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Stop stop stop stop—My mind screamed but my body only pulled harder. The darkness was everywhere, flooding my lungs, drowning me. I couldn't see, couldn't breathe, couldn't tell where I ended and the shadows began.

My throat tore open in a scream just as golden light exploded through the darkness. Strong hands gripped my shoulders, and Rethlyn's voice cut through my terror:

"Enough."

And then, in an instant, my heart stilled, and a haze began fluttering across my mind, seeping into the darkness. But the feeling fled just as quickly as it had arrived, and terror overtook me again, but I was in control. The shadows snapped back to Rethlyn with such force that we both cried out. I collapsed forward, retching, my whole body shaking. He’d used his tether, and I couldn’t exactly blame him.

"Rethlyn?" My voice shook as I watched him struggle to sit up. "Why do you look—are you in pain?"

He managed to lift his head, and the exhaustion in his eyes made my stomach turn. "Sharing shadows is one thing," he said, sighing, "but you just ripped them from me. Tore them out like they were being shredded from my bones."

Fresh horror washed through me. I'dfelthis pain, I realized. Those fragments of sensation that had mixed with the shadows—that had been him. I scrambled backward until my spine hit stone, trying to put as much distance between us as possible.

"I didn't know I could—" My voice broke. "I didn't mean to?—"

"I know." He winced as he shifted. "Sometimes one reaches for them in desperation."

“I’m sorry.” I murmured.

He took a step towards me but stopped, concern etched into his features. After a moment, he simply sat down beside me, close enough to reach but not touching. We sat in silence as I focused on my breathing, on the feeling of cold stone against my palms, on the distant sound of Vördr wings beating against the wind.

"You know," Rethlyn said finally, his voice softer than I'd ever heard it, "I saw you. Back in Sídhe."

I turned my head slightly, confused by the sudden shift.

"The way you handled those shadows—absorbing them, wielding them on such a large scale without any training?" He shook his head, something like awe in his expression. "Even a practiced wielder would struggle with that kind of raw power. But you? You just... adapted. Like they were always meant to be yours."

"I almost lost myself," I whispered, remembering the darkness that had threatened to consume me.

"But you didn't." He picked up a small stone, turning it over in his hands. "That's the thing about power—it's not about controlling it perfectly. It's about choosing to keep fighting even when it feels impossible."

I drew my knees to my chest, suddenly feeling very young. "Everything's different now. My life, for so long—I was just... hiding. From everyone. From myself." My voice caught. "I never wanted any of this. The expectations, the pressure. Being told I'm the key to ending a war I didn't even know existed. No one ever expected anything of me."

Rethlyn was quiet for a moment. "I have a sister," he said finally. "She's everything my parents ever wanted. Master medic, perfect tether, perfect life." A wry smile touched his lips. "Meanwhile, I couldn't figure out what my tether was even for. The black sheep who could make people feel things they didn't want to feel."

"What changed?"

"I stopped trying to be what they wanted. Found people whosaw me—really saw me." He glanced at the entrance where we'd come from. "The Umbra gave me purpose, but more than that, they gave me a home. Somewhere the numbness couldn't reach."

I knew what that was like. I had always had Osta, and then Ma came around. And I loved them both dearly. But the first person who ever truly saw me, truly saw that I could be something more—was Laryk. He believed I could be something extraordinary.

Rethlyn turned to look at me fully then. "It's not about proving them wrong, you know. It's about proving to yourself that you're worthy. That you always were."

The words hit something deep inside me. I thought about the tower, about the girl who had spent weeks staring out that window, numb to everything. But before that—before the Umbra—there had been years of hiding in Sídhe. Years of pushing my power down, making it smaller, more normal. Years of pretending to be something I wasn't, because the alternative was too frightening to face.

And then the shadows had found me. In that moment in Emeraal, when darkness had surged through my veins, it should have felt wrong. Foreign. Instead, it felt like waking up. Like some part of me that had been sleeping finally opened its eyes.

"I'm scared," I admitted.

"Good," Rethlyn said. "It means you understand what's at stake." He stood, brushing off his leathers before offering me a hand.

I took it, letting him pull me to my feet. My breathing had steadied, though my chest still felt tight. But something had shifted—some small kernel of certainty taking root beneath everything else.

As if he had anticipated my distress, Tryggar's wings emerged from around the mountain, beating against the wind furiously. Seconds later, he was landing on the platform and trotting over to me.

"Think you can handle him on your own?" Rethlyn asked.

"Am I allowed to?" I shot a hesitant look over my shoulder as Tryggar nudged me.