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Mercurial’s eyes slit into two thin lines, and his lips widened into a smile. “Until next time.” He looked up to the ceiling and vanished.

“They were just in Elyria,” I said. “How did they get to Bamaria?”

Rhyan had returned from a hunting expedition only a week before.

“I don’t know,” he said, lips drawn.

I started pacing the room. “Three? Here? How, with an hourly patrol? With the hunting parties?” I asked, frantic. “We’ve never had them breach the borders. For them to get so deep into the city undetected, it’s not possible. They would have been caught, they would have been seen. It’s almost like…it’s like someone let them in…Gods!” My eyes widened. “Ka Kormac! Rhyan, do you know the schedule? Were they patrolling the border tonight?”

Rhyan shook his head. “Lyr, come here to me.” He took both my hands in his. “Listen. How they got in doesn’t matter now. That’s a future problem. Right now, we know they’re here. So we’re worrying about one thing, and one thing only—getting you to safety.”

I heard a roar in the distance and the sounds of glass crashing and screaming.

“Your escort will be searching for you. We want to find them first.”

My escorts probably had already been looking, but whatever Mercurial had done to steer Tristan away must have concealed us from them as well.

“Hart!” The call came right on cue from his vadati stone, muffled in the pocket of his belt—the belt I’d just removed from his waist. It was Markan. “Have you seen her grace? Location?”

Rhyan pulled the glowing stone out. “Secured. Temple back room,” he said.

“Get her out,” he roared. “Temple breached.” Terrified screams sounded from the stone, echoing and reverberating against the halls outside our room.

The communication stopped, and the light vanished from the stone, leaving behind a milky white haze.

This couldn’t be happening.

“Lyr,” Rhyan said, “the best soturi in Lumeria are out there now. We’re going to stop the threat. Nothing’s going to happen to you.”

“What about my sisters, my father?”

“They’re protected. Remember? More protected than anyone out there. There’s a protocol to keep you all safe.” He exhaled sharply, a haunted look in his eyes, and I knew why; having me back here, alone, away from everyone, had broken that protocol. “Don’t worry about them. Priority is always on the ruling Ka. That includes you.” He squeezed my hand then withdrew his sword, the blade scraping against his sheath.

I reached down, pulled up the silvery white fabric of my gown, exposed my thigh, and unsheathed my own dagger.

Rhyan nodded in approval. “Stay close to me. If I say run, you run. Hide, you hide. No questions.” His voice had roughened, taking on an air of power. The chain of command that had dissolved just moments ago as every line between us had blurred was now back in full force. “I’m getting you out of this.”

He stepped forward and pressed his ear to the door. He unlocked it, turned the knob, and swung it open, his sword pointing forward, his stance protective and angled in front of me.

Screams carried through the temple hall as masked Lumerians rushed past us without looking, their mouths drawn in horror. More came rushing by until Rhyan couldn’t even step outside the door.

“Hart!” Aemon called through the vadati. “Seraphim carriage behind red ray. Blade slaughtered one akadim in sanctuary. We’re tracking the other two. Go now!”

I stared at the hall. We were behind the green ray. I blinked. When I’d panicked earlier, we had been in the hall of the red ray, where Markan had chased me down, where I’d last seen Jules….

“Come on,” Rhyan said, grabbing my hand, running against the crowd.

Together, we headed back through the hall out into the sanctuary where the Valyati ball had been.

I gasped. It looked like a hurricane had torn through the hall. Scrolls were lying across the floor, scattered and torn apart, amongst shattered glass. Some were on fire. Soturi of different Kavim littered the floor in what I prayed were moments of lost consciousness and injury…not loss of life. Tables had been overturned, and the final remnants of the party dwellers were all pushing and scrambling over each other to reach the various temple doors.

In the center of the sanctuary, across Auriel’s Chamber, its body turning colors from the eternal flame, was the corpse of an akadim.

I froze. I’d never seen one before, only pictures or crude statues and puppets. Nothing prepared me for how truly massive the demons were. Blade stood over it, wiping blood from his forehead as he lifted his sword, the steel catching the firelight above.

“Ah!” he yelled as he slammed his blade down, severing the akadim’s arm from its body—an arm that was the length of my entire body. The skin was pale and full of jagged red lines crossing each other.

The akadim’s foot twitched as Blade pulled up his sword.