Ethan's fingers were gone.
Their form was that of absence, strands of emptiness twisted with fading starlight. Liora struggled in his hold, her body tearing into roots that tore at the ground in a last-ditch effort to break free.
Her voice broke like glass as she yelled, "What are you doing?"
Ethan remained silent.
He didn't know.
Once more, the hunger that had taken the place of the Keeper, moved inside of him.
Her body broke apart, not into flesh and bone, but into a raw, emerald light that encircled into Ethan's hollowed chest, transforming Liora's scream into something wet and growling.
The Obsidian Wastes trembled. A crack appeared in the glass plains. And somewhere, deep in the center of the world, the Thirteenth Star blinked.
Ethan fell to his knees. Fragments of unknown memory flooded his vision.
Drinking from the skull of a god, a woman with bark for a skin.
A chain of shadows tightened around a throat.
"You were never the heir," a whispering voice said. "You were the sacrifice."
Then there was silence.
When he looked up, Liora was gone. All that was left was one twisted thorn, rising like a grave marker from the cracked earth.
Ethan grabbed it.
His hand passed right through.
….
The dagger fell to the floor with a clanking sound.
Mara's knees pressed into the cold stone as the shadow of her Grandmother wrapped around her, whispering promises that tasted like poison.
"She doesn't want the children," the shadow murmured. "She never did. She wants the blood that caged her. Your blood."
Liss laughed.
Her eyes were dancing with green fire.
"Say it," the child's inner voice pleaded. "Say the words."
Mara's throat was burning. She knew the price.
Every Ravenscroft did.
"I offer myself," she whispered.
The healers gasped.
It was too late when someone reached for her.
Grandmother's shadow sprang forward.
The cold ran through Mara's veins. She could only see one point as her vision darkened at the edges.
Liss's smiling face.
Then—
Agony.
Her skin was covered in vines that twisted around her bones and muscles. She heard a scream.
Perhaps it was hers.
The healers running away with the children was the last thing she saw before the darkness engulfed her.
"Well," she thought, "at least they are safe."
The vines then made their way to her heart.
…..
The martyrs stared at Jarek with hollow eyes.
Their faces, his face.
Over and over.
Fathers, uncles, cousins.
All Ravenscrofts. Everybody is bound.
The First Duskheir ran a rotting finger down his cheek.
"Your family did not simply put me in jail," she muttered. "They fed me. To keep me asleep, a new sacrifice is made every generation.
Jarek's knife trembled in his hand.
"Why?"
The Duskheir laughed.
It sounded like wind through dead leaves.
"Because your ancestors were clever. They knew true gods can't be killed, only starved."
Behind her, the hanging tree groaned. The martyrs moved forward, reaching with their thorny hands.
Jarek stumbled back and his boot hit something soft.
A body.
Fresh. Bleeding.
Mara.
Her lips were silently parted, and her skin had green veins. The vines, alive and hungry, throbbed beneath her flesh.
The Duskheir let out a sigh.
"Oh. She's early."
…..
The thorn dissolved into smoke when Ethan touched it.
The void inside him rippled in response like a hound catching a scent. His instincts drew him to the hanging tree to the east.
Toward her.
He tried to run.
His legs gave way.
The earth shook. He no longer owned his body. The emptiness grew, devouring his body.
No.
Ethan scratched at the molten dagger that was still stuck in his chest. If he could just pull it out
His eyes exploded with pain.
The world split.
For a heartbeat, he saw through the veil.
A woman of bark and leaves, smiling as Mara's blood soaked the roots beneath her.
A chain of shadows tightened around his own throat.
A voice…his voice whispering.
"Kill her."
Then the vision shattered.
Ethan collapsed.
His scream was swallowed by the emptiness.
…..
Mara opened her eyes.
At the base of the hanging tree, where she was kneeling, there were corpses.
Ravenscrofts. All of them.
With her hollow eyes glowing with fireflies, the First Duskheir towered over her.
"Welcome home, daughter."
Mara looked down.
Vines crawled beneath her skin, knitting her flesh back together. Her blood combined in the roots beneath her, now black and shinning.
She tried to scream.
But the vines squeezed her body.
…..
Jarek grabbed Mara's wrist.
Her skin was cold. Too cold. It was surrounded by pulsing vines that, like snakes smelling their prey, crawled up his arm.
With amusement, the Duskheir observed.
"You can't save her," she stated. "But you can join her."
Jarek bared his teeth.
"Go to hell."
He forced Mara to stand up and drove his knife into the trunk of the hanging tree.
A bubble of black sap appeared.
The tree let out a cry.
The martyrs marches forward.
Jarek didn't wait.
He ran.
…..
Ethan felt the emptiness come to his throat.
He couldn't breathe.
Couldn't think.
But he could see.
East. Always east.
The roots of the hanging tree drank deeply of Mara's blood as its branches twisted against the sky.
And there, in the dark between its thorns.
A single, glowing eye.
The Thirteenth Star.
Watching.
Waiting.
Smiling.