“MOVE!” I push forward, the boy on my hip, Dena at my side. “Everyone, faster! Run if you can!”
The children scatter into a ragged sprint. The ones who can’t run are carried by the ones who can. Kharvek falls back, positioning himself between the group and the Sanctum, ready to intercept anything that might pursue.
I don’t look back. Can’t afford to.
But his emotions pulse against mine. His determination. His fury. His love, burning steady beneath the violence.
We’re going to make it. We have to make it.
FORTY-SEVEN
IMARA
The boundary markers loom ahead.
Stone pillars, carved with ancient sigils, marking the edge of the Matron’s domain. Beyond them, the Vale’s influence weakens. The ground stops bleeding. The air clears. Life becomes possible again.
Fifty yards.
The children are flagging. Even the strongest are struggling now, their bodies pushed past endurance. The youngest are crying—silent tears, because they’ve been taught not to make noise, but tears nonetheless.
Forty yards.
The ground bucks. Cracks open in the soil, releasing jets of crimson steam. One of the older children screams as the crack runs beneath her feet—and Kharvek is there, hauling her back, carrying her the rest of the way.
Thirty yards.
I’m gasping. The boy on my hip feels heavier with every step. Dena’s grip on my robe is the only thing keeping me oriented, keeping me moving forward instead of collapsing.
Twenty yards.
A sound behind us. Not the Sanctum falling—a voice. Clear and cold and impossibly calm despite the chaos.
“You can still stop this.”
I spin.
The Blood Matronstands at the edge of the Red Fields.
She’s emerged from the Sanctum’s ruins—her white hair streaming in the heated wind, her robes untouched by the destruction around her. The blood seeping from the ground parts around her feet, refusing to stain her. The crimson light that paints the sky seems to bend toward her, to worship her.
Two centuries of power. Two centuries of stolen lives. All of it contained in that ageless form, radiating from those solid crimson eyes.
She looks serene. Patient. As if the world isn’t ending around her.
As if she isn’t ending with it.
“Matron.” Kharvek moves forward, putting himself between her and the children. His scars blaze so bright it hurts to look at him. “Come to watch your legacy burn?”
“Come to offer one final chance.” Her eyes—those solid crimson orbs—fix on him. Not on me. Not on the children. On him. Her creation. Her masterpiece. Her son. “The ritual can be stabilized, Kharvek. The destruction can be contained. All it requires is the right vessel.”
“No.”
“You haven’t heard my terms.”
“I don’t need to.” His hands curl into fists. “Whatever you’re offering, the answer is no.”
The Matron smiles. It doesn’t reach her eyes—nothing reaches those eyes, that endless crimson depth.
