The Serpent-Coil's shadow swallowed the sun whole. Its treads — living serpents fused to iron the size of freight trains — ground bone into black powder that smoked and whispered when stepped on. Farren slipped through a vent in the beast's underbelly, Cherina clinging to his back, Sable ghosting ahead with silent paws. The jackal tooth pendant had shattered hours ago; her song now pulsed raw through the metal walls, a heartbeat that made the entire fortress feel alive.
Inside, the soul-forge roared like a furnace of hell. A cavern of heat and screams. Children — no older than twelve — were chained to anvils of blackened steel. They hammered soul-iron into bells with mallets of bone and circuit. Each strike rang with a stolen voice: high-pitched wails, low guttural moans, pleading whispers. Sparks of violet magic arced between hammer and bell, searing flesh. The air tasted of blood, oil, and burnt memory. Sweat evaporated before it could fall.
A girl — Lira, owl-fused — whispered from a cage of crystal and bone: "They take voices. Make bells. Yours next." Her eyes were hollow sockets glowing amber; feathers matted with oil and blood. One wing hung broken, feathers singed. Her beak clicked when she spoke.
Farren cut her free with the plasma sword. The blade's runes flared white-hot: FREE. Lira's talons clicked on the grate as she led them through steam pipes that hissed like dying snakes. The forge's heat pressed against their skin like a living thing. Cherina's song vibrated in the metal — felt more than heard. It made the bells in the distance ring back in sympathy.
They reached the resonator core — a chamber thirty feet high, walls of crystal and bone. A bell of living glass hung at its center, veins of light crawling across its surface like living code. It pulsed with Cherina's song. The air sang back. Every note made the bell grow brighter, hungrier.
Guards poured in: serpent-priests with diamondback coils for legs, fangs dripping venom that ate through steel. Their scales glinted like oil under the forge-light. Farren's last bullet — FAMILY — detonated mid-air into a sigil of violet fire. The blast collapsed a wall in a rain of debris and screams. They escaped into the Coil's underbelly — a labyrinth of pipes, screams echoing like ghosts in a tin can.
Lira scratched a map into her arm with a claw: the core was guarded by Prime — the clone. "He waits," she rasped. "With the bell. It's almost ready. One more voice."
Farren's revolver was empty. He etched new runes with blood from his palm: HOPE. WILL. FURY. CHERINA. The plasma sword drank it, edge glowing brighter, hungry. Sable's Rift-mark spread — gold veins crawling up the lynx's neck, into its eyes.
Cherina's song grew louder. The walls trembled. Pipes burst with steam. Bells in the forge rang in sympathy. Children looked up — eyes wide, mouths open in silent screams. One boy dropped his hammer. It rang like a funeral bell.
Farren kissed her forehead. "We're not done, Cheri."
They moved deeper. The requiem was building. The forge's heat pressed harder. Lira's wings twitched. "Hurry," she whispered. "The bell hungers."
Farren's duster smoked. Sable's claws left sparks. Cherina's song cracked the air — a single pure note that made the crystal bell ring back. The Coil shuddered. Somewhere ahead, Prime waited.
Farren reloaded with blood-runes. WILL. FURY. CHERINA.
They ran. The final bell waited. The requiem was building to its crescendo. The forge itself seemed to breathe.