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“Stay down!” Mira’s fingers dig into my shoulder, dragging me lower behind the bushes, when I start to stand.

Her grip is painful.Desperate.

The smell of moss and damp earth fills my nose. Wet stone, decaying leaves, the iron-sharp scent of impending violence and death. But I can’t look away. My eyes are locked on the tragedy playing out below, as though by watching I might somehow be able to change the outcome.

I shake her off, trembling with rage and fear so profound it threatens to consume me entirely. My muscles are vibrating with energy, every nerve ending screaming for release. The power inside me pulses harder with each passing second, no longer dormant but alive and aware. A living thing desperate to break free.

I feel like I’ve swallowed lightning. Like the storm in my blood has found its matching darkness.

Below, Sacha stands unmoving—a statue of arrogant defiance carved from darkness and fury. Shoulders squared. Head high. Facing the overwhelming odds with the cool detachment of someone who has fought this war for decades. His posture speaks of a man who has imagined this moment a thousand times. The inevitable confrontation with those who caged him.

The man in crimson robes, Sereven, stands opposite him, a study in cold calculation. Pure, unfeeling power radiates from him in almost visible waves. But even from this distance, I catch something hidden beneath. A slight tilt of his chin. A narrowing of his eyes. He hadn’t expected Sacha to look like this.

Not beaten. Not broken.

The soldiers circle, weapons drawn. They move like a machine designed with only one task in mind.

Destruction.

The fading sunlight glints off their blades, revealing the same blue energy I saw earlier, and with it comes the memory of where I know it from.

The tower’s walls. The silver prison that held Sacha. The same light that held him hostage.

My stomach lurches, acid rising in my throat.

Sacha and Varam are surrounded. Outnumbered. Yet somehow stand tall, defiant even in the shadow of death.

And then he moves.

Darkness erupts from him, not merely an absence of light but a living force that swallows the clearing whole. It coils like smoke, strikes like a beast—an extension of will so absolute it reshapes the very air. This isn’t just magic. It’s defiance made manifest.

The same shadows that held me last night now lash outward like knives.

The soldiers’ shouts carry up to our position. Terror and confusion mixing in a cacophony of human fear. Through fleeting gaps in the artificial night, I glimpse Varam running northeast, whileSacha lunges in the opposite direction. He’s not just distracting. He’s channeling their attention, anticipating their instincts, dictating the chaos. Choosing to protect, even in collapse.

Sereven flinches. A single step backward.

Sacha moves like shadow, terrible and beautiful. The force flows around him in unnatural currents. His blade finds targets with a precision that seems impossible. Bodies fall. Even from here, I can see the chaos, the destruction, the way soldiers collapse.

For one breathless moment, hope surges. My heart leaps painfully, banging against my ribs. This is the Shadowvein Lord who opposed the Authority. TheVareth’elthe Veinwardens follow. The man who still makes hardened soldiers tremble in fear. Maybe against all odds, he’ll break through. Maybe the force of his long-contained power will overwhelm even these numbers.

The air itself seems electrified with possibility. No one on the hill moves. No one breathes.

Then Sereven lifts his hand.

Whatever he’s holding glints—cold, impossible, pulsing with a blue light that feels wrong. A crystal, no larger than a fist, but radiating power that makes the air itself recoil. Magic snaps through like a whip made of frozen lightning. The sound carries even to our position. Not just heard, butfelt. A vibration that passes through bone, through thought.

It rattles my teeth. My vision doubles. The silver power inside me jolts.

Sacha stumbles. His darkness falls apart, devoured by the energy pouring from the crystal. Each tendril of shadow dies a violent death,disintegrating into the air like smoke caught in a gale. His power, the essence of who he is, being systemically destroyed in front of my eyes.

His raven screams above his head, a sound of pure agony that rips through me. Its wings flail, caught in invisible hands, its form breaking apart.

“No.” The word is more breath than sound. My voice breaks.

A net launches from one side. It glitters with the same terrible blue energy that emanates from Sereven’s crystal, wrapping around Sacha as it lands, flaring on contact with a flash so bright it’s visible even here. His body contorts in a way that speaks of unimaginable pain. A sound carries across the distance—half-snarl, half-choked breath that speaks of agony beyond anything a human should be able to endure.

The pressure behind my eyes sharpens. The power flowing through me convulses. It crackles through my fingertips, and burns the back of my throat.