And their masks—carved from pale bone, smoothed by time, each one marked with the same sigil: a crescent moon pierced by three Stars.
My gaze casts long to the west, past the lines of soldiers that hunger for our blood and the fire that barely holds them back, to the treeline.
They start as dark shapes coalescing at the horizon, torches illuminating the night.
But as their staves strike the ground, and they converge on Kryntar Castle, I see them for what they are.
“The Vaythari,” I breathe. “They came.”
In time with their staves striking the ground, they rumble a chant that calls to me. “Zhari! Zhari! Zhari!” And my Lightborne mark flares in resonance.
“Syphra,” her name slips from my lips as I see her leading her people towards us, shoulders pulled back like a warrior who knows battle.
The Velmara flank her, maws dripping, teeth bared.
“They came foryou,” Kael murmurs.
The Nullveil continues disintegrating, painfully slow, as if the Stars themselves are giving us time.
“There’s more,” Teddy announces. “From the east.”
“Not having a plan genuinely works for us,” Ronyn quips, back on his feet, but never without an arrow nocked.
“They heard me,” Seren murmurs, hands pressing against the dome in awe.
I race to the east side of the dome. “Who heard you?”
Seren sucks in a sharp breath. “Syphra. Tvira.”
They heard her?
But I’m too shocked to figure out what she means.
“The Cindrali people came,” I whisper to no one in particular, disbelieving, as rows of their warriors descend on Kryntar Castle.
The Stars answered my call.
The Nullveil recedes further, and I can’t take the wait anymore.
I want blood.Now.
I spin back to Jax, eyes gleaming.
“Take down the Nullveil,” I command, panic obliterated and replaced with something sacred: vengeance.
Panic gives way to focus, and the hum returns to my bones.
I am here, daughter. Duskae’s promise snakes through my mind, and I’m soothed by her presence. By her refusal to abandon me.
Because I wasn’t burnt out—I was forgetting my power.
“Okay, before you do that,” Ronyn cuts in, “I’m assuming I’m allowed to do the whole Tarrakai thing now?”
The Starborn army claws at the Nullveil, desperate to reach us. Rhyven’s smug face waiting patiently.
But my friends are ready—weapons raised, muscles coiled tight at the promise of violence.
As pandemonium beckons, it’s the prophecy that calls to me, words slipping through my mind like a whisper, and snagging in my throat.
