The air in the Northern Capital did not carry the warmth of the Southern Dawn. Here, the wind was a whetted blade, smelling of old ice and the iron tang of the Frost-Queen's peaks. But today, the cold felt different. It was not the natural winter of the North; it was a stagnant, soul-deep chill that clung to the throat like a handful of grave-dirt.
The Royal Tomb of the Frost-Queens was a sanctuary of silence, carved directly into the heart of the Iron Mountain. It was a place where the dead were supposed to be anchored by tons of enchanted stone and the eternal vigilance of the Shadow-Sentinels. But as Gwen and Lucien stood at the threshold of the deepest chamber, the silence was broken by the sound of something that should never have happened: the sound of an empty void.
