"How could this be happening…"
Alector's voice was barely a whisper as he stood inside the Holy Tree of Eden.
He stood deep within its sanctuary, in a place few eyes had ever glimpsed: before the radiant root itself, which pulsed with a life and magic older than the ages.
An armchair sat before the root, bathed in the root's radiant glow. This was the Prophetess Claudia Tepes' seat, where she often meditated, about her Prophecies.
Reaching inside the Holy Tree of Eden was, in a sense, deceptively easy. Guards patrolled, yes, but there was less security than one might expect for such a sacred site. Amael, a member of one of the Eight Great Houses, had managed to enter this place in the past without undue trouble, even as an Olphean—a title which alone should never have granted such access to the tree's depths.