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brEAKFAST SITS FORGOTTEN on Hazel’s back porch. After Natasia’s declaration, everyone moved inside to debate our options.

The debate was quick; there isn’t much time.

I watch the cambions shift Hazel’s furniture around, placing things gently out of the way after Natasia asked to make an open circle in the middle of the room.

My father stands at my side, eyes wide at the ease with which Zoe and Lark lift Hazel’s heavy dining table. But some evidence of my churning emotions must show on my face, because after a moment he loops his arm around mine. I offer him a tight smile.

Old emotions batter my heart. Frustration, that a quiet moment, in what was meant to be a safe place, has already been interrupted by a new threat. Guilt, that Selwyn’s sacrifice to save me has led to this. Worry, that we won’t be able to help him. That he, like Lark, has followed the story of demonia that the Order has declared to be true—a path that Natasia so firmly disavows as false. Shame, that it will always be this way for those around me. A piercing voice within tells me that my friends and father don’t deserve to be caught up in another one of my messes.

But when Zoe blurs by to sneak another biscuit before going back to work, her question from Penumbra finds me again. Who does that benefit? And when Valec pulls Nick aside to debate tactics for neutralizing Sel without harming him, I hear his words, too. You had to fall… because you had to rise. And when my father squeezes me close, immovable determination in his features even in the face of a situation he can’t fully understand, he reminds me that this room of people are enacting his wisdom in real time.

Loving folks is a practice.

Guilt and shame won’t help me here. They arrest motion, and now is the time to act .

“Wait,” Valec says, and the room stops. “We need to take a second look at Bree’s soul. It’s why we came here in the first place—”

“Let me do this first,” Natasia says. “Please. I’ll buy you some time, in case Sel’s on his way.”

Valec steps back, shrugging. “Do your thing.”

Natasia beckons me into the circle and puts her hands on my shoulders. “I need you to forge a construct, Bree.”

I blink. “What kind of construct?”

“Something hard and strong. A construct that’ll persist, even when you’re not maintaining it.” Her golden eyes look over my features. “You’re powerful enough. I can feel it. Can you?”

I nod quickly. “Yeah. Yes.”

“You sure?” Lark asks skeptically. Half the room shoots him a glare. “What? I’m not, like, doubting doubting. I just mean, you’ve never had to make one that, you know, lasts. That takes a lot of focus and precision. Years of training for most Merlins.”

“Bree’s not a Merlin, Merlin ,” Zoe shoots back. “She’s got this.”

“Zoe’s right. Before…” I glance up at Valec, then Nick. “Before my soul piece was taken, I couldn’t have done something like this. Now I can. I’m sure of it.”

Natasia squeezes my shoulder. “I believe you.” She steps back, giving me about eight feet of clearance. “Something big but not spherical. Protrusions are best.”

I hold my hands out wide. “Big, not spherical… protrusions.” I close my eyes and envision the space around me as the void from Erebus’s early lesson. In it are two things: my power and myself.

I inhale slowly, and when I release the breath, I open the furnace in my chest. Distantly, I hear the others react at the sight of it, and I imagine what they see.

A roiling, purple eruption all over my arms and skin, licking up my throat, flowing down my legs, engulfing me in my own power. It writhes around my legs like snakes, curls around my body like living smoke, lifting my hair and tickling along my spine.

I don’t need to use words for most workings anymore, but I find they help. So, for this one, I choose… Grow.

The power rushes outward into a swirling pool at my feet. I churn it into a round, smooth bud tall enough to meet my shoulder. Wide at the base, coiling into a pointed tip at the top.

Once the bud settles, I give it another push. Bloom.

Without much effort, the bud expands.

I open my eyes to watch the bright purple-white light of my root sparking and flowing, part flame, part liquid, as it blossoms open into a half dozen wide petals the length of my arm, with a set of secondary stems beneath them. When the petals open to reveal a crystalline center, I tell the bloom to stop.

The glowing flower shifts and floats in the air, breathing as it waits for my next command.

Valec whistles into the silent room. “Yeah, I’d say she learned a thing or two.”

The concentration of root in my construct is so substantial that even my father can see it. When I look back at him, his eyes are filled with shiny pride—and my heart blossoms too.

Hazel shifts closer to me, clutching my arm. “Do you know what plant that is?”

I shake my head. “No. It just seemed right.”

“Your mom grew these,” my father says, “before you were born.”

“What are they?” I ask.

“Epiphyllum oxypetalum.” Hazel’s eyes have gone teary. “More commonly known as queen of the night. These flowers require regular sunlight to flourish and yet they only bloom in darkness, only one night a year. A Wildcrafter like your mother would have known exactly how to care for one of these plants. Sensed its blossom in time to watch it open and wilt before dawn.” She wraps an arm around my shoulder. “These flowers take faith, Bree. Even when we can’t see their progress, even when we forget they’re growing, they bloom. And they are worth the wait.”

I swallow around a lump in my throat.

“Faye would have loved this.” Natasia looks to Hazel. “Tell Bree—”

“I will.” Hazel nods.

“Okay,” Natasia says. When she steps closer, the purple leaves of the plant sway toward her and illuminate her face in a deep lavender glow. “Believe me when I say that I think this is incredible work, Bree. Truly stellar. But”—she reaches up to a petal—“we’re gonna have to destroy it.”

She grimaces, wrapping her hand around the petal and yanking down—hard—until it snaps off in her hand. To my satisfaction, the petal holds its shape. A gleaming crystal in her palm.

Natasia turns and does a quick head count of the room. “How many cars?”

“Four, including yours,” Valec answers.

She tosses the first petal to him and he catches it easily. “Take this one with you.”

She breaks another off, then throws it to Lark. “That’s two.”

“You’re using the petals as decoys,” Nick says, stepping closer. “Splitting us off so that Sel will take the bait while we get Bree clear.”

“Yup,” she says. She crosses her arms over her chest and addresses all the cambions at once, a general before her troops. “Four cars, four different routes, one cambion per car. Valec and Lark will each take a piece of Bree’s construct as bait, and I’ll take one, too. Bree will ride with Zoe in the final car while she keeps her power secured and hidden . He should go for one of our cars before he picks up on hers. As cambions, you’ll sense his presence faster than a human would and, with any luck, you’ll be able to slow him down while Bree goes undetected.”

Valec flexes his free hand, root sparking in his palm. “I can stop Kane just fine, Merlin.”

Natasia regards him. “Noted. You might hold your own, but he won’t make it easy. He’ll be territorial. Any cambion who stands in his way will be considered a threat.”

“What are you gonna do?” I ask. “You only broke off two pieces.”

Natasia claps her hands together and forges a sprawling silver-blue net, then tosses it over the remaining core and petals of the flower. “I’ll take the biggest bait with me. Leave first to try and head him off entirely. The two other Bree decoys will be backups while you head in the opposite direction.” She collects the rest of my construct and hefts it onto her shoulder to walk through the sliding door to the porch outside.

“Wait!” I run after her. “How will we know if he takes the bait?”

Natasia shrugs. “You won’t know unless you get somewhere safe and successfully take transportation he can’t track as easily. A train or plane, maybe. This isn’t a solution; it’s a stall until you get where you need to go, and we get a handle on Selwyn.”

“If I end up facing him, I don’t want to do it without my memories,” I protest.

“We’ll tackle that next,” Valec says, setting down his piece of the bloom for a moment. “Natasia, you go. Lark and William, y’all get going too.”

Lark begins to complain, but William shushes him.

Valec continues. “We’ll make this quick here with Bree, and then she, Zoe, and Nick can hit the road. I’ll set an extra ward so that Hazel, Lu, Mariah, Alice, and Bree’s pops are good and protected, then take off on my own.”

“Mariah’s with me,” I say.

“My thoughts exactly,” Mariah says, crossing her arms.

“Riah—” Valec starts.

“You didn’t see her at Penumbra,” I say. “With the Heart on she can take a cambion or a demon out if she has to, without getting hurt. I want her with me.”

Valec looks like he might argue again, but this time it’s Lu who stares him down. He groans, but gives up. “Fine.”

Natasia is gone before I can say much of a goodbye. William and Lark leave next, and say they’ll call us if they encounter Sel. They take William’s phone, but leave Lark’s with me so I’ll have one to call the others just in case.

Everyone else watches as Hazel draws me and Valec into the now empty circle in the center of the room.

“Did you meet me as a kid, Miss Hazel?” I ask as she draws a salt circle over her carpet. “What Natasia said…”

She looks up. “Yes. But I didn’t know it was you, or I woulda told you earlier. And, of course, when I worked with you, your power didn’t surface.” She finishes the circle and dusts her hands off. “When a Rootcrafter wants to get a handle on their child’s likelihood of becoming a ’Crafter, of having a branch of power, they bring them to me. Sometimes, not all the time, but sometimes, they put a mask on the child so that no one can identify them later. Safety precaution, when they don’t know me.”

Lu frowns. “Which explains why I don’t remember it. I step out when folks ask for privacy, even as the Grand Dame.”

“How folks handle their magic is their business. We don’t force people to disclose. You never know what they’ve experienced—or who they’re running from,” Hazel says.

“Faye was always careful about bringing new folks around the house,” my dad says slowly, eyes distant with memory. “I just thought she didn’t like company, but…”

Lu sighs. “It makes sense Faye didn’t want her daughter to be identifiable to anyone, in the event that Bree inherited the Bloodcraft. A power like that needs to be hidden, protected, until it can be properly claimed.”

“Hate to say it, but plenty of Rootcrafters would have been suspicious of Bree and her mother’s Bloodcraft, given how folks feel about binding power from the dead to the living.” Mariah sighs heavily. “So protecting Bree wasn’t just about keeping her away from demons and the Legendborn, but her own community too.”

“She took so many precautions,” I murmur. “Plans within plans, for every possibility.”

“Ten steps ahead,” my dad says fondly. “Always.”

“Now,” Hazel says, her hands on her hips. “My branch of root allows me to petition the ancestors to strengthen folks’ connection to their own life force. If I am working with an individual who possesses a dormant or suppressed vitality, or a hidden Rootcraft power, then I can ask the ancestors to help them surface it temporarily. If that individual’s abilities have already presented themselves, however, like Valec’s have, then I help them petition for greater control.”

I beam. “That’s great!”

“Not so fast.” Valec’s arms cross his chest. “What Hazel’s not saying is that my ability to take stock of someone’s magical luggage isn’t a Rootcrafter power inherited from my Rootcrafter ancestors. That’s a party trick gifted to me by my father. So, Hazel will be petitioning my human ancestors to help boost a power that came from a Shade.”

“Is that why you don’t think it’s going to work?” I ask.

Valec sucks his teeth. “I said it might not work. As far as I know, it’s never been tried.”

“We can’t control what the ancestors will do,” Hazel adds. “But we can ask.”

She walks over to her counter and comes back with a strong-smelling tea. “Ancestral magic of any type requires an open connection in both directions. In this case, we’re opening the way using a mixture of dandelion, wormwood, bergamot, bladder wrack, and bay. My intention is woven into this tea already, Valec, so all you have to do is drink it.”

“I think we have a cocktail like this at the Lounge.” Valec takes the drink and sniffs it, wincing. “Nope, nevermind. That would never sell.”

He tips the whole thing back and sticks his tongue out, shuddering as he hands the cup over the salt line and back to Hazel. “Gahtdamn, that’s nasty.”

I can’t help but snicker. “Better you than me.”

He shoots me a glare. “Get over here. Let’s do this.”

I step closer. He places his hand on my sternum—and nothing happens.

“Valec?”

He grits his teeth, twisting his head to the side. “Gimme a minute.”

We wait a second more, then he turns back to me again. “Look at me.”

We fall.

The world turns red and redder, until it nears black. As if a thundercloud has passed over us all, stealing the sunlight from its journey to the earth before it reaches us.

Wherever we go, Valec is at my side. His fingers curl, turning to claws against my skin.

Someone shouts—but I can’t move. Green smoke erupts between us and seeps from beneath his black-veined fingertips. Hands try to pull us apart, but we are seared together.

I hear voices.

The bright summer storm scent of Nick’s aether swords reaches me from afar.

My eyes snap open.

Valec’s eyes are a furious bloodred. His fangs rest long on his lip.

I had forgotten that part of him is so inhuman.

He snarls, yanking his arm back and pulling me with him—and then freezes.

His eyes begin to change. No pupil, no iris, no brown or red—just the bright, blazing golden color of root.

The room returns to me in bits and pieces. Daylight finds us through the windows. The others surround us in a tight, shocked circle. But all I can see is Valec, blinking.

“Well, that’s different.” When he speaks, his voice resonates and booms around the room, deep and grating.

“Can you see my soul?” I whisper.

He tilts his head as he stares at me. “Clear as day.”

My breath catches. “And?”

Valec’s brows tighten. “What did the King say, exactly, when you realized you’d lost people?”

That first morning comes back to me quickly. “He seemed curious that they were missing at all. Like he hadn’t been certain what to expect from his own spell.”

“So even the King of Shadows can only guess at the true essence of a human soul before he tampers with it,” Valec muses. “Like I said, souls are unknowable. What else did he say?”

“That no one could reverse it.”

Valec frowns. “Then why are the cuts so clean?”

“What do you—”

“This isn’t the work of an amateur, or a demon out of control with hunger. No jagged edges. No tearing or shreds.” He tilts his head the other way, eyes narrowing. “This is a precision cut by a steady hand who understands his craft. You make cuts like this when you want to preserve something, not destroy it.”

My heart leaps in my throat. “Valec, please tell me good news.”

He licks his lips. “I think… I think the King left things tidy so that he could make your soul whole again, if he wanted to.”

“So it was a lie?” My eyes widen. “He said he can’t restore it. That no one could—”

“Wordplay. Oldest trick in the book.” Valec bares his teeth. “?‘No one’ can reverse it. If the stories are true, that two parties are required to sever a soul, then the reverse could be true, as well. No one single person can fuse the two pieces. Only two. You both have to agree to return it whole, together.”

Distantly, I hear Zoe curse. Something that starts with an “M” and ends, well, rudely.

“He’ll never agree to that,” I say.

“Not unless you give him a real good reason to reconsider.” He squints. “But there’s something else… something I couldn’t see before. Didn’t have the power.” He steps closer, voice low with awe. “This ain’t just a break. It’s an injury. There’s scar tissue here, and that’s not on the King. That’s all you.”

“What does that mean?” I ask, suddenly frantic that I’ll always have gaps.

“You lost an aspect of your soul.” Valec murmurs a quick thank-you to his listening ancestors, and his eyes return to their usual brown. “Your soul is an engine, remember? Engines have critical components to help them run.”

I shake my head. “I don’t understand.”

Valec smiles softly. “No matter where you are or what power you have, you choose to help, powerhouse. To fight. To save people. It’s what you did with the missing Rootcrafter girls, isn’t it?”

“Fighting?” I blink through sudden tears. “My soul can’t just be about fighting… I won’t survive that. I can’t live at war—”

“It’s not just about being at war. It’s more than that,” Valec says, stepping closer to take my hands. “When the King took part of your soul, he took the part of you that holds on to the folks in your life. That’s what made them disappear. But that scar tissue proves that those missing people and the conflicts they bring to your doorstep are not all that drives you. Even in your own grief, even without your community, you healed over the raw break the King left behind, patched it up, and kept going. You used your soul again, risking reinjury, for a group of girls you didn’t know, when nobody else was watching, just so you could sleep at night.” When tears drip down my face, he wraps his arms around me, holding me tight. “You pushed me to try something today that I never even thought was possible, just because you wouldn’t give up on yourself and you refused to give up on me. Even when you choose yourself, you turn hope into something tangible for the rest of us. Even when you choose not to fight, you turn the tides. If you ask me, that right there is the soul of a king.”

“Soul of a leader,” my father adds.

“A hero,” says Nick, eyes fond.

“An icon!” Zoe shouts, grinning.

The room laughs, but I blink through tears, shaking my head. “I didn’t…”

“Yes, you did.” Valec draws back to look at me. “That’s the point. What you chose, yeah?”

I nod. “Yeah.” He lets me go with a squeeze.

“So, what’s the move?” Mariah asks. She glances at the still-glowing petal. “We gotta leave here as soon as possible. Where we headed?”

They all look to me, waiting, and for once, I don’t feel like their expectations, their hopes, are a burden. They’re… an honor. And one I won’t take for granted.

“I have an idea.”

Two minutes later, I’m on the back porch, pacing while my friends and family watch. The phone rings once, twice, then the line picks up.

The voice on the other end is low and even. Far too calm. “Would I be correct in assuming that you are not, in fact, Larkin Douglas?”

I wait a beat before I reply. “You’d be correct.”

Silence.

“Have the rules changed, Briana?”

I look at my friends. My father. Nick. And think of everyone who’s still missing. Of Alice. “They have.”

Another beat.

“I see.”

“We need to meet.”

“Why is that?”

“Because you have something of mine.” My eyes slide to the brown cloth–covered crown on Hazel’s counter. “And I have something of yours.”

He chuckles. “All right. Meet me at Mikael’s estate, tonight in the back grounds. If you aren’t here on the property by the time the sun sets, then I will pay a visit to the home of the Dame. I heard your father went missing—would I find him there?”

I grip the phone but remain calm. “No need for threats. I’ll be there.”

“You are a very clever, very resourceful girl. Before you come up with a scheme to cross me, may I remind you, I hold an unmet bargain over your head?”

“I think you’ll listen to what I have to say.”

“And why is that, Briana?” His voice is hard and unforgiving. “What would I gain from giving up my advantage? I could simply order you to give my crown to me as soon as you arrive.”

I expected that question, and so my answer is ready.

“You could,” I say. “But if you do not, and you hear me out, you’ll receive something from me that I will never offer you again.”

“Oh?” he says. “And that is?”

“My mercy, Erebus,” I say. “My mercy.”