They didn't fall into darkness.
They fell into *breathing* darkness.
Something alive.
Something moving.
Something *waiting* for them.
The ground opened like a throat, swallowing them whole. Cold air spiraled
around their bodies as they dropped—too fast, too far—until gravity broke
and the world twisted sideways.
Inara screamed.
Irvine grabbed her hand.
But the moment their fingers interlocked, the walls reacted—
veins of black light shot across the stone, branching like ink spreading
across parchment.
The Groom's Mark on Inara blazed.
Irvine's wound flared in response.
The fall stopped so abruptly that Inara's breath punched out of her chest.
They landed—not on rock, but on soft, sinking earth that pulsed beneath
them like muscle.
Inara gasped.
"What… what *is* this place?"
Irvine pushed himself up, panting.
"This is the heart," he whispered hoarsely.
"The altar before the altar."
The chamber around them wasn't carved—it had grown.
Pillars twisted upward like ribs.
Roots hung like chandeliers.
The ceiling loomed so high it disappeared into shadows that oozed down like
liquid smoke.
And on every surface—floor, walls, pillars—
*faces* were carved.
Not human faces.
Screaming faces.
Trapped mid-howl.
Mid-plea.
Mid-sob.
Their mouths open, forming one voiceless chorus of agony.
Inara felt bile rise in her throat.
"Oh God… Irvine… these are—"
"Brides," he finished quietly.
Her blood ran cold.
Brides.
The Groom's brides.
Every woman who'd been dragged into the ritual.
Every soul who didn't escape.
Their faces were preserved here—
forever witnessing the next one to join them.
A whisper slid across the chamber.
Not one voice.
Hundreds.
Layered.
Distorted.
"Inara…"
She staggered backward.
The stone beneath her foot *moved.*
Irvine lunged forward—
yanking her away just before a face on the floor clenched its teeth, trying
to bite her ankle.
She stumbled into Irvine's chest, breath trembling, body shaking.
"I can't— I can't stay in here—"
His arms closed around her.
"I won't let them touch you," he whispered fiercely, even as his own voice
shook.
But the chamber did not care for promises.
It cared for vows.
And as if acknowledging theirs, the walls changed.
The screaming faces shifted—
eyes opening, mouths widening, expressions warping into something worse.
Something hungry.
Inara pressed a hand against the nearest wall.
It was warm.
Too warm.
"Irvine… this place is alive."
He swallowed.
"It's the altar's womb. The ritual grows here."
The words made her shiver uncontrollably.
Then, in the far end of the chamber, a structure emerged from the shadows—
like a stage waiting for the next act.
A staircase.
Carved unevenly from bone-white stone.
Leading up to a dais that resembled a wedding altar.
But twisted.
Warped.
Wrong.
Vines of black lace wrapped around the steps.
Blood dried in patterns resembling veils.
And in the center lay a pedestal—
shaped perfectly to cradle a bride.
Inara's stomach twisted.
"That thing is shaped like—"
"An altar bed," Irvine finished.
He clenched his fists.
"He wants you on it."
A hiss rolled through the chamber.
A cold wind cut across their cheeks.
The Groom did not appear—
but his presence filled every crack, every breath, every heartbeat.
Inara's Mark pulsed violently.
Irvine groaned in pain as the wound across his chest tightened like a
choking hand.
He staggered to one knee.
"Inara—don't come near me—my body—he's—he's trying to—"
She knelt in front of him anyway, grabbing his face with shaking hands.
"I don't care what he's trying. Look at me."
He forced his eyes open.
Pain.
Fear.
But something else—
Focus.
She pressed her forehead gently to his.
"Stay with me. Stay here. Don't let him pull you into his mind."
His breath shook.
"I'm trying," he whispered.
"God, Nara, I'm trying."
The floor shuddered beneath them.
Inara jerked around—
And froze.
The altar bed…
was glowing.
Gold.
Black.
Red.
The colors spiraled together like a bleeding sun.
Irvine's voice cracked:
"He's calling you."
"No," she snapped.
But the chamber disagreed.
The stone faces around them parted—
opening, widening, creating a path.
A wedding aisle.
A grotesque, living wedding aisle.
Irvine staggered to his feet, clutching her hand.
"Don't walk it," he whispered urgently.
"If you do, he wins."
"I won't walk it."
He pulled her close, foreheads touching again.
"But, Inara… the ritual doesn't need your feet."
She blinked.
"What?"
A surge of force slammed into her chest.
Invisible hands grabbed her waist, her shoulders, her arms.
Her legs lifted off the ground.
She screamed—
as her body was dragged forward.
"Irvine—!!!"
He roared—
And the roar was not human.
His eyes flashed with black fire.
The Groom's influence.
The tether pulling both pain and power through him.
He grabbed her mid-air, yanking her back with a strength he did not own.
His muscles trembled violently as he fought the unseen grip tearing her
away.
"Inara—run—please run—he wants you—he wants you badly—"
She clung to him, trembling.
"I'm not leaving you."
The chamber exploded with noise—
Hundreds of carved mouths opening—
Screaming—
Crying—
Singing a wedding hymn twisted by decay.
Irvine pulled Inara into his chest, shielding her with his entire body as
the altar ignited in black flame.
He forced his voice into her ear:
"Listen to me—
The Groom's Mark will try to claim your body.
But the only thing stronger than his vow—
is *yours.*
You have to choose what you love.
You have to choose who you love."
"I already chose you," she whispered, nearly choking.
He hugged her tighter, voice breaking:
"Then keep choosing me—
because the altar is waking up—
and it's coming for you."
The flame surged—
The altar pulsed—
The Groom whispered through every burning shadow:
"BRIDE."
The altar-chamber didn't just breathe.
It watched.
Every inch of the walls—those twisted, screaming faces—turned subtly as
Irvine and Inara moved, as though a thousand dead brides shifted their
gaze in unison.
A low rumble vibrated beneath their feet.
Not from stone.
Not from machinery.
Something *alive.*
Inara stiffened. "Irvine… it's beating."
He placed a hand on the ground.
Thump.
…Thump.
...Thump.
His breath caught.
"This entire chamber is a heart."
Her skin prickled.
"A heart of what?"
His jaw tightened.
"Not what. *Who.*
The Groom's first bride.
They built the altar around her."
Inara staggered backward, staring at the floor as if it might open and
swallow her again.
"But why—why keep her alive like this?"
"To feed the ritual," Irvine answered, voice low, hollow.
"Every bride added strength. Every death added layers. She became the
core."
The chamber pulsed again—faster now, as if excited by their presence.
Inara felt heat rising beneath her shoes.
"Irvine… it's reacting to me."
His eyes darted to her Mark, which was glowing so brightly the veins on
her wrist looked like burning gold wires.
"He's calling for you."
She clenched her jaw, fighting the tremor in her fingertips.
"I don't answer men who don't exist."
Irvine almost smiled. Almost.
But then the altar bed—
that twisted, grotesque pedestal—
lit up with a violent surge of light.
Not gold.
Not red.
Both—
swirling violently into a color that looked like *raw fear*.
The stone faces around them shifted—
their mouths stretching wider—
their eyes rolling upward—
as though the entire chamber screamed in silence.
Inara grabbed Irvine's hand.
"What's happening—?!"
He inhaled sharply.
"He's waking up."
The floor vibrated violently, throwing them off balance. Inara toppled
forward—just as the stone beneath her rippled like water.
Irvine caught her waist mid-fall.
But the ripple didn't stop.
It grew.
Waves of stone—alive, shifting, trembling—rolled toward them, corralling
them like cattle toward the altar bed.
Irvine yanked Inara behind one of the rib-like pillars.
"Stay behind me!"
"In this place? Nothing stays behind anything—"
She stopped.
A shadow moved across the opposite pillar.
Tall.
Still.
Slender.
Watching.
The air thinned until breathing hurt.
Inara whispered, "Irvine… is that—"
"No," he said immediately.
"Yes."
The shadow… nodded.
Then it separated from the pillar, peeling away like wet paint, forming a
clear silhouette—
A groom.
With no face.
Only a veil of black lace drifting like smoke.
He didn't walk.
He glided.
And every face-carving in the room screamed without sound.
Irvine shoved Inara behind him, his body trembling with the effort to stay
upright as the Groom's influence seeped through his wound.
"Stay away from her," Irvine rasped.
The Groom tilted his head—not toward Irvine, but toward their linked hands.
Then toward Irvine's chest—
Toward the wound.
Then toward Inara's Mark.
Recognition.
Possession.
Claim.
His lace veil fluttered as if blown by invisible wind.
A whisper slithered through the chamber:
"Mine…"
Inara's vision blurred.
Not from fear.
From fury.
She stepped forward before Irvine could stop her.
"I'm not yours."
The Groom lifted a hand.
Every stone face in the walls gasped.
The chamber darkened—
colors draining—
air freezing—
And her Mark flared so violently she collapsed to one knee.
Irvine lunged, catching her shoulders.
"Inara—don't fight him directly—you'll trigger—"
Too late.
A pulse shot out of her Mark, slamming Irvine backward as if an unseen
force punched him straight in the chest.
He choked, collapsing to the floor, twitching.
"Irvine! Irvine—look at me!"
He tried.
But his eyes flickered between *Irvine*—
and something else.
Black veins veined across his arms.
His fingers curled like claws.
"Inara…" His voice cracked into two tones at once.
"Don't—let me—don't let him take—"
The Groom raised his hand again.
The entire chamber bowed like a cathedral of corpses.
Irvine writhed, grabbing at the ground, trying to anchor himself.
The Groom's voice echoed from everywhere:
"Vow…"
Inara staggered forward, rage burning hot in her chest.
"Your vow is nothing to me!"
A shockwave erupted from the altar bed, hurling her backward into Irvine.
He wrapped his arms around her midair, twisting his body to take the brunt
of the impact as they slammed into the rib-pillar.
He gasped, blood on his lip.
"I told you—don't talk to it like that—"
"I'll cuss him out if I want to—"
A deep, monstrous vibration shook the chamber.
The Groom was suddenly inches from them.
He moved without sound—
without air—
without physics.
Inara froze.
His hand hovered inches from her cheek.
One touch meant death.
Or worse—possession.
Or worse—becoming his bride.
Irvine yanked her away, snarling, something primal ripping from his chest.
The Groom's veil fluttered.
Contempt.
Or amusement.
It was impossible to tell.
The altar behind him ignited again.
The chamber pulsed faster.
Irvine's breathing hitched.
"Inara," he whispered, voice shaking,
"He's drawing power from your heartbeat.
Every time you panic… he gets stronger."
"What—what do I do then?"
His hands cupped her face.
"Love me more than you fear him."
Her heart broke and rebuilt itself in the same beat.
"I do."
The Groom hissed.
The altar cracked.
Lace shadows spread across the walls.
Irvine pulled Inara into a desperate kiss—not romantic, not gentle, but
survival itself. A grounding. A vow stronger than the Groom's claim.
The chamber shuddered.
The Mark dimmed.
The Groom froze.
For the first time, something in his posture changed.
Surprise.
Emotion.
Jealousy.
He lifted both hands, and the altar bed ripped open like a jaw.
The chamber screamed.
Irvine broke the kiss, forehead pressed to hers.
"Inara… he's coming for you himself.
We need to move. Now."
"But where—"
He grabbed her wrist and pointed upward.
A spiral staircase of bone appeared—
forming itself in real time—
leading toward an unseen exit.
But the Groom's hand had already risen.
And every single face in the chamber shrieked:
"BRIDE."