Team Umbra ran into the interior of the north path .
Behind them the Red Widow had come down for its feast and found only the floor . Ahead of them , in the dark they were running toward , something the shriek had woken began to move — and they ran anyway , because the thing behind was certain and the thing ahead was only possible , and a team that had survived the Cruentus Heart this long had learned to run toward the possible .
Asp at the front .
The Spirit Naga's pale form moving through the bloodglow-lit dark with the specific economy of a body built for exactly this terrain , the forked tongue reading the air ahead , the blue eyes finding the route before the route announced itself . Behind her the Rite Cleric . Then Rada , with the High Cleric at her side . And Rapax at the rear , still in the Living Darkness — the partial incorporeality holding him between the physical register and the shadow , the rearguard position taken by the one member who could least be caught .
