The door groaned shut behind them with a finality that reverberated through their bones. The sound ricocheted across the vast space before dissolving into a silence so thick it felt almost tangible, almost alive.
Elijah and Chloe stood frozen at the threshold, their eyes struggling—and failing—to make sense of what lay before them.
The building was a cathedral. Not to any god they recognized, but to the sigil itself. This wasn't mere decoration or religious fervor taken too far. No, the very bones of the structure were an act of architectural blasphemy, a love letter written in impossible geometry to something that should never be worshipped.
The walls weren't constructed from brick or plaster or any material Chloe had ever seen. Instead, they were formed from a seamless, matte-black substance that seemed to devour what little light dared approach it. Etched into this void-surface—covering every single inch from floor to the impossibly high ceiling—was the symbol. But "etched" was too gentle a word. These weren't painted lines or carved decorations. They were inset so deeply, so precisely, that each stroke looked like a crack leading to some deeper darkness beyond. The three-sided triangle of sutured eyes formed the repeating structural pattern across every surface, a nightmare tessellation that the eye couldn't help but follow, even as the mind recoiled.
And there was something worse. From the corners of each carved eye, slender channels had been grooved into the walls themselves. Through these channels flowed a viscous, obsidian fluid in a silent, perpetual circuit that defied every law of physics Chloe had ever learned. The liquid climbed upward as easily as it dripped down, a living, ink-black circulatory system that turned the entire building into something organic. Something that breathed and pulsed with hideous life.
The floor beneath their feet was a single, massive rendition of the concentric inverted spiral. It had been laid in tiles of dark, blood-red stone that gleamed with a wet sheen, as if freshly washed—or worse, freshly fed. To stand on it was to feel a subtle but undeniable pull, as if the spiral itself was a drain and they were standing at the edge of something vast and hungry, waiting to swallow them whole. At the very center of the spiral, directly beneath the apex of the ceiling, was what she could only think of as the Open Void—a circular section of floor that wasn't stone or tile or anything material at all. It was a pool of absolute blackness, so complete that it didn't merely fail to reflect light. It consumed it, obliterated it, a flat two-dimensional hole punched straight through reality itself.
But it was the ceiling that made Chloe's breath catch in her throat and refuse to come out.
The ceiling was the six-fingered handprint.
It had been rendered in some kind of luminescent, ghostly material that cast the entire chamber in its sickly, pulsating glow. The fingers—one too many, each far too long—stretched across the vault like the skeletal remains of something massive and ancient. The elongated claws at their tips seemed to scrape at the corners of the room, as if trying to tear through to something beyond. The palm, positioned directly over the void in the floor, pulsed with that same slow, dying heartbeat rhythm she'd felt outside.
Thump… thump… thump.
From the center of this luminous palm descended a chandelier, though calling it such felt like an insult to every chandelier that had ever graced a ballroom or mansion. This was a cascade of jagged, crystalline shards, each one capturing and refracting the handprint's glow into the deep, pervasive reddish hue that saturated the air like a fog of dried blood. The light didn't fall naturally. It hung there, suspended, a bloody mist that made the air feel solid and cloying, difficult to breathe.
The realization hit Chloe like a physical blow: this was no abandoned warehouse. This was a sacred space. A profane temple. A shrine built by a true believer in an Architect of Unmaking.
Elijah's expression was unreadable, his features carved from the same stone as the floor beneath them. He released Chloe's hand—she hadn't even realized he'd still been holding it—and brought his own up to his chin. His thumb stroked slowly along the line of his jaw as his eyes tracked the flowing black channels in the walls, ascended the impossible fingers stretching across the ceiling, and finally came to rest on the abyssal pool at the room's heart.
His internal thoughts were a silent, focused hum of analysis: Not a trap. Or not just a trap. A shrine. A stage that's been set with meticulous care. We're not prey here. We're… participants. Players in someone else's production. So what's the play? What comes next? What's the script we're supposed to follow?
Chloe's heart was a frantic bird hurling itself against the cage of her ribs, desperate for escape. The sheer scale of the devotion on display here, the chilling precision of every carved eye and flowing channel, dwarfed the fear she'd felt standing outside. This wasn't the work of a madman scribbling symbols on walls in the grip of delusion. This was the work of a scholar of the abyss, someone who had studied and understood and dedicated themselves completely to something terrible.
Regret flooded her mouth with a taste like copper and bile.
Why did I listen? Why did we come here? Stupid, stupid, STUPID! Aubrey sent us to a… a church for that thing! Is this the Grey Accord she was talking about? Is this the first landing place? Oh god, oh god, we just walked right in. We walked right into a trap and closed the door behind us like obedient little—
Tap.
The sound was soft—just leather sole on stone—but in the consuming silence of the cathedral, it cracked through the air like a gunshot.
Both of them snapped to attention, their bodies going rigid. Elijah dropped his hand from his chin, his posture shifting into something lower, more ready, coiled like a spring. Chloe instinctively stepped closer to him, her breath held so tight in her chest it burned.
Tap. Tap-tap.
Footsteps. Slow and measured, echoing in the cavernous space with deliberate precision. They came from the far side of the chamber, beyond the central void, where the bloody light and deep shadows conspired to hide everything in layers of crimson darkness.
A figure resolved itself from the gloom. Just an outline at first, backlit by a secondary, softer red glow emanating from an archway they hadn't noticed before. A feminine silhouette. The cut of a tailored skirt, the swing of hair around shoulders, the gait of someone who belonged in boardrooms and fundraising galas.
Chloe's breath escaped in a rush of confused, desperate relief. "Aubrey?" The name came out as a plea, a prayer.
The figure took several more steps into the fuller light of the chandelier. The reddish hue softened her features, blurred the edges of reality. For one beautiful, hopeful moment, Chloe's brain clung to the shape, willing it with everything she had to be her friend, to be someone who could explain all of this away.
Then the woman stepped fully into a pool of clearer light, and hope shattered like glass.
It wasn't Aubrey.
The face was sharper, more angular, the eyes wider and set with a perpetual, knowing amusement that Aubrey had never possessed. The hair was a shade darker, cut in a sleek bob that spoke of expensive salons and standing appointments, not Aubrey's practical ponytail that always looked like an afterthought. She wore a cream-colored blouse and a grey pencil skirt that looked almost obscenely normal against the hellish backdrop, like a business woman who'd taken a very wrong turn on her way to a meeting.
Chloe's mind stuttered over itself, trying to process what her eyes were telling her. "V… Vivian?" The name came out barely above a whisper, wrapped in confusion.
Vivian Wycliffe stood perfectly still for a moment, her own expression one of profound disturbance. Her lips parted in shock, her eyes wide and glazed with something that looked like barely-controlled panic. Then, as if recognizing a lifeline in the middle of a shipwreck, her face transformed completely. A brilliant, almost manic smile broke through the fear like sunlight through storm clouds.
"Chloe? Chloe Halvern? Oh my god!" She rushed forward, her heels clicking a rapid staccato on the spiral floor that echoed wrong in the space, and enveloped Chloe in a tight, perfumed hug that smelled of lavender and desperation. "What are you doing here? I've never been so terrified in my entire life!"
Chloe stood stiffly, arms hanging uselessly at her sides, too bewildered to even think about returning the embrace. Over Vivian's shoulder, she could see Elijah watching the exchange with narrowed eyes, his gaze scanning the shadows behind Vivian like he was expecting something worse to emerge from the darkness at any moment.
Vivian pulled back but kept her hands on Chloe's shoulders, holding her at arm's length. Her smile trembled at the edges, threatening to crack apart. "I don't understand. How did you—? Why are you—?"
"Of all the people I had to encounter in this absolute dump," a new voice drawled from the shadows, lazy and steeped in arrogant annoyance, "it just had to be you. Elijah Marcus Isley."
The voice came from the same archway Vivian had emerged from. A young man swaggered out—there was no other word for that particular walk—with his hands shoved deep into the pockets of an expensive varsity-style jacket that probably cost more than most people's monthly rent. He was in his early twenties, with the build of an athlete who'd recently stopped training quite as hard but hadn't noticed the softening yet. His face was handsome in that petulant, self-assured way that came from never being told "no" in his entire life. He stopped beside Vivian, his gaze locked on Elijah with a mix of contempt and deep, personal irritation.
Elijah's stance didn't change, but his entire focus shifted to the newcomer like a laser finding its target. When he spoke, his voice was flat and utterly devoid of emotion. "Ron Richie Blackwell."
"In the flesh," Richie said, popping his jacket collar in a pointless gesture that somehow managed to convey volumes about his personality. "Though I'd rather be literally anywhere else right now. Even detention with Coach Brennan. Seems you got catfished too, Mr. Isley."
"Catfished?" Chloe found her voice, finally disentangling herself from Vivian's grasp and taking a small step back. "What do you mean, catfished?"
Richie let out a dramatic sigh that would've done a theater major proud, rolling his eyes toward the pulsating handprint ceiling as if seeking patience from whatever dark gods might be listening. "I'm a shooting guard. Crestwood Cougars? Ring any bells? We're actually good, unlike some teams." He paused, clearly expecting recognition that didn't come. "Anyway, two days ago, we absolutely wiped the floor with Northvale. Fifty-two to thirty-eight. I scored twenty-three points. In the locker room after, riding that high, I get a text." His face scrunched up in frustration, the first genuine emotion Chloe had seen from him. "From my father's number. Said he had something major to tell me, couldn't say it over the phone, couldn't risk anyone overhearing it at the house. Told me to come here, to this address. To this…" He gestured around at the nightmare cathedral surrounding them. "…this Satanic locker room from hell."
He threw his hands up in a gesture of supreme exasperation. "So here I am, expecting some kind of serious father-son talk about the family business or college recruitment or whatever. And instead of dear old dad, I find her," he jerked a thumb at Vivian without even looking at her, "wandering around crying in the dark like some kind of horror movie victim. And now you two show up. So someone want to explain what sick game this is?"
Chloe turned to Vivian, hope and confusion warring in her chest. "What about you, Viv? Who contacted you? How did you end up here?"
Vivian's relieved smile vanished as if it had never existed. She looked at Chloe, and her expression closed off completely, transforming into something guarded and deeply suspicious. Her eyes went cold in a way Chloe had never seen before. She didn't answer. She just stared, like Chloe had suddenly become a stranger. Or a threat.
Richie snorted, a sound of dark amusement. "Oh, this is the oddly interesting part, isn't it, Viv?" He took a deliberate step toward Chloe, his voice dropping into a false, conversational tone that dripped with accusation. "The one who called sweet Vivian here into this charming little abode… the one who sent her texts saying it was an emergency, that they needed to meet right away, all very dramatic and urgent…" He paused for effect, his eyes boring into Chloe's. "…turned out to be you, Miss Chloe. Or rather, someone pretending to be you. Texts from your number. Your name in her phone. Your words on the screen."
He crossed his arms, his posture radiating smug certainty. "And since you Halverns have a… let's say, a well-documented family history of pulling odd and frankly criminal stunts on the people of this town, would I be completely wrong to think this is just some sick, rich-girl joke you're playing on all of us? Some kind of twisted entertainment for the bored elite?"
The anger that flooded through Chloe was so sudden and so hot it incinerated every trace of fear in her chest. "First of all," she shot back, her voice cutting through the thick air like a blade, "why would I do this? What possible intention or benefit could I possibly get from luring people to a nightmare temple in the middle of nowhere? Use your brain for something other than a basketball backboard for once!"
Richie's face reddened, but she didn't give him a chance to respond.
"Secondly, I am not Azaqor! I am not my psychotic brother who apparently decorated this place during his spare time! This entire building has 'Azaqor' written all over it in fifty-foot letters of crazy, if you haven't noticed!" She gestured wildly at the walls, at the flowing black channels, at the pulsating ceiling. "And third—and this is the important part—the one who called me and Elijah here was Aubrey! Aubrey Keene! She sent us texts from her number telling us to come to this exact address!"
Vivian's suspicious stare didn't waver. If anything, it intensified. She took a subtle step back, physically aligning herself more with Richie than with Chloe, and the betrayal of that small movement hurt more than Chloe wanted to admit.
Richie opened his mouth to deliver what was sure to be another arrogant retort, but another voice cut him off. This one was calm, analytical, with the measured tone of someone working through a logic puzzle.
"Then if that's true," the voice said from somewhere in the shadows near the wall, "where is this Miss Aubrey? Because she's notably absent from our little gathering."
A young man stepped out from behind one of the flowing obsidian channels, as if he'd been standing there the entire time, just waiting for the right moment to make his presence known. He was dressed in neat geek-chic attire—a graphic tee featuring some obscure reference under an open plaid shirt, dark jeans that actually fit properly, and thick-rimmed spectacles that caught the red light and glinted like mirrors. He had a thoughtful, almost bored expression on his face, but his eyes behind those glasses were sharp and calculating, missing absolutely nothing.
Chloe's surprise was a visible jolt that ran through her entire body. "Marcus? Marcus Saye?"
Marcus Saye—son of Crestwood PD's famously stern Lieutenant Detective Caleb Saye, the man who'd interrogated half the town at one point or another—gave a curt, economical nod of acknowledgment. But his gaze wasn't on Chloe. It was fixed entirely on Elijah.
They stared at each other across the red-lit space, and something passed between them. Something heavy and complicated and unspoken. A brief flicker of mutual recognition, followed immediately by a swift, deliberate walling-off of whatever history existed between them. An odd tension snapped into place in the air, electric and cold, like the moment before lightning strikes.
Marcus broke the stare first, looking back to address the group as a whole. "For me," he said, pushing his glasses up his nose with one finger in a gesture that seemed more habit than necessity, "it was this Elijah fellow here." He gestured loosely in Elijah's direction without actually looking at him. "A call from his number. A voice that sounded… well, close enough. Said we needed to meet, that we had to discuss our… affairs… privately. Somewhere discreet where no one would overhear or interrupt."
He gave a dry, humorless chuckle, and for just a moment, something wounded flashed across his carefully controlled expression. He shook his head slowly. "I should have known a location this theatrical was too much, even for your documented flair for the dramatic, Isley. But I wanted to believe. Foolish of me."
Elijah's flat calm finally cracked, irritation flashing in his eyes like sparks. "That's not true. I was with Chloe the entire time. I didn't call you. I didn't call anyone. I wouldn't—" He stopped himself, his jaw tightening.
"Really?" Marcus's eyebrows arched high above his glasses frames, and he sounded more academically curious than actively accusatory, like a scientist observing an interesting specimen. "That's a simple thing to prove, then. Extraordinarily simple, in fact. Take out your phone. Show us your call history. Show us you didn't place a call to my number at…" He checked his own phone, though Chloe suspected he already knew the exact time. "…8:47 PM last night. Eastern Standard Time. Simple verification."
Elijah stared at him for a long moment, something unreadable passing across his face. Then, slowly, deliberately, he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his phone. He tapped the screen with his thumb. Nothing happened. The screen remained black and lifeless. He pressed the power button, held it down. Still nothing. The screen refused to light up, to show anything at all.
A soft, collective inhale rippled through the group like a wave. The sound of five people all realizing the same terrible thing at exactly the same moment.
Richie frowned, pulling out his own sleek device—probably the latest model, knowing him. "Mine's been dead since I walked in here. Won't even turn on. I thought maybe the battery just drained faster than usual, but…" He pressed buttons, shook it slightly. Nothing.
"Mine too," Vivian whispered, her voice small and frightened in a way that made her sound years younger. "I tried to call for help when I first got here, but it just… died. Right in my hand."
Marcus held up his own phone, and his expression had gone very still. "Full battery when I entered. Checked it right before I walked through that door. Ninety-eight percent charge. Now…" He pressed the power button.
The screen lit up—but not with his home screen or lock screen or anything normal.
It displayed a single, stark image: the three-eyed triangle with the inverted spiral beneath it.
The image glitched as they watched, the spiral seeming to rotate slowly despite being a static image, the sutured eyes blinking open for a fraction of a second to reveal static-filled voids beneath the stitches. Then, without warning, the screen went black and stayed black. Completely dead.
One by one, as if responding to a silent command none of them had heard but all of them understood, they pulled out their own devices. Chloe's hands were shaking as she extracted her phone from her pocket. The screen flickered to life—and showed chaos. A scrambled mess of digital noise, interspersed with fleeting, corrupted glimpses of the sigil appearing and disappearing like subliminal messages. The phone emitted a faint, high-pitched whine that made her teeth ache and her skull throb. Then it died completely, the screen going black with a finality that felt personal. Felt targeted.
This wasn't just dead batteries. This wasn't random electronic failure or poor signal in an old building.
This was violation. This was a precise, targeted silencing. Someone—or something—had reached through the digital world and strangled their connections to the outside, to help, to safety.
In the heavy, suffocating silence that followed this realization, the faint, wet sound of the black fluid flowing through its channels in the walls seemed deafening. The liquid pulsed and moved with grotesque life, and Chloe could swear she heard it whisper as it flowed, though she couldn't make out any words.
The thump… thump… thump from the ceiling hand continued its rhythm, a countdown to something none of them understood but all of them feared.
Without a word, without any conscious decision, they all moved. Elijah, Chloe, Vivian, Richie, Marcus—they each took a step back from each other. Guards that had been half-lowered in the confusion and explanations snapped back up, higher and sharper than before. Eyes that had been examining each other with suspicion now filled with something worse: a dawning, unified dread that looked beyond their small circle to the impossible space surrounding them.
Their eyes scanned the sigil-etched walls that seemed to breathe. The pulsating ceiling with its too-many-fingered hand reaching down toward them. The abyss at the center of the floor that called to them with gravity that shouldn't exist. And finally, each other's suddenly unfamiliar faces, painted in the bloody light, each one a potential enemy or victim or both.
The stage was set with meticulous care. The players were assembled, each one brought here by strings they hadn't seen until now. And the director—the Architect of this Unmaking—had just demonstrated its complete and total control over every aspect of this performance.
The real Trial, it seemed, was about to begin.
And none of them had any idea what role they were meant to play.