Chapter 105 Chapter 105
Chapter 105 Chapter 105
Continue the Nightfall Investigations series with…
FRACTURE-Beginings-Book 2 (Nightfall Investigations Series)
The supernatural world beneath Seattle is beginning to crack. Ancient factions are moving in the shadows, and the power surrounding Sponsor Echo is growing stronger, and more dangerous.
Cyne Nightfall has spent centuries keeping monsters under control. Now the city itself is starting to break, and the deeper Sponsor’s power awakens, the harder it becomes for Cyne to protect her…from the enemies hunting her and from the darkness inside himself.
The story continues...
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PROLOGUE
The tunnel beneath Seattle hadn’t seen firelight in nearly thirty years. Water dripped steadily from cracked concrete overhead, falling into a rusted drainage grate that led deeper into the dark labyrinth beneath the city. The old service corridor had once carried steam lines between municipal buildings, but time and neglect had turned it into something else entirely. A forgotten place, that was exactly why they used it.
Six figures stood in a loose circle carved into the grime-streaked floor. Their robes brushed the damp ground as they moved slowly around the chalk markings, careful not to disturb the intricate sigils etched into the concrete. At the center of the circle, a shallow iron bowl burned with a thin blue flame that flickered without heat.
The man leading the ritual raised both hands. “Begin.”
His voice echoed through the corridor, low and reverent. The others bowed their heads.
A knife flashed briefly in the firelight, and one by one, they cut their palms, letting the blood drip into the bowl. The flame hissed, for years they had searched. Decades, if one counted the older records. Their order had hunted the anomaly through whispered sightings, broken prophecies, and the scattered remains of rituals that had collapsed before completion. Every attempt had ended the same way. Silence…until now.
The man at the center closed his eyes as the bowl began to glow brighter. “By blood awakened,” he murmured, his voice steady with anticipation. “By the ancient current beneath this city, we call the echo forward.”
The sigils scratched into the concrete began to pulse faintly. A tremor rippled through the corridor, as one of the younger members looked up sharply. “Did you feel that?”
The leader didn’t answer, his attention had shifted to the flame that had changed color. The pale blue fire deepened into something darker, something alive, as if the flame itself had grown curious about the ritual surrounding it.
“Continue,” he ordered.
The circle began chanting. Their voices rose and fell in an ancient rhythm that had been passed down through generations of those who knew the truth hidden beneath Seattle’s streets. Most of the city slept above them, and they had no idea…no idea what moved beneath their feet.
The sigils flared and the iron bowl shuddered violently. For a moment, the flame stretched upward like a reaching hand, then the world snapped.
The fire exploded outward and the circle shattered as several of the robed figures were thrown backward against the tunnel walls. The bowl flipped onto its side, spilling blood across the symbols etched into the floor.
Someone screamed as the leader staggered, barely managing to keep his balance. “What happened?”
No one answered, because something had answered the ritual, just not in the way they expected.
The air in the tunnel thickened suddenly, pressing down on their lungs like the weight of deep water. The lights strung along the corridor flickered once…then burst. Darkness swallowed the passage. For several seconds, the only illumination came from the dying flame rolling across the floor.
One of the cultists crawled backward, panic rising in his voice. “The wards…they’re failing.”
It shouldn’t have been possible as the containment wards had been stable for decades.
The leader’s eyes widened slowly, realization of what had occurred sinking in. Something had triggered the wards…the power they had spent years searching for had already awakened.
The same realization moved through the group like a shockwave and someone whispered, “It’s active.”
“But we haven’t found it yet,” someone else remarked.
The leader knelt beside the overturned bowl, studying the blood spreading across the sigils. The markings had changed, The ritual had answered, not with a location, with a name.
A whisper brushed through the tunnel, so faint it might have been mistaken for wind, but everyone in the circle heard it.
The leader slowly lifted his head. “Do you hear it?” he asked quietly.
The youngest cultist nodded, fear tightening his voice. “Yes.”
“Then say it,” the leader ordered.
The man hesitated. The whisper returned. Clearer this time.
The name carried through the corridor like something alive and the cultist swallowed hard.
“…Echo.”
The leader’s expression hardened. Sponsor Echo. The anomaly had a name, and now that the ritual had awakened the trail, every faction in the supernatural world would begin searching.
Vampires. Cults. Things older than either.
The leader rose slowly to his feet. “Send word,” he ordered.
The remaining members of the circle stared at him.
“To who?” a voice echoed out.
His gaze shifted toward the dark tunnels stretching beneath the city. “To everyone.”
Look for Fracture-Beginings-Book 2 (Nightfall Investigations Series) coming soon