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“The Ascension ceremony!” Gatrielle screamed over the eruption of more searching, tentacle-like limbs. “It wants us to reenact it.”

“Why?” I asked, but I knew.

This field was not only an altar.

This was a memorial ground touched by the highest of Angel magic.

“We’re being forced to ascend as damn Angels because Malakai touched the pyre?” Mila growled.

“It was when I touched the statue itself,” I corrected, though I wasn’t sure why I would have that impetus on the Angels.

“Not ascend,” Gatrielle corrected, calling our attention back. His words grew hoarse as a vine tightened around his throat. “I think it wants—us to pretend. Warriors can’t—become Angels.”

He was right. No one could simply choose to become an Angel, and I doubted a loosely guarded ceremony in a field would change that.

“Three warriors here.” The vine loosened the pressure on Gatrielle’s windpipe as he put the pieces together. “Three Angels who created the ceremony.” A bit more lax. He panted, “We have to use knowledge and logic to prove ourselves.”

Of course. Use the Bodymelder’s pillars and values to win this task against the Angels, and likely find more in the process if my hunch was correct.

“Tell us what to do,” I demanded.

“Each of us needs to stand in one of those rings of fallen flowers,” Gatrielle directed. Mila and I hurried to our spots, the vines seeming to give way now that we’d deduced what they wanted. They trailed us along the ground, their leashes slack, but still watching. “How much do you know of the ascension?”

“Every clan’s account is different.” I watched the statue warily, ready to shove the others out of the way should pieces begin to crumble again. “I know Damien’s tale, but I think we need yours.”

“It’s said that Ptholenix had a close relationship with Valyrie and Xenique.” The Starsearcher and Soulguider Prime Warriors. That aligned with what I knew of the Angels. “When the seven split to maintain their own domains, those were the only three who remained in contact, though very rarely. They are the three who discovered how they could ascend and birthed the ritual for their peers.”

“What did they do?” What do we need to do?

“All of our magic comes from the land.” Gatrielle swallowed. “So they each sacrificed something to the earth.”

My stomach turned over.

I was so damn tired of sacrificing. I had nothing left to offer—was simply trying to repair the husk I’d turned into—and now the world wanted more.

“What did they give?” Mila asked, voice soft but gaze studying me.

Jaw grinding, I kept my eyes on Ptholenix. Fuck the Angels for this. Fuck the Angels for all of this.

“We don’t know exactly,” Gatrielle said, fists clenched at his sides, a distrust in his narrowed stare at his Angel. “One gave a sign of life. One released the fears and mistakes that tethered them to this world. One, a promise of service.”

What in the Spirits did any of that mean? I had a lifetime of mistakes weighing me down, but how was I to release them to a statue in this stupid field?

“I’ll take the second one,” Mila asserted. My head whipped toward her, finding nothing but resolve and maybe a hint of understanding.

“I can give a sign of life,” Gatrielle offered.

“Then I’ll give the promise.” I had an inkling of what it wanted, but I was reluctant to offer it. I supposed that was the point of a sacrifice, though.

Confidently, Gatrielle held his rapier high. “What are you?—”

He sliced it down across his palm, right across his allure tattoo. Red sprinkled the field like warm rain drops.

A sign of life.

His blood that made him a Bodymelder, drawn from the tattoo that proved he was blessed by the Angels.

Gatrielle did not even cry out as he watched his life sink into the earth. In response, the ground around us hummed. It wasn’t the unsteadying rocking from before that tried to undo us. It was a warm beckoning that seeped into my own bones.