Kael reached Velmire at dusk.
The city was a sprawl of iron towers and soot-stained streets, where even the moonlight looked dirty. He wore a hood low, blending with the nameless. Everyone here was chasing something—coin, secrets, or silence.
He was chasing death.
Specifically, the one they called The Warden.
And beneath Velmire, something waited.Hollowrise.
The Old Catacombs – Midnight
Kael found the entrance behind a ruined chapel. A symbol etched into the stone—a serpent coiled around a sun—glowed faintly under moonlight.
He pressed the locket to it.
It clicked.
Stone shifted, and a stairwell spiraled into darkness.
Deep Underground
The catacombs were quiet. Too quiet.
Kael moved silently, every step calculated. The walls whispered. The torches lit themselves. The air was thick with old blood.
Then the voices came.
Not from men.
From masks—lined along the wall like a gallery of the damned. Their hollow eyes followed him.
"Your name is ash," one said.
"You should have died with them," another hissed.
Kael drew his sword. "Not until the last name dies."
He passed the masks.
They screamed in silence.
The Gate of Echoes
At the heart of Hollowrise was a sealed door, black iron with a thousand names scratched into it.
Kael touched one.
Elira Voss.
His wife.
The moment his fingers grazed it, pain surged through him—visions of her, alive, shackled, bleeding.
She was here.
Alive.
A voice boomed behind him.
"I warned them you'd make it this far."
Kael turned slowly.
Veylan stood in the shadows—older, crueler, cloaked in black and gold.
His blade was drawn.
But he wasn't alone.
Behind him, masked figures stepped from the dark—six in total.
The Court of Ghosts.
To be continue...