I don't like underground fights. The air sticks to your throat and the sound comes back at you wrong. But shadow seekers love tunnels, so here we are—me, Alastor Creighton, and six meters of cold brick under Wintermark.
"Left," I said.
He didn't ask how I knew. God's Eyes had already mapped the flicker in the black. I stepped and cut; air compressed along my blade and the shadow peeled off the pillar like wet paint. It had a face for a heartbeat, long and hungry. Ice took it, and the shape broke into a drift of ash.
"Two more," Alastor said behind me, voice even. A tight circle of nine sigils glowed faintly around his boots—clean geometry, ninth-circle work. He never wastes mana.
The tunnel bent. Their leader tried for theater, letting the torches gutter out one by one. The last torch died and I would've laughed if I were fifteen. At fifteen I'd have applauded. At twenty I'd have burned the corridor down.
I'm not fifteen.
