But Walter… Walter just drifts through it all, touching corrupted ground that briefly blazes with cleansing light before the darkness seeps back in. The corruption retreats wherever he passes, but only for moments—like he's testing the boundaries of something larger than himself.
A creature lunges for Kaia, and my heart lodges somewhere in my throat. Malrik's shadows surge up, tangling with the beast while I blast it with enough chaos magic to level a small building. The thing screams—a sound that should not exist in any realm—and dissolves.
For half a second, I think we might actually survive this.
Then I see it—the way the corruption seems to pulse beneath the ground, reaching for Kaia like hungry veins. My warning dies in my throat as one of the shadow creatures clips her wing.
She falls.
The world stops.
I'm moving before I register the decision, chaos magic exploding from me with more power than I knew I possessed. Malrik reaches her first, catching her before she hits the ground. The look on his face—gods, I never want to see that expression again. Not on him. Not for her.
"No, no, no," I mutter, dropping to my knees beside them. Black veins are already spreading across her skin, corruption seeping into her like poison. Her shadows are frantic—Bob trying to organize a defense while Patricia's notes become increasingly desperate. Finnick darts between us all, his usual playful energy transformed into panicked movement.
"We need to—" Malrik starts, but a roar cuts him off.
The sound shakes the very air, and for a moment, I think another creature is about to end us all. But this is different. This feels… ancient. Powerful. Wrong.
A figure drops from the writhing sky, his landing cracking the corrupted ground. A wave of energy pulses outward like Walter's touch but magnified a thousandfold, making the creatures scatter into the darkness as if fleeing something they recognize as deadlier than themselves.
The stranger rises slowly, and there's something about his movements that feels wrong—too fluid, too precise, like he's having to remember how limbs should work. His eyes catch the firelight in a way that human eyes shouldn't, reflecting gold for just a moment before settling into a more natural shade.
Then he sees Kaia.
The change that comes over him steals my breath—not because of what he does, but because of what he doesn't do. He goes completely still, the kind of stillness that belongs to predators and ancient things. The power rolling off him stutters, like a heart skipping a beat. When he looks at her, his expression cracks open with something so raw and complicated that I have to look away.
"I'm here," he says, and his voice carries like harmonics that make my teeth ache. "You're safe now, little star."
The corruption in her veins seems to pause its spread at his presence, or maybe it's responding to the strange energy rolling off him in waves.
"Who—" I start to ask, but Malrik's sharp intake of breath stops me.
"Kieran," he breathes, and there's something in his voice I've never heard before. "The Dragon of the Void."
Oh, I think hysterically as Kieran kneels beside us, that's just perfect. Because we definitely needed to add whatever the void this is to our mess.
But the way he touches her—gentle, reverent, like he's remembering how to handle something breakable—kills the quip on my tongue. His hands glow with light that pulses likebreath, like something alive and ancient, not quite light, not quite shadow. There's a story here, written in the tension of his shoulders and the way his hands shake slightly despite their steady glow.
I look at Malrik, finding my own confusion mirrored in his silver eyes. The ache in my chest pulses, drawing me toward both him and Kaia even as this newcomer changes everything.
Well, I think as Kieran begins working magic I've never seen before, at least life's never boring.
Chapter 11
Kieran
Kieran
I feel her before I see her. The pull is visceral, a hook beneath my ribs that's been empty for centuries suddenly filled again. When I land, the corrupted ground cracks beneath my feet, power rolling off me in waves that send the shadow creatures scattering. They remember what I am, even if she doesn't.
Little star.
The sight of her steals the breath I don't need. She's grown so much, but something in her face still echoes the child I knew—the same determined set of her jaw even in unconsciousness. Her wings, gods, her wings, shimmer between shadow and light, so similar to how Solveig's did. The corruption spreading across her skin makes my ancient heart stutter.
"I'm here," I manage, though the words feel clumsy in this form. "You're safe now, little star."
Malrik's sharp intake of breath draws my attention. He's grown too, no longer the solemn child who used to pepper me with questions about Absentia's history. The corruption that drove him from his realm has left its mark—not on his body, but in the silver of his eyes—no longer the questioning gaze of a boy, but the blade-edge of a man who's lost too much.
