The air in the altar chamber was no longer mere oxygen; it was a pressurized, toxic mixture of ozone, ancient dust, and the metallic, sickly-sweet scent of a soul being unraveled. The space was a vast, subterranean cathedral carved from the obsidian roots of the North, a place forgotten by the sun and the moon alike.
Its walls were etched with the forbidden, blood-stained history of the first wolves—those who had traded their humanity for the hunt. At the absolute center stood the sacrificial altar, a jagged slab of black rock that seemed to drink the very light from the room, stained with the psychic echoes of a thousand years of ritual and despair.
Sienna stood before this monolith, her silhouette small and frantic against the darkness. The Ancient Seal of the Elders was held high above her head, trembling in her grasp.
