The column of light pulsed above the altar, but Lucian didn’t reach for it.

Not yet.

He had learned patience in the Springs, in the long hours of meditation that felt like doing nothing until they felt like everything. The pendant wasn’t going anywhere. The ruin, however, was very likely to kill them if he moved too fast.

Behind him, Cora watched the entrance. Margie watched the walls. And beside them, leaning against a broken column, was the reason Alistair had insisted on sending backup.

Her name was Drusilla. She was old—older than Alistair, older than Margaret, older than anyone on the team had ever met. Her hair was white, her face lined, her eyes pale with the kind of sight that came from decades of hunting things that shouldn’t exist. She was a scholar of the Old Bloods, one of the few remaining experts on races that had vanished before the Veil was even a concept.

Alistair had called her a consultant. The team had called her a mystery.

She hadn’t spoken since they surfaced.

Now she pushed off from the column and walked toward the altar, her footsteps silent on the ancient stone. Her eyes traced the carvings on the walls—sea creatures with too many limbs, symbols that predated any human language.

"Atlanteans," she said. Her voice was dry, like old paper. "They didn’t just live underwater. They were the water. Or thought they were. The distinction mattered to them."

Cora kept her sword drawn. "Are they still around?"

"The Old Bloods? Some. The Atlanteans retreated to the deep trenches after the First Crossers came. They didn’t want to fight. They didn’t want to flee. They just wanted to be left alone." Drusilla touched a carving—a spiral of waves and teeth. "This ruin is a temple. Not for worship. For sealing."

Margie frowned. "Sealing what?"

"Things they didn’t want coming back."

The floor trembled.

Lucian straightened. "We need to move."

---

The first trap activated when Cora stepped on a tile that looked exactly like all the other tiles.

Water erupted from the walls—not a flood, but pressure. Crushing pressure, like the weight of the ocean had been compressed into a single point and aimed at her chest.

She phased.

The water passed through her, but the force behind it didn’t. It slammed into the column behind her, cracking the stone.

"Phasing doesn’t block pressure," Drusilla said calmly. "You’d know that if you’d studied Old Blood architecture."

Cora glared at her. "A little warning would have been nice."

"I’m warning you now."

The floor trembled again. More tiles shifted. Water began to pool at their feet.

Lucian moved to the front. His eyes scanned the path ahead—the symbols on the walls, the gaps in the stone, the faint glow of something waiting.

"The pressure traps are triggered by weight," he said. "Stay in my footsteps."

"And if we don’t?" Margie asked.

"Then you’re on your own."

He walked. Cora followed. Margie came after. Drusilla brought up the rear, her pace unhurried, like she’d done this a hundred times.

The corridor opened into a larger chamber.

Statues lined the walls—Atlantean warriors, their faces stern, their hands raised. In the center of the room, a stone door blocked the way forward. It was massive, covered in runes that glowed faintly blue.

Margie stepped toward it.

Lucian grabbed her arm. "Wait."

"I can break it."

"It’s warded. Break it wrong, and the room floods."

She pulled her arm free. "Then break it right."

She placed her hands on the door. Her demonic strength surged—not enough to crack the stone, but enough to make the runes flicker. The glow shifted from blue to red.

Drusilla’s voice was sharp. "Stop."

Margie didn’t.

The runes flared. The walls groaned. Water began to seep through the cracks in the stone.

Lucian moved.

He knelt beside the door, his fingers tracing the runes. They were old, older than anything he’d seen in the Keep’s archives. But the logic was the same—input, output, consequence. He found the seal, the binding, the point where the magic was weakest.

He pressed his palm against it.

The runes went dark.

The water stopped.

Margie stared at him. "How did you do that?"

"I read."

She didn’t ask what he’d read. She didn’t want to know.

---

The stone door didn’t open.

It dissolved.

The stone crumbled into sand, then dust, then nothing. Beyond it was another chamber—smaller, darker, lined with shelves of clay tablets and ceramic jars. The walls were covered in paintings: Atlanteans building cities beneath the waves, Atlanteans fighting creatures with too many teeth, Atlanteans kneeling before a figure made of light.

Drusilla walked to the nearest painting. Her fingers hovered over the figure.

"The First Crossers," she said. "Not the ones you know. The ones before. The ones who taught the Atlanteans to build wards."

Cora stepped closer. "I thought the First Crossers were demons."

"Those were the second wave. The first wave were... different. Older. They didn’t want to conquer. They wanted to observe." Drusilla’s voice was distant. "The Atlanteans learned from them. Sealing. Warding. The art of keeping things out."

"Or keeping things in," Lucian said.

"Yes. That too."

A grinding sound echoed through the chamber.

The shelves began to move. Not sliding—rotating. The clay tablets shifted, revealing passages behind them. From those passages came shapes—humanoid, but not human. Stone bodies. Crystal eyes. Guardian constructs, carved in the image of Atlantean warriors.

They raised their weapons.

Cora phased. Her sword cut through the first construct’s chest, but the stone didn’t break. Her blade stuck.

"They’re warded against normal steel," Drusilla said.

"Great." Cora pulled her sword free. "What are they warded against?"

Lucian drew his twin blades. Star-steel and silver. The constructs paused.

"They recognize that," Margie said.

"They should."

He moved. 𝓯𝓻𝒆𝙚𝒘𝓮𝙗𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝒍.𝙘𝓸𝙢

His first strike shattered a construct’s arm. His second took off its head. The stone crumbled, but the crystal eyes kept glowing. The construct kept moving.

"Aim for the crystals," Drusilla said.

Lucian adjusted. His blade found the eye socket, pierced the crystal, and the construct fell apart.

Cora copied him. Her sword was slower, but she was faster. She phased through a construct’s guard, stabbed it in the face, and moved to the next.

Margie engaged a construct with her bare hands. Her demonic strength cracked the stone, but the construct grabbed her wrist. Squeezed. She hissed, pulled free, and drove her knee into its chest. The stone cracked again. She hit it again. And again. The construct crumbled.

"Behind you!" Cora shouted.

Another construct lunged at Lucian from the shadows. He didn’t turn. His left blade came up, caught the stone hand, and his right blade pierced the crystal eye.

The construct fell.

The last one paused. Its crystal eyes flickered. Then it turned and retreated into the passage, disappearing into the dark.

Lucian didn’t chase.

"The pendant," he said. "We need to keep moving."

Cora sheathed her sword. "Those things are going to come back."

"Then we’ll be ready."

Drusilla walked to the far wall, where a final painting showed the pendant—floating above an altar, surrounded by Atlantean priests.

"This is the inner chamber," she said. "The pendant is close."

Lucian looked at the passage ahead.

"Then let’s finish this."