She was right, but with so many armies in close proximity, Dorian needed to use his gift to make sure he didn’t trigger a cataclysm. He’d done everything he knew to do militarily to discourage the Cenarians from attacking, but with Neph’s men and Moburu’s nearby, there were too many factors at play for him to not try to see the futures down the roads before him.

He’d studied his gift with a Healer’s eyes, and he thought he understood why prophecy seemed easier to begin and harder to stop now. The vir had broken open new channels everywhere throughout his Talent, and it had penetrated his prophetic gift, too. All his magic, and now all his prophecies, passed through the tentacles of vir rather than their natural channels. Because the vir was thicker, everything passed more freely. It was quite possible that the vir, tainted itself, was tainting Dorian’s gift with bizarre visions like those he’d had of the Strangers and his wife pregnant with twins, but there was no help for it now. He would stop using the vir and only use the Talent—after this.

“I love you,” he said.

“I love you too,” she answered. She had a quill and parchment to write down anything he said, in case he couldn’t remember it afterward.

Then he dove in. He tried to hold onto enough of himself to speak what he saw, but the current was too strong. He saw a Titan rise from Black Barrow, and then he pulled downstream fifteen years to Torras Bend. There was Feir, standing at a smithy, ordering his young apprentice to gather wood. Then Dorian was a hundred years downstream, in Trayethell, somehow magically rebuilt, celebrating something, a vast parade working through the street. Dorian fought it, tried to throw himself back to a time where his visions would help him. He found himself standing in the guts of Khaliras, deciding whether to take Jenine out through the sewage chutes or try to fight their way out, everything would turn from this one choice—no, that was the past, dammit.

“Rodnia? Nidora?” He heard the voice calling for him, but it was too distant, and he hadn’t found anything yet. There was a whisper as it called again, and then it was lost.

Jenine drew the curtain that separated Dorian’s throne, where he was quietly mumbling, from the rest of his tent. “Dorian!” she whispered one more time, but the king didn’t stir. She shut the curtain and said, “Come in, General Naga.” The man had been knocking for more than a minute.

“Your Highness,” he said, coming in and looking conspicuously at the drawn curtain. “My apologies, but we’ve just had a report from a spy. His Holiness must hear it.”

“His Holiness is not to be disturbed right now.”

“I’m afraid this requires immediate action.”