The sky above the battlefield had turned black.
Not with night.
With power.
Storms spiraled outward from the massive rift where the Ancients hovered like silent judges. Lightning ripped across the clouds, illuminating the broken valley in flashes of violent white.
But none of it compared to the force rising from the crater below.
Kael stood at its center.
Still.
Silent.
Watching.
The ground around him was no longer stone. It had melted into something glass-like, warped by the pressure of his existence.
The air trembled with every breath he took.
High above, inside the glowing prison of celestial metal, Seraphine gripped the cage bars.
Her knuckles had gone white.
“Kael…” she whispered.
Even across dimensions, she could feel him.
The bond between them pulsed painfully in her
