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“You don’t understand what this place is,” he cut in. His voice was still controlled, but there was urgency beneath it now. “It isn’t just a prison. It’s a convergence point. They’re using it to stabilise the final alignment. They’re going to open the Fracture.”

Maia’s chest tightened. “We know. Orell told the city tonight. He said we have to choose to accept Umbralyn rule, or… to be consumed.”

Caelith laughed but without humour. “Orell, of course. A man who has spent his whole life mistaking control for virtue. He thinks compliance will spare him.” He paused. “It won’t. Whatever they’ve promised him, he dies the same as everyone else who isn’t Umbralyn, the moment this opens fully. He simply hasn’t been told that part yet.”

Julen cut in. “This is what you wanted though, isn’t it?”

“I—”

“We saw the stone,” Maia said. “All of it.”

Something changed in his face. It might have been relief, or the exhaustion of someone who has been holding a truth alone for too long. “You did?”

“You were right, Caelith,” Maia reassured him. “It called to me. I told Julen and Selinne everything.”

“So you understand,” he breathed.

“Everything,” she said, reaching out her hand. “And I do understand. Truly. What happened with your brother. Why you wanted revenge. I understand.”

“And you don’t recoil from what I am.” It wasn’t quite a question. It was testing a wound to see if it still hurt.

“I think you eventually saw beyond your anger. Your emotions. You saw what matters.”

“That’s the problem. The plan was solid. I knew what I wanted and how I was going to do it. Then—”

“I know,” Maia said. Her fingertips brushed his. He didn’t pull away. He didn’t look at her either, guilt still consuming him.

Julen shifted. “Are we too late? Can we still stop it? The people of Eryssan, our families, they’re still there. Many refused the Umbralyn’s offer.”

“That’s why we came,” Maia added. “If it’s true what they say, we need to stop it.”

She didn’t look away from Caelith. The words felt too small for what they meant. Too simple. But they were true.

“Maia, I—” he said, quieter now, but his voice tailed off.

Maia tried deliberately not to say what was on her mind. She had so many questions: where were you? Why did you lie to me? What does this mean for us? But none of those questions mattered, yet they were on the tip of her tongue anyway.

“Will you help us?” she said instead.

“You assume I can,” he said.

Maia shook her head. “I know you can.”

“That was before—”

“Before you changed your mind,” she said.

Caelith finally held her gaze. “They’re not wrong,” he said quietly. “The Fracture will open.”

Maia didn’t flinch.

“It will unmake the city,” he continued. “Everyone in it. Anyone too close to the surge. And even those it doesn’t reach… well, the night will come for them.”

Julen made a sound. “The night,” he said. “You mean the rest of the creatures within it.”

“I mean all of it.”

Maia said nothing. She was thinking about the children in the line; the baker standing third from the front with his hat in his hands.