The descent into the guts of the Academy felt like sliding down the throat of a dying beast. Ra Elgara didn’t just feel the cold; he felt the absence of heat, a vacuum-like chill that gnawed at the marrow of his tiny, four-year-old bones. He was draped over Lyra’s shoulder like a sack of discarded grain, his vision a fractured mosaic of silver light and oily, black shadows. Every time he blinked, the black ink—the "deleted files" of his own soul—smeared across his cheeks, smelling of old parchment and burnt electricity."Hold on, Ra. Just keep your eyes on me, okay? Don't look at the walls," Lyra whispered, her voice hitching. Her boots clattered against the rusted rungs of the ladder, the sound echoing upward into the darkness where the Bell of the Architect was still humming its low, predatory thrum."The walls... are screaming, Lyra," Ra rasped. His voice was a ruined thing, a grating sound that shouldn't have come from a child's throat. "They’re not stone. They’re... placeholders