Aria stumbled as the golden portal swallowed her, the world around her folding and twisting like molten glass. For a heartbeat, there was nothing, no sound, no light, only a sensation of falling through every layer of reality at once. Her embers flared instinctively, coiling around her like serpents of light, holding her together against the dizzying distortion.
When the world finally settled, she found herself standing on fractured ground, shards of crystal jutting upward like jagged teeth from a broken ocean. The sky above was a swirling mass of twilight, violet clouds laced with gold and crimson, as if the sun and moon had collided and shattered across the horizon. Mist crawled along the ground in thick tendrils, carrying whispers that seemed almost alive.
Kael was beside her, steadyi
