Goran’s black eyes swept over my movement, my stride.
“You walk like him,” he said, glancing at me. “Like Eamon. Same heavy heel. Same way of checking the corners before you turn.”
My throat tightened. “You knew him?”
“I knew them both,” Goran said, facing forward again. “Liora was one of us. The brightest of us. She brought the Archives here when the surface became too dangerous. And Eamon… Eamon was the wall she stood behind.”
He tapped the stone wall of the tunnel.
“I walked this path with them many times. You have his gait, girl. But you have her fire.”
I forced down the lump in my throat. Blood hadn’t forged me, but they had. Even down here, in the dark, my parents had left footprints for me to follow.
We reached the end of the passage. It terminated at a massive, circular blast door. It looked like the entrance to a bank vault built by giants, etched with runes that made my eyes water just looking at them.
Goran stepped up to a rusted iron wheel set into the stone and heaved.
Gears ground within the thick walls. The floor vibrated. The doors groaned open, revealing a vast, cavernous space.
I moved inside and stopped.
It was an atrium the size of a cathedral, carved directly into the bedrock. Walkways crisscrossed high above, lit by amber lanterns that cast long, shifting shadows against the stone.
To my left and right, broad dark archways led into the rock, hinting at a network of chambers branching off the main hall. Directly ahead, at the far end of the hexagonal cavern, a cavernous open archway loomed, leading deeper into the stronghold.
It was a fortress. A city beneath the city.
But it was empty. The quiet was total, speaking of a population that had dwindled to almost nothing.
Except for one figure standing in the centre of the room. She was waiting for us.
She wore a long grey dress, her pale hair loose around her shoulders. Her luminous eyes were fixed on the door.
Aelira.
The City Archivist. The woman who had known and worked with my mother, and the one who had pointed me towards the truth before I could even see it.
I looked at Riven.
The tension drained out of him. He hadn’t known Goran wasleading us to the deep sanctuary, but the sight pulled him back from the brink.
Aelira offered a wistful smile.
“Selene, Riven,” she said. “Welcome.”
She held his gaze, the shared memory of his rescue hanging between them.
“It has been a long time since you stood here with us.”
THIRTY-ONE
Selene
Aelira stood in the centre of the atrium, her hands clasped loosely in front of her. The guise of the City Archivist was gone; she looked like a queen in exile, commanding the silent stone of a buried kingdom.
Riven held his ground near the door, rigid as a sentry. His hand remained white-knuckled on the canvas-wrapped iron box.
“We need answers, Aelira,” he said, his voice rough. “We came for your help.”
