Rhenna’s gut twisted into a knot tighter than any she’d ever wrestled a street thug with. The tiny wooden bird, her only link to a life far removed from this one, gleamed faintly in Ysbel’s spectral grip. Each carved wing feather, each delicate curve of its beak, belonged to a workshop thousands of miles and dimensions away. She wanted the familiar resin-rubbed grain back against her skin. But Vondir. He stood beside her, a spectral aura of dread clinging to him, his hand a cold stone within her own. Surrender him? Never. Not after everything. Not after he’d finally, truly leaned on her.
“Keep it,” Rhenna snarled, her voice a raw rasp, defiance burning in her eyes. “Burn the damn thing. I’m not giving you Vondir.” She tightened her grip on his fingers. He flinched, then squeezed back, his grip surprisingly strong, his eyes fixed on Ysbel with a predatory glint that chilled even Rhenna.
Ysbel’s projected smile didn’t waver, but a sharp edge entered her tone. “Such a shame. And such a foolish choice. Do you truly believe you can win, little brawler?”
“I’ll break you, piece by piece, just like I break everyone else who tries to hurt him,” Rhenna shot back, ignoring the pang of fear. She shoved the image of her burning artifact aside, focusing on the immediate threat. “Now, where are you, you coward? Stop hiding behind cheap illusions.”
Puckio, who had been cowering behind an overturned table, suddenly scrambled up. His gaudy tunic was torn, and dust streaked his powdered face, but his pupils locked onto the far archway. “Illusions, yes! But sound travels! Her voice resonates with a hollow slap, a ring common to the old spell-dampening basalt down in the foundations. If we isolate that tone…” He trailed off, looking uncertain, but his idea sparked a thought in Rhenna.
“You mean you can track her?” Rhenna asked, a flicker of hope igniting. “Through a glorified sound wave?”
Puckio puffed out his chest, a flash of his usual theatricality returning. “A bard’s ears are finely tuned, protector! Every note, every vibration, a story. This particular resonance… it feels like the abandoned Sunken Levels, beneath the main city grid. A hollow of buried secrets and, more importantly, crumbling wards.”
“The Sunken Levels?” Vondir mumbled, his voice hushed. “The legends say that’s where the first Void-weavers were imprisoned, before the city was even built. A place of eternal silence and binding spells.”
Rhenna looked from Puckio to Vondir, then back at the flickering projection of Ysbel, who watched them with an amused, patient air. “Fine. Lead the way, Puckio. And if you get us lost, I’m using your lute for kindling.”
The journey into the city’s underbelly was a descent into an archaic, suffocating gloom. The air grew heavy, thick with the stench of cellar mold and wet lime. Gone were the intricate light-globes of the mid-tiers or the vibrant glow of the upper terraces. Here, only Puckio’s occasional luminous chord from his lute provided a path through the maze of collapsed arches and dead drainpipes. The walls were not of the familiar crystalline rock, but rough-hewn obsidian, scarred with strange, angular runes that seemed to drink the light.
“These markings,” Vondir said, his voice softer than usual, a strange fascination in his eyes as he traced a finger over a particularly intricate glyph. “They’re not merely decorative. They’re residual warding spells, meant to contain… something vast. The very ground vibrates with a suppressed power.” His void-touched hand began to glow, a faint, abyssal hue that thrummed in time with the tremors beneath their boots.
Puckio winced. “The flags carry the vibration. That’s what gives her voice that hollow bite. We’re close, protector; the pitch is sharpening.”
They came to a massive, circular door, etched with symbols deeper than those along the corridor. A lattice of pale violet static drifted across its iron face, designed to ground raw casting. Puckio tried a few sonic vibrations, but the barrier swallowed them without a spark.
“This is it,” Vondir stated, his glowing hand extending. The void clinging to his sleeves flared into an ink-dark tide. He thrust his palm forward, and the shadows bled directly through the barrier, seeking hair-thin stress fractures across the ironwork. The metal squealed, the runes flared violent white, then slagged into gray ash. Vondir gasped, trembling as the valve ground open to reveal a cavernous chamber.
“Vondir!” Rhenna caught his arm as he swayed, his power growing wild, untamed. His skin felt clammy, though heat radiated from his blackened knuckles. Strain thinned his lips as the miasma threatened to slip his control. She didn’t hesitate. Her rough, calloused hand found his, intertwining their fingers, anchoring him. “Easy,” she murmured, her voice uncharacteristically soft, her focus entirely on him. “Just focus on me.”
He met her gaze, pupils blown wide, until recognition softened his features into fierce relief. The chaotic void around him seemed to calm, shrinking back, drawing into the reassuring touch of her skin. He leaned into her, taking a deep, ragged intake of air.
“The central chamber,” Puckio announced, peering inside. “The leyline nexus. Ysbel must be here!”
The chamber was vast, far larger than it had any right to be. The air hummed with dormant power, but it was empty, save for a single, gleaming construct in the very center. It was a sphere of polished Ley-crystal, etched with delicate runes, glowing with a steady, rhythmic amber light. A soft, rhythmic *tick-tick-tick* echoed in the silence.
Rhenna’s eyes narrowed. Too quiet. Too clean. “That’s… not right.”
Before she could finish the thought, Puckio stumbled backward, jaw slack. “Protector, that’s an alchemical fuse! It’s primed!”
Her instincts screamed. Rhenna lunged forward, grabbing Vondir and Puckio, intending to pull them back. But it was too late. The core flared white, its rhythmic clicks cutting out just before a searing flash consumed the floor.
Then came the roar. The stone vault overhead sheared apart, groaning under the sudden blast. Cracks spiderwebbed across the obsidian, and immense slabs of rock began to plummet, kicking up choking clouds of dust and debris. Rhenna threw her body over Vondir, shielding him, her arm instinctively reaching back for Puckio, but the chaos was too overwhelming. A deafening crash erupted as a massive section of the ceiling collapsed directly between them, a wall of falling stone and earth separating her from the others in an instant. Darkness swallowed her, thick and absolute, punctuated only by the fading echo of Puckio’s panicked scream.
She lay sprawled on the cold stone, coughing, the dust burning her lungs. The air was heavy, the silence oppressive. She hauled herself onto her elbows, spitting gravel. Vondir? Puckio? She couldn’t see them, couldn’t hear anything but the ringing in her ears. Cold sweat pricked the back of her neck in the sudden quiet. Then, through the settling grit, a blue luminescence flared. Ysbel. She stood less than ten paces away, her projected form intact, her face serene, eyes alight with a triumphant, unholy mirth. She smiled. A slow, knowing, utterly predatory smile. The rubble behind her formed an unbroken wall of stone, leaving her cut off from both boys.