The seal gave way with a sound like something tearing that had been held too long.
The green vapor from the obsidian shard had been eating into it for less than a minute but the crimson sigil went through three colors — red, violet, gray — before it just came apart. Four centuries. Gone like old glass.
The door ground outward.
Whatever came through it didn't move the way Hades moved. Hades moved like weather. This was different — slower, heavier, the way bedrock moves when it decides to. His robes were the color of volcanic ash and his eyes were the gray of something that had been dead and cold for a very long time. He looked at Jester and said nothing for a moment. Just took in the air. Felt the castle with whatever sense a god uses for that.
