembered the screams. A cold draft crawled in from the shattered tunnels, stirring the black water pooled around the sigil circle.
Kael stood at the heart of that circle, the red light beneath his boots glowing faintly like embers in the dark. The chains coiled loosely around him, some half-submerged in the water, their hooked ends twitching from time to time as if dreaming of the s*******r they had tasted. His gaze was fixed on the shadows that clung to the hollow walls, watching them breathe with the slow rhythm of the cavern itself.
The boy sat by a crumbled pillar with his spear across his lap, shoulders hunched as if the weight of it could keep him st
