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Brandr frowns, his earrings flashing in the light.

“This land is ours , Brynja. All of it. The First Ones gave it to us—Daeros stole it, defiled it. The Skaandans rebelled against the judgment of our ancestors. It isn’t right for them to be here—they’ve endured far longer than they ought to have.

Have you been playing at being Skaandan for so long that you feel sympathy for them? ”

I bow my head.

A memory flashes through me: my father kneeling beside me where I’d fallen from the wire in the practice arena.

Sand was ground hard into my face, and my arm was bent underneath me at an unnatural angle.

I didn’t feel the pain yet, just numbness, and shame that I wasn’t better, faster, stronger. That I wasn’t what I needed to be.

My father didn’t heal me immediately, like he usually did. He just frowned and voiced my own thoughts back to me: “You have to be better than this, Brynja. We’re sending you to Kallias in less than a month. You have to be better .”

Tears welled in my eyes, and I couldn’t stop them from falling. My father looked at me in disgust. “We must sacrifice everything we are for the greater good,” he said sharply. “You must want this, need this, be this. Your sacrifice will save our people. Never forget that.”

Only then did he heal me, his magic coiling green and white and blue around my arm, knitting the bone back together.

I didn’t understand what he meant, then. I didn’t realize I was sacrificing myself. I thought I was infiltrating an evil king’s court like a hero from a story. I wouldn’t be there long. My family would come for me.

Except they never did.

I do understand his meaning now. I did sacrifice myself, nearly to the point of death. And that’s what Brandr is talking about. Sacrificing Skaanda and Daeros to restore Iljaria to what it once was.

To erase the defilement of our land.

To bring, at last, true peace.

But I don’t know how peace can come out of death, and it makes me feel sick, down to the deepest part of me.

I follow my brother up the long, long way through the tunnels without another word.

I catch Brandr’s arm as he’s about to head down the main corridor. “There’s something we have to do. Now. Before anything else.”

He frowns but follows me to the great hall, where he speaks a word and silvery light shimmers into existence, illuminating the vast room. I watch him as his eyes flick impassively around the cages. His mouth presses into a firm line. “Are there other Iljaria here?”

It’s my turn to frown. Does he not remember the night he watched the Collection perform? “Yes.”

“Lead the way.”

I take him to the iron cage at the back of the room, and Finnur looks at me with expectant hope as we approach.

Now Brandr is angry, red sparking off him because one of our own has been kept behind iron. “ This is why we will unleash the Yellow Lord,” he tells me shortly. Then he snaps his fingers, and Finnur’s cage opens.

Finnur spares only a single glance for my brother before fixing his gaze on me. “Is it time?” he says softly. “Is it done?”

My heart seizes, and I don’t know whether to grin or to weep. “Yes,” I tell him. “You’re free.”

Finnur slips out of his cage and bows to me very low. Tears prick and I grab his hand, pull him up. His fingers are cold and thin and tight in mine.

Brandr gives Finnur an approving nod. “You will be given a room in the palace, with all your needs attended to, until this is over. Then you may stay here, or return to your family in Iljaria, whichever you prefer.”

“Thank you, High Master,” Finnur whispers.

An Iljaria appears seemingly out of nowhere and bows to Brandr, then beckons for Finnur to follow him. But Finnur doesn’t move, still watching me.

“Go, then,” says Brandr, impatient. “We have a celebratory dinner to attend.”

My heart jerks. “Finnur isn’t the only one here, Brandr.”

Brandr squares his jaw. “Skaandans and Daerosians don’t deserve anything from us.”

“They’re children !” I shout. “They haven’t done anything to anyone. Kallias has kept them like animals and—” My throat closes up. “I promised them. All of them.”

Finnur blinks up at me, wisps of colorful magic swirling around his head, now that he is no longer shut in his iron cage.

“Fine,” Brandr snaps.

I lead him next to Gulla’s cage at the back of the room, with Finnur close beside me. Brandr unlocks the cage with his magic, and she kneels in front of me and kisses the hem of my skirt.

My heart twists, and I pull her to her feet again. “You do not bow to me, Gulla. You have been my savior many times. I’m only returning the favor.”

She smiles at me and touches two fingers to my brow.

Brandr is looking at her strangely. “Who are you?” he asks.

This is the new Prism Master? she says to me in her finger speech. He is very young.

“Gulla, this is my brother, Brandr. Brandr, this is Gulla, Ballast’s mother.”

Brandr frowns but inclines his head to her in respect.

We go on around the room, Finnur, Brandr, Gulla, and me.

Brandr uses his magic to unlock every cage and the children creep out like terrified rabbits, tears slipping silently down their cheeks.

Not a one of them speaks a word, and I realize with a twist of my gut that none of them actually expected me to save them.

But they trust me now, following along behind me like an increasingly unwieldy procession.

There is only one cage left now: the iron one above our heads that used to be mine and is Rute’s now.

Gulla and the others stand with me in silence as Brandr calls it down with his magic.

This time I pick the lock myself, stepping into the cage and trying not to let my fear of it overwhelm me.

Rute stares at me, tense, wary, but her anger seems to have leaked out of her.

“I’m sorry it took so long,” I say quietly.

She gnaws on her lip and then she weeps, her thin body shaking. She lets me lead her out of the cage, and both of us breathe easier, I think, with our feet planted squarely on the floor.

Gulla glances about at the children, barefoot and ragged, many with barely scabbed cuts on arms or legs or faces. She touches my arm. Let me be their guardian, she signs to me. Let me look after them. For as long as is needed.

Tears press hot behind my eyes, and I sign back to her: Lords bless you, Gulla. Thank you.

I swear to myself that when all this is over, I will find a true place for her, and for all these children, too.

I try not to think about the Yellow Lord, about Brandr unleashing him on the world. There must be justice, yes. But I will protect each one of these precious souls with everything that is in me.

I look back at the cage, revulsion and hatred and horror searing through me. Rute makes fifteen children saved, fifteen free, out of far too many others who lie forgotten in the Sea of Bones.

“Where have you put Kallias?” I ask my brother.

Brandr has been growing more and more annoyed with this whole process, impatient with me. He lifts his eyebrows at the mention of the king. “In a cell like the rest of the prisoners.”

My stomach twists at the thought of Saga and Vil locked away, of Ballast writhing in the dark with the collar burning his neck. Grief and guilt war within me. “I want him locked in here,” I say, nodding to the cage.

Brandr raises his eyebrows, a hint of laughter in his eyes. “So you have developed a Skaandan heart. Very well, it will be done.”

“Immediately,” I press.

He snaps his fingers for the Iljaria guards and relays my instructions. They bow and go to do my bidding.

I wait with Gulla and the huddle of freed children, my heart blazing in my chest. I think it will burn through my bones and my skin.

I think it will fall to the marble floor and turn to stone.

All I can feel is the children, clinging to me like I’m the only thing mooring them to the earth.

I wonder if they know they’re the only things mooring me .

I try not to sense Gulla’s frigid disapproval—but how can she think my request anything but just?

It’s a moment or an eternity.

Then footsteps ring on the floor.

Kallias comes into view, gripped on either side by two tall Iljaria. Somehow the king manages to look as smug as he did down in the mountain, striking the final blow against the rock. His bewilderment is gone. He holds his head high and sneers at me.

All the children stare at him, stare and stare, like they can’t believe their roles have been reversed. Gulla looks at the floor, as if she is ashamed.

“In there,” I say roughly, pointing to my cage. My skin is buzzing. Bronze sparks blur my vision.

The Iljaria guards shove the king inside. He perches there, an oversized spider too large for its web.

I lock the cage myself, shutting the door, turning the key. Kallias peers at me through the bars. “I knew it was you,” he says. “My wayward acrobat, come home to me. Did you think you had changed so much?”

I resist the urge to strike him. To spit, to swear.

But he sees it all in my eyes, and he laughs at me.

I turn my back to him and nod to Brandr.

His magic curls around the chain, and the cage is hoisted back up to the peak of the roof. Kallias dangles above me, as I once hung above him.

But I don’t feel satisfied. I am shaken to my very core.

“We’re done here,” I tell Brandr. I turn to the guards.

I can’t look at Gulla, can’t meet her eyes.

“Find these children and the Lady Gulla rooms in the guest wing. Treat them like kings and queens, or I’ll have your heads.

” I am wildly, viciously angry, and I want to cry until all the rage pours out of me, but I won’t.

Not here, in front of my brother, who has forgotten he was ever weak.

I leave the great hall. I don’t look back at Kallias in my cage, but I feel his eyes, burning into my shoulders.

Did you think you had changed so much?

He was playing with me this whole time. It surprises me, unsettles me.

My childhood perception of him as the impulsive, reckless king who couldn’t keep hold of his temper isn’t quite right.

If it were, he would have exposed and killed me the instant I set foot back in Tenebris.

But no, he was a lion, toying with his prey, plotting the moment of his victory, and my demise, all the more satisfying for having spun out his manipulative game to its conclusion.

The Ghost God card, triumphing yet again.

But none of that matters now. I’m free. The Collection is ended. I can be with my people again, and all shall be well.

All shall be well.

If only I could wholly believe that.