Ella's POV
The air burned with frost and shadow.
I could still hear the echo of Remo’s voice through the bond—ragged, raw, and half-wild—but it was fading fast. My body trembled as I stood in the hollowed ruin of what once was the battlefield, now just a wasteland of smoke and ash. The witches’ magic clung to the ground like oil, dark and slick, whispering things I couldn’t understand.
My pulse thrummed in my throat. I was alone. Or at least, that’s what they wanted me to believe.
“Come back, Guardian…” a voice crooned through the fog—soft, feminine, familiar. It was the same one that haunted my dreams for weeks, since the Hollow King first reached into my mind. But this time, it wasn’t a memory. She was here.
“Eiravelle?” I whispered before I could stop myself.
The mist stirred—and
