"Hostile?" Sidhu asked, gripping his knife tighter.
"Maybe. Let's find out."
They approached slowly, weapons sheathed but ready.
Kev called out, voice low and calm. "We're not infected. Not Revenants. We're survivors. We don't want trouble."
A silence.
Then the door creaked open.
A woman stepped out.
She was wrapped in gray cloth, her face obscured by a torn veil. What skin they could see was scarred and pale. One of her eyes glowed faintly blue.
Not Revenant-glow. Something else.
"Show your cores," she said.
Kev blinked. "What?"
"You've killed Revenants. Their cores mark you. I can see it."
Kev slowly unbuttoned his shirt. Around his neck hung a small pouch—within it, the crystalline core of the one Revenant they'd killed back in the Abyssal Burrow. He opened it slightly. The blue glow pulsed faintly.
The woman nodded. "You're clean."
She stepped aside. "Come in. Quietly."
