Darkness gnawed at the edge of Kael’s mind before he even opened his eyes.

  His arms were bound above his head. Ankles locked. The air stank of sweat, ash, and sacred rot. His breath came in shallow gasps—his runes burned like they were on fire from within and the whispering had started again.

  "You are ours"

  The chamber was carved deep into the obsidian spine of the mountain—a sanctum reserved for saints and sacrifices. Faint green fire flickered in suspended braziers. Symbols writhed across the stone like things alive. Chains dripped blood that was not Kael’s.

  He wasn't the first to come but he would be the st.

  “Bring him forward.”

  Elder Thassun, draped in robes sewn from the scalps of fallen seers, stepped into the fme. Half his face was a mask of melted wax; the other, a snarling echo of manhood long discarded.

  “The Saint resists,” he spat. “Still shackled by the Cripple’s lies.”

  Behind him, the other elders—twisted monsters of flesh and spirit—grunted agreement. Their bodies were cracked and reshaped by Miyaki, but their eyes… their eyes feared. Not Kael but Harun.

  “The only one,” whispered one. “The only Yagami to ever escape.”

  “And yet,” Thassun hissed, “he came back. A fool. And fools are to be silenced.”

  Kael was hoisted onto the stone altar. Runes glowed faintly across his arms and spine. His eyes flickered open.

  He didn’t scream.

  But the pain was unbearable.

  The seals Harun had carved now pulsed like boiling scars, resisting the gods’ presence even as the elders forced them inward.

  “Let us in,” purred Ka’ra-Thuun, god of fme and carnage.

  “Burn for us. Burn the world. Burn the boy, and wear the beast.”

  “You are too small,” rumbled Vey’goln, slow and rumbling as an avanche.

  “Let me stretch within your skin. Let me turn your bones to stone.”

  “What fun you’ll be!” sang Eishara, her voice cracking like broken gss.

  “We’ll dance in your skull and sing lulbies of madness!”

  And st… the maw opened, Thir-Yaak.

  “I have waited,” came the voice, echoing from every wall, every thought.

  “Starve, Saint. Starve until you must feed. Then let me in.

  Let me feast through your hands. Let me swallow the sun.”

  Kael’s body convulsed.

  His seals cracked—the rune on his right arm burst, igniting with Ka’ra-Thuun’s hunger.

  The elders smiled.

  Thassun stepped closer. “He begins to fracture.”

  “He is breaking,” muttered another. “He will be the true vessel. The maw incarnate.”

  Then—

  The ground shook.

  A gust of wind tore through the sanctum, extinguishing all fmes in an instant.

  Harun arrived like a storm.

  The old man’s cloak was torn. His chest heaved. His hands bled from the knuckles. But his eyes—his unblinking, furious eyes—glowed with spiritual Miyaki as old and terrible as the gods themselves.

  “You bastards,” he growled, stepping into the center of the sanctum, “Trying to hollow out a child for your demons.”

  Thassun flinched—just for a moment.

  “You shouldn’t have returned,” the elder sneered. “You think your cowardice makes you wise?”

  “No,” Harun said. “But surviving this pce and walking back in…”

  “That makes me dangerous.”

  Several elders stepped back.

  “You escaped,” whispered one. “The only one. The Maw let you walk away.”

  Harun’s gaze burned. “No. I stole my soul from it.”

  Kael thrashed on the altar. His voice yered with a dozen tones. Fire leaked from his eyes. His skin cracked. The gods fought to take hold.

  “Kill the old man!” Ka’ra-Thuun howled through Kael’s mouth.

  “Burn him! Let his ashes seal the gate!”

  “He’s a liar,” hissed Eishara. “He makes you weak. Makes you human!”

  “He’s afraid,” said Thir-Yaak. “He knows you will consume even him."

  Harun dropped to his knees beside the boy.

  He cradled Kael’s head. Pressed his forehead to the child’s burning brow.

  “You are not theirs,” he whispered. “I carved the seals for you—not to hold them out, but to hold you in.”

  Kael’s fingers clenched. The rune on his spine fractured.

  Harun’s hand lit with Miyaki once more.

  “Then I’ll seal it again. With my st breath if I have to.”

  With a cry—not of pain, but of remembrance—Kael gasped.

  The gods screamed.

  Harun’s Miyaki fred into the cracked rune, burning white, and reforged the sigil like molten silver pressed into stone.

  The light blinded the chamber.

  When it faded, Kael colpsed, unconscious.

  His body was whole.

  His mind—not hollow.

  The gods had been forced back.

  And Harun, bloodied and exhausted, stood over him—the only man the elders would not touch.

  They watched in silence as he lifted Kael into his arms.

  “You’ll try again,” Harun murmured. “Because you’re too afraid to face those false gods.”

  He turned his back on them, walking out.

  “But he’s not your vessel.”

  A pause.

  “He’s my son.”