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“Get away from that bird. It’s wrong… It was shot down by the Barren. There was a Death Cry… We all heard it,” one of the Barren Riders shouted.

I turned to the towering white bird perched behind me. Her feathers snow-touched and rippling in the breeze. Her beak held high. Her gaze piercing, watchful… knowing. She was just a fledgling when we first met a decade ago. When I followed Lex into the Choosing. I had always been so good at being quiet and staying hidden. Twenty-three birds were present that year, and the records showed only twenty-two Riders were chosen. But they’d missed one small, thirteen-year-old girl who wouldn’t let her brother face the monsters alone.

“She was reborn.” I didn’t know how. Only that over the years I had felt her die and return again and again. Each time, the feather on my shoulder grew a little more. Each time, I felt her passing and the surge of power when she came back. She wasn’t cursed like the rest of them.

The Ash stretched out her neck, reaching for me to confirm the Bond. The one I had refused for ten years, fearful that it would kill me, and because my cousins needed me. And I needed to be able to touch them… comfort them. I never wanted Skyworld magic pumping through my heart. I had seen how it destroyed Lex, but now it was the only way.

I took another six steps back until her warmth pressed against my back. Her chest feathers were silky whispers against my bare arms.

My gaze found Aster’s amongst the sea of guards. His eyes were wide and fearful, but not for himself. For me. For us. “I’m sorry,” I signed.

He lifted his fingers and pincered them together. The sign of the rebellion. And then he blinked, just once, as if he knew that I needed his consent to leave.

In reply, I lifted my hand, showing him the underside of my wrist, and ran my index finger in a circle over it. That was always our secret sign. It meant, “You are my pulse.” Then, I signed, “Always.”

I would die from the bond as the Kings told us all I would, or I would become a monster that would be their reckoning. I would leave everyone I ever loved so that our people could plough their fields and raise their children in peace. That was what it was to believe in something greater than yourself. That was the vow I’d made as I stood on the battlements with Aster as Lex fell. To do whatever was necessary.

Rebellion requires sacrifice. It was Aster who taught me that.

And now, everyone who played a part in our kingdom’s devastation would pay for what they did. I had given my soul over and over again to make that happen.

Turning, I blocked out all the shouting as I reached out a shaking hand towards my phoenix. Before my fingertips touched her beak, a bright blue rogue landed next to her. Then two more Fire Phoenixes landed to our right, and the stone underfoot shuddered with their power. With their wings outstretched, fire hissed from their nares. Their talons scratched over stone, and snow settled on the tips of their feathers and swept past into the freezing space around us, blocking my vision. The bright blue Air Phoenix pounded forward as arrows flew by my ear, but the last night of Yule was owned by the Skyworld, and they melted before they reached us.

Closing my eyes, I pushed out my palm until it reached for my phoenix’s beak, touching the cool, smooth surface, but nothing happened. Perhaps the Kings had been right. That a woman couldn’t bond, or it had been too long… but then… my limbs hummed. A soft hum at first, but then it built. And grew, and I tried to pull away, tried to stagger backwards, but my hand had fused to her beak.

My eyes locked on her one black eye. There was nothing but strength written there. She wanted this—had wanted it from the very beginning—and she was offended by my refusal. I didn’t even know how I knew all that, but I did…

And then I was burning from the inside. I opened my mouth to scream, but nothing came out. My palm seared with harrowing pain. Fire licked over my skin, and my vision blurred. Aster cried out. And that was what got me through… made me push back against the all-consuming fire.

You will not consume me.

You cannot break me.

I will not become the Sky.

I reached through the pain—as I had done after so many beatings when I had to get up and go to the library—and I found the orb of starlight inside her and pulled it to me and then pushed it… OUT!

As I did with the amulet, I chanted Life, Death, Rebirth… Stop them… NOW.

Instinctively, I claimed the Skyworld magic inside her for myself and then blew out the fire until there was only smoke and ash.

Stop them…

Burning hot tears of rage ebbed down my cheeks as I opened my hands and tried to picture dust-like ash flowing into the lungs of all those guards. But not Aster.

Through the narrow slit of my eyelids, Torran was still holding him back.

But it was over.

All I could hope was that I had done enough. For Thorn to be free. That Ember was alive… safe. That our kingdom still had a future.

I tried to tell him goodbye, or that I was sorry. I wanted to tell him I had loved him more than I had ever loved myself, but no words came. Because all that had changed.

The Guards collapsed one by one.

My vision fogged, and then the room was filled with coughing and wheezing. Boots pounded on the stone floor as my sight returned. The guards close to me had fallen where they stood, and the others had fled. The space was consumed with the finest grey dust.

My legs were too heavy to move and not strong enough to hold me upright.