I look past him at my mates. Five faces, five people I love more than anything in this world, all of them watching me with the same expression. The bonds between us flare bright enough to see.
"Ready."
Then the world goes dark.
The transition feels exactly like drowning. Cold rushes in from every direction, filling my lungs, my chest, my skull, and every instinct I have screams to fight, to claw my way back to the surface, back to light and warmth and air. Harlow's hands are the only solid thing in the darkness and I grip them so hard my fingers ache.
His voice reaches me, not through sound but through something deeper, pressed directly into my consciousness.Don't fight. I've got you. Just hold on.
The darkness thins. The crushing pressure eases. And the death realm opens around us.
Gray. Everything is gray. Not the gray of overcast skies or stone walls, but a gray that feels intentional, like color itself has been stripped from the fabric of existence. There's no horizon, no landmarks, no sense of direction. Sound is muffled to almost nothing. Even my own breathing sounds distant, like I'm hearing it through water.
Harlow stands beside me, and for the first time since I've known him, he looks completely solid. No flickering at the edges, no translucence when the light hits him wrong. Here, in the realm of death, he is more real than I've ever seen him.
"Welcome to the other side," he says, and there's something almost gentle in his voice. "Stay close. Don't look too long at anything, and don't let go of my hand."
"What will it show me?"
"Deaths. Possible, past, future. The realm knows you don't belong here, and it will try to convince you to stay."
We walk. I don't know how else to describe the movement because there's nothing to move through, no ground beneath my feet that I can identify, no sense of progress from one point to another. Harlow navigates by some internal compass I can't perceive, guiding us with the confidence of someone who knows this place the way I know the halls of Phoenix Sanctuary.
The first vision comes without warning.
Stellan, engulfed in his own fire, screaming as his phoenix form consumes him from the inside out. The flames eating through his skin, his bones, his essence, until there's nothing left but ash and the echo of a scream that goes on and on.
I lunge toward him before I can think. Harlow's arm locks around my chest, dragging me back.
"It's not real," he says against my ear. "Not yet. Keep moving."
The vision dissolves. Another takes its place.
Rumi, on his knees, the black threads in his aura pulling away from the gold, tearing him apart from the inside. His mouth open in a silent cry as divine balance fails and the two halves of him rip in opposite directions.
"Harlow, I can't—"
"You can. Keep walking. Don't look."
But the realm has found what hurts me and it's not going to stop. Ambrose crumbling to dust, aging centuries in seconds, his hand still reaching for a contract he'll never finish writing. The visions come faster, each one finding a deeper fear, each one more detailed and more real than the last. The realm is learning what I love and using it against me, weaponizing every bond, every connection, every piece of my heart that I've given away.
My grip on Harlow's hand loosens. The gray is pressing in closer, and it doesn't feel threatening anymore. It feels quiet. Peaceful. The visions hurt, but the space between them is so beautifully empty, so free of fear and responsibility and the constant weight of holding six people together. I could rest here. I could stop fighting and just let the gray take me, let it wash away the exhaustion and the terror and the impossible task waiting for me on the other side.
"Skye." Harlow's voice, sharp with panic. "You're slipping. Stay with me."
I try. I try to hold on, but my fingers won't close properly and the gray is so warm now, wrapping around me like sleep after a long day, and maybe if I just close my eyes for a moment...
Harlow's essence slams into mine. He forces himself into my consciousness with the desperation of someone watching the person they love disappear. Memories flood through me, hismemories, vivid and immediate. The first time I touched his hand and didn't pull away from the cold. The night I fell asleep against his shoulder and he stayed perfectly still for four hours because he didn't want to wake me. The morning I looked at him across the kitchen and smiled for no reason, and he felt something crack open in his chest that he'd kept sealed shut for years.
You are my reason for choosing life,his voice echoes through every memory.You keep bringing me back. Every single day. Now let me bring you back.
The gray shatters.
I gasp, and it feels like being born, painful and bright and overwhelming. Harlow's essence is tangled with mine so completely that I can't tell where I end and he begins, and for a moment that terrifies me. Then it steadies me, his certainty flowing through the connection, his absolute refusal to let me go grounding me in a way nothing else could.
"There you are," he breathes. "Stay with me. We're almost through."
We move together through the remaining gray, our essences still intertwined, neither of us willing to separate yet. Light appears ahead of us, actual light, warm and golden, and the sight of it makes my chest ache with relief so intense it borders on pain.
