The cold hit them first.
The moment the great cracked orb turned fully toward the family, the frozen-night walls of the chamber seemed to lean inward, and the warmth of thirteen living bodies began, subtly, to bleed away into the dark.
"It is pulling from us," Sameira said sharply, her lantern already flaring against the draw. "The way the Concourse fed on fear. This thing feeds on warmth itself."
[ The Hollow Star. ]
[ A dying guardian, feeding on what still burns to keep from going dark. ]
"Then we do not let it feed slowly," Erix said, his amber eyes already spreading wide across the vast chamber, marking the orb's every cracked seam. "Formation. Do not let it pull you in alone."
The Hollow Star answered before anyone could move further, and the silver light-channels threading the chamber floor flared bright all at once, feeding straight up into the orb's cracked shell.
It split.
