1
~Vaxan~
“Sylas is dead.”
Those devastating words—the confirmation that none of us had wanted to register, let alone reconcile—had first come from Kai, shortly after Ariana had arrived on the scene, and been unable to save Sylas in spite of her True Celestial might.
It had been too late.
Sylas Morgrave was gone.
I couldn’t chase away the devastating imagery of his loved ones breaking down around his prone form. Lazriel cradling him on the grass with Cassius shocking Sylas repeatedly with his power, Velra stroking Sylas’ hair off his sweat-drenched brow, Kai compressing the wound.
Ryker had been pacing on the phone with the Guardian Movement and reinforcing the illusion Velra had cast over the area, ensuring the campus didn’t discover what had happened.
Remnant had arrived back on the scene, and he had been alternating between trying to comfort his son, and making call after call, mobilizing his whisper network of The Shadowed to keep this under wraps.
The world discovering the Last Necromancer was dead would be deeply damaging.
Remnant had brought Evira back with him when he’d arrived and the two of us had left the Loxley Academy campus after Sylas’ body had been taken home by his family.
Ryker had transported equipment from the medical wing at the Guardian Compound into one of the guest rooms atGlacialis Arx, and Kai had told me that Sylas’ body was being contained within a Restoration Chamber. They were cylindrical vessels of stone and reinforced glass with restorative magical properties. Although he was dead, he was still being treated. They were still trying to rouse him. It was…brutal, as Evira had termed it.
I shifted my weight and tightened my hold around Evira.
I was actually trembling. Barely holding myself together—absolutely unheard of for me. I could weather anything.
But this wasn’t just anything.
We’d failed to stop Ruxnoth.
Sylas had perished.
And Winter…
Our beautiful love had been taken by that monstrosity of a True Celestial.
And now, here Evira and I were preparing ourselves for a very similar reaction from Zayn that would no doubt be forthcoming.
We stood outside the Requital building. Zayn had just returned from his field operation and was currently being debriefed by his mentor, Charles Petrone.
“He told me he loved me.”
I started at Evira’s quiet confession that whispered on the wind.
She angled her head to look up at me. “Just before that monster arrived, Winter spoke those amazing words to me. I told him I loved him too, but I was in dragon form and Winterdoesn’t speak Draconic Tongue. So maybe he didn’t realize that I—”
“He knew, beauty. Winter knew.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“The look in your eyes. Even in dragon form, they read the same. Winter being so very perceptive and attuned to others, especially those he cares deeply for, would also have conveyed your heartfelt truth to him.”
She smiled and sank against me. “Thank you.”
“Of course,” I breathed into her hair.
I stared at the Requital building, studying its striking exterior for the umpteenth time since we’d arrived, something that was somewhat helping to keep my mind… contained. A grounding point of fixation.
