Not a room anymore.
A grave.
The tunnels close in cold and damp and breathing.
And something ugly and absolute locks into my bones:
I will kill every man down here if that’s the price.
Every scout.Every soldier.Every idiot loyal to a dead king.
I’ll stack them in sacred hallways like a new altar.
Because the collar I wore couldn’t save my soul.
She walks one step behind me, trusting me with her life.
“Stay close,” I murmur, blade low.
“I’m not fucking losing you again.”
The Tunnels: Graveyard of Secrets
The tunnel swallows us the moment we clear the vault.
Cold breathes off the stone like the mouth of something ancient—something that’s been starving in the dark for centuries. Water seeps from the ceiling in fat, irregular drops, each one hitting the floor with a hollow plunk that sounds too much like counting.
Time.Lives.Mistakes.
The walls press tight enough to graze my shoulders if I forget how wide I am with a blade in one hand and Pia one step behindme. The air is damp and old and wrong—like it’s been steeping in prayers that rotted before they ever reached heaven.
I move.
Slow.Measured.
My boots barely whisper across the stone, but my eyes never stop.
Every shadow could be a man.Every echo could be a footstep.Every breath I hear could be a lie.
Pia stays close behind me.
Like she knows I’m the only thing between her and the ground falling out from under her—and she’s daring the world to try.
We walk through stone doorways, finding only darkness. Old catacombs. Storage chambers. Sealed confessionals left behind when the church pretended it had evolved.
No one cleans a place like this.
They just bury the rot deeperand paint crosses over the cracks.
“I didn’t think we’d make it out,” Pia whispers.
Her words don’t echo.
They die where they land.
Good.
Sound is a traitor.
