Lucas's head throbbed as the voice dragged him back from unconsciousness.
He blinked up into the face of a ghost.
Short hair. Freckles. A jagged scar down her temple. Her eyes were fierce, pale blue—like ice that learned how to cut.
"Corin?" he whispered.
Corin Vale had been his first ally. A fellow orphan. A runaway who once helped Lucas sabotage an Ashen Veil initiation rite when they were sixteen. He thought she died in the purge that followed—her body never found.
She smirked, extending a hand. "Still slow to get up."
Lucas stared at her in disbelief. "You're supposed to be dead."
"Supposed to be," she echoed. "But I'm not. I've been underground. Watching. Preparing. Waiting for you."
Lucas stood slowly, wiping blood from his face. "You knew I was alive?"
"I felt it," she said. "The night the cathedral burned? Every blood-marked soul in Eastbridge screamed. And one name echoed louder than the rest: Thorne."
Lucas looked away. "I didn't want this."
"Too bad," Corin snapped. "You lit the fire. Now you burn with it."
She turned, leading him into a tunnel carved into the riverbank wall. Inside: lights, weapons, maps, scattered books—all signs of resistance. A surviving network. Corin wasn't just hiding.
She was building an army.
"They call themselves the Hollow Choir," Lucas said, breath fogging in the cold.
"We know," Corin replied. "But they're just one hand. Ephraal has many. And now they're looking for you."
Lucas frowned. "Why me?"
Corin pointed to his chest—at the mark that burned beneath his skin.
"Because you're the last key. The breach you made isn't just a wound. It's a door. And they want you to open it wider."
Lucas went cold.
Malgros whispered: "You are the lock. They want the god inside."