Chapter 12 · The Lock He Left Behind

The second heartbeat didn't stop.

Cole pressed his bleeding palm against his coat and felt the rhythm through the stone under his boots. Steady. Slow. Like something huge had been holding its breath for years and finally remembered how to pull air.

The runes along the walls pulsed with it. White light, then gold, then something close to red. The cracks between the stones leaked that same light, and Cole could taste copper in the back of his throat. Not from his own blood. From the air.

"We need to move." Ivy's voice cut through the hum building in his ears. She was already stepping back from the altar, her eyes on the archway behind the Taker. The one they'd passed on the way in. "Now."

The Taker hadn't moved. It stood exactly where it had been when Cole's blood hit the ground, head tilted like it was listening to something neither of them could hear. Its shape flickered once—almost human, then not, then back again.

Cole didn't wait for it to decide. He grabbed Ivy's wrist and pulled her toward the archway.

The passage beyond was narrow.