The knock came again, low and deliberate, and Evelyn felt the sound travel through the soles of her feet before she fully understood it.
Cassian had frozen beside her.
For a brief second, neither of them moved. The greenhouse around them remained perfectly still, the warm glass walls holding the night in a pale, humid glow. The red vial on the table caught the dim light and gleamed faintly, as if it had heard the sound too. Evelyn's pulse quickened in her throat while the room seemed to lean inward around the two of them.
Cassian glanced down at the floorboards.
The sound had come from beneath them.
Evelyn slowly turned her head toward the planter bed they had already moved aside earlier, the hidden panel sitting neatly over the opening they had discovered. The stone floor under the greenhouse had looked solid enough from above, but now it felt deceptive, as if the whole room had become a lid over something breathing below.
