The silence that followed the echoes' destruction should have been peaceful. Selena stood beside Dante, breathing in the clean air, feeling the crimson lightning settling into a steady hum beneath her skin. They had refused every temptation, shattered every throne, silenced every voice that had begged them to accept power. It should have been over.
Then the ground beneath them split open.
Not a crack or fissure, but a deliberate rending, as if invisible hands were tearing reality apart at the seams. Cold air rushed up from the gap, carrying with it a smell that made Selena's stomach turn—not the corruption of the marrow, but something older, something that existed outside the normal flow of time. Through her link with Dante, she felt his recognition and his dread.
"The Rift," he whispered. "I thought it was sealed."
