Se connecterElvanya's Pov Kieran did not cry.He went very still. He was standing in the doorway of the war room and Tomas turned and saw him and neither of them said anything for a moment and then Tomas crossed the room and picked up his son and held him and Kieran put his arms around his father's neck and that was all.Kael looked at me and I looked at him and we both stepped back and gave them the room.I waited in the corridor outside and after a while Tomas came out carrying Kieran and he said he was going to take him somewhere quiet and I said yes and I watched them go.I found Luna in the practice room and I told her what had happened.She listened to all of it and she did not ask questions. She set down what she was holding and she said "where is he" and I told her and she went.I followed at a distance. Tomas had taken Kieran to a small room near the garden that got afternoon light and when Luna arrived
Kael's PovThe rider came in on the third morning of the fault line work and the look on his face when he came through the gate was the kind of look that means you already know the news is bad before he opens his mouth.I was in the war room with Lira and Aldred and two of the earth mage elders and I stepped out to hear what the rider had to say."Eastern Isles," he said. He was breathing hard from the ride. "A breach. Opened this morning. One of our ships spotted it from the water and sent a fast boat back.""Location," I said."The main island," the rider said. "The northeastern coast. The fishing district."My stomach dropped. I knew what was in the fishing district of the main island because Tomas had described it to me when he first arrived. His village. His wife. The life he had before Kieran was born with a sun mark."How large," I said."The ship captain could not get close en
Luna's Pov They moved us inside after that. Eldric and both my parents and the elder from the Southern Wastes and Sera who had recovered faster than I had and was sitting beside me with both hands wrapped around a cup of warm water.Everyone was looking at me."Tell us exactly what you heard," Eldric said. "Word for word if you can.""It was not words exactly," I said. "It was more like knowing. The way you know something in a dream. You understand it without someone saying it.""But you understood it clearly," Eldric said."Yes," I said."Then tell us what you understood," he said.I had been organizing it in my head since I came back around and I told it the way I had organized it."It was not a threat," I said first because that was the part that had shaken me most. "I expected a threat. It was not. It was an offer."My parents were very still."It
Elvanya's Pov The earth mages from the Southern Wastes worked differently from anyone I had watched work before.They did not use tools the way a builder uses tools. They put their hands on the ground and they listened. Twelve of them in a wide circle around the courtyard that Eldric had identified as the nearest surface point to the fault line's center and they knelt and pressed both palms flat and they stayed still for a long time.Then the elder stood up and said to Eldric: "It is moving. Whatever is on the other side is not just present. It is actively working.""Can you reinforce against it," Eldric said."Yes," the elder said. "But we will need the children. The scale of this fault line is beyond what our techniques alone can address in the time you have described."Sera was already there. She crouched beside the elder and put her palms on the ground the way the elder had done and stayed very still.
Kael's PovEldric set the map on the table at the morning briefing and everyone in the room went quiet.It was a large map of the known world and he had marked eleven locations in red and drawn lines between them showing how they connected and the lines were not random. They followed paths through the places where the Old Guard had fought longest and where the Changelings had been embedded deepest and where the most people had suffered over the longest periods of time."Fault lines," Eldric said. "Locations where reality is weakest because of sustained suffering concentrated in one place over many years. The Changelings were not just harvesting suffering. They were choosing where to harvest it. Strategically. The locations they selected correspond almost exactly to the points where the boundary between the mortal world and the Void Court's space is thinnest.""How thin," I said."Thin enough for a breach to open without th
Kael's PovKing Aldred of Aldoria arrived on a Tuesday morning with thirty thousand soldiers and no ceremony.He rode to the main gate himself and I met him there and we shook hands and he looked at the city around us and he said "I have been reading your reports for three weeks. I brought everyone I could.""Thank you," I said."Do not thank me yet," he said. "I brought them because the alternative is the Void Court consuming Aldoria while I am sitting in my hall. This is self-interest as much as anything.""Self-interest that puts thirty thousand soldiers in my courtyard," I said. "I will take it."He laughed once and we went inside and I showed him what we had been building.The Eastern Isles ships came into harbor four days after Aldred. Twelve ships carrying soldiers and the six Sun Temple priests who served as advisors and protectors to Kieran. Tomas stood at the dock and watched the ships come
Kael's PovIt took two more weeks of investigation but finally my intelligence network identified the three main leaders of the conspiracy. Lira brought me the report personally."We found them" she said. She laid three files on my desk. "These are the ones orchestrating everything."I opened the f
Elvanya's PovI was having breakfast with Mira when one of the palace guards knocked on my chamber door. He looked nervous and kept glancing behind him like he expected something bad to happen."What is it" I asked."A letter arrived for you Your Majes
Kael's PovI was in a meeting with the city guard commanders when Lira burst through the door without knocking. Her face was pale and she looked genuinely afraid which was unusual for her."We have a serious problem" she said."What is it" I asked. I stood up immediately from my chair."Our spy in
Elvanya's PovI woke up the next morning to find guards posted everywhere. There were four outside my chamber doors. Two more at the end of the hallway. Guards at every window and every entrance to this wing of the palace."What is happening" I asked Kael. He looked like he had not slept at all."F







