Tamal blinks and shakes his head slightly. “I do not know how you always convince me to share my secrets, dear sister.”
Nox smiles. “Because you adore me, Tamal,” she says lightly.
They were twins, yet she was the only one who was a feeder. She was exactly the daughter her father yearned for, that Yorali’s feared.
Yet they would never find out, not until it was too late.
Tamal keeps talking. She pretends to listen.
“Ah, yes. Did you know the coast of Gyarin thwarted an undead invasion?”
Nox nods as though she cares. She does not.
There is only one thing that matters now.
Yvara Dyvarin.
Part Five
CHAPTER 50
Welcome
We do not slow. The movement never becomes something I can follow with my eyes. I drift in and out of sleep without meaning to, the rhythm of it strange and unbroken, hours folding into one another while the warmth inside the transport holds and everything outside moves far too quickly.
At some point something changes.
Colsar feels it first. "We are close," he says.
I open my eyes. The air has weight now, the presence of something vast and long established pressing inward from every direction. The transport slows just enough for me to notice. Voices carry from outside, ordered and controlled.
We are being received. The opening parts, its wards reacting as though they had been waiting.
“My father has prepared for us,” Colsar murmurs.
Wyn and Trophi ride forward, their horses cutting cleanly through formation before stopping at the edge.
Trophi's gaze moves to the children, then to Colsar. "Do you wish to be seen?"
"No," Colsar says. I nod.
He lifts his hand and the air shifts, the feeling of it like stepping slightly to the side of everything else, close enough to see but removed from it, as though the world continues on one path and we have been placed just beside it.
"Remain within the boundary," Wyn calls to the troops. “You will not be noticed."
The opening closes, and we pass into Shalvar unseen.
Even like this I feel it. Shalvar does not rise upward in display. It builds into itself, each level shaped with intention, drawn from the land and layered into something vast and connected. Structures stretch across one another, elevated paths crossing above and below, forming a city that folds inward instead of spreading out. Light moves differently here, gathering along surfaces in warm tones as though everything has held fire at some point and never fully released it. Nothing shines or glows, the effect is quieter than that.
I look at the sky. The gray has cleared. There are no signs of the firebirds anymore, though it seems they are never truly gone, only scattered, waiting until he reaches for them again.
The palace sits at the center, not separated from the rest of the capital but woven through it, its reach extending in every direction.
When we arrive, the transport opens. No army waits. Only a small gathering, and at the center of it Arabar, who stepsforward immediately and straightens when he sees Colsar, pride moving through his expression before he can contain it.
"My King."
Colsar steps down and grips his forearm. "You did well."
