He did not answer. But his talons clicked on stone. His feathers flared, chest puffing, tail swishing. His head tilted. Just a degree. A measure of her worth, perhaps.
More silence.
Either his glaive would give to her Weave or he would step back.
"Veskra na'voth,”he said at length.“Iri kal'dren shava."
This isn’t finished. I will return.
Auryn’s jaw clenched so tightly that pain spiraled up into her temple. But she forced herself to answer in a steady deadpan.
"Kal'dren shava—iri vosh'taren karesh," Auryn replied. Smooth. Without hesitation.
Return to me, and you risk my retribution.
He paused. Blinked. His talons didn’t click on the stone this time. They scraped as he turned to face her more fully. His feathers flared once more, wings pulsing outward. Increasing his size. Lengthening his shadow on the ground.
“Your tongue hasn’t earned the right to taste the Sky,”he warned in Glider speech.“Attempt it again, and I will cut you down, sanction or not.”
The ground answered his threat. Lu'ma jumped to Auryn's side and cast a ward around them just as an ear-piercing explosion shattered the quiet of the alley. Auryn braced herself as a violent shudder rolled through the cobbles, rattling her very bones. Far off, a familiar horn keened—one, then another, taken up by a chorus from deeper in the Commons.
Solutus.
Auryn felt it in her teeth. Lu’ma’s head snapped toward the sound. The Polis light around them lit up with emerald brilliance in response to the sound, then steadied.
The Glider’s head tilted to the horns—listening, measuring. Duty crossed his face like a shadow. He lowered the ruined blade of his glaive a fraction then leaned a hair closer. His eyes first lingered on the thin golden braid at her shoulder then focused on her hand, nostrils flaring and pupils contracting. He drew in the sharp tang of her blood like a scent he meant to remember.
“Not finished,” he declared—no flourish, only fact.
One wing swept open, blotting out what little light reached the square. The other followed, the downstroke striking her like a physical blow, a gust of air spiraling upward. Auryn stumbled back, lifted her arms to block the sudden gust of wind. But she couldn’t keep her balance.
When the chaos cleared, he was gone.
Hands supported her at her back and shoulders. She looked down. Lu’ma was signing, her black eyes heated, 'Your Radiance, we must report this to His Quintessence immediately. That creature—'she fumbled, seeming to be at a loss for words.
“Don’t worry, Lu’ma. I will tell him.” She looked around, holding back shivers, willing her knees not to give out. “This is larger than I could have thought. That male wasn’t like the others. Zarrek should know, too.”
The horns pressed in again, wailing like a eulogy through the mist of mana smoke and Polis light around them. Auryn stood still, her blood dripping in slow, steady drops to the cobbles.
I want to go there. I want to see. To understand.
Her eyes slid to the key sigil on her wrist. She touched the cuff. Five glowing sigils woke like stars.
But I promised. I promised him.
Lu’ma signed, 'Your Radiance, we must leave. Take shelter.'
The Attendant reachedinto her own satchel, pulling out a shawl she’d taken to keep the chill at bay if Auryn stayed out longer than expected. She pressed it against her Host’s wound, but Auryn hardly registered it. Her gaze was still fixed on the space where the violet eyes had been.
Lu’ma’s hands signed with deliberate clarity, 'This Nameless will remember his face.'
Auryn nodded once. She didn’t tell Lu’ma a frightening truth. That she’d already seen those eyes in her dreams, and that his face had been a part of her visions for months.
This time, when she touched her bracelet, she did so with firm intent. One of the five sigils blinked out as a portal irised open behind them, light fanning over the street around them.
“We’re not finished,” she swore to the empty dark where the Glider’s violet eyes had stared her down before.
And with that promise made, she and Lu’ma stepped through the portal.
