Page 98 of Dance of Stars and Ashes

“To the city of Premyiv,” he answered. “It’s at the heart of the island. That’s where we’ll find the grove.”

They set out on their journey, stopping to rest for the night when the sun had set.

Zarya lay awake, listening to the soft snores surrounding her, thinking of her conversation with Row on the boat and the notebook that belonged to her father. Would she ever meet him in real life? Did she want to?

She twisted the turquoise jewel that hung around her neck between her fingers, thinking about her mother. She recalled the image in the book with the swirl of magic surrounding the pendant, and on instinct, she floated a tendril of spirit out. Was there any way to feel the heartbeat or the echo of the woman this had once belonged to?

She watched as the pale light surrounded the stone and then sunk into the surface.

Zarya. A woman’s soft voice.

She sat up, looking around, searching for the source. Row, Rabin, Apsara, and the rest all slept quietly.

“Who’s there?” she whispered into the silent dark.

Her hand had wrapped around the stone, and she pried her fingers open, sending another tendril of spirit into it with more force.

Zarya. The voice came again.

She continued feeding magic into the stone, her heart thundering in her ears.

If you’re hearing this, then you’ve found a way to unlock your magic. I knew one day it would happen, but I tried to protect you for as long as I could.

Zarya’s heart seized behind her ribs. This was her mother. It had to be.

Your father will come for you. Whether it’s soon or many years from now, he will find you. The day the oracle foretold your coming was a death sentence for both of us.

“Mother?” Zarya whispered as the briny sting of tears seared her eyes.

I don’t have much time, but no one else knows everything the prophecy said. The oracle chose it for my ears alone. Only I know it in its entirety, and now you will, too.

To the queen of the west, an heir shall rise.

Gifted of fire to tame the night skies.

For the people caged by the stars after the fall,

She will be the one to free them all.

Zarya. Know that I loved you. That I always will. That I had no choice.

Zarya had stopped breathing entirely, her head swimming with the lightness of confusion. She gasped, sucking in a lungful of hollow air as the light around the stone died.

“Mother,” she whispered, calling up another tendril of spirit. The same message repeated itself. There was nothing else to draw out, but it was already more than she could have ever imagined.

She listened to it over and over, and only after she’d tasted every syllable in the cadence of her mother’s voice did she finally take a magnifying glass to the words.

The first two lines were clearly about nightfire. That part she already knew, but the rest. The rest.

To the people caged by the stars.

That could only mean one thing.

She looked into the distance where she knew the rest of Rahajhan lay.

Punished for a thousand years for the actions of two fabled kings.

She had felt the power in Meera’s markings—the affinity between their magic.