Page 174 of The Reckoning of Starlight

He dragged his eyes open to a ceiling swimming out of focus, sandstone and carved arches resolving slowly until memory found purchase.

Asharyn.

The city they’d abandoned once Centarya learned its location, where a portal could split the air and spill an army into the streets.

Linen brushed his thighs, a loose sleep tunic cooling against his chest, while his shoulders still burned where flight leathers had bitten deepest. The grit that had darkened every crease of his palms was gone. Someone had stripped the battle from him while he slept and dressed him in clothes carrying the faint scent of cedar soap and sun-dried cloth.

Jassyn’s fingers sank into the sheets as the missing hours crowded in. Cloying perfume caught at the back of his throat, memory arriving first as nausea—the old terror of waking to choices made for his body while he was gone.

A clay mug steamed on the nightstand beside dried figs and flatbread. Mistpetals lay scattered near it, their white leaves jeweled with dew. At the table’s edge, a small painted pot held a cluster of squat desert cacti, their spineless crowns swollen with stored sap.

Jassyn pushed himself upright, arms shaking under his weight, his Well scraped almost dry. The room lurched sideways. He caught himself with one palm braced against the mattress as the sandstone walls spun, then slowly steadied.

Framed against the night sky, Lykor stood at the open balcony door, so still he could’ve been carved from the same stones as the city. Jassyn’s grip loosened on the sheets. Lykor had been there when the world went dark, and the memory of arms catching him in open sky quieted the old terror enough for him to recognize the evidence of care.

Arms crossed, Lykor stared across the desert, gilded by twin crescent moons hanging low. Only the tension across his shoulders betrayed that he’d heard Jassyn move.

Jassyn’s voice rasped, barely forming the words. “How long?”

A muscle twitched in Lykor’s cheek, his attention riveted beyond the balcony. “Twelve hours.”

Twelve hours was long enough for the battle to have ended without him, long enough for the dead to have become a number someone else already knew.

“What happened? Who’s alive? Is the Aetherveil—”

“Still floating. Mostly.” Lykor’s shoulder pressed into the doorframe, the small surrender exposing the fatigue his stillness had hidden. “A handful of islands fell. Kaedryn pulled the wounded to the upper chain. Vesryn has the rangers flying the perimeter.”

The report met the ragged edge of Jassyn’s memory. Veyrix flying away at Rimeclaw’s flank. Blossom’s power reaching into the sky. The razorwing swarm. Open air dropping beneath him. The hard line of Lykor’s jaw under Jassyn’s palm.

Then nothing.

“The army at the river?” Jassyn asked. “Blossom?”

“Gone. Fenn said the elves opened portals, and every last human vanished through them.”

Lykor hesitated for the first time since Jassyn started questioning him before adding, “They took Blossom.”

An ache settled in Jassyn’s ribs, deeper than exhaustion could explain.

“They withdrew?” He swung his legs over the side of the mattress.

“Galaeryn got what he came for.” Lykor was already crossing the room, pressing the mug into Jassyn’s hands before he could refuse it. His palms stayed on the cup until Jassyn’s trembling fingers closed around it, their hands overlapping for a moment until Lykor let go.

“He had the numbers to end us,” Jassyn said. “Why leave any of us alive?”

Lykor stood close enough that his shadow reached across the bed. “Because we didn’t cost him anything. We threw everything at him and didn’t leave a mark that mattered. He has every dragon he needs for the Aelfyn, whatever remains of Centarya’s magus, the northern shamans, and a human army large enough to drown the continent.” His expression hardened. “Whatever he’s planning, finishing us off wasn’t worth the detour.”

The battle rearranged itself around that truth, every decision sharpening against the cruelty of hindsight. The tea scalded Jassyn’s tongue as he sipped it, but he swallowed through the burn. “He sent the army into the Aetherveil instead of searching for Veyrix himself. But sunfire lit the sky and showed him exactly where the dragon was.”

“And then he came to claim him personally,” Lykor finished.

Steam curled over Jassyn’s hands and vanished. “How many did we lose?”

Lykor’s mouth tightened. “I don’t know.”

Beyond Lykor, the familiar walls rose, arched windows Jassyn had stood under weeks ago when this city had still pretended to be a sanctuary. “Centarya?”

“No sign of them. I swept the palace and flew over the city.” His claw flexed against his thigh. “But I had to leave you here alone for ten minutes.”