Chapter 211: Glass Thrones
The bells of Seraphim’s Hold tolled once every hundred heartbeats.
A slow, deliberate clang of silver and soulsteel that echoed through the temple city’s hollow corridors.
The Great Church rose like a mountain in the heart of the city, layered in obsidian and pearl, veins of golden sigils pulsing faintly beneath its skin. Light did not merely shine here—it was forced. Bent through stained panes and mirrored halls until every shadow was branded.
No birds circled the spires. No wind touched its heights. The air was too still. Too watched.
And below the main altar, in a room deeper than the sanctified tombs, three voices spoke behind a door that did not exist.
The chamber had no windows. No visible entrance. Its walls were lined with inscriptions of the Old Light—runic tongues too old to name.
The only furniture was a black glass table shaped like a sundial, though no light touched it.
Cardinal Varlen sat hunched forward, his robes hanging loose on a frame once battle-thick. His hands were stained with ink, scarred from divine branding. He looked tired, and worse—uncertain.
Across from him, Cardinal Mavrek stood with arms folded. He was younger by decades, but fire curled in his eyes like a man born during the burning of a city.
His robes were tighter, ceremonial armor beneath them, sunburst chain gleaming at his throat. Every word he spoke came with venom, but measured venom.
He’d practiced this hatred.