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Lenna

S he’d been staring at the scarred fingers of the East Cardinal, unable to believe they weren’t talons. The pain she felt in her heart after the goddess had stolen the ability to love from Jake was physical. Talons had clawed her heart, now a miserable organ left in shreds.

The next cursed, winged female had taken her twin’s eyes to make a fucking necklace.

Her sister would never see the red moon, the Radel Sea, her silver sparks, or the face of her lovers again. She wouldn’t see the face of her children, if she ever had them. She wouldn’t see anything or anyone else again, because the North bird wanted a pretty necklace.

A. Fucking. Pretty. Necklace.

The voice of the Organ Mandor in what seemed like another life echoed into Lenna’s thoughts. Female minds, twisted indeed , he’d said. Maybe he hadn’t been so wrong after all.

These feathered deities were creatures of malice.

They were brutal, barbaric beasts. And for the first time since the five Cardinals had appeared, the South Cardinal was now looking at her.

“Lenna Brachyan, unsuccessful striver of the South ordeal. You don’t belong here.”

“Thanks for the reminder that almost dying was not good enough. I came seeking answers,” her voice broke between ragged breaths. She couldn’t remember if she’d ever cried this hard, this much. The answers she had wanted seemed minuscule, irrelevant problems now.

“So I heard.” The South Cardinal’s face was severe, impassive. “While I wait, and because your attempt at my ordeal demonstrated courage, I will answer one question for you. Pick wisely.”

Lenna narrowed her sore, golden eyes. What was the Cardinal waiting for? She was the last goddess, and Lenna was the last one in this chamber they could fuck over. Whatever she meant, Lenna was not going to lose her chance.

The list of questions she wanted to ask was longer than her life was likely to be. What was the future of Thyria going to be like? How would Hope kill the Organ Mandor now that she had the Fifth Power? What would happen to the West Petal now that Ciaran was not the heir to his House? Would Raoul ever stop having nightmares and his hair turning darker with each one? Would Ayla ever be happy living without seeing? How many panomquakes had happened in Thyria this ante meridiem, with so many changes in the Houses and their powers?

There were other questions, too . . . Questions that hurt too much to say aloud.

What would happen to Jake? Was the Cardinal’s price he had agreed to pay irreversible? Would Lenna survive loving him for the rest of her days, when he would not—he could not—reciprocate? Why the Fifth fuck had these Cardinals ruined the two beings she loved most? Why were they so perverse? Why, like the Organ Mandor himself, did they deserve to live and destroy lives without consequences?

Nothing in her life was certain anymore. Certain things changed in a matter of seconds.

Love ended as if it had never existed, sight was stripped as if someone had never deserved it. Certainty was an empty concept, a fantastic creation to give reassurance to beings who craved it.

Lenna didn’t crave certainty, though. She craved something bigger, more dangerous and wilder. She craved the truth, and she had one chance to get it.

“How can a Cardinal be killed?”

The impassive features of the South Cardinal finally changed. She tilted her chin up, her red lips pressed tight in a line. “The life of a Cardinal can only end when her wings are torn by the weapon bearing her own blood, and her heart is struck by the weapon bearing the blood of her Queen.”

All Lenna had time to do was save the valuable information for later, because firm steps approached the entrance to the chamber through the path they had walked under the mountain. And when she turned to see who it was, her blood froze.

“Precisely the five beings I wanted to see. And as always, it’s an honor to see you, too, my Cardinals.”

The grin on the face of Rhei Coralt, Organ Mandor of Thyria, was as repulsive as it had ever been. His silver eyes, identical to Jake’s, shone with excitement, his obsidian black hair shorter than the last time Lenna had seen him. The suit he wore was impeccable, accentuating the tall figure of his body and every marked angle of his face.

“You’re late,” said the South Cardinal.

The Organ Mandor walked in front of her throne, bowing his head as his hand did a stupid flourish. “My sincere apologies. I couldn’t understand the cryptic clues of where the Fifth Judgment was happening. This . . . location was quite unexpected.”

The Core Cardinal’s nostrils flared, and her voice was angry. “If you didn’t understand it, how is it that you are here?”

“A little bird told me.” His smug smile was even worse than his vomit-inducing grin. “Since I’m here, we might as well proceed.”

He put his hand inside his jacket, and a few gasps echoed in the room when they saw what he held tightly inside his fist.

The Organ Mandor had the crystal feather of the South ordeal.

“Why the South ordeal, Ruler of the Organ House?” the Core Cardinal asked, her eyes narrowed to slits that surely could spit red fire.

“If male honesty is ever allowed, I have no doubt you’d have ensured I wasn’t successful in your ordeal, Core Cardinal, which I think is deeply unethical and unfairly biased. Your interests and mine have never aligned. But the truth is, by the time I realized what these five beings were doing, my precious bird told me the South ordeal was the only remaining one to be completed.”

“South?” Core Cardinal asked, her voice raising an octave and making the rocky dome tremble, some small stones falling to the ground.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“I missed your bleeding inks, Father. I wondered why.” Was Hope—

Lenna narrowed her eyes, trying to confirm that—Yes, Hope was fucking smiling . Of course, that woman was bloody smiling when her biggest enemy was in front of her.

His silver eyes were cold and sharp as he stared at the black irises of his bastard daughter, heir to his throne. “I stopped sending you inks because I had bigger commitments in mind.”

Then, it hit Lenna.

The outlandish force of water that would have hit their navia when they traveled to the South ordeal, the one Jake stopped before it could drown them all. He hadn’t been able to identify what it was, but he had known it wasn’t nature.

The ink from the Cardinals before Lenna had arrived at her ordeal. The feathers are claimed , it had read on their skins . The message had been Cardinal-cursed clear, and it hadn’t been sent to Lenna.

And when Lenna had entered the ordeal, after stubbornly promising “I am going to do the South ordeal even if it’s the last thing I do.”

The South Cardinal had allowed her to enter it, but there was nothing to gain. Because the feather of the Taking ordeal, shining in the fist of Rhei Coralt, had already been claimed.

How had she been so painfully narrow-minded and dumb? All the signs had been there. Signs, inks, and even a gigantic water force against their navia, for Fifth’s damned sake.

Everything had been there, except her opportunity to pause, analyze, understand, and prepare, and now it was too fucking late.

“Rhei Coralt, successful striver of the South ordeal. Do you present your feather to unveil the fate of your gamble?”

The hairs on Lenna’s spine rose with the words of the South Cardinal. The Organ Mandor lifted his fist and opened it, the crystal edges marked on the skin he had held tightly.

“Yours to take.”

“For the Fifth Power, I will take your feather, and I will take the life of someone who gave you something.”

His grin was immediate, and his silver eyes met Jake’s. From the look on his face, Jake’s ability to hate had multiplied exponentially for every bit of love he would never feel again.

“Please take the life of my wife, who gave me my son.”

The growl that left Jake’s throat was not of this world, his fists clenching as navy sparks raced around his hands, charging.

The South Cardinal nodded, and a woman with the same full lips and straight nose as Jake’s appeared in front of her throne. Before the woman could blink, the South Cardinal Took her heart.

Lenna lifted her hands to her throat, running to the dead body that crashed to the ground a few steps away from her. Organs couldn’t be Taken, but clearly the Taking Cardinal could do whatever the fuck she wanted.

Lenna’s skin tickled, and she tried to cover it as she read Hope’s words on her skin.

When Lenna looked up, she saw Ciaran lifting his head from his biological forearm, too.

“Where is it?” Rhei Coralt asked impatiently, not even glancing at the dead woman at his feet.

“Your Fifth Power is here. You may drink.”

The South Cardinal left the levitating liquefied mass of Fifth Power in the air, and then, as if their duties were completed and the Judgment had finished, the five Cardinals vanished.