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Kato’s entire body coiled with effort. Water surged around him. His boots slipped, his stance buckling for half a second before he caught himself, shoving harder. “It’s not giving,” he growled.

Shards save them all. This wasn’t going to work.

Shrieks echoed over the water, louder— closer .

Skye’s legs trembled. His fingers slipped against wet stone. His body screamed at him to stop.

And still, he shoved .

Because stopping meant losing her.

It meant failing.

It meant everything—every fight, every step to get them here—had been for nothing.

Skye roared as stone and water rained down on them, fury and helplessness crashing inside him. He’d always been told to stop channeling when it started to hurt.

This time, he didn’t.

Heat rolled inside him, searing through muscle, latching onto bone.

His breath hitched. His pulse pounded through his skull.

And then—something shifted. Something… tore .

It started deep and kept spreading. And through that rending, power came flooding in.

It built with the pain, rising steadily and ever upward. Until it became a tidal wave, a deluge—a seal breaking over a well he hadn’t even known existed.

His fingers dug into the pillar— through it. The stone, unyielding just moments before, crumbled beneath his grip like packed sand.

“That’s it,” Kato grunted.

The pillar groaned, shifted.

Skye snarled, muscles burning, legs sinking deeper into the muck. More. Just a little more.

The river fought to pull him under. The runes on the stone flared, magic snapping against his skin. He threw everything he had into it, tipping his head back, teeth bared to the sky as he roared.

With a final monstrous shove, the beam ripped free.

Chunks of mud and soil fountained into the sky.

Above them, the whole structure tilted, one side breaking away from the riverbank in a spray of falling timber and stone.

“Another,” Skye panted to Kato as they waded to the next beam. The rapids swirled past, waist-high and relentless. “We need to take down another.”

Water splashed in Skye’s eyes, stinging with salt. The riverbed sucked at his boots, shifting, dragging him down. But he barely felt it.

His eyes locked on the column. The last barrier. The last damn thing between him and Taly’s safety.

The power was still there, rolling beneath his skin. He hadn’t used all of it.

He needed more.

His lungs burned. His pulse hammered. His muscles flexed, not with effort, but with… change .

Beneath his sleeves, tendons flexed and realigned. Ligaments stretched as bones reformed.

It should’ve terrified him. Maybe it did.

But Shards, it felt good .

Every lick of pain burst into power. He was splintering from the inside out, like his body was feeding itself to the fire.

And he let it.

His shoulders broadened. His spine stretched. His body reinforced itself from the inside out. His legs braced deeper, calves corded with new strength. His fingers elongated—jagged, built to tear through stone.

Kato swore. “What the—”

But Skye was already moving through the water. The river parted around him in churning arcs.

He would not die here. Neither would she.

He’d come too far. He was too close to the finish line to lose everything now.

With a snarl, he struck.

Where his fists came down, rock shattered.

The second column didn’t tear from the earth like the first.

It snapped.

Countless tons of reinforced rock and metal crumpled and burst apart, followed by the telltale crackle of aether as the wards spat sparks into the storm.

“Go, go, go!” Kato shouted as they both ran for the bank, fingers digging into the mud as their boots slid.

The bridge collapsed behind them with a thundering crash. A wave of water slammed into his back, dragging Skye backward. Fingers splayed, claws sinking knuckle-deep into the slick earth, he hauled himself upward, refusing to slide back.

The river surged again.

“Shit!” Kato fell.

Skye lunged, snagging the back of his coat. The added weight wrenched at his shoulder. His grip faltered. For a terrifying heartbeat, his fingers slid through the mud.

Then, Taly was there—awake. She grabbed his collar and yanked him over. Skye twisted, hauling Kato up with him.

Kato collapsed immediately. Skye staggered a few more steps up the riverbank—then dropped.

Everything unraveled. That raw, volatile power ripped away, leaving him hollow.

Muscles shrank. Strength drained. Claws dulled, shrinking back into fingers. Power slipped through his grasp faster than he could hold onto it.

Tremors wracked him, slow to fade. He felt wrung out. The adrenaline had burned off, and what was left was raw and aching. There’d be a price for what he’d done. There always was. But right now, he didn’t care.

They were alive—mud-caked, breathless, battered. But alive .

Skye forced himself up. His legs trembled, his head spun, but he stayed upright. Taly stood on the river’s edge, wind whipping through her hair. He came to stand beside her, and they surveyed the wreckage.

The bridge had crumpled, momentum and force shearing the rest of the beams. It almost seemed knocked over.

The river churned through the remains. Trees along the bank leaned dangerously, their roots unearthed by the shifting current.

The air hung thick with damp earth and upturned sediment, mixing with the charred scent of ruined aether wards.

“We’ve got company.” Taly pointed to the opposite bank.

They emerged through the fog, a grotesque tableau of decayed flesh and hollow stares. Dead men and women, pallid and mottled, materialized from the trees, gathering along the far bank.

They stood motionless, as if waiting.

“That’s creepy,” Kato muttered.

Then they moved—as one.

“That’s creepier,” Skye whispered.

The mass parted, and a lone figure stepped forward. He moved with measured ease, his fine cloak obscuring his face.

Over the crash of the river, a voice rang out.

“I get it. I may have come in a bit light on the offer. Just part of the game, you know?”

Skye’s jaw clenched. “Who is that?”

“That,” Taly rasped, “is the man invading our island.”

Skye felt his pulse spike. “How do you know that?”

She swallowed, still too pale in the moonlight. “Because I met him.”

Skye went cold. Then hot as the realization settled.

The Veil tears, the spiders, the hours spent clawing their way back—it was a distraction. None of it was chance. While they’d been lost in the Shards-damn woods, the enemy had made his move.

And she’d faced him. Alone.

The rage curled slow and sharp in his chest, simmering beneath the exhaustion.

“Look,” the man called, voice smooth as ever. “If it’s the killing that’s the problem, I can stop. I swear it—I’ll stop. Just... think it over, alright?”

“What is he talking about?” Kato asked.

Taly opened her mouth to answer, but the words caught. A cough tore through her. A wet, tearing sound that immediately gave way to another. Then another, her body folding over as she gasped for air.

“You better go,” the man called. “She won’t last much longer.”

“What does that mean? Taly?” Skye reached for her, gripping her shoulders. He tried to catch her gaze through the coughing. “ Taly? ”

Blood hit her palm. Her breath hitched—then turned to a gasp, a choke, another cough, harder, rawer.

“Oh no. No, no, no,” Skye pleaded. “ Breathe . C’mon, Tink, you’ve got to breathe.”

But she couldn’t. She was gasping, turning blue.

Should he give her aether? Would it even matter if she couldn’t get down a breath?

Her eyelids fluttered. Skye caught her as she collapsed, hooking an arm beneath her knees.

She didn’t fight him. She was limp as he gathered her up.

Shit. This was bad.

“Keep up,” he snapped at Kato.

He didn’t wait for a reply.

His legs surged into motion. Pain lanced through his thighs, up his spine, but he forced them forward through mud and rain, through torn muscle and screaming lungs.

He didn’t care about the cold, the burn, or the forest trying to close around him. All he saw was the path ahead.

All he felt was the weight in his arms and the fear that he was already too late.

Skye ran, heading north. And he didn’t stop until Ryme loomed in the distance, a shadow set against the rising dawn.