A low hum began to grow behind the Divine Six. Mal’Thariel lifted a hand, smooth and crystalline, carved of glass and marble. An unnatural circle of runes spiralled open in the floor beneath Korithax’s body, glowing with eerie precision.
“No,” I growled, stepping forward. “Don’t touch him.”
But the Architect had already begun. “The Child of Ruin must not be revived,” Mal’Thariel grinds out. “This is a necessity. This is law.”
Daisy’s lips parted. “What are you doing?” Her voice cracked with raw panic. “No. No, stop. Don’t take him from me!”
I lurched forward to help her, but the runes burned with such ferocity I fell backward, my sword clattering to the ground. Velentha’s head snapped toward Mal’Thariel, her eyes flaring with something calculating. A whisper, too low for anyone to hear, slipped past her lips. The runes under Korithax’s body pulsed… just once, then flickered subtly. No one noticed but me, and I narrowed my eyes on her. What the hell was she up to?
The spell completed, and Korithax’s body vanished, his crown falling from him and clattering to the floor with a metallic cry, the last echo of his presence.
“NO!” Daisy screamed, lunging forward.
But it was too late, and her hands reached nothing but the blood-stained floor where his body had been just moments before. She roared, the sound no longer human. The temperature of the room plummeted before spiking into a scorching heat as a final surge of magic exploded outward from her. She threw her hands toward the Divine Six, flame erupting in a blazing spear of pure will—pure, blazing white bright. Itcollided with their forming forcefield of protection. The energy crackled violently, screaming against the magic holding it back. Cracks spiderwebbed across the shield, but it held as Daisy’s power began to drain. She wasn’t trained. I had no idea how she was even wielding such magic when she hadn’t been taught how to use it. She truly was magnificent.
Seraphiel’s eyes widened in alarm. “She’s breaking through?—”
“We must leave!” Elaron shouted.
Velentha didn’t move as her gaze remained fixed on the ground where Korithax had lain, her fingers subtly moving behind her back. Suddenly, a blinding light engulfed the Divine Six.
“No!” Daisy shrieked. Her magic surged again, but it was too late.
They vanished in a burst of divine radiance, the shield disappearing with them. Their exit sent a ripple of silence through the chamber. My gaze whipped to Daisy just as she collapsed, her flames extinguished in an instant. Her body hit the blood-slick floor with a dull thud, her hair fanned around her like a halo of scorched gold. Her hands were still stained with blood, and her crown’s fire sputtered and died. I ran to her, barely hearing the others around me. I fell to my knees at her side, reaching for her wrist—a pulse, faint but there. Her breathing was shallow, her body limp, but she was alive.
“Get help!” I shouted, not caring who listened. “Now!”
But even as I held her, I knew that something inside her was so utterly broken. And the girl who rose from this would never be the same again.
The healers had carriedDaisy’s unconscious form from the ruined throne room to her new chambers—the ones that had been prepared for her and Korithax. She hadn’t stirred. The girl who had once smiled with sunshine in her eyes was now coated in her best friend’s and lover’s blood.
The other leaders of their realms dispersed; their own urgencies to attend to. We agreed to reconvene in an hour in the war room to prepare for the inevitable. War was no longer a threat on the horizon. It had well and truly arrived. But there was something I needed to do before then.
I walk alongthrough the deathly quiet halls of Zeriavoss, heading toward the door that had once led directly to the Divine Six’s pretentious, sacred realm. It now stood magically sealed, its celestial sigils faintly glowing with power that nobody beside them could breach. I pace before it, my pulse thrumming with anticipation, my thoughts a storm.
A shadow peels through the door, as though it had split like skin. I move fast, closing the distance between us, and pull her into my arms. “Are you okay?” I whisper.
“I’m fine,” she replies, but her voice shakes. “I don’t have long. If I’m noticed missing, questions will follow.”
I nod, but my grip on her doesn’t ease.
“That went worse than expected,” she murmurs, stepping back enough to look me in the eye. “Much, much worse. There were so many pathways tonight… his death wasn’t one I thought likely.”
“I had not seen it clearly either,” I rasp. “So much so, I ruled it out.”
The pain rose again, gnawing at me. I’d spent my entire life watching the threads of fate tangle and snap, but seeing my brother fall… seeing Daisy break. It tore something out of me.
“She has fully awakened now,” she breathes shakily. “Dasmyrin reborn. But this version of her? She’s something more. The war ahead will be carnage. Too many futures, all of them ending in tragedy.”
“I know,” I say sombrely. “I can’t see the outcome anymore. But with their help, we might chart a path. Do you have it?”
She reaches into her robes and pulls out a thick, rune-covered book. The Divine Six’s grimoire. Bound in scales, pulsing with faint light like a living heart. My breath catches as I reach for it.
“They’ll kill you if they realise?—”
“They’ll know it’s missing in fourteen hours,” she says, cutting me off. “That’s how long you have to use it and gather everything you need.”
I nod, tucking the book deep into the folds of my cloak. “Are you going to be okay?”
