Run: 2026-02-19-01KHT0021A1QXNAGM21DG7DXC4

Stone gave way beneath Aurora’s palm. A haze of scented heat and sugar-smoke uncoiled before her. Heartstone at her throat pulsed. Each beat rattled her ribs. She forced herself forward, blade at her hip biting cold into her side. Nyx melted from shadow into form beside her, voice twisting like wind through dry leaves. Amber light dripped across rolling hills of grapevines and orchard trees heavy with fruit the size of fists. Vines curled into spirals, threading through wrought-iron arches that held lanterns shaped like curled horns. The sky above burned with the color of maturing honey. She inhaled, and something acidic turned her lungs to stone. A single grape split under her thumb. Juice ran in slick rivers down her wrist. She licked the bright tang. Sweet, metallic. Her stomach clenched. “This soil tastes…wrong,” she said. Nyx’s outline wavered. They leaned closer to the fallen grape, sniffing with a hunting hush. Faint violet glow flickered in their eyes. Wind carried a distant burst of laughter, like bells twisting under water. Aurora tracked the sound—farther into the orchard, where the vines grew so thick they formed living walls. She slipped between two trunks scarred with runic grooves, pushing aside a curtain of leaves that rustled like silk. A courtyard lay beyond, the ground strewn with crushed grapes and blackened orange peels. A fountain carved from obsidian sprayed a steady arc of wine the color of old blood. Under its spill, small creatures made of skin and bone knelt and drank, their backs bowed with silent worship. Nyx hovered at her shoulder. Their voice was a breath. “When a realm gluts itself on sin, its veins swell with the sin’s own hunger.” Aurora didn’t answer. She stared at the creatures. Each face was hollowed, hollow as a broken bell. They knelt longer, letting wine pour into open mouths until their eyes rolled back. The sky’s amber glow deepened, shifting to orange-red. Shadows spilled in ribbons across the courtyard. The wind fell silent. She felt the Veil tremor underfoot. Heartstone flared against her chest, a faint inner glow blossoming through its crimson depths. She flicked her fingers along its silver chain, half-dreading what might follow. “Keep moving,” she said, stepping away from the fountain. Nyx drifted beside her, form thinning until only that whisper of a shadow remained. They climbed a low rise, stepping over broken columns wrapped in thorned vines from which dangled plump figs. Each vine pulsed, as though alive, and when Aurora touched one brittle stem it quivered under her fingertips. Across the crest stood a portico. Four marble pillars carved with twisted mouths leaned at odd angles. Beneath them, a bench supported a feast of fruit heaped on leaf-shaped platters wider than a person’s hand. Melons the size of helmets lay alongside pomegranates whose seeds shimmered like garnets. Golden pears spilled their amber juice onto stone. Aurora crouched, tracing a path of spilled liquid. She knelt and tasted a drop. Warm, sticky. A gust rattled leaves overhead. With it came a distant chant, low and rhythmic. Aurora’s pulse jumped. Nyx solidified, every edge sharp. “They prepare for something,” they said. “We should slip past.” She nodded. Her pulse drummed in her ears. She stood, lifted the Fae-Forged Blade from its sheath—moonsilver glinting where it caught the dying light. Always cold to the touch, it felt icier here, as though the dagger itself recoiled from the sunlit haze. They slipped past the table, ghosts through a palace of hunger. Each step echoed on marble. Overhead, birds—huge as eagles, feathers the color of spilt wine—circled, trading cries. A rustle from the vines made Aurora freeze. Sunlight fractured through leaves. She held her breath. A head poked into view—small and round, with beady eyes reflecting the fountain’s bleed-red glow. It disappeared as quickly. She exhaled. “Not all eyes here belong to demons,” Nyx whispered. They rounded a second rise into a grove of orange trees, each one bowed under its own fruit. The wind returned, carrying voices: human, laughter edged with hunger. Aurora stalked forward, teeth bared. She passed beneath twisting boughs and felt the ground shift underfoot, softening like the earth had turned to dough. At the grove’s center, a low stone dais held a dish piled with roasted birds whose plumage gleamed gold. Steam curled off their bodies, releasing a scent of honey and war. Butterflies—wings striped in red and black—fluttered through the steam then folded onto the carcasses, biting at dripping fat. Aurora’s throat clenched. She swallowed. Shadow drifted at her back. Nyx flicked a finger toward a narrow archway beyond the dais. “We go there,” they said. She stepped around the dais. The archway led into a tunnel carved from living rock. The walls pulsed with veins of amber resin. Nomadic lights flickered in pairs, half-candles melted into the stone. Each step down the tunnel drew the sky’s glow into a single point behind her, then cut it away. Darkness pressed in at the edges of her vision. Her foot slipped on something slick. She looked down. A ribbon of deep crimson trailed into the gloom. Blood. “Stay close,” she told Nyx, voice low enough that even the dead ears of this realm wouldn’t catch it. They advanced, every footfall dull as a heartbeat. The tunnel ended at a carved chamber ringed with tables. They gleamed with fresh meat: slabs of crimson flesh stacked like walls. Bone skewers held strips of fat. Each table bore a bowl of thick black sauce that bubbled with a slow hiss. The air here tasted of iron and rot. Aurora felt nausea coil in her gut. She swallowed it back. Nyx glided to the nearest table, fingertips brushing the sauce’s steam. They jerked back as if burned. “It waits,” they whispered. A clatter echoed from the far side of the chamber. Aurora froze. A figure stepped out of shadow: tall, robed in cracked leather stitched with dull metal plates. Horns curled above their shoulders. Their eyes were pits. They carried a ladle the size of a painter’s brush. Without turning, the robed figure spoke into the silence. “Guests,” came a voice like oil pouring. Aurora’s grip tightened on her blade. She backed away toward the tunnel. Nyx materialized beside her. Their shape went rigid. The figure lifted the ladle and flicked it. Sauce dripped across the stone floor in whispered arcs. “Help yourselves,” the voice said. “The feast is endless.” Aurora slid backward. She risked a glance at Nyx. Their mouth opened to shape words but no sound came. She didn’t wait. She spun and ran into the tunnel. Shadows swallowed her. Nyx streaked after her, silhouette streaking like ink in water. They emerged back beneath the arches where the trees bent heavy with fruit. The amber sky pressed in. Aurora’s legs trembled. Heartstone pulsed in irregular bursts, as though begging to break free. She pushed past a cluster of vines. Behind her, the echo of laughter trailed into nothing. She slowed, breathing ragged. Nyx hovered, form coalescing. “We should have left,” Aurora said. Nyx’s gaze drifted toward the distant courtyard, where the wine fountain’s arc still glowed. “A thousand feasts await,” they said. “But only one keeps us here.” She turned to them. Their eyes burned violet. She swallowed. “We go deeper,” she said. They stepped forward again beneath the twisted columns. The vines shivered in a wind they could not feel. Heartstone glowed bright. They walked into silence.