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The air grew thick, pressing against her skin like the stale breath of a closed room. A second voice sliced through the density.

A shadow moved at the chamber's far end. Then a shape that swallowed the surrounding light.

Nellith.

Idonea's breath caught painfully in her throat. No. Not here. Not now.

Beside her, prowling low, came the daemon.

Vinea was bigger than Idonea had imagined. The corridor behind them seemed barely wide enough to admit his bulk. Lion and man at once. Mane that flicked in patterns no fur should make. In one clawed hand he carried a viper, alive, coiling around his wrist. His eyes were the colour of old fire. They fixed on the relic in her hands and didn't look away.

Nellith smiled. "At last."

Her grip tightened around the relic until her knuckles whitened.

Vinea's mouth opened. The teeth inside were crystalline, set unevenly, and the sight of them turned her stomach. "The child holds the heart."

Balmo hissed at Idonea's shoulder. "Told you. They want it. Want you."

Idonea pressed the relic against her chest. "Nellith." Her voice came out hoarse. "I told you I wouldn't give you this. Why are you here?"

"I have never let you go, Idonea." Her mother's voice was soft. The voice from her childhood. The voice that had hummed lullabies. "Not since I saw what you were."

"An experiment." The word tasted like ash.

Nellith's eyes widened. "You are the crucible." She stepped forward, and the surrounding shadows stepped with her. "The one thing strong enough to change the world. I bred you for this. I have loved you for it. You cannot imagine how long I waited."

Loved. The word her mother had so rarely used, never like this.

Vinea didn't wait. He paced forward, every step shaking dust loose from the chamber's ancient stones. "Give it to me, little witch. Or I will take it from your corpse."

Idonea took a step back. The Current in her arms responded, coiling around her bones like a wire pulled taut.

"You can't open the Nexis," she whispered.

Nellith sighed. "Vinea wishes to see the worlds joined. He is a creature of appetite and longing. I…" her face shifted, briefly. "I want you to survive what comes next. If the world burns for it, so be it."

Vinea lowered his head. His eyes' amber brightened until it hurt to look directly. "You were made to open the Nexis. My kin hunger for your light."

"Stay away from her." Lysander's voice came from the chamber's mouth.

He stumbled into view, battered, his sword gone. Blood streaked his temple, and his hand pressed against his ribs as though trying to hold himself together. Lance circled overhead, careful of the daemon's reach, his wings cutting sharp arcs through the gloom.

Vinea snorted. "The Severant survives. How touching."

Idonea's hand twitched. The urge to run sat in her throat; she didn't act on it. Vinea would run her down, and Nellith wouldn't stop him.

Nellith's eyes flicked to Lysander. The smile on her mouth was that of a person who'd finished a long task.

"You have done your part," she said. "You brought her to the brink."

"I brought her here to stop you." Lysander's voice cracked with strain.

"Did you?" Nellith's smile widened. "You brought her exactly where she needed to be. You protected her. You made her strong. Your use is at its end."

She nodded to Vinea.

"No—"