The path we took felt like it was breathing under our boots.
That faint pulse of pale light running through the black glass wasn't just there anymore — it had a rhythm now, slow and steady, like the Tower had settled into step with us. Every ripple of that glow felt… aware. Like it was recording each move, each breath, each thought.
Liora was just off my shoulder, close enough that I could hear the whisper of her breath between footsteps. She didn't speak, and she didn't need to — I knew she felt it too. The heaviness in the air wasn't just the Tower anymore. Something unseen was here with us, pacing in the dark.
The scythe in my hand gave this low, curious thrum. Not frantic, not warning — just… paying attention. It made my fingers tense a little tighter around the shaft. My gut already knew that hum meant we weren't alone.
"Do you feel that?" I murmured, keeping my voice low.
Her eyes flicked along the warped walls, scanning for anything out of place. "Yeah," she said, quiet but sharp. "Feels like we're not just being followed. Like we're—" she cut herself off, jaw tightening.
"Hunted," I finished.
The corridor bent in ways corridors shouldn't — twisting not just physically, but somehow… in the way light shifted when you stared too long. The reflections on either side of us were wrong again, bending in slow, unnatural waves. Then, just ahead, something moved.
A shape pulled itself out of the shade as if it had been there the entire time, waiting for us to see it. Tall, purposeful. Its presence was steady, deliberate. And the moment I saw the way it stood — calm in a place that swallowed people whole — I knew it wasn't some ordinary monster.
"Zane Valthor," the voice was smooth but carried weight, like it had been saving those words for years. "You've begun to stir the deep places of the Tower."
Hearing my full name out loud here made the air feel colder. I didn't answer right away. My mind was already collecting possibilities, and none of them were good.
Liora's stance tightened — blades angled just so — but I reached out just enough to still her. "Not yet," I said under my breath. This wasn't a swing-first kind of enemy.
He stepped closer, and the shadows peeled with him like they were part of his skin. The moment his face caught a trace of the pale floor-glow, recognition hit like a knife in the ribs.
Cassian.
He was different here. Sharper around the edges. No warmth anywhere in that expression.
"Remember the name," he said. "Because before long, you'll find the Tower isn't the only thing moving against you."
The scythe's hum deepened, sliding hot into my palm, urging. It wanted me to act, to end this before his words found roots. I kept it leashed.
"I know what you were," I said finally.
That half-smile of his sharpened without touching his eyes. "And I know what you still could be. You can keep carrying those broken promises — or you can stop pretending you don't want more."
Liora cut in, her voice cracking with the tension she was holding in. "Enough. Whatever game this is, pick another time to play it."
Cassian held my gaze for another slow second, and then — almost lazily — took a step back.
It didn't feel like a retreat. It felt like him setting the next piece in some game I couldn't see yet.
"This isn't the place for our truth," he said quietly, and then he was gone — dissolving into the dark as if the space had swallowed him whole.
We stood there for a long moment after, the Tower's silence pressing heavier around the gap he left.
We kept walking. Neither of us spoke at first. The Tower's been here long enough to know when you're talking about something worth hearing. And I'd already given it enough tonight.
The floor's faint veins kept pace under our feet, like the Tower was pacing beside us. Every few steps, the whisper of old echoes brushed the walls — almost conversation, almost memory.
"You're thinking too loud," Liora said after a while.
I looked her way. "That a problem?"
"It is when I can tell it's about him." She didn't have to say the name. "Zane… I've seen the way you looked at him. And him at you."
I let the silence carry my answer for a moment. "Cassian is the kind of danger you don't walk toward unless you've planned every step on the way in — and twice on the way out."
Her eyes stayed locked ahead, but her grip on her knives eased slightly.
Ahead, the corridor ended in a door — not like the shimmer we'd passed before, but a physical one. Ancient, scarred, its surface marbled with those same pale veins, all converging at its center like they were bleeding into it.
The scythe's hum shifted again, lower now. Steady. Like it was waiting too.
"You think it's trapped?" Liora asked.
"Everything in this place is trapped," I said. "The trick is figuring out what kind of trap you're willing to spring."
She gave me a look — the one that says give me the bad news first.
"I don't think what's past here cares about doors," I added.
A faint, wry smile tugged at her for half a heartbeat before it was gone.
I stepped closer, letting my palm hover inches from the cold surface. The hum in the scythe synced to my heartbeat — or maybe it was the other way around. The veins glowed a little brighter, like they recognized me.
"Ready?" I asked.
Liora just nodded.
Together, we put our hands to it and pushed.
The air changed instantly.
Cold metal underfoot replaced the glass. The space ahead stretched impossibly far, but you couldn't see where it ended. Shadows here didn't just fall — they bled, running along the ground and up the walls in jagged slashes. It was wrong… and it was waiting.
I tightened my grip on the scythe. I didn't need its hum to know — whatever this floor was, it wasn't going to let us walk through without leaving something behind.
And in the back of my skull, that patient, cold voice whispered again:
Choose.
To be continued.....