The world shattered.

  The moment Korrak seized Rylana by the throat, the chamber collapsed into madness.

  The torches guttered out. The cold flames snuffed in an instant, plunging the temple into unnatural darkness. The scent of perfume and honeyed myrrh twisted, curdling into something foul, something rancid and rotten, as if the walls themselves had begun to decay from the inside out.

  And the shadows moved.

  Not as they had before—not simply shifting under the flicker of firelight.

  They came alive.

  Tendrils of pure blackness unfurled from the corners of the room, curling across the walls like creeping vines, pulsing with a hideous life. They slithered forward, reaching for him, their edges writhing like grasping fingers.

  And Rylana?

  She laughed.

  Even as his hand tightened around her throat, even as his fingers pressed into her too-warm flesh, she laughed.

  Low. Breathless. Thrilled.

  "You should have taken my offer," she whispered, her golden eyes burning even in the dark. "But you—you never could, could you?"

  Korrak bared his teeth, his breath hot and ragged. "I don’t make pacts with corpses."

  She smiled. "Then let’s see who buries who."

  The shadows struck.

  Korrak barely moved in time.

  One of the tendrils lashed out, striking the stone where he had stood moments before, splitting the floor apart like brittle ice. Fragments of ancient rock sprayed into the air, and from the gash in the earth, something pulsed.

  Something old.

  Something hungry.

  Korrak rolled aside, his body still screaming from Gorthak’s bruises, his muscles aching with exhaustion. But pain was nothing. He had fought through worse. He had bled through worse.

  And he would kill through worse.

  He drew his sword.

  Steel sang in the dark.

  But the shadows kept coming.

  They lashed forward, some striking like whips, others clawing at the air, their edges alive with writhing mouths and hollow, whispering voices.

  Korrak moved between them, his blade flashing, cutting through their shifting forms. Each time the steel met the dark,the tendrils screeched, recoiling back, momentarily banished—but never destroyed.

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  They kept reforming.

  Kept coming.

  And at the center of it all, Rylana stood untouched.

  She did not command the shadows.

  She was them.

  Korrak’s jaw tightened.

  "You were never here to stop me," he growled. His blade deflected another strike, sparks flying as the tendril scraped across the steel before retreating.

  Rylana tilted her head, that ever-present smirk still playing on her lips.

  "No," she admitted. "I was here to slow you."

  The shadows lurched all at once, forcing him backward—toward the altar.

  Toward the Gjallarbrand.

  Korrak’s eyes flicked toward the blade, still resting on the cracked stone, gleaming with an unnatural glow.

  The whispers in his skull grew louder.

  We are waiting.

  We are fire.

  Take us.

  The air thickened.

  The ground shifted.

  And then Korrak saw it.

  Not just the altar.

  But what lay beneath it.

  A second burial slab, hidden below the first, buried in chains of black iron, pulsing with veins of living dark.

  It was breaking apart.

  Korrak’s breath hitched.

  "You didn’t come to kill me," he murmured, realization dawning. His gaze snapped back to Rylana. "You came to keep me here. To keep me occupied."

  Her smile widened.

  And then—the chains snapped.

  The temple shuddered.

  A deep, terrible noise rumbled from beneath the stone. A sound that was not sound. A noise that came from the bones of the world, vibrating through the walls, the pillars, the shattered runes beneath his feet.

  Something was waking up.

  Something older than Velros.

  Older than the gods themselves.

  Rylana let out a shuddering breath, golden eyes rolling back for a moment as power flooded the chamber.

  "Finally," she whispered.

  The altar split.

  Darkness erupted.

  It was not smoke.

  Not fire.

  It was the abyss.

  A formless wound in the world, writhing, pulsing, its tendrils lashing against reality itself, trying to unmake everything it touched.

  The temple began to fall apart.

  And Korrak knew—if he didn’t take the sword now, it would be lost.

  He moved.

  Fast.

  The moment his fingers closed around the Gjallarbrand’s hilt, the world exploded.

  Fire.

  Not the flickering light of torches.

  Not the cruel, blue-tinted flame of sorcery.

  This was something else.

  Something ancient.

  Something that burned with the voices of the dead.

  The moment Korrak grasped the hilt, the Gjallarbrand awoke.

  We are with you.

  We are fire.

  We are the blade.

  Heat rushed through his body, not burning, but searing. Branding. His muscles locked, his breath caught in his throatas the sword became part of him.

  And the abyss howled.

  Rylana let out a sharp gasp, stumbling back, her eyes wide for the first time. "No," she breathed. "No, you weren’t supposed to—"

  Korrak moved.

  The Gjallarbrand sang.

  The fire rushed outward, cutting through the shadows like a scythe through wheat.

  The abyss recoiled.

  Rylana screamed.

  Korrak did not stop. He surged forward, the blade wreathed in white fire, cleaving through the tendrils that still clawed toward him.

  The shadows burned.

  The abyss reeled.

  And for the first time—Rylana looked afraid.

  The temple was falling now, the ground cracking beneath them, the abyss spreading, seeking something to devour, to cling to.

  Rylana was staggering backward, breathing hard, bleeding now.

  "You bastard," she whispered, her voice ragged. "You don’t even know what you’ve done."

  Korrak stepped toward her, his sword still burning, his breath still heavy.

  "I ended this," he growled.

  Rylana let out a breathless laugh.

  And behind her, something moved.

  Not her.

  Not the shadows.

  Something bigger.

  Something pulling itself from the pit.

  Korrak felt it before he saw it.

  A presence that did not belong in this world.

  His breath came slow and sharp.

  This was not over.

  Not yet.