But power cannot be cast away,
And light will rise on judgment’s day.”
The wind tightens, curling around me, pressing against my ribs like a vice.
“The light sleeps in mortal skin,
The gods’ last breath lies deep within.
A vessel forged, a fate unmade,
A power caged—a debt unpaid.”
A vessel.
My breath locks in my throat.
I lurch back as if struck, but there is nowhere to run. The words tighten around me, latch on to something deeper than bone.
They left their power inme.
Not as a gift. Not as a blessing.
But as a final act of desperation.
I am the last fragment of what was stolen.
The Stars whisper their final truth.
“Rise, Lightborne, bearer of flame.
The world is shifting, the Stars have named.
The chains will fall, the past undone,
And fate will bow before its sun.”
The wind shatters. The sighing vanishes.
The world slams back into place. My ears ring with the absence of sound, as though the gods' voices carved themselves into the marrow of my bones, leaving a hollow where they once were. The silence is too sharp, too sudden. I can still feel the echo of their whispers, still feel them clawing at the edges of my mind.
I turn to him, breathless, something burning in my chest that was not there before.
I am not just Starborn.
I have the magic of the gods in my veins.
For the first time, I understand—I am more than the prophecy. I am the one who can rewrite it.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
KAEL
The wind tightens around me,the pressure sinking into my chest like an invisible weight. The world outside the tunnel of turquoise light is gone—nothing but silence, nothing but this.
Elyssara stands beside me, breath shallow, eyes wide, lost in whatever truth the heavens are whispering to her. But I don’t hear what she hears. I hear something else entirely.
A slow hum grows, deep and resonant, a vibration that isn’t sound but feels like it’s pulling me apart thread by thread. My body locks against it, every instinct urging me to resist, but it doesn’t matter—the heavens have already decided.
