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“I will allow you to live,” he tells him. “Because I know somewhere within you exists a creature of some decency. But know this,” he says, pointing a threatening finger at the Glacian. “You did notsavemy mother. You put her in the belly of a mountain and washed your hands of responsibility.”

“Can I prove myself to you, deshun?” Phineas says now. “I will fight with you. I–”

“If I see you on the battlefield, I will count you as my enemy.” Ryon’s voice resonates, deflecting off the stone walls around them. “Go from here.”

Phineas does not resist. He nods once, giving Farra and Ryon both one long remorseful look, and turns to leave.

“You ought to be on your way too, Ryon,” Farra says. “Rally the mixed. There is little time.”

Ryon nods. “I will come to find you after,” he says. “If… if you want to be found.”

Dawsyn sees the light in Farra’s eyes at Ryon’s words, the satisfaction it brings her. Farra smiles in her small way.

Ryon turns his back, reaching his hand for Dawsyn’s. But she hesitates to take it. The pool before her swirls in its lazy patterns, not quite liquid and not quite air. The words impregnated on her mind only need be said once and the entire well will dry.

So long as the pool exists…

“Go,” Farra says, this time to Dawsyn. She watches her with a knowing grimace. “You do not belong up here, Dawsyn. Our kind never has.” It makes Dawsyn think of the Ledge people cloistered in the valley. Farra nods encouragingly at her. “Be in the valley. And take my son with you. Please.”

Dawsyn tears her eyes away from the glare of the pool. She looks at Ryon, proffering his hand, waiting for her, begging her not to break her vow, praying she doesn’t choose the pool, the Chasm, Yerdos’ pit, rather than him.

It is in that moment, pulled in opposite directions, that Baltisse’s voice once again returns to her.You were not born for destruction,she reminds her, as she once had,or for the Ledge. You were born for Terrsaw.

Perhaps she should listen.

Perhaps destruction is not all she was made for.

Dawsyn places her hand in Ryon’s, and it fills her with a light that is neither mage nor Glacian, but the rightness of two souls such as theirs, and the assuredness that they should collide.

CHAPTERFIFTY-TWO

Under Farra’s instruction, the small army they had gathered flies toward the Boulder Gate. They clog the sky with their multi-hued wings, brimming with freedom, and Ryon’s chest swells to see it, to join them.

Long has he fought for those in the Colony to experience exactly this, the feel of the frigid wind beneath them, the thrill of the descent. The endless expanse of sky all around, too big for any one Glacian to claim. They tumble and wheel over treetops, nudging one another out of the way as they soar, laughing loudly, and Ryon thinks that even if they should forfeit some to this battle against Adrik, at least they have tasted the air and seen the world as Gods do.

He clutches Dawsyn tightly now against his chest, but she does not seem bothered by the altitude nor speed. Somewhere between holding a knife to his throat and saving his life, she has built a tolerance for flight.

“Why are you smiling?” she asks suddenly. Without taking her arms from his neck, she brushes his bottom lip with her thumb.

“I was thinking of the first time I took you from the ground.”

Dawsyn huffs. “You tried to take my ax and I almost cut your hand off.”

“That wasn’t the first time.”

Ryon cannot see her face properly, but he imagines her frown. He knows it well. “Then, what was the first?”

“You held a knife to my throat, and I flew you into the trees to hide.”

“Ah,” Dawsyn nods against him. “That was uncomfortable.”

“Not for me,” Ryon smirks. “I was fond of that dress you wore.” He can still picture the way it had hugged her frame, how delicate it had made her seem, even after she’d drawn blood from his neck.

“You were fonder of me removing it,” Dawsyn says then and Ryon feels all the blood in his body rush south.

“That was foul play,” Ryon scowls. “Trying to weaken my resolve like that. By then, it was tenuous enough.”

“Men are easily weakened.”