Farris let out one final howl.
Rising, I rushed to him, landing hard on my knees beside him. The talisman blistered my hand, but I held on. I tangled my fingers in his fur, but I couldn’t hold him back. He was being stolen bit by bit.
“Farris! “
His paws twitched, and he scrambled across the stone, trying to stay with me.
Shadows had gathered around the pool, along the edges of the cave, and even on the stone reaching into the ocean beyond the entrance. I'd never seen so many of them in one place.
A meaty growl echoed from the cave mouth, and the queen dragon stepped forward, her wings curling down onto her spine. Her silver-blue flame blasted in a roar that shook the cave.
The flames wrapped around Prager’s body, but she didn’t fall. She laughed, a sharp, awful, twisted sound that tore through me. The dragon fire peeled back. Red flared around Prager’s armsand chest as she fed on every shadow in the cavern, rebuilding herself with what she stole from them.
Her face started to knit back into that of the gorgeous woman who'd possessed Erisandra. Her body reshaped itself into the lush woman dressed in red who'd stood at King Tallin's side.
With each shadow she sucked into her maw, Prager grew prettier, deadlier.
“She’s feeding on them,” I breathed. “Sucking them in to remain alive.”
Each stolen shadow was a piece of someone's essence, their capacity for hope and love. She was literally consuming what made them whole.
Farris was barely here now.
“If she gets his shadow—” I couldn’t even finish the thought. I knew. That would be the end of my friend.
The talisman shook in my grip. Its light arced across my skin.
And the answer slammed through me. This wasn’t only about the Iskar Cor.
The final answer has been inside me all along.Seek within to find the parts of yourself that are missing. Fuse them to heal the wound that has long gaped wide.I'd thought the elder's prophecy referred to the talismans, but all this time, it wasme.
All the pieces of myself I'd hidden, denied, buried—they were what needed fusing. Until I became whole, the Iskar Cor couldn't reach its full power.
It hadn't been waiting for the three pieces to unite, it had been waiting for me to stop fragmenting myself.
I tightened my grip around the Cor.
“I’m whole now,” I said. “And I will not let her win.”
Hands shaking, I gave everything I’d buried and refused to expose into the Cor. All the times I’d smiled when I wanted to scream. All the grief I swallowed so no one would worry. Everyinch of rage I wasn’t brave enough to show. Each time I walked away when I wanted to stay. Every goodbye I never healed from. Each scream I didn’t let out. And every drop of love I thought I wasn’t allowed to give.
It surged out of me and into the Cor.
It was hungry.
I rose to my feet with my wrath churning through me.
Night slammed across the cave in a wave. The shadows swirled, circling the pool, the walls, and rising toward the ceiling.
They waited.
“Shadows.” My voice came from marrow deep. “Take back what she stole from you.”
The Iskar Cor wasn't only channeling my power, it was amplifying my connection to every shadow Prager had stolen. Each one recognized me as their path home.
They spun upward like wings unfolding.
These shadows carried echoes of magic and buried pain. They needed somewhere to belong. Prager had stolen that from them too.
