Daniela stumbled forward, dragged by some invisible hook lodged deep behind her ribs. She tried to fight it—God, she tried—but her legs moved on their own, carrying her into the room thick with old breath and rotting prayers.
The circle pulsed, alive in ways it never should have been. Veins of light and rot spiderwebbed across the floor, and every beat of its heart synchronized with hers until she wasn't sure if she was moving toward it, or if it was moving into her.
The thing in the center lifted its head.
And smiled.
A mouthful of teeth far too familiar.
"Danalael," it crooned, voice slithering through the cracks in her mind. "Come home."
Memories surged—a child's laughter warping into shrieks, a door slammed shut, hands reaching through firelight, a promise whispered in a language older than grief.
She remembered now.She remembered him.
He wasn't the one they tried to lock away.
He was the one they left behind.
The sacrifice wasn't a sealing.
It was a tether.
