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Our meeting had been brief, a charade of inter-realm diplomacy that had left a bitter taste in my mouth. He lounged in an ostentatious chair, that small sharp smile never leaving his lips. A smile that promised nothing good. The way he had looked at me… For the first time in an age, I’d felt like prey.

And now he was circling Cassia.

Jealousy, a mortal poison that angels were not meant to taste, coiled tight in my chest. I tried to rationalize it, to name it a concern—a guardian’s instinct. Not this raw, possessive fear of being replaced, of her choosing that darkness over any sliver of my light. But the truth was a bitter, undeniable pill.

I’d have to face her again. Whether to stop her or to see her one more time, I didn’t know.

I turned, ready to melt back into the shadows, when a sharp and authoritative presence stood behind my back. It cut through the rain-soaked air like a thrown spear, cold and absolute.

I spun, my boots skidding on the slick stones. There, just beyond her garden wall, stood a figure. No armor but the sigil faintly burning between his eyebrows was unmistakable—the cold, unwavering seal of Malakar.

My throat tightened. A messenger.

He didn’t bow. Didn’t offer a greeting. His halo was a thin, fractured band of pale gold that flickered as if the mortal plane itself rejected its light. Rain streamed down his impassive face. He didn’t blink.

“Remiel,” he said, his voice like iron with the weight of celestial decree behind it. “You have been summoned.”

I went rigid. Summoned. Not asked. Not invited. Summoned. The word itself was a chain.

“By the tribunal?” The question was out before I could stop it, though the answer was already a heavy dread settling in my chest.

The messenger’s gaze was flat, unwavering. “By Malakar himself.”

The rain seemed to fall harder, as if the storm itself recoiled from that name, and a knot tightened in my stomach. Malakar. One of the two heavenly seats on the tribunal. His word was law, his judgment swift and absolute. This wasn’t some bureaucratic formality, some tedious celestial paperwork. This was personal. He didn’t summon unless he intended to deliver a verdict, and his verdicts were rarely merciful.

My jaw clenched, and my fists tightened at my sides, a useless, impotent gesture. Of course. Now. Just as Cassia walked deeper into the shadows, seeming so determined to embrace them.

“When?” I forced the word out, my voice strained.

The messenger’s mouth thinned into a grim, almost unreadable line. “Immediately.”

My gaze drifted, one last time, to the crumbling manor, to the window where her light, however faint, still burned against the encroaching darkness. A sharp ache lanced through my chest. The Undermarket, Valden, Cassia… All of it would have to wait.

But if I did not make it back from this…there would be no one. No one to catch her if she fell further. No one to even try to save her from the darkness she courted.

The messenger turned, his movements precise and unhurried. Knowing I would follow. I lowered my head, let the cold seep into my bones, and walked into the storm.

Heaven awaited. And with it, Malakar’s judgment.

The way to Heaven was not what mortals dreamed. There was no light, no chorus of ethereal voices welcoming the righteous. Only cold. A sterile, oppressive, and absolute cold that leached into bones and silenced souls.

I passed through the shimmering veil.

White halls stretched before me, endless and gleaming. The purity of it grated against my skin like sandpaper. My light, usually a hum in my veins, felt heavy here—dense and churning. I felt less like a brother returning home and more like a virus passing through a healthy body.

The halls were empty, save for the hollow echo of my own reluctant footsteps. Here, in this realm of perfect, unyielding order, even breathing felt like a transgression.

The messenger led me to a tall chamber. The door, imposing, loomed before us. He pushed it open without ceremony, and the oppressive, absolute silence of the place swallowed the sound.

Malakar was within.

He didn’t rise. Instead, he sat upon a throne of polished white marble, which was intricately carved with glowing sigils of ancient power and immutable law. His vast winter storm-colored wings were folded behind him. His pale, almost silver eyes were devoid of any warmth, any mercy, and any hint of humanity. When he spoke, the very walls seemed to draw inward under the sheer crushing weight of his voice.

“Remiel.” The name was a judgment in itself.

I knelt. Instinct. Duty.

The weight of his gaze was a physical force, suffocating. “You linger too long among the broken,” he said, his voice a slow, relentless grind of stone on stone. “You forget what loyalty demands.”