Because the veil thins. Your Faction rises. And past betrayals must be atoned for.
The marble shattered. A brilliant flare of gold and white light burst upward, engulfing me.
They reach for you, child of our blood. Five lights through the shadow. Five hearts bound by oath and love. Feel them. Call them. Remember.
Beware the sixth.
The light swallowed everything.
And I woke gasping.
My body jerked upright, heart pounding so hard I was scared it would beat right out of my chest. I knew it must be morning, but with the stress from helping with the Varruk’s escape and my strange dreams, it felt like I’d barely slept at all.
Then I felt them.
A pulse of warmth, no longer just a vague feeling.
Jet.
Oren.
Nathan.
Zeke.
Zane.
They weren’t just names but pieces of me snapping back into place.
I stumbled out of bed, my breath catching. My hands trembled as light flickered beneath my skin. The Nexus mark burning—still invisible to the naked eye—the bond pulsed like a living thing, each thread connecting, weaving, calling.
It was overwhelming—heat and ice and static all at once—but beneath it was something steady, achingly familiar:them.
I pressed my palm to my mark, tears spilling freely now. “You’re alive,” I breathed. “You’re really?—"
“Here.”Oren breathed into my mind.“And we’re coming.”
The pulse of their energy faded back into my bones, leaving me trembling but alive in a way I hadn’t been since I was torn from them.
Outside, Bellona’s dawn bells tolled—a cruel, mocking sound over the city of blood and spectacle.
I thought of everything that stood in their way and the danger we all faced.“Don’t come to the coliseum, wait for word from me, and above all, stay safe.”
“I love you, my Nexi.”Nathan’s voice felt like a caress.
“We’ll see you soon,”the deep voice of Jet sounded in my head.
I noticed thatno oneagreed to wait until further notice.
“I love you all to the depths of my soul, but you have to wait until it’s safe.”I pleaded with them.
“Trust us.”The twins spoke in unison in voices that didn’t seem wholly human.
I felt them cut off the connection before I could respond. “Those hard-headed bastards better not get themselves killed,” I murmured to myself.
The whispers of my Ancestors lingered faintly, wrapping around me like smoke.
The blood remembers. The bond endures.
