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“What you’ve accomplished goes against the laws of my castle.” He tore his eyes from the flower, dropping it. “How did you do this?”

I crossed my arms, distrusting the hint of genuine wonder in his question. “I’m not telling you that.”

Something misshapen and dark formed behind his back: wings.

Two wide, velvet-blackwingsunfurled from him in a burst of feather and shadow. He glanced back at them, surprise briefly registering on his face, before taking a powerful leap into the sky. Within a few beats, he had disappeared into the mist beyond the clearing, leaving gusting, swirling patterns in the air behind him.

“What in theMaker?” I gasped.

The wake he left ruffled my dress, and I felt every sensation sharpen: the tickle of grass beneath my feet, the cool spot of mud pressing into my heel, and the edge of a stone touching my toe. Small lifelike sensations. Memories of my childhood flashed before me, too. Lying in the sun with Eden, searching for shapes in the clouds with Elliot, all three of us running barefoot on prickly midsummer grass as we played tag or some other jaunty, mindless game before dinner.

After some time, the Shadow Bringer reappeared through the mist. He fell from the sky, not pausing to catch his balance, and collapsed hard into the grass. He ripped off one of the metal gloves that armored his hands, trembling as he did so, and clutched at the ground with long, white-knuckled fingers.

It was more unsettling, perhaps, than when he’d nearly beheaded me.

“Little,” I heard him murmur. He placed his helmed brow againstthe tangle of grass at his knees, pausing to draw in a deep breath, then rose to his knees again, still grasping the ground. “Your world is so little.”

“I don’t have much of a say in the matter,” I responded, eyeing him warily from where I sat. “My parents are Absolvers. We have a duty to the people of Norhavellis. It’s the only place I’ve ever been.”

“So this is truly all you know? You crafted this dream based on your reality, but your reality is limited. A town—no, a village—infested with ruin and rot. That is Norhavellis? And then, five miles at most beyond that, an uneven perimeter around your home. That’s all?”

He paused to look up at the sky, almost as if he was uncertain about saying anything else. But then, as quickly as he had descended into that strange pit of sorrow and contemplation, he shifted, jolting upright as if branded by fire.

“There must be more. If you’re bound to the Light Bringer as one of his followers, there must be more.” He stormed over to me, his lifeless eyes now burning. “Give me your arm.”

I made to move away, to scramble across the porch into my house, but the dream was starting to blur, its colors melding into smeared pools of pastel. I stumbled to my feet, swaying as he grabbed me by the wrist.

“You willnotwake up now,” he snarled, forcing me back into focus. “Let me see what you know. Show me your world.”

Trees shook as the violet sky darkened into a bloodied plum.

Wind tangled my hair and hissed past my ears as sparks caught the side of my face, falling like dust around us, and I looked on, numb, as my home erupted into flames. Shadows of people, donning the garb of the Light Legion, marched from the depths of the Visstill, eyes haunted and faces hollow. Others ringed the shadow-scorched edges of a burning pyre.

“They’re burning them,” I said slowly, tasting the foulness of my words and the air heavy with the smell of fire. It was the cremation of all things. Grass, root, pine, hair, flesh. It was all there, burning, mingling.

Wrong.

He tightened his grip on my wrist, pulling me in. “You can’t go to them. They will not see you.”

“But this is my home,” I protested. “I need to find Mother.” I twisted away from him, fury growing wild in my stomach. “Father.” I ripped free.“Elliot.”I stumbled into the clearing. Wave after wave of warm, fire-fed air pushed into me, drying my eyes and heating my lungs.My home was an inferno of flame and smoke, cracking and groaning so violently, it was as though it were alive.

Dying, butalive.

The nearest legionnaire was tucked into the shadows of the Visstill, the golden metal of his breastplate charred and streaked with blood. He was gazing past me—eyes fixed on the pyre, the smoldering house, sparks exploding across the sky—and made to turn away, moving deeper into the trees.

“Stop!” I shouted, clawing my way through the smoke that drifted between us. “Please stop!” As I ran, darkness began to cloud the edges of my vision. “Stop!” I screamed again, crying out so forcefully that my voice cracked.

The legionnaire paused, turning toward the clearing—just as an explosion of red flame and dark, all-consuming smoke thundered behind us.

My home had collapsed into itself, releasing its innards to the earth.

I staggered sideways into the legionnaire, gasping, wild-eyed, and suffocating on both the smoke and my own panic. I should have fallen against the man’s metal front, but instead I fellthroughhim, crashing to the ground as he walked forward and through me.

This isn’t happening.

I stumbled to my feet, lunged forward, and grasped for the legionnaire’s shoulder, only to pass through him in a wave of shadow.

This can’t be happening.