He was thrown across the clearing, his body cutting right through ancient trees with the force. The ground trembled as they fell.
Isla stood from the ground, like a phoenix rising from the ashes.Endure, her mother had said. She would do that and more. She would carve a new path, so no one would ever have to endure him again.
He thought he had killed her.
He was going towish he could kill her.
Cronan didn’t stay down for long. His shadows erupted from his crown, through the gap in the woods, but she was fire and wind and stars and sky and shadow and the ground itself, and the world seemed to bend to her will as the rock in front of her feet rose, the sky fell, and energy ignited in between, shielding her with power forged from every element. It was so bright, she watched Grim turn and shield his eyes.
When the light cleared, Isla was wearing a full suit of sparkling armor. She was holding a sword forged of every shard of her power. And it all seemed to converge into something new. Something stronger.
“You can’t have my world. You can’t have my husband,” she said, taking a step forward. When Cronan’s shadows shot at her again, she blocked them with her sword, the sound producing an ear-splittinghowl. “You can’t break me. Not because I’m unbreakable, but because I am not alone,” she said.
With that, the waters of the starlit pool behind her began to ripple. She could feel it as if it was in her own mind. Her consciousness was in two places.
Isla formed a root-spun cage around Cronan, then poured the rest of herself into that pool—the flair she had taken from Lark, the abilities she had been born with, the power she had claimed for herself. Life, death, and everything in between swirled in its midnight waters.
The diamond around her neck began to burn, searing into her skin. The shard of the heart of Lightlark that had stitched her own heart together pulsed, awakening.
Both infinite forces merged, amplifying everything she was.
And she was glorious.
Not unscarred, but unyielding. A flame that refused to extinguish, a night sky that refused to gutter out. A mind and body that was fractured and bleeding but still standing.
Everything in her was focused on that pool. Her arms were stretched wide. Her head was thrown back. It was from this angle that she saw a flash of darkness spiral through the night—pure obsidian, concentrated into a pike. It pierced through every layer of the shield around her. Her fingers flexed, but all her power was focused in the other direction. Cronan had broken free of the cage, and now, he was going to split her mind in half, in so many pieces they might not ever reform the same again. She gasped, bracing for the impact.
In the instant before the pike reached her, a wave of silver energy like liquid metal bloomed in front of Isla, and Cronan’s pike shattered. Isla turned her head to see a familiar face looking back at her, silver hair gleaming as brightly as the energy surrounding her.
“I’ve got your front. You, finish this,” Aurora said, as she turned sharply toward Cronan, unleashing a torrent of power that halted allhis incoming shadows midair, then burst them, one by one. “Go,” Aurora said, when Isla didn’t move.
It had worked.
Slowly, Isla turned, calling her power back into her body, and saw that the pool was filled with figures, still forming. Her relief was nearly enough to make her sob right here in this forest, but her work wasn’t done yet.
She faced Grim. His posture was rigid as he looked from Cronan to her, as if he was still undecided. Still torn. She reached out her hand. “We need you.” Grim didn’t move. “We—” She took a step forward, just as Aurora was flung through the forest, her energy withering away as she landed in the waters.
Cronan had broken free again. His shadows raced forward, and Isla lifted her arm to form a shield. She felt the impact in her bones as she was knocked off her feet, into the pool, and her vision went black as her head hit the bottom.
Quiet. Everything was so quiet here. She blinked away the darkness, and it only subsided a little as her vision returned. Her world became midnight waters, shifting as limbs moved around her.
The energy she had used to turn death into life, and to release herself of the souls within her, was starting to take its toll. She tried to move—
Then found she couldn’t. The familiar feeling of Cronan’s shadows locked around her wrists and feet, shackling her to the bottom. She tried to move, to fight, but they held firm. Her throat contracted. Her lungs burned. Her vision blurred.
Finally, she couldn’t take it any longer, and water rushed into her mouth.
She drowned.
Again.
Again.
Cronan’s voice spoke into her mind.This is your fate. I will keep you here for all eternity...or I will allow you the mercy of death, if you bring me the Sunling king.
Oro? Why would he need Oro? What had Cronan seen in these waters?
No. She refused.
