She looks up and around in an effort to throw off the oppressive sense of cringing. The stone reliefs seem to burn, so near are they to the encased light, so stark and immediate. Hunters wrestling lions, shepherds balancing lambs upon shields, on and on, all struck speechless in the stone of ages. The illumination crosses a lip; the ancient vignettes fall away, as though over inverted cliffs. They have come to another great chamber, not as vast as the Repositorium, but great enough. The air seems cold and graceful.

They rope from the narrow hall, gather in milling clots, gawking at this latest wonder. Their mules bray and tremble for exhaustion. One collapses amid echoing curses.

The columns are square, panelled in more animal manifolds, and even though she can see only the lower and outer limits of them, she knows they form great aisles across the darkness, that the company stands in some underworld forum or agora. Achamian is leaning against his knees next to her, staring into his shadow, mustering the spit to swallow. His teeth bared in exhaustion, he bends his head back, looks to the looming gallery.

“The High Halls,” he gasps. “The High Halls of Mû—”

Haroooooooooooooom!

Men twist and whirl about. The dust shivers. The sound seems to filter, to rise, as though they can only hear what mounts the surface of their ears. Sranc horns.

They feel it in their teeth—not so much an ache as a taste.

Never before has she heard them, and now she understands their antique power, the madness that saw mothers strangle their own children in besieged cities of yore. Their depth is tidal in its compass, yet riddled with thin and piercing notes, like a shriek unbraided into wincing threads, each towed wide across the unnameable. A portent hangs within them, a promise of what is other and impenetrable, of things that would glory in her lament. They remind her of her humanity the way burnt edges speak of fire.

Temple silence rises in their wake. There is a distant sound—like leaves skidding over marble flagstones. It seems to tighten her skin to the prick of moments passing.

Cleric calls, and they follow. They leave the fallen mule where it lays grunting.

They run, but the slow succession of pillars seems to diminish their pace. Their arcane lights throw shadows that swing and sweep out with monumental elegance. The greater blackness hangs from them, shrouding the hollows beyond the adjacent aisles.