The air was thick with stone dust, every breath scratching against the throat. Ren pressed his palm to the wall for balance as he led the half-dozen younger members deeper into the cavern, his Threads brushing the surfaces ahead for any hint of movement. Behind him, their footsteps dragged - tired, uneven - echoes carrying like whispers that weren’t theirs.

  They had lost sight of the others the moment the quake hit. One instant, the whole expedition was retreating together - Raven’s wards flickering overhead, Sinclair shouting orders - the next, the cavern groaned and the world folded in on itself. Ren remembered shoving someone aside, maybe two someones, just before the dust swallowed everything. When the ringing in his ears finally cleared, all he had left was Leo and a cluster of fresh-faced recruits staring at him like he knew what to do.

  He didn’t. But he couldn’t let them see that.

  “Keep close,” he said, forcing steadiness into his voice. “No stragglers. Hands on the walls. This place wants to split us apart.”

  The passage narrowed into a jagged throat, stalactites drooping like old teeth. One of the younger members - a girl whose name Ren hadn’t caught in the chaos - kept glancing over her shoulder, expecting the swarm to burst from the dark at any second.

  Leo walked at Ren’s side, pale beneath the dust. His hair was matted with grit, his breaths shallow - but his eyes still flickered with restless thought.

  “We can’t just wander blind,” he murmured, low enough only Ren heard. “If Raven and the others think we’re crushed, they’ll - ”

  “They’ll keep moving,” Ren finished. He didn’t want to imagine Raven deciding they were lost causes.

  Leo suddenly stopped, pressing a palm to the wall. That calculating spark lit in his eyes - trouble, every time.

  “I’ve been working on something,” he said. “A communication weave. Not like the Order’s leylines - those need anchors. This is temporary. Fragile. But it might let us reach them… for a moment.”

  Ren frowned. “Fragile how?”

  Leo let out a short, humorless laugh. “Fragile as in it might fry me if I hold it too long.”

  The recruits stiffened behind them. Ren met Leo’s gaze - saw that stubborn determination he recognized too well. The same look Leo had worn when helping Ren master Thread Surge until both of them nearly collapsed.

  “Do it,” Ren said before the group could spiral. “But don’t push past your limit. We need you walking.”

  Leo nodded and drew a deep breath. Blue Threads unfurled from his fingers in trembling arcs, weaving a lattice of sound. The air thrummed, vibrations prickling over Ren’s skin. The weave was unstable from the start - edges fraying, fighting to unravel.

  Then a voice crackled through it.

  “…Leo? No - Ren? Report.”

  Raven. Sharp even distorted.

  The recruits gasped, hope flaring. Ren leaned closer. “We’re alive. Cut off during the collapse. Six with us. Low supplies.”

  The weave flickered. Static blurred Raven’s reply: “Hold position if possible. Don’t overextend. We’ll - ”

  The weave ruptured. Mana snapped like overstressed wire. Leo staggered, clutching his head. Ren caught him before he fell as the recruits surged in, panicked.

  “That’s it,” Leo gasped, sweat streaking the dust. “Couldn’t hold longer.”

  But for several precious seconds, they hadn’t been alone. And it steadied everyone.

  Ren eased Leo against the wall and turned to the recruits. Their faces were still pale, but steadier now. Waiting for orders - his orders.

  “All right,” Ren said, pushing calm into his breath. “You heard her. No wandering, no panic. We keep close, find a safer chamber, and wait for a chance to regroup. Eyes sharp.”

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  The girl who kept checking behind them nodded. A boy tightened his grip on his spear.

  Ren noticed how their gazes settled on him - expectant, anchoring. He felt it like a weight on his ribs. He wasn’t Raven, wasn’t Sinclair, wasn’t meant to lead anyone. But here they were, looking at him like he could hold the cavern up with his bare hands.

  Leo let out a weak, breathless laugh. “You’re better at this than you think.”

  Ren wanted to argue. But instead, he adjusted his pack and started forward. “Come on. Deeper. We find somewhere to rest before this ceiling decides to finish what the quake started.”

  Their footsteps followed - still anxious, but not hollow.

  The cavern pressed on them like a clenched fist.

  Ren had grown used to the heavy underground air - stale, damp, suffocating - but after the collapse, it felt worse. Every drip from the ceiling echoed too loudly. Every scrape of a boot ricocheted down the stone like a warning. Above, the swarm’s muffled vibrations throbbed like a storm, but down here they were blind to everything except their own fear.

  They walked single file, Ren near the middle, Leo toward the rear. The mage leaned heavily on his staff, drained from the communication weave. His veins stood stark under his skin, blue as ink.

  Ren slowed until he matched his pace. “How bad?” he asked quietly.

  Leo offered a thin grin. “Like pulling three all-nighters and then being asked to calculate a thunderstorm’s resonance. I’ve done worse.”

  Ren scowled. “That’s not the comfort you think it is.”

  “Didn’t say it was comforting. Just true.”

  Their conversation cut short when a recruit at the front whispered, “Wait!” His arm shot up.

  Everyone froze.

  Torchlight caught skittering movement - shadows darting over stone faster than eyes could follow. Then came the sound: claws scraping rock. And the stench - sickly rot mixed with damp fur.

  Ren’s gut twisted. He knew that smell.

  A rat lunged from the dark.

  Not a city rat - this thing was the size of a mastiff, fur patchy, eyes milky white. More poured after it, shrieking. The recruits panicked immediately - shouts, shaky spellfire, weapons unsheathed too late.

  “Hold the line!” Ren roared. “Shields front! Casters behind!”

  They stumbled into formation - sloppy, uneven, but better than nothing.

  The first monster slammed into a shield with enough force to nearly bowl its bearer over. Another darted low, claws catching a boy’s leg before Ren intercepted, driving his dagger through its skull. Thick ichor splattered the stone.

  Behind them, Leo fired a concussive blast that flung two more rats back, but their shrieks echoed down every tunnel. More coming.

  Ren could smell panic rising off the recruits like sweat. One of them - Tomas, barely nineteen - broke entirely. His shield slipped from his hands as he staggered back, eyes wide, breath coming in sobs.

  “Too many - too many - we’re going to die - ”

  Ren lunged, grabbing his shoulder before he bolted. “Tomas! Look at me!”

  The boy couldn’t. His eyes snapped everywhere but Ren’s.

  Ren shook him once, hard. “Look at me!”

  Finally, Tomas’s gaze locked onto his, glassy with terror.

  “You’re not dead,” Ren said, tone low, steady. “You hear me? You’re here, and people are counting on you. Pick up your damn shield.”

  “But - ”

  “No buts.” Ren shoved the shield back into his hands. “We get through this together, or not at all. Hold.”

  Tomas swallowed, trembling - but he raised the shield. Just in time for another rat to crash into it. Ren braced him with a firm hand against his back.

  “Good,” Ren muttered. “Stand. Don’t break.”

  The cavern erupted around them - fire spells bursting light across snarling muzzles, Leo’s magic cracking stone, the smell of blood and burning fur choking the air. The rats poured in from every shadowed crack. For every one they killed, two more scuttled forward.

  Golden Threads surged in Ren’s veins, begging to be drawn. He rationed them carefully - bursts of speed, sharper reflexes, precise cuts. Each surge made his bones ache like something inside him was burning down to keep the rest of him moving.

  Minutes dragged on like an hour.

  The recruits slowly found their rhythm. Shields locked tighter. Spells stopped misfiring. Ren’s commands - “Lower your guard! Left! Don’t overreach!” - cut through the chaos and anchored them.

  Leo, pale and swaying, unleashed a final blast large enough to collapse a narrow side-passage. The falling stone bought them a breath of silence.

  And finally - finally - the rats withdrew, squeals fading back into the dark.

  The cavern floor was slick with ichor. Bodies lay in grotesque piles. The metallic stink of it turned Ren’s stomach, but he forced himself up, scanning his people.

  “Injuries?” he called.

  Cuts, bruises, one bad bite - but no deaths.

  Relief hit him hard enough to stagger.

  The recruits looked at him differently now. No longer like he was just some cook dragged along for luck. Not just a Thread-wielder still figuring himself out.

  In that moment, they looked at him the way he once looked at Sinclair.

  Someone who could get them through the dark.

  And Ren realized - with a cold, quiet twist - that now he had to live up to that.