A breath of air escaped the widening gap — not wind, but something alive. It carried the scent of burnt parchment and iron, and with it came a sound that made Lyra step back: a low, resonant hum, like a tuning fork struck against bone.

“Kael.” Her voice had lost its whisper. “Close it.”

But the runes were already dissolving, their light bleeding from blue to a deep, arterial red. The summoning circle on the door fractured and reformed, each new configuration more complex than the last, as if whatever lay beyond was rewriting the wards from the inside.

Kael drew his hand back. His palm was marked now — a faint sigil burned into the skin, still warm. He recognized it from the Archon's journal: the Seal of Witness. Whoever touched the door when the wards broke became bound to what emerged. Not a summoner. A keeper.

The door swung fully open, and the darkness beyond was absolute — not the absence of light, but the active consumption of it. Shadows pooled at the threshold like liquid, testing the edges of the doorway as if remembering how to move.

Then a voice, thin and ancient, threaded through the hum: “You are not the one who locked this door.”