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Her eyes found mine, and a chill spread through me. Catherine was not frightened. No, not even at the thought of three against one. She looked delighted. “You idiots. Have you come to see the show?”

I frowned. “What are you talking about? You’ve lost. Don’t you understand that? Viktor is dead.”

She tossed her head back and laughed. “I haven’t lost anything. Did you really think killing Viktor would be the end? That if you put down one old man, the world would simply right itself?”

“Shut up,” Kage growled. Lysander hung back, saying nothing.

I watched Catherine’s face as she looked at the Veil with an expression of reverence. “I didn’t come here to bring it down—we’ve already done that, don’t you see? I came to make an offering and watch what we put in motion come to fruition.” She looked over at me. “The Veil will fall today. We didn’t need dragons for that. You’re too late.”

Kage swore under his breath. “She’s lying.”

I wanted him to be right. “Why did Viktor want the dragon eggs?” I demanded. “Why bother with them, if you didn’t require them for this?”

“Viktor always wants more dragons, and he’d sought the eggs for a long time. Of course, he wanted Marcus to go after them once we knew where they’d been kept. But the dwarves lied to you all. They didn’t care about the Veil falling. Why would it matter to them when they’re safely tucked away belowground? No, they wanted the eggs. The eggs were always their fail-safe.”

Shit. I didn’t know what to believe anymore. I turned to Lysander. He’d gone still in the way he did when I knew he was seeing more than one thing at a time: the world in front of him—and the one from his dreams. His eyes weren’t on me or on Catherine. They were fixed on the Veil. On the dark wall rolling and churning before us.

“Lysander,” I said softly, “we need your council.” His gaze finally shifted to mine. My stomach dropped. “You’ve seen this already.”

Kage looked back and forth between us. “What?”

Lysander nodded. “Yes.”

“I don’t understand,” I said slowly. “You knew and you wanted us to come? Why, if you knew we couldn’t stop it?”

He closed his eyes. “We were always meant to come.” His beautiful face was miserable, like a man trying his best not to come apart.

I looked at the Veil, at Catherine, at the blood on the ground. Then the pieces came together. “As the Veil grows thin,” I said aloud, “she shall approach. The woman who has crossed over and stood against the darkness.”

Kage grabbed my hand. “Regan. No.”

I looked between them. At Kage with his fierce, protective eyes. At Lysander, pale and cursed with foresight. He’d known he was coming to this place even as his sister crumbled to dust. And he hadn’t tried to run away. The truth hurt so badly. It felt like a blade between my ribs. The prophecy had never been about the girl I wanted it to be. It wasn’t about Lunaya. Or Medra either.

It was about me. About us.

“Prophecies are deceptive things,” Lysander said, watching my face. “People treat them as if they’re maps, but they aren’t. They can be traps. Or warnings. Sometimes everything at once.” He looked past me at the Veil writhing above the trees. “There was no way to know who would fulfill it. It might have been about Lunaya once, but her path shifted.” His mouth tightened. “The words could have fit Medra, too—if she hadn’t accepted the dwarves’ quest and gone belowground.”

“I don’t understand,” I whispered. “Then, why me?”

His gaze met mine, weary and so full of sorrow. “Because you are the one standing here now, with the power.”

I let out an incredulous laugh. “Power? What power?”

“If we do nothing, the Veil will fall,” he said quietly, the words landing like arrows. Behind us, Catherine made a strangled sound. “If it falls, what Catherine expects to happen won’t happen the way she thinks. She and Marcus and Viktor wanted power. They thought the Veil’s fall would mean conquest and dominion. But if it collapses …” he breathed in “… it will mean death. Countless deaths. Or worse.”

“Worse? How?” Kage demanded.

“Both worlds may simply tear apart and vanish,” Lysander said quietly. “It could mean the end of everything.”

“No,” I murmured.

“That’s not going to happen,” Kage snapped forcefully.

Lysander gave us a broken sort of a smile. “I don’t want to believe it either.” He looked at me. “We still have a choice.”

“What choice?” I desperately wanted to believe that there was another way.

“We can leave,” Lysander said gently. “We can turn our backs on all of this and pretend none of it ever happened. We can go back to Bloodwing. Back to Persis.”